Gun Rights Organizations – Page 39 – Shall Not Be Questioned

Left Trying to Make Hay out of NRA Board Members

John Richardson has reported what I’ve been meaning to cover, but haven’t had time to. A few lefty groups are giving three NRA board members a hard time for selling guns or gun accessories, claiming this is proof that NRA is in it for gun profits. Even though NRA has 76 board members, and they are all, each and every one of them, elected by the votes of NRA members.

If our opponents think these three board members means NRA is in bed with the interests of the gun industry, what does it mean that at least seven NRA board members (off the top of my head, there are probably more) are current or former law enforcement officers? What does that imply to the anti-gun movement?

Felony For Doctors to Ask About Guns

I have to agree with Eugene Volokh on this one. I think NRA is being supremely stupid by pushing this nonsense. This is a private problem. We do not need a government solution. I don’t expect the NRA to defend the whole constitution, but it would be nice if they wouldn’t defile other parts of it. I would not be happy if a bill like this gets pushed in other states, and will continue to speak out against it as a member.

Gun Rights Dominates Social Media

Technorati notes who the big shots are. NRA has 690,000 Facebook fans. The Brady Campaign, on the other hand has 12,347. Even Glock has 123,000 fans.

Larry Prattling

Had to steal an Uncleism for the title. A few days ago Weer’d noted that he heard Larry on a local radio show blasting Congresswoman Giffords for her position on the Second Amendment. That struck me as a bit tasteless, given the circumstance. I asked him to find a recording, and he has managed to do that.

But listening to the whole thing in context, I don’t think what he said about Giffords was all that tasteless, because the host asked him about her record. I was more appalled by his speculation about what party the dead folks belonged to:

“There was at least one guy who was a Republican that was killed, and that was the federal judge. But the others we might presume could have been Democrats… don’t know.”

The host cut him off at this point, which is probably lucky for Larry. I don’t know where he was going with that, but I’m betting it wasn’t good.Â Other classy moments?

“Your [Carolyn McCarthy’s] solution is to leave us all victims, the way your husband was. He was in a gun free zone when he was mowed down by Colin Furgeson.”

I don’t like the woman’s politics either, but I’m not too keen on using her dead husband to make a point, along with the reminder that he was “mowed down.” It’s one thing to think it. It’s another thing to say it on a public forum, while you’re speculating on what to tell her. This is the kind of stuff I expect on Internet forums, not from a self-professed leader in the pro-gun movement.

Backpedaling

SayUncle reports on this Reason article that shows GOA’s Larry Pratt backpedaling on his statement to Fox that indicated he did not support gun rights for permanent legal residents. He’s claiming he position was misstated. Except in the first comment over at Uncle’s, we have a response that indicates that was not the case.

This looks like a case of Pratt not expecting quite the backlash he did, and backpedaling.

Larry Pratt Lives Up To His Name

The ACLU in South Dakota is doing the right thing by filing suit to get a UK citizen, but permanent resident of the United States, his right to keep and bear arms back. Larry Pratt things that’s a bad thing, apparently:

Even gun rights advocates are divided on the issue.

“If you’re a law abiding citizen and you’re allowed to buy a gun you should be allowed to carry it to defend yourself,” NRA spokesman Andrew Arulananda told FoxNews.com. “Just because you’re not a us citizen doesn’t mean that you’re somehow to immune to crime outside your home.”

But Gun Owners of America Executive Director Larry Pratt says the state has every right to restrict conceal and carry permits to citizens.

“If the guy wants to enjoy the full benefit of residing in the United States become a citizen. Heâ€™s been here for 30 years whatâ€™s he waiting for?,” Pratt told FoxNews.com.

Pratt says the only reason the ACLU brought the suit is to pave the way for illegal aliens to have conceal carry permits.

“They want to make it so illegal aliens have the same rights as everybody else…every little bit chipping away,” he said.

If you believe that rights come from God, nature, Shiva, or whatever source of natural rights you want to recognize, and are merely infringed or recognized by governmental entities, on what constitutional basis can we restrict the Right to Keep and Bear Arms to legal immigrants into this country? Hell, on what legal basis can we restrict the Right to Keep and Bear Arms to illegal immigrants, for that matter? Perhaps a distinction can be made, but I’d like it to be based on a little more sound reasoning than it gives Larry Pratt the heebie-jeebies.

Does Larry Pratt believe the right to keep and bear arms is one that fits in with, “we are endowed by our creator, with certain unattainable rights,” or doesn’t he? Is he so horribly blinded by his socially conservative prejudices that he can’t see the forest for the trees?

Personally, I think that anyone ought to be able to walk into a store, plunk cash on the table, and walk out with a gun, and carry it with lawful intent. I accept that will probably never be reality, and agree we have to work practicably within the constraints that reality imposes on us, but South Dakota’s law is not necessarily among those realities we have to live with. ACLU has a good case. Larry Pratt doesn’t like it. NRA does. Tell me who’s really a believer in the Second Amendment here?

UPDATE: I should make clear I think there can be a basis for denying illegal immigrants rights, like the right to keep and bear arms, based on the fact that they are in the country unlawfully, but there is very questionable legal basis for restricting the right for people who are lawfully in the United States, even if they are not citizens of the United States. If you think it’s a fundamental right, that has consequences.

WaPo on NRA

So the WaPo has finally done their bit on the NRA, and reveals this bit of information:

In the past few days, the plan [to require multiple long gun purchases to be reported] has quietly gained traction at Justice. But sources told The Post they fear that if the plan becomes public, the NRA will marshal its forces to kill it.

I also love this:

The fate of the Mexican gunrunning rule is only the most recent example of how the gun lobby has consistently outmaneuvered and hemmed in ATF

The mexican gunrunning rule? Instead of the “we get to hire additional bureaucrats to process all this extra paperwork, and thus grow our empires” rule? I will say this, and say it proudly: I’m not willing to give an inch to deal with Mexico’s problem. Guns are largely illegal in Mexico, and largely legal here, and they are the ones with the violence problem, and not us. In addition, and we’ve said this until we’re blue in the face, the cartels are not getting machine guns, grenades and rocket launchers from legal sources in the US. Also, let’s take a look at this:

Don Davis, 77, has run Don’s Guns and Galleries in Indianapolis for 37 years and says he is one of the highest-volume dealers in the region. A big supporter of the Second Amendment right to bear arms, Davis resigned from the NRA many years ago. “They used to be an organization for the hunter and the fishermen,” he said recently. “Then they got into politics. They’re so political, that’s what they do with their money. Today if you say anything about a gun, they use their money to run against you.”

That’s this Don’s Guns. I seem to also recall that this guy is a major source of crime guns. Hey Brady folks and Bryan Miller: why don’t you go protest Don? I promise, I won’t lift a finger to help him, and I think everyone else will probably agree.

The WaPo article then goes on to speak of NRA as a powerful, evil force, blocking these very nice people at ATF who just want to fix this whole nasty gun violence thing. I mean, how can you argue with unbiased reporting like this:

Obama never said anything about banning handguns or closing gun shops. His campaign platform promised to pursue long-standing proposals to address urban violence: reinstating the assault weapons ban, outlawing “cop killer” bullets and closing the “gun-show loophole” that permits firearm sales without background checks.

Except he did. He has supported both in his past, and that fact is well documented. And how do you square that any of those other measures will do anything to address urban violence? The CDC studied the assault weapons ban and found it did nothing. I also doubt that the WaPo reporters involved in this piece have any idea what a “cop killer” bullet is. But it exists. Trust them. They are gun experts, right?

It’s days like this that make me happy fewer and fewer people are paying attention to print media.

Constitutional Carry

From NRA’s legislative agenda for Iowa in 2011:

â€œConstitutional Carryâ€

Building on NRAâ€™s â€œConstitutional Carryâ€ successes inÂ AlaskaÂ andÂ Arizona, NRA is making a strong push for more â€œConstitutional Carryâ€ states around the country, includingÂ Iowa.Â Â The proposed legislation would allow individuals who lawfully possess firearmsâ€”meaning individuals who are not federally prohibited from shipping, transporting, possessing, or receiving a firearmâ€”to either open or conceal carry without a permit. The new shall-issue permit system would remain in place, for those who wish to carry concealed in states that recognizeÂ Iowaâ€™s permit, but residents who legally qualify would no longer be subject to the permit process to carry concealed in state.

Looks like they will also be pushing a RKBA amendment to the Constitution in Iowa. I like the 2011 agenda, but I was particularly glad to see constitutional carry is now going big time. All it takes is winning in one larger state to get the ball rolling. The language would also seem to indicate that the effort will not be contained to just Iowa. As I said before, in Tennessee, Haslam opened the door to this issue there, it’s just a matter of trying to walk through it.

Transparency, Government, and Gun Rights

Thanks to David Post for pointing to these excellent thoughts on the Wikileaks scandal, because I think it has a useful concept that also speaks to some recent happenings in the gun rights movement here in Pennsylvania:

On the other hand, human systems canâ€™t stand pure transparency. For negotiation to work, peopleâ€™s stated positions have to change, but change is seen, almost universally, as weakness. People trying to come to consensus must be able to privately voice opinions they would publicly abjure, and may later abandon. Wikileaks plainly damages those abilities. (If Aaron Badyâ€™s analysis is correct, it is the damage and not the oversight that Wikileaks is designed to create.*)

And so we have a tension between two requirements for democratic statecraft, one that canâ€™t be resolved, but can be brought to an acceptable equilibrium. Indeed, like the virtues of equality vs. liberty, or popular will vs. fundamental rights, it has to be brought into such an equilibrium for democratic statecraft not to be wrecked either by too much secrecy or too much transparency.

So how does this relate to the gun rights movement? Because it explains why it’s not really possible for NRA, or any other group that may be in a position to know legislatively sensitive information, to share that information with grassroots activists who aren’t made privy to it. I think the root of much of the tension is that negotiation and dealings happen behind closed doors, and there’s not enough trust that the people who are in the smoked filled room will do the right things.

There’s always the argument that perhaps there ought to be more transparency in the process, and I think there is merit to the argument that NRA hasn’t been transparent enough in what it’s doing when lobbying legislatures. But it can’t be perfectly transparent. There will be some point where John Hohenwarter goes into the smoke filled room, and you’re stuck having to live with whatever comes out of that process. There might be times when it’s someone else headed into the smoked filled room to negotiate on our behalf. But it’s going to be someone, and can’t be everyone. And that someone is going to keep his cards very close to his chest, if he or she is a smart negotiator.

That’s one reason I’m not sure what cooperation between pro-gun groups in Pennsylvania is really going to look like. Not all groups are going to be on equal footing in the minds of the elected officials who control access to the smoke filled room, which means not all groups will have the same information. Not all of that information will be of a nature that can be shared broadly without risking compromising the overall legislative agenda. If the first requirement for harmony is for everyone to be on equal footing, information and access wise, that’s a non-starter out of the gate.

So I suppose it comes down to who you trust? Do I trust John Hohenwarter of NRA? Do I trust Kim Stolfer of FOAC? Do I trust Dan Pehrson of PAFOA? I would trust any of them to do the best they could for gun owners behind closed doors, because I think they all sincerely care about the issue, and have the best interests of our movement at heart. That’s really all I can ask for. I don’t expect a poker player to win every hand at poker, and I don’t expect a lobbyist to win every vote in a legislative battle either. Obviously, someone visibly incompetent at playing would be another matter, but I don’t think we have anyone who fits that bill in Pennsylvania.

NRA Influence on Voters

Dave Hardy links to a new poll that shows NRA’s impact in the elections this cycle. Overall, this looks really good. A total of 44% of voters polled claim they listen to what the NRA has to say in an election all, most or some of the time. Among independents this number is 42% on those polls.

â€œThese numbers show that the tea party and the NRA were the two major voices that influenced voter opinion in the midterm elections,â€ said Brad Oâ€™Leary, publisher of The Oâ€™Leary Report.

I suspect NRA’s numbers may even be better in a year where they aren’t endorsing a lot of Dems who voted for Health Care and other measures unpopular with the Tea Party movement. But this is an overwhelming amount of influence. And the Brady’s wonder why politicians don’t want to cross us?