Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Open Letter To The NRA

Dear National Rifle Association - Political Victory Fund:

Judging by the NRA’s recent communications and publications it’s becoming clear that NRA is conditioning its members to accept an NRA endorsement of “maverick” Senator John McCain. As a life member of the NRA, a gun owner and an American, I ask in the strongest terms that you do NOT endorse Senator McCain for president.

John McCain is NO friend of the Second Amendment, gun owners or the NRA. He stated in your recent puff piece interview, “While we have disagreed at times on some issues, I have never tried to hide my positions, or to say one thing and do another.” If John McCain’s biggest selling point is that he prefers to stab us in the front, rather than the back, why endorse him?

McCain has supported severe restrictions on gunshows (potentially shutting them down), has supported mandatory storage laws (so much for instant self-defense), and considered supporting the ban on so-called “assault weapons,” but his biggest slap in the NRA’s face was the McCain-Feingold “Incumbent Protection Act.” During the debates on this bill, the NRA was mentioned BY NAME as one of the groups that the bill sought to shut up. NRA`s own Wayne LaPierre called it "the most significant change in the First Amendment since the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798, which tried to make it a crime to criticize a member of Congress." In short, John McCain has not earned the NRA’s endorsement, even by being the (slightly) lesser of two evils.

Why should we trust McCain to stand up against the gun-control schemes of a Democrat Congress when he has conducteded all of his previous dealings with liberal Democrats with only slightly less zeal than Monica Lewinsky? John McCain will betray the NRA the first chance he gets, if he thinks it will win him an approving nod from the mainstream media.

Endorsement by the NRA should mean that a candidate is a committed friend of American gun owners. John McCain is not that. The NRA should not act as a rubberstamp committee for whomever has an “R” after their name on the ballot. There are third-party candidates that you could endorse, Libertarian Party nominee Bob Barr (who even sat on the NRA Board of Directors from 2001 to 2007) for instance. Even not endorsing a presidential candidate at all would be better than endorsing John McCain.

In conclusion, please do NOT endorse John McCain. He doesn’t deserve the support of such a fine organization as the National Rifle Association.

Sincerely,
Ben

3 comments:

Bawb said...

Alas, the NRA has long since given in to accepting the lesser of two evils, being defensive rather than offensive, and compromising good to receive a little less bad. Just like the GOP. "Yeah, well, our guy may suck, but that other guy sucks more." Hardly a basis for anything remotely resembling decent leadership.

Ben said...

NRA's initial reply:

Thank you for your email regarding the upcoming presidential election and John McCain. As you are aware, we have not yet come out with our grades or potential endorsement for this race; archived grades for each of the candidates are available on our website, www.nrapvf.org. I will be certain to pass your message regarding McCain’s history with firearms issues on to the appropriate office for review. We appreciate your support; if you have further questions or need more information, please contact us at (800) 392-8683.

Bawb said...

Wow. Someone actually read the letter AND responded. That actually does impress me about them. Many years ago, I parted ways with the NRA over a simple address change, which they could not seem to figure out even with standard change-of-address cards, phone calls, emails, and letters from my end. I thought they had become just another nameless, faceless bureaucracy with its hand out. Now you get an actual response, written by an intelligent being. I really am impressed.

The GOP, on the other hand, at both state and national levels, never answered my "resignation" letters. The lights are on, but they pretend not to be home.