Month: April 2012

Mother of a Virginia Tech victim speaks out… in favor of campus carry. Watch our opponents try to uncomfortably explain why her victimhood is less legitimate, somehow, than their victimhood.

Before our opponents get too fired up, thinking they are swinging back the pendulum, while they’ve been busy foaming at the mouth over Ted Nugent, NRA has managed to pass a bill through the House that would prevent EPA from touching traditional lead ammunition, would keep federal lands open to hunting and shooting, and would grandfather polar bear hides and other products from the importation restriction provided they were taken before the species was listed as “threatened.”

UPDATE: Already pissing off the right people.

Much hay is being made of Ted Nugent’s rhetoric at the annual meeting, where he apparently urged members to figuratively “Chop their heads off in November.” Apologizes are being demanded of Mitt Romney for ever haven been within a 1/4 mile of the Nuge, and naturally the Obama Administration is helping play this up, given that the Secret Service has apparently taken some time off from procuring underaged Colombian prostitutes to take a look at the situation.

That said, I’ve never been a fan of Nugent’s over-the-top rhetoric, but that’s too bad, because there’s nothing I can do about it. Uncle Ted is one of the highest vote getters every time he’s up for the Board. Any time he’s around at Annual Meeting people are lining up around the corner to meet him, get autographs, or what have you. Our opponents are constantly telling us nonsense like the NRA leadership are out of touch with their membership. I hate to tell you guys, but the reason Nuge can dominate a board election is because a lot of members like his over-the-top, take-no-prisoners confrontational style. They get to see Ted Nugent say and do things that validates many of their core beliefs, and say it in a way they could never get away with in polite society. It is a difficult thing for our opponents to accept, but if NRA is out of touch with its members, that often runs in the other direction, and not in their direction.

To understand that, is to understand the Nuge appeal. So help me God, I don’t understand it, but a coalition made up of people just like me would be a very small one. Without the kind of people Nuge can fire up and bring to the table, we don’t really have a movement, and that’s an important thing to remember for those of us who are often embarrassed by his rhetoric.

The GOP and their political apparatus can always be counted on to run for cover and hide when the going gets tough. They are, at best, fair-weather friends to the Second Amendment. The great source of NRA’s power is derived from its membership, to harken back to an old post on the sources of NRA’s power. In addition to its membership, there’s a much larger pool of people who are influenced by NRA’s opinions but may not be currently paying dues (and thus not counted as members). I’ve seen polls suggesting this is as many as 33 million people.

So how much does ALEC turning chicken shit hurt? That depends entirely on NRA’s membership. If members stay active an engaged, this is at worst a minor setback. If NRA membership buy the notion, peddled in the media, that there are no threats to gun rights, that we’ve won, already, then this is a harbinger of the pendulum swinging back, NRA losing influence, and the insanity of groups like CSGV and the Brady Campaign carrying the day.