Polls show American interest in gun control waning

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     President Barack Obama spoke Thursday about the church shooting in Charleston, S.C., the night before. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

    President Barack Obama spoke Thursday about the church shooting in Charleston, S.C., the night before. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

    The shooting in Charleston this week raised again the issue of gun control. Long-term trends paradoxically show a decreasing interest on the part of the American public on controlling guns.

    This was mirrored in President Obama’s statement on Thursday:

    “We do know that once again, innocent people were killed in part because someone who wanted to inflict harm had no trouble getting their hands on a gun . . .At some point, we as a country will have to reckon with the fact that this kind of mass violence does not happen in other advanced countries. It doesn’t happen in other places with this kind of frequency. It is in our power to do something about it.”

    Then, what is good and what is bad about the U.S. economy? Americans’ opinions come down again and again to jobs — the need for better jobs, and the improvement that has been made on the jobs front.

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    Finally, this week marked the exciting end of two major sports seasons: the NBA finals and the Stanley Cup. We might think that an increasing number of Americans are sports fans, but that isn’t the case.

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