Every single time America is rocked by a mass shooting, the insults come raining down: Conservatives and Republican politicians who oppose new gun-control laws aren’t just wrong, they’re cowards.

The insult is echoed in Congress, on television, and countless times on social media. It’s as if each of these people actually believes that members of Congress and conservative activists know what’s right, but are afraid to act.

Angry voices take an extraordinarily complex social, cultural, and political phenomenon, boil it down to preferred progressive policy provisions, and then declare everyone who opposes their ideas a craven weakling in thrall to the NRA. Yesterday was no exception.

Calls of cowardice came from cable hosts: