Even RINO support seems to be drying up. Granted he’s disgusted by the deal rather than the unconscionable restrictions on free speech, which really tells you all you need to know about Mike Castle. It doesn’t look to me like it’s going to get easier for Pelosi to push this bill forward with time, but health care looked doomed more than a few times, until it wasn’t.
Month: June 2010
Gun Control …
Westchester Gun Show
I was happy to see this news from Jacob, that the Westchester Gun Show, running in one of the suburbs of New York City, was back in business after being closed down in post-Columbine hysterics. At first I thought this was good news, but I am so thankful for the New York media pointing out that it was just a bunch of nazis. The New York Daily News I am particularly grateful for pointing out that no one has thought of the children, in addition to driving home the whole nazi thing.
But in all seriousness, we all know most guns hows have militaria, and a lot of the same people who collect guns collect militaria, this reinforces my view that gun show promoters who are operating in hostile media markets (and you don’t get much more hostile than New York City’s) need to think about public and media relations. I actually would like to see NSSF do more to reach out to gun show promoters and try to build some accepted practices. I am absolutely not suggesting this road needs to lead down the path of removing militaria from gun shows, but as we restore gun rights to a lot of these infringing jurisdictions, we’re going to continue to have this problem, and have to have a plan.
The Daily News and the Journal News ought to be ashamed of themselves for such one sided, shoddy journalism, but we can expect more of this kind of thing if we don’t think about how to mitigate the problem.
Congratulations Massachusetts!
You can now legally store your pistol in cooler in the back yard… as long as you put a lock on it.
What’s Wrong With This Picture
But in response to complaints by the NRA bosses who don’t want to tell the public where their money comes from, the 53 Democrats who receive money from the NRA apparently insisted the bill be changed. This led to a “compromise” that exempts groups with more than a million members; and that raised 15 percent or less funding from corporations; that have members in all 50 states; and that have been around at least 10 years.
So you’re suggesting NRA doesn’t want to tell the public where their money comes from, even though the exemption tells you where. NRA is raising most of it’s money from its 4 million members in increments of 20 and 30 dollars. I’m glad when our opponents make mistakes. Why include the terms of the exemption? It basically just tells the world they’ve been lying to the public about the nature of the “gun lobby” for years — that it was a tool of the gun makers rather than a real grassroots organization.
Pulled Again
The Lentz bill, HB 2536, to weaken PA reciprocity, was scheduled for a vote today, but has once again been pulled from the agenda. I’m guessing because Lentz still doesn’t have the votes. Keep the pressure on.
Reading the Chess Board
So since it seems like we’re going to get DISCLOSE rammed down our throats by the White House, it’s worth taking a look at the chess board and seeing what we stand to lose. It should be noted that at this time, the White House seems to be sticking behind Van Hollen’s promise to proceed with the large group exemption. Because many folks were quite emotional about the NRA deal, I’m going to take a cold, hard look at just what is at risk with this bill from a movement wide perspective. But in order to do that, I should first explain what kind of activities DISCLOSE regulates. DISCLOSE only regulates electioneering activities for federal office.This means advocating for the election or defeat of any specific candidate for federal office. It doesn’t not include advocating on behalf of a bill, lobbying (though there are some implications if you’re a group that lobbies or are a lobbyist), educational efforts (which can include voter education, and issue education), or most personal communication about political topics. It is limited only to advocacy on behalf or against a candidate for federal office. NRA does a quite a lot of all these things, but few groups have much in the way of an election apparatus. Let me explain.
Most groups tend to do electioneering activities through their Political Action Committees or PACs. NRA’s PAC is the Political Victory Fund. A few other groups have PACs. But let’s look at the monies at risk here:
This is the bread and butter when it comes to electioneering. NRA spent a bit over a million dollars in funds directly to campaigns in 2008. That was nearly 10x more money than Gun Owners of America spent, and for pro-gun Democrats it’s more than 1000 times more than GOA spent. The other groups here are so low on their spending as to not even being worth mentioning. But we shouldn’t just look at PAC giving just to candidates. Let’s also not forget independent expenditures, which in the 2008 cycle amounted to about 18 million dollars, 13 million of which was against anti-gun Democratic Candidates. By contrast, GOA does very little in the way of independent expenditures, with most of their money going directly to candidates. So far for the 2010 election cycle, NRA’s independent expenditures amount to more than 76 times that of GOA’s.
So why pick GOA for comparison? Because they are the only other group with PAC spending that’s even on the radar screen at all. SAF, a non-profit organized under 501(c)(3) of the tax code, cannot legally participate in electioneering or independent expenditures without putting their tax status at risk. The are not affected by DISCLOSE, so their ability to speak in the electioneering domain is not at risk. JPFO also shares the same tax status. But what about other national gun rights group, like Dudley Brown’s National Association for Gun Rights (NAGR). They’ve been some of the most outspoken critics of NRA for DISCLOSE. Well, they don’t have a PAC, or if they do, they spend no money to show up on any radar. NAGR doesn’t even have a lobbyist registered on the Hill, so how they are promoting gun rights is beyond me. What about Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, which is SAF’s 501(c)(4) sister organization. They don’t have a PAC it seems. They do, however, have a lobbyist registered on Capitol Hill. Given that they are spending little on electioneering activities, they aren’t putting much of anything at risk maintaining opposition to the bill even when the exemption was offered to be lowered to 500,000 members. GOA has some money for electioneering at risk, but compared to their other spending and income, it’s a small amount. Compared to the overall movement it’s a puny amount.
So purely from a numbers game, if you’re making the call, do you put NRA’s entire electioneering machine at risk to try to save GOA’s which is orders of magnitudes smaller? I argue it would be irresponsible for the movement as a whole to do that. Many people speak about principles. Principle is the name of the hill you’re going to die on in politics if you fight based on that alone. Principles are a guide through the process. They are not the process itself. The process itself is a high complex strategy game. That has to be kept in mind.
Why the Democratic Leadership Wants to Shut us Up
Last night, I spent 2 1/2 hours making phone calls for Tom Corbett for Governor, Pat Toomey for Senate, and Dee Adcock for Congress. Â I assumed, when asked to help out, that we would be calling hardcore Republicans to recruit volunteers and get a general sense of how much they know about the specific candidates now that the primaries are over – not formal polling by any means, just a general view of the picture.
Except, I found out when I arrived that the call list was of “soft” Republicans. Â They don’t vote in primaries very often, if at all. Â They are registered with the party, but not active by any measure. Â A few undecideds here and there, a few who didn’t really know about the candidates (especially at the Congressional level, which isn’t a surprise given the district and the lack of a specific media market for that area), and a surprising number of people willing to volunteer for the candidates.
Really, the Democrats really could be in big, big trouble if this is a sign of the times. Â Of the 4 other people in the room with me, 2 had never volunteered for phone banks before. Â One was moving over into general Republican issues after having mostly volunteering for pro-life groups before. Â Keep in mind that it is June. Â It’s freakin’ June and nearly half the people in the room are new to volunteering, and I recruited several more from the soft Republican call sheet. Â (There were many more callers in the rest of the building, I just eavesdropped on those in my room so I could make more calls instead of chatting it up.) Â This can’t be good news for Democrats.
On Saturday, we’ll be doing a walk for the same candidates. Â I don’t know if that list is for hard or soft Republicans. Â I do know that Obama’s camp is already canvassing soft Democrats, particularly those who just registered last year and/or those who don’t vote in midterms. Â So we definitely need to be doing the same on our side.
If you’re in SE Pennsylvania and want an excuse to get a little exercise & help a good cause on Saturday, I’ve got locations for several events in Montgomery, Bucks, and Delaware counties.
I would also suggest to bloggers that helping a campaign out for a couple of hours a month is a great way to get a read on the pulse of your local voters. Â It’s absolutely fascinating at times. Â Great blog fodder, too. :)
Aiming to Shove DISCLOSE Down Our Throats
Well, it looks like the White House is putting its full weight behind DISCLOSE to get it back on the House calendar for a vote. This is bad news. When this story first broke, I left a comment at Joe’s about some of the writing on the wall that had to go into the decisions that any group was making on the bill (with additional notes):
From what I’m seeing out of other groups, this amendment could very well kill the bill. Here’s what we either know or can safely assume by the actions of this Democratic Congress so far:
- They have a history of ramming things down the throats of the American people even when there is 50%+ opposition – even very loud and visible opposition.
Health care, anyone? Â Try getting people as worked up over campaign finance – an issue that few people know anything about. Â Hell, just look at the comments here and on other blogs to show how little people know about the issue. Â Besides, you’re also talking about competing with the millions that George Soros has pumped into a “campaign finance reform” public relations effort over many, many years.
- They pretty much see the writing on the wall that this is their last stand in the House. They could back off to calm people down before the elections so they have a shot at holding on to power or they could try to get every little thing they can right now while they know they have it.
Talking to some DC folks this weekend, this point is even more important than I realized at the time. Â Everyone there knows that this won’t pass court muster. Â But that’s not the goal. Â The goal is to get this into law before this year’s elections so that angry groups are cut off from the voters. Â Whether it’s liberal groups turning against Democratic incumbents or conservative groups targeting Democrats, they want them all shut out of the campaign process. Â They are actually the ones who are just trying to live to fight another day here.
- They wanted this bill, and it’s clearly a priority of the President who broke all standards of reasonable protocol by attacking the Supreme Court justices who attended his SOTU. Therefore, fact # 1 becomes more relevant to anyone working on this issue.
See above. Â The White House is now getting in to twist some arms. Â They are, however, conceding the big group exemption. Â My guess is that they are going to tell the far left members of Congress to shut the hell up and get in line – just like they did on healthcare. Â And they will do it. Â The House leadership & White House will probably promise that the bill will eventually be “fixed” someday, but they really know it won’t and that it will be struck down. Â That doesn’t matter, they just need some of it to work this year to try to minimize their losses.
- NRA could make sure their members were taken of in the event they do ram this through Congress. It may only hold off the fight for another day, but come January, we’ll at least have a friendlier House – even if we don’t take full control of it back. In two more years, we may have a friendly White House & Congress to gut this thing.
The big group exemption makes sure gun owners can still be heard on Election Day. Â I hate it, but it at least makes sure our concerns don’t go down the tubes this year while we wait on the courts to (hopefully) throw the law out or a future Congress & president to gut it.
- The side benefit to this kind of exemption is the added attention that could kill the bill in all forms. The outrage is there from the left. But, looking back at # 1, NRA donors are still safe for now. It’s just a matter of whether Pelosi, Schumer & Obama are so confident to stick their tongues out at the left and yell, “What are you going to do, vote Republican? Just take it with a smile and vote for us again in November.” Based on the “hell no” Van Hollen gave to any union exemption last night, I tend to think they’re going to try and ram it down everyone’s throats even over the objections of their base.
This is may still be the case. Â The opposition may be the reason the House cut their calendar by a week this year – always a good thing to get the politicians out of DC. Â However, with the White House making the noises they are about how it’s not a “perfect” bill, but they will take it, it does appear they are telling their base to shut the hell up and get out of the way.
Now, there is still room for those of you who fall in the general conservative category to fight this. Â If you live in a Blue Dog district, get on the damn phone right now. Â If you live in a far left district, get on the phone now and tell them to kill the bill – leaving them to assume you’re part of the base. Â If you live in a GOP district, there’s a good chance that they will oppose it, but get on the phone anyway because we can’t afford to have any stray. Â You know the Democrats can afford to have a few wander off the reservation, but the Republicans can’t afford it. Â And when you’re dealing with literally hundreds of millions invested into convincing the public that anything called “campaign finance reform” is a good idea, it could be a tough fight. Â Whether we like it not, that’s the political reality of the moment. Â We have to figure out how to beat them anyway.
Burn, Baby, Burn
The Democrats new choice to take the Pennsylvania chair has an interesting name, that is hopefully prognostic, given the openly gun control supporting folks running on the Dem ticket in the state wide races this year. But we’re happy the MAIG mayor lost her bid for the position.
We have no idea where Jim Burn stands on the Second Amendment, but we’re hopeful being from Allegheny County, he does not follow the current trend of going against us.