But my broader point is just common sense: people are far more dependent on cars than on firearms; regulating access to driving privileges offers governments more tools than access to firearms does.
And do you think they're going to poke their noses equally around homes belonging to known gun owners as they do those of non gun owners?
>people are far more dependent on cars than on firearms
Sure, but some people benefit a lot more from the proliferation of firearms than other people do, and the people who are harmed by the proliferation of firearms have a much stronger motivation to remove them than do people that are harmed by the proliferation of cars.
No one is really concerned that the government is going to stop people from being able to drive cars without a viable alternative that works for the vast majority. There is concern that the government is going to stop normal people from owning guns, eventually. They don't need to confiscate them to do that, they just need to institute mandatory background checks so it's illegal to hand your guns down to your kids without government permission, and gradually make it more difficult to get a license, and then legal gun owners die off and all there are left are the lawbreakers.
The political psychology point is well taken, of course; the problem with all gun control proposals in the US is that they're perceived, with some validity, to be a slippery slope towards universal confiscation, the same way abortion regulation is perceived as a slippery slope to a universal ban.
But in the airless vacuum of a message board we should be able to discuss the proposals on their merits without being chained to partisan political analyses.