Friday's assassination of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has prompted some predictable gloating from America's political Right about the fact that it happened in a country with some of the strictest gun laws in the world. "Proof that gun control ... does not prevent violence," declared one typical tweet. "Gun control really works huh," chimed in another. "Japan bans guns and look what happens."

Such schadenfreude is not only heartless under the circumstances but demonstrably, wildly wrong. As Japan's almost nonexistent gun-mortality rate makes clear, Abe's killing is the exception that proves the rule: gun restrictions work. Furthermore, polls increasingly show Americans want them.

It's unsurprising that Abe's alleged killer resorted to a homemade gun, given how difficult it is for civilians to buy guns in Japan. Handguns are outlawed completely. To own a shotgun or air rifle requires a months-long process that includes a written test, a score of at least 95% accuracy in a shooting-range test, and extensive mental health and criminal background checks — and then doing it all over again every three years.

While that may sound onerous to an American, consider the outcome: Japan, a nation of more than 125 million people, generally sees fewer than 10 gun deaths a year. Not 10 per 100,000, to use the typical measure of firearms mortality rates, but 10 total.

Contrast that to Missouri alone (population 6 million), which sees in excess of 1,200 gun deaths annually. Here, there are virtually no impediments for any adult who wants to buy and carry a gun immediately. Even criminals who are technically prohibited from having them can easily obtain them since Missouri lawmakers refuse to require universal background checks as some other states do. (Like Illinois, for example, where recent annual gun-death rates have been around half that of Missouri's.)

No rational person can look at the above numbers and conclude that gun restrictions don't save lives. Those who still make that argument are either willfully naive or are unwilling to say what they really mean: That allowing tens of thousands of Americans to die from gun violence every year is an acceptable tradeoff for not inconveniencing gun owners with even modest restrictions.

But polls show that view is becoming increasingly unpopular — even among gun owners. A new NPR/Ipsos survey, for example, finds that 8 in 10 American gun owners favor universal background check requirements to buy guns, more than 70% favor raising the minimum age to buy assault-style rifles to 21, and 65% favor red-flag laws. Republican gun owners sided with the majority on those questions.

Part of why Japan is reeling from Abe's death is that gun murders of any kind are so rare there. Imposing Japan-style restrictions here would almost certainly be legally and culturally untenable. But that doesn't mean America is helpless to address what is truly a national crisis.

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