[There was a video here]

At the Democratic debate on Sunday, Bernie Sanders gave a very bad answer to a question about his gun-control record. After reminding everyone that he has a D-minus voting record grade from the NRA, Sanders said, “This should not be a political issue. What we should be doing is working together.”

Sanders supports closing the gun-show loopholes and is one of a handful of national politicians to link last year’s Charleston church shooting with racism and domestic terrorism. A more generous interpretation of what he said is that, basically, the way forward is so obvious that it should not even be a debate.

A less generous—but equally possible!—interpretation would be that Sanders really is so sympathetic to those who would resist stricter gun laws that he would obfuscate the issue with explicitly political platitudes.

Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.