It’s gunmakers and the NRA. Full stop.

Bloomberg Opinion Today

Today's Agenda

Republicans must pass common-sense gun-control regulations.
Trump and his party fostered the hatred that drove the El Paso shooter.
China's yuan devaluation and soybean strike show it's fighting smart.
The stock market's pain may only have just begun.

It's Always About the Guns

On December 14, 2012, 20 young children and six adults were shot to death in Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. The massacre was so horrific that many hoped politicians would finally do something about America's gun problem.

They didn't. Since then, there have been 52 mass shootings in America, in which 426 people have died. Two took place in the span of just 24 hours this weekend. Meanwhile, some 36,000 Americans die of gunshots, including suicides, every year. Predictably, as they do after every mass shooting, gun advocates say the problem is not gun ownership. It's mental health, or video games, or something, anything but the fact that there are an estimated 390 million guns in America – enough to arm every man, woman and child and still have 70 million guns left over.

Contrary to the fear-mongering of the gun lobby, gun-control advocates don't want to confiscate these guns. All they want is common-sense controls on who can own them, notes Bloomberg LP founder Michael Bloomberg. In fact, there's a bill awaiting Senate approval right now that includes background checks and closes a common loophole exploited by mass killers. These fixes enjoy wide popular support. But Senate Republicans and President Donald Trump, who has vowed to veto that bill, stand in the way. How long will they get away with this inaction? How many more will die in the meantime?

Trump's Rhetoric Is a Problem Too

One of the weekend's shootings, in a Walmart in El Paso, was motivated by hatred of immigrants, according to the shooter's manifesto, which borrowed anti-immigrant language Trump has used for years. This morning, with all the vigor of a hostage forced to recite a ransom note, Trump read a statement condemning white supremacy (and confusing Dayton, Ohio, for Toledo). But his long record of cheerleading bigotry and violence opened the door to El Paso and other white-supremacist terrorist acts, Tim O'Brien writes. A look at this history shows he is not the person to close it.

Some Republicans have condemned white nationalism in the past 48 hours and should be commended for it. But the party has indulged Trump's brand of bigotry for far too long, writes Jonathan Bernstein. It still has a lot of work to do to prove it's serious about opposing it.

Trade Wars: China Strikes Back

Oh, meanwhile, markets around the world are melting down, including a 3% drop in U.S. stock indexes today, as Trump and China settle in for a long, ugly trade war. China, possibly waiting for Monday morning to maximize the market impact, struck back at Trump's tariff threat of last week by letting the yuan weaken and stopping imports of American agricultural products.

China's currency devaluation is probably just a warning rather than the start of a new tactic, but it shows Beijing is getting smart about how it fights this war, writes Shuli Ren. It reminds Trump that China can outlast him in a currency war, given its ability to easily coordinate fiscal and monetary policy.

Trump only wishes he had that kind of power, as he constantly hounds the Fed to do his bidding. He's obviously itching for a currency war, but he should be careful what he wishes for, writes Brian Chappatta: A strong dollar fuels America's endless orgy of borrowing.

China shutting down agricultural imports is another smart move by China, writes David Fickling. It's a low-cost bargaining chip Xi Jinping can use to avoid more-painful concessions in any deal. It also hits Trump in his heartland base, just in time for the 2020 election.

Democrats are struggling with how to run against an economy that is so far doing fine, writes Ramesh Ponnuru. But Trump seems bound and determined to solve that problem for them.

Further Currency War Reading:

Trump's trade-war escalation hammered oil prices far more than tensions in the Persian Gulf helped them. – Julian Lee
Europe and Japan, out of ammunition, would be collateral damage in a currency war. – Marcus Ashworth

Telltale Charts

Stocks are set up for much more pain, with historically high prices, artificially inflated earnings and blaring recession signals, warns John Authers.