Tag: National Rifle Association

Gun Owners of America and Partisanship

I’ve been ripping on Gun Owners of America (GOA) quite a bit recently. My main beef with them is that they seem to spend all of their time bitching about the National Rifle Association (NRA) instead of doing something to eliminate gun control laws. Recently they’ve been going on about the NRA’s potential endorsement of Harry Reid who voted for the Brady Act back in 1993.

The problem? Well Kay Bailey, a Republican, voted for the same act. Why does that matter? Because she has an A rating from GOA. This seems to prove the point that GOA isn’t a second amendment organization but a conservative organization. They spend time talking about non-second amendment related issues and take those into account when grading politicians. The NRA on the other hand usually focus almost exclusively on gun rights.

I wouldn’t have a problem with GOA if they didn’t spend all their time whining and claiming they are the only no compromise second amendment organization out there. But to top it off they do that while bashing the NRA who actually work to get shit done.

Once again I state if you’re disenfranchised with the NRA please send your money to an organization that gets things done such as the Second Amendment Foundation.

Sitting on Your Butt Doesn’t Equal Doing Work

So I’m watching Gun Owner’s of American’s (GOA) feed on Facebook and the following popped up:

Gun Owners of America elosi Trying to Shove DISCLOSE Act through Congress Once Again
— NRA remains on the sidelines – http://gunowners.org/a062210.htm

First of all I notice they couldn’t both proof reading their post as Pelosi has a ‘P’ in it. Second if you click on the link nothing is mentioned about what GOA is doing to fight this. The only two things they state are first asking you to call your representatives (which you already have I’m sure) and second call the National Rifle Association (NRA) and tell them to change their position.

Now I don’t agree with the NRA’s position but alas I disagree with GOA’s constant attacking the NRA while doing nothing themselves even more. I’m sorry I really want to like GOA as they are a pro-rights organization but unlike most organizations fighting for the right to keep and bear arms GOA spends most of their time attacking another organization instead of doing anything to preserve our rights (that I’ve seen and nobody so far has provided me citation of GOA doing anything major).

Once again I ask those of your disenfranchised with the NRA to ignore GOA and look at another organization like the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) who are spending their time and resources fighting bad gun control laws.

A Slight Change

Yeah I made a slight change on the side of the page here. I removed the link to join Gun Owners of America and replaced it with a link to the donations page of the Second Amendment Foundation. After the two previously mentioned fiascos involving the NRA there has been a lot of calling for people to abandon the NRA and join Gun Owners of America. It was this that reminded me that I still had the link for joining Gun Owners of America (GOA) on the side of my page. I’ve been meaning to replace it for a while now but haven’t gotten around to it due to sheer laziness and a memory that doesn’t really remember things.

So why the replacement? Because after being a member of GOA for two years I’ve determined something, they don’t do anything. Well that’s not entirely true they do whine a lot. But in the two years I’ve held a membership I’ve not seen them actually work much for the right to keep and bear arms. Sometimes they send out envelopes with postcards pre-addressed to my representatives that they want me to sign and send. It’s an interesting gesture but I’ve already sent letters to those same representatives about the issue labeled on the postcard. Furthermore those postcards are far and few between. Their RSS feed for alerts almost never updates while the NRA-ILA feed has a rough average of 10 news items a day. The only decent thing GOA has is their rating page for representatives but that’s even tainted by non-gun related issues.

The bottom line is they claim they are the only no compromise group in Washington but don’t actually do anything. This is where people usually tell me GOA can’t accomplish much because they don’t have a whole lot of money. Bullocks. The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) doesn’t have nearly the same number of members as the NRA, nor nearly the same amount of money, but they manage to bring up lawsuits against entities who infringe on the right to keep and bear arms. Heller vs. D.C. and McDonald vs. Chicago were both SAF initiatives. They also hold a Gun Rights Policy Conference every year (where they work with other gun rights organizations like the NRA which GOA seems unwilling to do).

Another gun rights group is the Jews for the Preservation of Firearm Ownership (JPFO). Once again even though they don’t have the membership numbers of money of the NRA JPFO manages to do something. They produce literature and videos dealing with the right to keep and bear arms. They did an English translation of the Nazi’s gun laws and compared them to the Gun Control Act finding them to be very similar. They produced several videos relating to the right of self defense and the roots of gun control, racism (real racism not what the “progressive” liberals accuse pro-rights people of being). Like SAF JPFO is able to do something with less money than the NRA. Also you don’t have to be Jewish in order to join, just thought I’d toss that out there.

So really my point is this, if you don’t want to be a member of the NRA at least put your money somewhere useful. Join SAF or JPFO for instance. Join a local gun rights organization that’s doing something. But please don’t join GOA and then claim your money is being used to fight for your right to keep and bear arms. Unless I’ve missed something in my two years of membership I haven’t seem them do a whole Hell of a lot.

Maybe I’m wrong and my rage is misguided. I would love to be proven wrong on this so if you believe GOA is doing something please comment on what it is. I love being wrong on these kinds of issues. I do believe their hearts are in the right place but their lack of action depresses me.

Another NRA Shit Storm

This week is just riddled with NRA shit storms. First they drop opposition to the DISCLOSE Act after being granted an exemption and now they’re endorsing Democrat candidate Ted Strickland.

Being one to share my opinion with everybody (because this is my site and I get to do that) I thought I’d jump into this fray as well. What do I think about this? Well I’m not a fan of Governor Strickland nor most of his polices. But the NRA endorsing him makes nothing but sense. When it boils down to it the NRA’s main focus are gun rights. That’s their thing*.

There is no way the NRA could have endorse the Republican candidate because he has an F rating from the NRA. The R in NRA doesn’t stand for Republican. Further many people are parroting how the NRA is working against freedom as a whole by endorsing a Democrat. Guess what? If you personally endorse either the Republican or Democrat party you’re working against freedom as a whole. Neither party is pro-freedom. They both want to take your rights, they just want to do it in different orders. So the excuse that the NRA is working against freedom as a whole by endorsing a Democrat holds no water with me, I despise both major political parties for their polices towards my freedoms.

The NRA endorses candidates based on their stance in regards to gun rights. That’s what they rate representatives on, their stance on gun rights. If you want to know where a candidate stands on gun rights go to the NRA. If you want to know where they stand on other issues go to other organizations. An NRA endorsement simply states the candidate is better on gun rights than the opposing candidate. That’s it. It’s pretty simple.

* For those about to jump at me and claim I just ripped on them for being single-issue in the last post please realize that my complaint with them abandoning opposition to the DISCLOSE Act is due to the fact that was a direct attack against them. They left the second the government gave them an exemption even though nothing is going to stop the same government from later making an amendment repealing that exemption and nobody is going to be willing to help the NRA to fight it. It’s a long term defensive strategy failure in my book.

Who Cares so Long as Our Dog Isn’t in the Fight

I’m sure you’ve already heard about the veritable shit storm hitting the gun blogs today as the NRA pulled it’s opposition of the DISCLOSE Act. Well they made an official statement stating they are a single-issue organization and this issue isn’t their issue. Needless to say this has created somewhat of a rift between the NRA and many of it’s members.

Sebastian says this is OK being the NRA is a single-issue organization. Robb made an analogy regarding how only fighting for a single issue can not win your the fight, even on that single issue. Sailor Curt lays it out that the NRA doesn’t seem to care since they have an exemption everybody else can fend for themselves. Alan brings up the fact issues don’t exist in vacuums all to themselves.

Well I love giving my opinion on things so here it is. The NRA fucked up big time here. With all due respect (never mind when anybody says that it’s instantly followed by a lack of respect) regard to the fact the NRA does the most when it comes to fighting for the right to keep and bear arms they are being juvenile and idiotic with this. I agree with the general sentiment that the NRA is more than happy to drop this issue now that they no longer have to worry much about it. More or less they went from fighting this bill as a crusade against the freedom of speech to a “single-issue organization” that only has focus on the second amendment. That’s just plain short sighted and dirty.

Let me make an analogy since they’re fun. Let’s say you and two friends get into a fight with four other people. The reason for the fight is irrelevant but you are outnumbered and stand less than a 50/50 chance of winning. You’re one of the larger and more capable fighters in your little group of three and the opposition want you out of the fight. To that end they make you an offer, they will not pursue you to kick your ass if you leave right now. If you leave you may save yourself an ass whoopin’ but your two buddies are going to be even more unlikely to escape without a few broken bones. What do you do? Personally I’d stand with my two friends if for no other reason than someday I may need their assistance and abandoning them now is not going to motivate them to help me later.

The NRA is a powerhouse in Washington D.C. They have a lot of weight and thus clout with the people on Capital Hill. By pulling out they abandoned other pro-rights organizations and their own members who happen to be members of those other groups that will still be affected by this legislation. Those other groups and those members will remember this and are likely going to be less than cooperative with the NRA in the future should they need help.

All they had to do was keep opposing this legislation. That’s it. Really other organizations could do the lobbying while the NRA could have been in it name only. But they second they were cut a deal they cut out of the opposition. Classy.

Basically they fucked up and I’m joining those who are calling them on it in the hopes they do better in the future.

Second Amendment Enforcement Act

Good news slaves citizens of Washington D.C. the Second Amendment Enforcement Act has been introduced in Congress. I haven’t read (nor found a copy of at this point) the bill but I’m guessing it’s very similar, if not exactly like, the amendment to the D.C. Voting Rights bill which was pulled (due to the amendment). A copy of the bill can be nabbed over at The Truth About Guns (not Truth About Guns). [Thanks Lee for the notification].

If passed this bill would force the officials of Washington D.C. to comply with the Supreme Court’s ruling in Heller.

Update 2010-04-29 17:29: Lee down in the comments section was good enough to link to a copy of the bill. The link has been added to the post.

Results of McDonald vs. Chicago Oral Arguments

A couple of sources are releasing summaries of the oral arguments today. The first one is Business Week’s write up which can be found here. SCOTUS Blog also has a write up.

Both seem to come to the same conclusion. It appears that incorporation though the privileges or immunities clause of the 14th amendment isn’t likely. On the upside it seems likely incorporation will happen but through the due process clause of the same amendment.

Getting incorporation period is a huge victory and I’m not going to be to picky on how we do it.

I Think We Have More People

Joe Huffman does a quick Internet approved survey to determine popularity between the gun rights crowd and the anti-gunners. He uses the number of followers each have on Twitter which is the Internet excepted method of determining everything.

Well we’re winning. In fact the Brady Bunch’s actual Twitter account is almost eclipsed in popularity by Mr. Huffman’s own daughter. Of course Mr. Huffman doesn’t take into consideration another possible meaning behind this. Anti-gunners are too stupid to understand how to use a service that involves sending 140 character messages. I guess typing is hard for any group of people who are using both of their hands to cover their ears while they scream, “I CAN’T HEAR YOU LA LA LA!” at the stop of their lungs.

Bloomberg’s Posse is a Little Screwed

So the NRA has a fact sheet on Bloomberg’s posse calling themselves the Mayors Against Illegal Guns. In this fact sheet is a list of mayors who have quit that is pretty long. Under that is a list of people who are not actually mayors of the localities as the group advertises. I count 28 names under that section which is quite a few incorrectly added names to their member role sheet.

This list is very complete and even has a section for mayors in the group who were convicted of crimes. I must say if Bloomberg wants to use his deceptively named group to attack the NRA he better start an offensive quickly. The NRA is curb stomping them with facts, which we know anti-gunners have a hard time with. Then again I think Bloomberg’s biggest failure here was the name he selected for his group. Although it did help initial membership by claiming it was against illegal guns as the groups true purpose is exposed many mayors are leaving. Don’t deceive your base membership, they won’t like it.

The NRA certainly is doing a good job with the fact sheet alone and pointing out the futility of Bloomberg’s posse and their crusade against guns.