In a sense, liberals are extremely religious.  They adhere to a set of dogmas that must be unquestioningly believed under peril of excommunication.  Obamacare is good, voter ID is evil, abortion is good, possession of guns is evil, diversity is good, restricting immigration is evil, and so on.  If you dare to challenge any of those sacred commandments, you will be promptly defriended.

And yet a doctrine is valid only if the logical principle behind it is valid.  Liberals seem to be unaware of the curious inconsistency between their positions on gun control and immigration.

One might call it the wolves-among-sheep problem.  What percentage of a flock of sheep are really wolves in disguise?  That is, what percentage of gun owners, or Muslim immigrants, are potential terrorists?  Let’s compare these threats.

The number of U.S. gun owners is very difficult to determine, but Pew Research estimates that 37% live in households with guns and 24% actually own a gun.  Similarly, the number of gun-related deaths ranges from 11,208 per year for homicides to 33,169 for all deaths including suicides.  Assuming a U.S. population of 300,000,000 and an active gun-ownership lifespan of 50 years, we can estimate that the percentage of gun owners who might kill someone (including suicides and accidents) is less than 2 percent.  The actual wolf-to-sheep ratio of potential terrorists is presumably orders of magnitude lower.

The percentage of Muslims who might perpetrate or abet a terrorist attack can be estimated from their professed sympathies.  According to various polls:

• 38.6% of Muslims believe that the 9/11 attacks were justified (Gallup)
• 61% of Egyptians, 38% of Moroccans, 83% of Palestinians, and 62% of Jordanians approve of some or most groups that attack Americans (World Public Opinion)
• 26% of young Muslims in America, 35% in Britain, 42% in France, and 22% in Germany believe that suicide bombings are justified (Pew Research)
• 25% of British Muslims disagree that a Muslim has an obligation to report terrorists to police (ICM Poll)
• 25% of Muslim-Americans say that violence against Americans in the United States is justified as part of the "global Jihad" (CSP Poll)

We are therefore justified in assuming that the percentage of Muslims who would be capable of perpetrating a terrorist attack or protecting someone who did so – the wolf-to-sheep ratio – is considerably greater than 10%.

Therefore, statistically, a legitimate gun owner is much less of a threat than a Muslim.  And yet the liberal hue and cry is for elimination, or at least severe restriction, of gun ownership while uncritically accepting hundreds of thousands of Muslim immigrants.  One is tempted to ponder the cause of this illogical disparity.

One answer is that rank-and-file liberals are themselves very much like a flock of sheep – easily herded and directed by the barking dogs of the Democratic leadership and the media.  But why do the dogs bark?  Could it be that this is purely a matter of politics?  Gun owners are overwhelmingly Republican (and should be punished for that sin), while immigrants usually vote Democratic, whether or not they happen to be U.S. citizens.  And the Democratic Party wouldn’t mind some grateful donations from wealthy Muslim sources.

It is noteworthy that the liberal view on accepting Muslim refugees is inconsistent not only with their position on gun control, but also with the policies of Muslim countries, who presumably know their people better than we do.  Five of the wealthiest Muslim countries – Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Kuwait, and Bahrain – have refused to accept any Syrian refugees.  By way of justification, they have argued that “accepting large numbers of Syrians is a threat to their safety, as terrorists could be hiding within an influx of people.”

I propose that we follow their example.