{"id":723,"date":"2007-10-04T19:58:40","date_gmt":"2007-10-05T00:58:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.blackgate.net\/blog\/index.php\/an-open-letter-to-the-pro-gun-community\/"},"modified":"2007-10-04T19:58:40","modified_gmt":"2007-10-05T00:58:40","slug":"an-open-letter-to-the-pro-gun-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.blackgate.net\/blog\/an-open-letter-to-the-pro-gun-community\/","title":{"rendered":"An Open Letter To The Pro-gun Community"},"content":{"rendered":"<blockquote><p>An Open Letter To The Pro-gun Community<\/p>\n<p>Gun Owners of America<br \/>\n8001 Forbes Place, Suite 102, Springfield, VA 22151<br \/>\nPhone: 703-321-8585 \/ FAX: 703-321-8408<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-embedded-content\" data-secret=\"70gTLXfHx4\"><p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.gunowners.org\/\">Home<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-embedded-content\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts\" security=\"restricted\" style=\"position: absolute; clip: rect(1px, 1px, 1px, 1px);\" title=\"&#8220;Home&#8221; &#8212; GOA\" src=\"https:\/\/www.gunowners.org\/embed\/#?secret=CGDCvh24mt#?secret=70gTLXfHx4\" data-secret=\"70gTLXfHx4\" width=\"500\" height=\"282\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Thursday, October 4, 2007<\/p>\n<p>It may be a cliche, but it is true: This letter is written not in<br \/>\nanger, but in sorrow and concern. It is written to our friends about<br \/>\nNRA staff who, tragically, have taken a course which, we believe,<br \/>\nwould be disastrous for the Second Amendment and the pro-gun<br \/>\nmovement.<\/p>\n<p>Two of us are Life Members of the NRA &#8212; one of whom was an NRA board<br \/>\nmember for over ten years. And our legislative counsel was a paid<br \/>\nconsultant for the NRA.<\/p>\n<p>So we certainly have no animus against the NRA staff, much less our<br \/>\nwonderful friends who are NRA members.<\/p>\n<p>In fact, over the last thirty years, GOA and its staff have worked<br \/>\nwith NRA to facilitate most of our pro-gun victories &#8212; from<br \/>\nMcClure-Volkmer to the death of post-Columbine gun control to a gun<br \/>\nliability bill free of anti-gun &#8220;killer amendments.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>But those who staff the NRA, without consulting the membership, have<br \/>\nnow made a series of strange and dangerous alliances with the likes<br \/>\nof Chuck Schumer, Carolyn McCarthy, and Pat Leahy. And we believe<br \/>\nthat, if allowed to continue, this will produce anti-gun policies<br \/>\nwhich the NRA staff will bitterly regret.<\/p>\n<p>Christ said, in the Sermon on the Mount, that &#8220;by their fruits, ye<br \/>\nshall know them.&#8221; And, frankly, these fruits are not likely to<br \/>\nproduce much pro-gun legislation.<\/p>\n<p>Substantively, the Leahy\/McCarthy\/Schumer bill, which NRA&#8217;s staff has<br \/>\nvigorously supported without consulting with its membership, would<br \/>\nrubber-stamp the illegal and non-statutory BATFE regulations which<br \/>\nhave already been used to strip gun rights from 110,000 veterans. It<br \/>\nwould also allow an anti-gun administration to turn over Americans&#8217;<br \/>\nmost private medical records to the federal instant check system<br \/>\nwithout a court order.<\/p>\n<p>But perhaps even worse, the bill was hatched in secret, without<br \/>\nhearings or testimony, and passed out of the House without even a<br \/>\nroll call. And now, the sponsors are trying to do the same thing in<br \/>\nthe Senate &#8212; in an effort to ram the bill through without votes or<br \/>\nfloor debate, led by anti-gun Senator Chuck Schumer. If it is good<br \/>\nlegislation, as its proponents claim, why such fears of a roll call<br \/>\nvote or debate in committee?<\/p>\n<p>Indeed, in the face of horrific dissent from the NRA&#8217;s own<br \/>\nmembership, its staff has tragically ignored arguments and dug in its<br \/>\nheels &#8212; in an almost &#8220;because-we-say-so&#8221; attitude.<\/p>\n<p>Understand this:<\/p>\n<p>* Passage of McCarthy\/Leahy\/Schumer will not quell the calls for gun<br \/>\ncontrol. To the contrary, it will embolden our enemies to push for<br \/>\nthe abolition of even more of our Second Amendment rights. Already,<br \/>\nthe Brady Campaign has indicated its intent to follow up this<br \/>\n&#8220;victory&#8221; with a push for an effective ban on gun shows.<\/p>\n<p>* Passage of McCarthy\/Leahy\/Schumer will not be viewed as an &#8220;NRA<br \/>\nvictory.&#8221; To the contrary, once the liberal media has used the NRA<br \/>\nstaff for its purposes, it will throw them away like a used Kleenex.<br \/>\nAlready, an over-confident press is crowing that this is the &#8220;first<br \/>\nmajor gun control measure in over a decade.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>* Taking the BATFE&#8217;s horrifically expansive unlawful regulations<br \/>\ndealing with veterans&#8217; loss of gun rights and making them<br \/>\nunchangeable congressionally-endorsed statutory law is NOT<br \/>\n&#8220;maintaining the status quo.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>* We are told that the McCarthy\/Leahy\/Schumer bill should be passed<br \/>\nbecause it contains special provisions to allow persons prohibited<br \/>\nfrom owning guns to get their rights restored. But there is already<br \/>\nsuch a provision in the law; it is 18 U.S.C. 925(c). And the reason<br \/>\nwhy no one has been able to get their rights restored under CURRENT<br \/>\nLAW is that funds for the system have been blocked by Chuck Schumer.<br \/>\nIt is no favor to gun owners for Chuck Schumer &#8212; the man who has<br \/>\nblocked funding for McClure-Volkmer&#8217;s &#8220;relief from disability&#8221;<br \/>\nprovisions for 15 years &#8212; to now offer to give us back a tepid<br \/>\nversion of the provisions of current law which he has tried so hard<br \/>\nto destroy.<\/p>\n<p>Finally, there is the cost, which ranges from $1 billion in the<br \/>\ncheapest draft to $5 billion &#8212; to one bill which places no limits<br \/>\nwhatsoever on spending. Thus, we would be drastically increasing<br \/>\nfunding for gun control &#8212; at a time when BATFE, which has done so<br \/>\nmuch damage to the Second Amendment, should be punished, rather than<br \/>\nrewarded.<\/p>\n<p>We would now respectfully ask the NRA staff to step back from a<br \/>\nbattle with its membership &#8212; and to join with us in opposing<br \/>\nMcCarthy\/Leahy\/Schumer gun control, rather than supporting it.<\/p>\n<p>And, to our friends and NRA members, we would ask that you take this<br \/>\nletter and pass it on to your friends and colleagues.<\/p>\n<p>Sincerely,<\/p>\n<p>Senator H.L. &#8220;Bill&#8221; Richardson (ret.)<br \/>\nFounder and Chairman<\/p>\n<p>Larry Pratt<br \/>\nExecutive Director<\/p>\n<p>Michael E. Hammond<br \/>\nLegislative Counsel<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An Open Letter To The Pro-gun Community Gun Owners of America 8001 Forbes Place, Suite 102, Springfield, VA 22151 Phone: 703-321-8585 \/ FAX: 703-321-8408 Home Thursday, October 4, 2007 It may be a cliche, but it is true: This letter is written not in anger, but in sorrow and concern. It is written to our [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-723","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-society"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>An Open Letter To The Pro-gun Community - Blackmoor Vituperative<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.blackgate.net\/blog\/an-open-letter-to-the-pro-gun-community\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"An Open Letter To The Pro-gun Community - Blackmoor Vituperative\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"An Open Letter To The Pro-gun Community Gun Owners of America 8001 Forbes Place, Suite 102, Springfield, VA 22151 Phone: 703-321-8585 \/ FAX: 703-321-8408 Home Thursday, October 4, 2007 It may be a cliche, but it is true: This letter is written not in anger, but in sorrow and concern. 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