On the NRA March -- "We don't let children determine policy!" Laura Ingraham

Wordslinger wrote:Right.  Screw schoolkids.  Let the little bastards die!  I love Bump Stocks!  The only way to put down a bad guy with a gun is with a big gun in the hand of a small child, or by furnishing a free howitzer to Mrs. McPhee in fourth grade!  

Think how many politicians haven't yet been shot.  I am the NRA!!!!

Welcome back words. Laura Ignoramus is a shrew. Even rats shudder when she blubbers her bile.

Countdown till the paid forum troll calls me a misogynist for exposing the evil of Laura Ignoramus.

https://www.abc15.com/news/data/mass-shootings-in-the-us-when-where-they-have-occurred-in-2018

These marches, which are happening all over the country, may do more to rehabilitate America's reputation throughout the world than anything our so-called leaders, Democratic or Republican,can or will do.

Deus X wrote:These marches, which are happening all over the country, may do more to rehabilitate America's reputation throughout the world than anything our so-called leaders, Democratic or Republican,can or will do.

Good thought, and valid. Will hope you're right.

Telstar wrote:

Countdown till the paid forum troll calls me a misogynist for exposing the evil of Laura Ignoramus.

Thought we'd agreed not to waste any more time on the Johnny-one-note troll.

Why do you want school kids to be helpless? The govt systems and gun free zones failed.

That's the real reality.

Wordslinger wrote: They are a stark contrast to our politicians who lost their own voices the day they were elected.  Our kids -- these kids -- would have found a better way to deal with Saddam, Assad, or Kim Jong Un. [/b]

As far as Saddam goes, it's people of our generation who didn't do enough to stop the invasion of Iraq. We saw it coming, but just let it happen. Where were the marches? Where were the defiant protests, the sit-ins and boycotts? We failed our country, we just let it happen.

They were not gun free zones. Armed Leo was there.

Of course, as it turns out "there" means Mar-a-Lago.

https://washingtonpress.com/2018/03/24/texan-matthew-mcconaughey-just-called-out-red-state-gun-lovers-at-march-for-our-lives-watch-2/

(video)

2seaoat wrote:They were not gun free zones.  Armed Leo was there.

Yes... they were gun free zones... and i'd hardly call that FL officer "armed"... he was more like a monitor with a gun... as useless as the the gun free zone signs. The reality is that there are already multiple laws that the shooters ignore. The real failure is that there are almost always warning signs and systems in place that can't seem to operate as they should from bureaucratic incompetence. That that isn't the cause of the angst is purely political conditioning. You've devolved into a useful idiot.

http://www.newscentermaine.com/mobile/article/news/local/next/a-look-at-every-school-shooting-and-the-warnings-signs-before-they-happened/73-531119651

Do you realize that the most recent domestic dispute in a school which ended with one student dead, and another in critical condition, and it took LEO less than one minute to kill the shooter. Here is the rub. He came into the school envelope with a hand gun. He walked through open doors. He had a plan. He executed the plan, and by the time the successful Leo shot him dead, he had won.

No, If I want to take my front door off the hinges and watch people come into my home and do criminal acts......do you think the first thing which comes to my mind is having an armed LEO sitting in my living room. Of course not as common sense and years of the real world......people make their envelopes secure from unauthorized people. You are just spewing out failed propaganda. The kids have this right. Armed leo and more guns is counter intuitive to solving the problem. Less guns and less access to schools. My wife's school for over ten years had another set of fire doors installed with the very expensive fire mesh which could have easily been bullet proof glass except state law required the fire chicken wire doors. The secretary in the office had video and when someone came to the school she would ask them their business, and buzz them into the enclosed and locked interior doors where just like gas stations had bullet proof glass and a slide which allowed people to put things into the tray which she could review. She would issue a visitor pass and slide it back to the visitor, and then.....and only then buzz that person into the school.

Why is the idea of arming schools so counter intuitive to a logical solution for school safety? Hell, in santa rosa every morning and every evening the kids are greeted by a squad in front of their school. Why spend societal resources on more leo, when existing resource officers could rotate, and my particular fear is how vulnerable our school buses are. In that instance, and only in that instance, I would have no problem with some bus drivers being hired who have conceal and carry. The achilles heel is buses as we finally start installing safe doors, metal detectors, electronic locks and video.

Why is it a Federal solution has become considered by so many to be the first/best remedy for whatever social ill comes down the pike in this country at any particular time?   Is that how our system is supposed to work .... federalize public school issues?   

Isn't it a conservative/Republican tenet that the Federal government get out of the business of State run public schools?  Do we have school shooters routinely crossing State lines in the commission of their crimes. Is there some interstate commerce nexus?    I don't understand why any Republicans in the Congress are even contemplating any kind of Federal solutions/remedies to the "school shooter" problem at all.   (well, actually I do understand, but I'm not gonna say it out loud)  

It would be more appropriate for these kids (and others) to protest this issue at their local school boards, State Depts of Educ, and State legislatures.  That's where the responsibility truly lies.  School security is an issue for local school districts superintendents and school boards ... not the Federal government.  Some districts/States may wish to hire more resource officers; some may wish to beef up physical security and access controls at public schools; some districts/States may wish to have programs for arming certain non-LEO school personnel; some may take a combination approach of several things; some may wish to beef up programs for at-risk students;  and there may even be some school districts satisfied with their security programs.  The people of Oakland CA might decide the best remedy is to strip search every student every day ... while in Montana they might want to just give every student a gun when they walk in the schoolhouse door.  Whatever .... local solutions for local schools.    If school districts and States don't have enough money for whatever remedies they decidre to apply in their individual school districts, well then the people in those States/localities can vote for a State property tax increase ... right?    No new Federal programs, laws, regulations, monies; or further restriction of Constitutionally protected rights necessary.

2seaoat wrote: .... and my particular fear is how vulnerable our school buses are.  In that instance, and only in that instance, I would have no problem with some bus drivers being hired who have conceal and carry.  The achilles heel is buses as we finally start installing safe doors, metal detectors, electronic locks and video.

High dollar security doors, access control systems, metal detectors, video cameras, additional officers, training for CCW teachers, etc etc .... well, okay.

But first consider my wife spent over $500 per year of our own money on classroom supplies when she was teaching elementary; and some years I know it was close to or maybe even a little over a thousand. Also .... ever see seat belts on a school bus?  Why is that?

What really needs to be demolished is the NRA with it's endless money connections to corrupt republigun politicians like little Marco Rubio. Dragging the twin ghouls Wayne LaPierre and Dana Loesch offstage would be a good start.

Deus X wrote:The surprising history of the NRA

The NRA used to tout its independence from gun manufacturers — branding itself as the century-old voice of average-joe hunters and sport shooters. Today, though, the organization bolsters its funds with million-dollar donations from 22 different gun makers, including Smith & Wesson and Beretta USA. The NRA received up to $52.6 million in industry donations between 2005 and 2013, according to one report — and from some gun and ammo companies, it makes $1 from every purchase. The gun manufacturers' influence is clear: Today, the NRA's answer to every mass shooting is more firearms — even in schools and churches. "Today's NRA is a virtual subsidiary of the gun industry," said Josh Sugarmann, executive director of the Violence Policy Center, a gun-control organization. "While the NRA portrays itself as protecting the freedom of individual gun owners, it's actually working to protect the freedom of the gun industry to manufacture and sell virtually any weapon or accessory."

http://theweek.com/articles/761135/surprising-history-nra

This ain't yer grandad's NRA. It's new and improved!

The NRA’s New Scare Tactics

With Trump in the White House, the gun lobby has transformed into a right-wing media outlet.

By LAURA RESTON
October 3, 2017

For the past eight years, Barack Obama provided the National Rifle Association with the perfect liberal bogeyman—an avatar of white anxiety who wanted to deprive gun-toting Americans of their constitutional right to bear arms. Annual gun production skyrocketed 239 percent during his presidency, and the NRA saw its membership hit a record five million. Last year, the group bet big on Donald Trump, pouring $30 million into his campaign and millions more to stack Congress with gun-friendly lawmakers. The gamble paid off: All but one of its Senate candidates was elected, and Trump has publicly aligned himself with the lobbying group. “The eight-year assault on your Second Amendment freedoms has come to a crashing end,” Trump thundered before cheering throngs at the NRA’s annual meeting in April. “You have a true friend and champion in the White House.”

But with Obama gone, and Republicans firmly in control, the NRA is suffering. In the first six months after Trump was elected, gun sales tumbled by 9 percent. Vista, the firearms manufacturer that owns brands like American Eagle and Bushnell, saw profits drop 27 percent in the first three months of the year—a reversal the company called an “unprecedented decline in demand for ammunition and firearms.” Individual contributions to the NRA, which account for roughly half its revenue, could also take a sharp plunge; the last time a Republican occupied the White House, the NRA’s membership flatlined. “They need a demon,” says Robert Spitzer, a political science professor at the State University of New York and author of The Politics of Gun Control.

Now, with no one in the White House to strike fear in the hearts of its members, the NRA is embarking on a bold new strategy. Instead of sticking solely to its pro-gun agenda—pushing for firearms in schools, allowing gun owners to carry concealed weapons across state lines—the group has joined the ranks of Breitbart and Fox News. Last fall, in the weeks before the election, the NRA launched its very own streaming service called NRATV. Some of the 34 shows it produces—from Armed & Fabulous to Trust the Hunter in Your Blood—are little more than infomercials for gun manufacturers, who sponsor the programs to drum up business. But many of the shows focus on issues far beyond the NRA’s traditional purview, from immigration to the “fake news” media.

“We’re seeing the rise of a new NRA,” says Adam Winkler, a UCLA law professor whose latest book, Gunfight, chronicles the battle over gun rights. “It’s long been committed to a die-hard approach to gun policy; they focused like a laser beam on Second Amendment issues. Now it’s focused on immigration, race, health care. We’re seeing the NRA become an extreme right-wing media outlet, not just a protector of guns.”


The swaggering hosts of NRATV, clad in baseball hats and golf shirts, go after their opponents with a ferocity that would make Rush Limbaugh blush: Hillary Clinton (“emotionally hysterical, blind drunk”); Lena Dunham (“wants to make conservatives look bad”); Rolling Stone (“blinded by bias”); Don Lemon (“your lies push division, hatred, and violence”). Cam Edwards, a mild-mannered Oklahoman who hosts a three-hour talk show on weekdays, interviews writers from the Daily Caller, columnists from Town Hall, and owners of shooting ranges. Oliver North drops by to discuss North Korea’s latest nuclear launch. Jim Geraghty of The National Review calls in to discuss angry vegans.

Other segments go a step further, portraying liberals as dangerous insurgents: activists who “openly call for the assassination of our president,” protesters who “set fire to buildings and attack people in the streets,” and “chaos creators who want to impose their will upon us, through their violence and lies.” NRATV’s imagery only adds to the fearmongering; a controversial ad that aired in April featured grainy black-and-white clips of torched buildings, trash cans lit on fire, and a Trump supporter beaten bloody, his face wrapped in bandages. Even the network’s motto echoes like a warning shot: “The truth is under fire.”

It’s a strategy sure to win supporters on the far right. Like Fox News, NRATV routinely parrots ultraconservative talking points, creating a familiar echo chamber for its viewers. Even after a young woman was killed at a rally of white supremacists in Charlottesville, hosts on the network continued to denounce the “violent left.” Grant Stinchfield, one of NRATV’s most strident voices, has called on police to round up Antifa members and teach them “what it’s truly like to live in a fascist community.”

Like Fox News, NRATV routinely parrots ultraconservative talking points, creating an echo chamber for viewers.
Such rhetoric marks a decided shift for the NRA. Rarely has the lobbying group aligned itself so closely with a single strand of the Republican Party. As recently as 2010, it was still spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to back conservative Democrats who opposed gun control. (Even Bernie Sanders once received an NRA endorsement.) “Now that there’s a president in office that their base likes, they have to make Americans afraid of one another,” says Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America. “They’re exploiting fear in America to sell guns.”

In the long run, however, the NRA’s new sales strategy could backfire. As more and more Americans earn college degrees and move to cities, support for gun control continues to grow. Latinos—who will comprise more than 28 percent of the U.S. population by 2060—favor gun control at a much higher rate than the rest of the country. “In a lot of ways, the NRA is facing the same demographic problems that the Republican Party faces,” says Winkler, the UCLA professor. “You need to appeal to new demographics in this changing America.”

Appealing to new demographics, in fact, is part of what made the NRA into one of America’s most powerful lobbying operations. Founded in 1871 as a marksmanship organization, the group has always been careful to follow the market: It reached out to hunters as outdoor activities became popular in the 1950s, and to homeowners terrified of urban decay and rising crime in the 1970s. “It was a new message that fit the changing time,” Winkler says. “The NRA has been remarkably successful as a political organization because of its ability to shift to reflect changing demographics.”

But now, with its turn to the extreme right, the NRA is bucking America’s broader demographic trends. In July 2016, for example, when Philando Castile was shot to death in the front seat of his car after telling a police officer that he was carrying a gun, the lobbying group could have welcomed black gun owners, publicly defending their right to bear arms. After all, one-third of all African Americans have a gun in their home, up from 19 percent just three years ago. “Here was a golden opportunity,” says Spitzer, the political scientist. “But they were dead silent. They understood that they ran the risk of alienating their conservative white constituency.”

NRATV does have one black host: Colion Noir, an eloquent gun aficionado and former YouTube star whom the lobbying group recruited during Obama’s second term. But as Trump proved that the GOP could still win elections by stoking the fear and hatred of its core supporters, Noir, like the NRA as a whole, has adopted the rhetoric of the alt-right. Once a supporter of Black Lives Matter, he now denounces it as a “weaponized race-baiting machine pushing the extreme liberal Democratic agenda.”

As a marketing arm of the gun industry, the NRA has long understood that fear sells—but now it has a new media platform from which to broadcast a daily drumbeat of extremism and paranoia. “I’m not even sure it’s a dog whistle anymore,” says Watts, the gun control advocate. “It’s just a whistle—to anyone in their base who’s willing to listen. They see the future: They’re selling guns to fewer people. Their demographic is older, white men. They have to create a culture war—to make Americans afraid of each other.”

https://newrepublic.com/article/145001/nra-new-scare-tactic-gun-lobby-remaking-itself-arm-alt-right

*************

NRA spokesperson and piece of trash Dana Loesch:


“They use their media to assassinate real news. They use their schools to teach children that their president is another Hitler. They use their movie stars and singers and award shows to repeat their narrative over and over again. And then they use their ex-president to endorse the resistance.

All to make them march, make them protest, make them scream racism and sexism and xenophobia and homophobia and smash windows, burn cars, shut down interstates and airports, bully and terrorize the law abiding — until the only option left is for police to do their jobs and stop the madness. And when that happens, they’ll use it as an excuse for their outrage. The only way we stop this, the only way we save our country and our freedom is to fight this violence of lies with the clenched fist of truth. I’m the National Rifle Association of America and I’m freedom’s safest place.”

fox & friends is nicer to your march if it includes neo-nazis https://t.co/5oBhGd57gW

Check out @existentialfish's Tweet: https://twitter.com/existentialfish/status/978315487577812994?s=09