When I first heard the NRA was refusing to meet with President Obama after his request for meetings to discuss the aftermath of the Tucson shooting, I was concerned that we were making a mistake. Now that I read the NRA response, I get it.
… to focus a national dialogue on guns — and not criminals or mental health issues — misses the point entirely.
…
We agree with your assertion that “Americans by and large rightly refrained from finger-pointing” in light of the shooting in Tucson. In truth, the professional, corps of gun control lobbyists moved with lighting speed to exploit the tragedy.
Yes … indeed they did. There were many posts and news releases right after the incident in which anti-gun groups reveled in the loss of life and what they perceived as a means of passing new gun control.
But while I agree with all the talking points of the NRA, what this response really shows is that the NRA has done an analysis and concluded that any anti-gun laws decided upon in this conference are going nowhere, so there’s no reason to be there. Sitting in a room with anti-gun groups in meetings moderated by an anti-gun administration would be nothing but a negative unless you truly need to do damage control to try and temper the outcome. If you don’t have to worry about the outcome, the whole spectacle just becomes an opportunity for anti-gun forces to draw the NRA representatives into trick questions and give the Main Stream Media fodder to attack them.
So this is all good news. As I’ve told the anti-gun bloggers out there who complain we pro-gun people don’t want to negotiate with them on one gun a month, no private gun sales, etc. … at this point in time, on the Federal level, negotiating gun laws doesn’t mean we negotiate with them on new gun restrictions to pass, it means they have to negotiate with us on how many anti-gun laws we repeal or soften.
That reality may change without notice, but apparently it’s still the way it is. The momentum is with us, and we’re going to ignore your cries for all those same old laws that haven’t worked anywhere else in the U.S. or the world and aren’t going to work now.
Bravo NRA. It’s a politically turbulent time, but hopefully we’re still winning as well as you believe we are.
And apparently President Obama realizes we’re winning as well. He posted his gun control based response to Tucson not in the NY Times or Washington Post, but in a Tucson newspaper. On the weekend. When Japan had just suffered the worst catastrophe in their history (other than WWII) and all the news reports were focused on widespread fears of a major radiation release from their damaged nuclear reactors and horrendous loss of life. And Mr. Obama’s response was a whole lot of political speak, not asking for anything specific (like a ban on large capacity magazines/clips) or background checks on all gun exchanges, but rather speaking of the need to talk and leaving his language wide open to support whatever happens. But not committing to anything in case it doesn’t happen. Make no mistake, to date Mr. Obama has not pledged one penny’s worth of political capital for the anti-gun movement.
Good news. Looks like it’s business as usual, so on to passing nationwide CCW and other pro-gun measures. Like eliminating the ban against carrying in Post Office parking lots/lobbies.
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