Gun Control, Immigration At The Bottom Of America's List Of Priorities

According to Gallup, Americans rank gun issues and immigration at the bottom of their list of priorities:

PRINCETON, NJ — Americans put reforming immigration and reducing gun violence — the focus of much of the attention on Capitol Hill in recent weeks — at the bottom of a list of 12 priorities for Congress and the president to address. Americans instead say leaders in Washington should give highest priority to jobs and the economy, followed by making government work more efficiently and improving the quality of education.

So why are our elected officials in Washington DC spending so much time on guns and immigration? I suspect its a mix of political opportunism – Democrats drafting off of the Newtown shooting to move the ball up the field on a long-simmering priority of theirs – and a desire to distract from the issues at the top of the list, which they really don’t have any good answers for.