Every time one of these losers goes on a shooting spree, there's a fairly well-worn decision tree which can track the spin. We know the anti-gun spin.
The pro-gun spin:
(*) Had no permit/permission slip/obtained the gun illegally: Bad guys don't get permits / follow the rules, so why are you hammering on law abiding citizens who do follow the rules - what purpose is served in regulations and laws if only good people follow them?
(*) Had permit/permission slip/bought the gun legally, and, until the perpetrator actually committed the crime in question, possessed and carried legally: Even with all of your vaunted gun control and red tape and jumping through hoops, a bad guy still got a gun, which shows that gun control is an ineffective, bureaucratic waste. With all of those stupid hurdles to clear, the scheme was still ineffective in stopping bad people from getting weapons to do harm.
So no worries.
Another shooting will happen and the pro and anti-gun crowd will trot out their very tired horses for the media.
The number one thing anyone can do is be active and organized, and/or contribute money to whatever gun organization best represents you effectively. What wins the whole gun control fight is who cares more, and who lobbies hardest. Right now, that's us. And to boil it down further, abject fear of the NRA. And yeah, I know, almost everyone I run into has big problems with the NRA now. But when you have the most powerful tank on the battlefield and it's going the wrong direction, you don't abandon the tank. You jump in and steer.
Here is what I do.
When I encounter some anti-gun tirade which could have influence - it could be an op-ed in a major newspaper, or it could be a documentary like Bowling for Columbine - I donate money to a pro-gun group.
If someone tangles with me on an Internet forum on the subject of guns, by which I mean they take the anti side, I mentally pledge $1 to donate for every message they write. That is, at least, if they're annoying me.
This gets expensive, if you're me, but it also has this effect: $10 to an effective pro-gun organization > 5,000 internet posts. I firmly believe this. I wonder what all those anti-gunners over the last 15 years would think if they knew how much money they were responsible for putting into the NRA's coffers.
Almost no one who actually clicks to read a story on gun control, or reads a comment section attached to an article about a shooting, does so without an agenda. And no one who posts or comments in those sections is there to learn anything - they're there to out-type, insult, ridicule, and (in their mind) win the war with the other side. This is true of pro and anti-gun people.
The bare fact is this: pro-gun people are more apt to be one issue voters, or prioritize the gun issue near the top of their list, or more apt to donate money to their cause, than the anti-gun side is. Brady's dwindling membership is indicative of this. Anti-gun people like to blather on but they rarely put their money where their mouth is like we do.
Anti-gun politicians tend to get elected - not always but most of the time - because they have a broader social agenda which appeals to voters, of which being anti-gun is maybe a positive checkmark down the list in priorities. The exception would be a very small minority who are obsessed with outlawing guns entirely, or fixated on restricting some expression of the RKBA, be it open or concealed carry. But those are not the meat and potatoes anti-gun constituency - they are outliers; the exception.
Therefore, my point - if you are worried how incidents like this affect your rights - and you should be - donate. Join. Get active. Don't worry about the spin. There is nothing new under the sun in terms of the debate. They know our arguments and we know theirs.
It would be far better, I trust most or all of you will agree, if we had a nation of laws - a very small number of laws, all of which restricted government power and protected individual rights and nothing more.
However we live in a degraded mobocracy with corrupt politicians and screwed up checks and balances. That's terrible and a problem in and of itself, but so long as it exists, the best thing to do is to play the game as best as you can, even if you don't agree to the rules (while working to change the rules as a separate effort, if possible).
Lobbyists. Money. Striking fear into corrupt, pandering politicians by whipping pro-gun voters into a lather. This is what works, and is the most effective use of everyone's time, in my opinion.
At least, until we really do live in a society where the Constitution actually means something and basic rights aren't merely a kind of degraded privilege which can be legislated away or declared invalid by a judiciary which has forgotten its place.
There will be more shootings.
Public "outcry" (they love that term "outcry.") will be the same. It will, in fact, not be "the public" but the same anti-gun voices who opportunistically use murder for polemical advantage in their lettes to the editor. It will be the same form letter they always send.
Pro-gun people will send in their form letters.
Smart people will donate and/or work to steel the resolve of the politicians who "represent" them.
