Yet another poll shows that the NRA does NOT represent gun owners.
https://www.americanprogress.org/press/release/2015/11/17/125618/release-gun-owners-overwhelmingly-support-background-checks-see-nra-as-out-of-touch-new-poll-finds/
Overwhelming support for background checks: 83 percent of gun owners nationally support criminal background checks on all sales of firearms, while only 14 percent of gun owners oppose them.
Gun owners want to see action and enforcement of current law: 79 percent of gun owners nationally want to see their politicians take action on this issue and require more gun sellers to conduct criminal background checks before they sell guns, while only 19 percent do not want to see their elected leaders act on this issue.
Gun owners are more likely to support a politician who supports background checks: 66 percent say they would be more likely to vote for a candidate who backs them, compared with only 19 percent who say they would be less likely to. Supporting background checks is not even a liability for Republican candidates in a primary election: 56 percent of GOP gun owners say they would be more likely to vote for a candidate who supports them, compared with only 27 percent who say they would be less likely to.
The NRA is out of touch with gun owners on gun safety issues such as background checks: Only 29 percent of gun owners feel that the NRA represents their thinking when it comes to background checks, with 62 percent saying the NRA is out of line with them on the issue.
And because I know the gunners here will attack the poll as biased, here is a link to the poll itself: https://cdn.americanprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/17054452/PPP-GunOwnersPollResults-11.17.15.pdf
So, contrary to popular superstition gun control is NOT a losing issue for Democrats.
= new reply since forum marked as read
I know what you're thinking: of course they'd be easy to pass in very "blue" Oregon. But that wasn't necessarily going to be the case. The liberal/conservative divide in my state not as one-sided as people think: rural Oregon and most of the larger towns/small cities are pretty conservative. Moreover, because this is the West, a lot of Democrats and other liberals are gun owners (like me).
Yet UBCs turned out to be surprisingly easy to enact...and I'm proud to have worked on the effort. I even wore my "Gun Owner for Background Checks" t-shirt to a gun show. No, seriously...I did. 
Got a surprisingly positive response, and those who disagreed were quite polite about it and some good conversation ensued. I'd have probably gotten more guff if I were a guy, I suspect (despite me not exactly filling out the shirt very impressively...). =P
I do, however, think that it's very speculative to state that successes with UBCs indicate that gun control in general isn't a losing issue for Democrats. UBCs and some other proposals meet with significant levels of gun owner approval...but a pretty wide range of other such proposals emphatically do not. It remains dangerous ground for Democratic candidates.