Quite a read, this thread.
I just joined recently and this is only my second post (the first was in a thread about defining conservatism, which segues to this thread
for me a bit).
I joined the NRA a long time ago, decades ago, but let the membership expire due to what I consider very unreasonable policies coming
from that organisation.
I do feel that the NRA is protecting my gun ownership and carrying rights. If it were not for them the CC laws around the country would
probably not have come about (not sure of that). I like the CC laws (concealed carry laws) because I'm a law abiding citizen and I feel
that those laws separate me out from creeps/criminals who also carry and who I must defend myself against.
But the NRA won't make a statement about all this, except to say that no laws are needed I sure disagree with that. We need registration
and the ability to trace weapons (and ammo!) from their use at a crime scene all the way to the makers. We have the technology to have
the manufacturers include a unique identifier on each bullet, cheaply. That should be done. .
.The 2nd amendment is fine, but I feel that gun ownership and public carrying should be a high privilege not a "right." I feel that the NRA
is ideological to a fault about this, and just wants everyone to have guns. Imagine the chaos if cars and trucks were treated that way and
we had no training and licensing for their use. It's bad enough now with thousands of injuries and deaths per year, imagine if driving
had no training, licensing and registration at all. It would be total mayhem
The NRA needs to rethink this and apply some common sense.
I too am a firearms owner. I must be picking on myself.
Joe
That you may well be but you are first and foremost a gun control advocate. Nobody ever accused gun control advocates as being able to cogitate.
I am a staunch 2nd Amendment advocate and after spending some time living in DC I recognize how restrictive gun laws are in some places. I don't agree with the NRA on everything. I personally have no problem with gun dealers being required to do background checks in order to ensure they aren't selling to someone on probation or parole. And I do hear criticisms that the NRA is more concerned with the desires of the gun manufacturers than its membership. But I also recognize that many of the liberties I do have in regards to gun rights are owed in large part to the pressure put on politicians by organizations like the NRA.
I am already a member of the ACLU and I feel joining the NRA would round things out nicely. What do you think? Any better alternatives to the NRA?
I am a life member of the NRA and a higher level member of the SAF. GOA is also a decent group as is Jews for the Preservation of the 2nd Amendment (they have changed names a couple times)
I tell people to join the NRA even though its less than perfect because it has the biggest voice and it does lots of good in training areas. as senator friend of mine noted, if half the gun owners in the USA joined the NRA, Chuck Schumer would be calling Wayne LaPierre asking for his consent or advice on any bill that might remotely impact firearms owners.
What the gun control disease lacks is a capable opposition. Virtually all opposition to gun control is at the unorganised grass roots level. People like us who see how wrong it is to toss our rights to safety, self-defence and freedom on the trash pile for a promise of non-existent government aid.
Which person here is willing to subcontract their safety and that of their family to government?
I wish the NRA did actually put pressure on politicians. Instead they cannot deliver a single vote, threaten any politicians or political parties position or popularity. You cannot buy politicians with campaign funds. You cannot persuade a politician that it is the right thing to do in the face of that politician losing power, popularity or votes. All of these trump money. The NRA is currently politically stupid and probably advised by idiots who believe all sorts of formal rubbish that politics is complicated.
Μολὼν λαβέ;1065763834 said:I became a life member of the NRA in 2008 when Hillary ran for POTUS the first time.
Bill's crime bill was a massive infringement on the 2nd Amendment in the name of a feel good, ineffective law that did nothing to alter crime.
The slimy politicians who voted for it got booted when their term was up.
Think the NRA wasn't a major factor in that outcome then I have a bridge to sell you...cheap.
Sure, join the nra if you want to be dominated by a bunch of thugs who want to tell you how you should live and how you should vote and only want your money.
Joe
That's funny. I wondered why they left you out of the loop. When I was an nra member, I got lots of phone calls pressuring me to vote for certain candidates and tons of literature mailed to me pressuring me to vote for certain candidates. If you receive one of their magazines then you have been told. I was really turned off by the nra when I saw Wayne LaP on a late night tv ad for the nra holding up a Remington 1100 shotgun while calling it a pump gun. He doesn't know one gun from another. He doesn't care anything about you or about guns. He is just another scum bag lawyer only interested in taking your money so that he can buy more $4000 suits.
Joe
So why are you now picking on gays? My life partner and I are both offended.
Joe
no-just the ones who are anti gun mainly because they think the NRA and its members are hostile to gays. And its true that the NRA often supports politicians who are not big fans of the homosexual political agenda because those same politicians are pro gun. But I see some hysterical attacks on gun owners by gays for that reason. I don't vote for a politician because he is anti gay. But if my choice is between a pro gun candidate and a gun banner, I will always vote for the pro gun politician because that is my main political issue.
The fact that you even brought up the subject of gays and intertwined it into the subject of the nra proves you are a homophobe. If you weren't, you never would have brought it up.
Joe
not at all and my history on this board is over ten years and I have not attacked gays or gay rights. I do have a very dim view of gays who attack gun owners because gays perceive (even rightly so) that the NRA supports politicians who may be anti gay because some pro gun politicians oppose gay rights. I don't oppose gay rights but I am tough on gays who are anti gun for the reasons I have stated.
are your somewhat extreme (based on a poll where you want to impose punitive taxes on gun buyers, ammo buys, ban semi auto rifles, ban normal capacity magazines) views the product of
1) an honest and studied belief all the restrictions you want to heap on gun owners will substantive reduce crime or
2) you think by pushing this crap (and it is crap as crime control) somehow gets you even with people who aren't tolerant to the fact that you are a gay man?
OK then, fair enough, but you shouldn't attack gays now.
Joe
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