1. I think when they talk about purchases over the internet they really mean nothing more than person-to-person transactions (think Craigslist) which is really nothing different than individual transactions at a gun show. Use to be you could find guns and other items in the Sunday paper classifieds but selling on Craigslist gets your product much better visibility today. Guns purchased through businesses, including those at a gun show, require background checks.
2. I was under the impression that most public polls, including Fox News polls, have the majority of Americans supporting greater or improved background checks. I heard Bill O'R say that yesterday. However, our Constitution, our government was ingeniously framed to protect our individual rights from being trampled by the majority. Every state has equal representation, regardless of population, in the U.S. Senate. So Montana, Wyoming and South Dakota are capable counter weights to LA, New York City and Chicago. Essentially, urban areas can't just roll over rural simply because they are more populous. Yesterday showed the sagacity of our founders.
U.S. Representatives on the other hand don't represent a state as much as an indigenous population and area within a state. Overall it can be expected that U.S. Representative's will typically vote more in line with popular opinion than the Senate because they are more reflective of the general population. Given the current make up of the U.S. House as dominated by conservatives, then either the polls are heavily swayed by overwhelming urban support for gun control and therefore distort reality, or there's a shift in sentiment occurring in conservative urban and suburban areas. It would be very interesting to see a breakdown on all of those polls.
