Practically, “gun control” always means “let’s ban as many guns as we can get away with at the moment”. This fact is lost on no one who has watched carefully. There is always a “ratchet” strategy behind it, which is why the NRA is right to oppose nearly everything the Left proposes.
Here is another conspiracy theory: what if the FBI ignored Cruz ON PURPOSE? Impossible, you say? So is falsifying documents, lying to Congress, and participating directly in the electoral process, but those all clearly happened.
Some great quotes on guns by dead white men, who in their time were vastly smarter politically than any other group of any other race on the planet: https://www.buckeyefirearms.org/gun-quotations-founding-fathers
I feel that the debate on a deep level really revolves around what it means to be human. Is it our purpose on this planet to be ordered around? Maturity comes with freedom, and guns are inherently a symbol and enforcer of freedom. People who are willing to take responsibility for their own well being, and who in fact DEMAND this right, support widespread gun ownership. Only people who do NOT want to take responsibility for their own safety, who WANT to place that responsibility in the hands of others, want guns taken away.
For my money, guns in important respects are a symbol of social maturity, not the symbol of regressiveness the political Left and its propaganda apparatus wants to paint them as.