The N.R.A. Is Naming Names

The New York Times ^ | 10-13-03 | BOB HERBERT

[johnny7]

The National Rifle Association doesn't call it an enemies list, but deep in the recesses of the organization's Web site is a long, long compilation of the names of groups and individuals that the N.R.A. considers unfriendly.

I'm happy to report that I'm on the list, but my name is truly one among very many. The A.F.L.-C.I.O. is there, and the American Academy of Pediatrics. The Children's Defense Fund and the Lutheran Office for Governmental Affairs are there. The United States Catholic Conference, the U.S. Conference of Mayors and the Y.W.C.A. of the U.S.A. are all there.

Among the celebrities on the list are Dr. Joyce Brothers, Candice Bergen, Walter Cronkite, Doug Flutie, Michelle Pfeiffer, Vinny Testaverde, Moon Zappa and the Temptations. Also on the list are the Kansas City Chiefs, Hallmark Cards, the Sara Lee Corporation, Ben & Jerry's, and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas City. I'm sure there's a method to the N.R.A. madness, but to tell you the truth, all I can see is the madness.

All of the groups and individuals listed are supposed to be anti-gun. I can't speak for the Kansas City Chiefs or Moon Zappa, but I'm not anti-gun. I think soldiers, the police and certain other law enforcement officials should have guns. Civilians, however, should be required to demonstrate a good reason for having firearms. We should go to great lengths to keep guns out of the hands of children, criminals and insane people. All guns should be registered. And all gun owners should be properly trained and licensed. The N.R.A. sees this as a radical, even lunatic position. So I guess we're at odds.

I asked Andrew Arulanandam, the N.R.A.'s director of public affairs, why the list had been compiled and displayed on the Web site. He said, "We put the list together in response to many requests by our members wanting to know which organizations support the rights of law-abiding Americans to keep and bear arms, and which organizations didn't." I asked what he thought his members would do with the information. He said, "How they use the information is at their own discretion."

I recently read Jules Witcover's book "The Year the Dream Died: Revisiting 1968 in America." The murders that year of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy were among the great tragedies of U.S. history. Both were killed by freaks with guns. What is not so well known now is that President Lyndon Johnson tried, in the aftermath of the murders, to get Congress to pass legislation requiring the registration of guns and the licensing of owners. The gun lobby fought and killed that effort, and it continues to fight to the death any attempt to bring sanity to the manufacture, sale and possession of guns. Between 1968, the year of Johnson's failure to get his legislation passed, and 2001, the last year for which complete statistics are available, more than one million Americans were killed by firearms.

No number of gun-related fatalities or serious injuries is sufficient to deter the N.R.A. from its fanatical course. A former N.R.A. lawyer has admitted in an affidavit in a lawsuit that distributors and gun dealers have for years been illegally diverting guns that end up in the hands of criminals, and that the industry has closed its eyes to the practice.

Instead of fighting to end this threat to the public's safety, the gun lobby and its allies in Congress are pushing legislation that would protect the practice by granting special immunity from liability to gun manufacturers and sellers.

The big item on the legislative agenda next year is the federal assault-weapons ban signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1994. Because of a sunset provision, the law will expire next September if it is not renewed by Congress and the president. The gun lobby has made it clear that it will do all in its power to bury the ban. The plan is to not even let the issue come up for a vote.

The N.R.A. Web site and its enemies list (which looks like nothing so much as a broad cross-section of America) has led inevitably to a counter Web site, nrablacklist.com, created by a group called stopthenra.com. In addition to facing off against the gun lobby on legislative matters, the new group and its site are inviting people to volunteer for a spot on the N.R.A. enemies list. Ah, free expression. 

[neverdem]

There was a report in the Journal of the American Medical Association in August 2000 about the effect of the Brady Bill. About the only positive effect that was found was a reduction in suicide by firearms in men 50 - 60 years old, IIRC. However, the total suicide rate for that group remained the same, meaning they just found another way to commit suicide.

Another interesting fact was that in a recent year, maybe 2000, the weapon used to commit homicide was not a firearm about 43% of the time.

Thanks for the stats.

[tet68]

All guns should be registered. And all gun owners should be properly trained and licensed. The N.R.A. sees this as a radical, even lunatic position.

And so it is.

Come and take them Mr.Journalist.
It's so easy if you try, just try, try.

[tet68]

Heck, if the author thinks this list is scary, he should see the one Morris Dees keeps. Now THOSE people are SCARY!

[eniapmot]

If you take all the Hollyweirdos out, the list is not so long.
Too bad about Sara Lee, though. I've been eating one of her poundcakes every day for decades.

[Squantos]

Yep but he's keeping "their" lists..........moot point (to them)............:o)

Stay Safe !!

[CyberCowboy777]

BTTT!

[eniapmot]

Isn't he a brother of the guy who tried to corner the silver market? Kind of like Soros (why isn't he on this list, btw..)

[tet68]

Great find, where did you get that.

Uncle Pekka bump.

[Snerfling]

include suicide figures since it almost doubles the number of "gun deaths" annually.

Probably another 50%+ is inner-city gang related crime involving males between 16-25.

I don't recall where I saw the stat, but crime levels in typical Republican voting rural areas & suburbs are no different from any western European country.

[CyberCowboy777]

Thx for the numbers

[Mulder]

"I'm not anti-gun. I think soldiers, the police and certain other law enforcement officials should have guns. Civilians, however, should be required to demonstrate [to the government] a good reason for having firearms."

Well, at least the seditious SOB is honest about his beliefs.

Most of the 'domestic enemies of the Constitution' will plainly state they are anti-gun, but their 'anti-gun' stance goes away when it's a masked JBT carrying an MP-5.

I suspect that a lot of sheeple "feel" that way, which demonstrates just how indoctrinated they are against the uniquely American ideal that the people possess all the power and loan only certain enumerated privlidges to the state. Not the other way around.

[Mulder]

If I were a "domestic enemy of the Constitution" I'd be far less worried about being on a list of some bureacratic organization in DC, and far more worried about being on the list of a few million Patriots who have taken an oath to defend the Constitution.

[archy]

Great find, where did you get that.

Uncle Pekka bump.

Terve! And a yapping pystykorvaa bump right back to you, Ukka-pekka!

All sorts of outstanding ruminations and fulminations from the late Finnish Master of the field, P.T. *Pete* Kekkonen can be found at the following site/s:

*Kickback* questions and answers and technical dialogues, #1-#18

*Finnish Gunwriters on the Web* [English edition] all sorts of articles and observations, technical, historical, political and sometimes very mixed.

[Noumenon]

I got a reply to my inquiry as to AARP's take on firearms ownership. My question was - "Where does AARP stand with respect to an individual's right to firearms ownership?" The response was as follows:

Thank you for contacting AARP headquarters on the issue of state and federal gun policies. We appreciate hearing from you. This is a difficult subject for people to discuss without misunderstanding. Even though you may not agree with AARP's objectives on this one issue, I hope you find our work toward prescription drug coverage in Medicare, for example, and many other important issues worthy of your continued support.

The AARP policymaking process is a long one, beginning in September and continuing through February annually. AARP's all-volunteer National Legislative Council thoughtfully develops each policy after reviewing the pros and cons and makes recommendations to the Board of Directors, also a distinguished cross-section of volunteers. Public policies are reconsidered and approved anew each year. Input from members like you, along with other members' suggestions, are carefully reviewed and contribute to establishing AARP priorities.

At this time, the Board of Directors has recently restated AARP policy to reduce misunderstanding and better fit the current legal environment on this issue. We do continue to support careful measures to restrict the availability of handguns to certain populations. Yet, our policy does not preclude responsible citizens who are educated in gun safety from gun ownership.

However, respected research continues to indicate that the use of firearms in assaults and robbery-particularly handguns-is directly linked to the high death rate from interpersonal violence in the USA compared with other industrialized countries. At a time when having enough resources to provide adequate healthcare for older Americans is a special concern for AARP, the medical costs of treating gunshot victims exceeds $1 billion a year.

The prevalence of random violence featuring handguns in some neighborhoods has resulted in numbers of older people becoming virtual prisoners in their homes. Increasingly, families are suffering the loss of children and grandchildren who are the victims of violent crimes and senseless shootings. While registration requirements do not eliminate criminal or psychotic misuse of handguns, such requirements reduce the availability of guns, just as laws do not eliminate but do reduce the availability of illegal narcotics. Reduced availability to inappropriate users means lives saved.

I want to emphasize that AARP policy does not preclude gun ownership for responsible citizens, just as no federal or state law precludes ownership for responsible citizens. Our policy now states:

"Congress should eliminate gaps in and strengthen enforcement of the Brady Act and other federal gun laws. States should enact legislation to eliminate gaps in and strengthen enforcement of federal and state gun laws, particularly with regard to possession by juveniles, convicted domestic abusers and those under domestic violence restraining orders."

I hope this information has been helpful. While you may disagree with the Board on this particular policy, we hope that many other issues, objectives, and services of AARP so beneficial to older Americans encourage you to remain or become a valued member of the association. We appreciate your participation.

Please do not hesitate to contact us if there is any way your headquarters staff may be of assistance in the future. Thank you again for taking the time to get in touch. It is an important part of my job to consider carefully the concerns of every member.

June
Member Service
Member@aarp.org

I report - you decide.

[Noumenon]

Disarm them [us] and he'll feel; so much better, safer to go to what he wants to do next. Interestingly, he hasn't told us what that is. But I bet that before it's concluded, he won't like it much better than most of the rest of us.

History speaks eloquently to the truth of that statement. History also teaches us that the first ones to get their nine grams down in some dark basement are the very same loudmouths who applauded, cheered and voted history's monsters into power. Thank Herbert'll 'get it' in his last few moments before he really 'gets it'?

[archy]

Disarm them [us] and he'll feel; so much better, safer to go to what he wants to do next. Interestingly, he hasn't told us what that is. But I bet that before it's concluded, he won't like it much better than most of the rest of us.

History speaks eloquently to the truth of that statement.
History also teaches us that the first ones to get their nine grams down in some dark basement are the very same loudmouths who applauded, cheered and voted history's monsters into power. Thank Herbert'll 'get it' in his last few moments before he really 'gets it'?

It's my sincere hope that it comes to him much sooner, delivered to him personally by one of the Americans who've had it with him and his kind.

But if it does, I don't think he will be the first.

-archy-/-

[FixitGuy]

"Civilians, however, should be required to demonstrate a good reason for having firearms."

The very idea that someone wants to take away my Second Amendment Rights has me looking through the Yellow Pages for "Gun Stores"!

Best reason I can think of to be armed!

[Bernard Marx]

We should go to great lengths to keep guns out of the hands of children, criminals and insane people. All guns should be registered. And all gun owners should be properly trained and licensed. The N.R.A. sees this as a radical, even lunatic position. So I guess we're at odds.

Mr. Herbert is a fanatical believer in the First Amendment. I say his proposal should also apply to the ownership of computers, typewriters, yellow legal pads and any machine capable of generating written words to be published or broadcast for public consumption.

If the pen is mightier than the sword (or gun) the person who is allowed to use it in the public prints should be vetted for sanity, responsibility and maturity far more thorougly than mere gun owners. Herbert has demonstrated over and over that he is an irresponsible and immature user of word processing technology. I say his computer should be confiscated and destroyed at the earliest possible moment.

[FixitGuy]

The stance AARP has taken here is predictable. They are a high profile organization and therefore historically feel the have to be PC!

Most cops (it is my understanding) feel that a citizen has the right to defend himself, but the Fraternal Order of Police take the Brady stance.

The ADL takes the same stance, forgetting that Jews were massacred horribly by the Nazis.

Makes NO sense!

[Dan from Michigan]

I'm not anti-gun. I think soldiers, the police and certain other law enforcement officials should have guns

He's not anti-gun. He's anti-freedom and anti-constitution, and frankly, anti-American.

Civilians, however, should be required to demonstrate a good reason for having firearms.

I have one. The 2nd Amendment.

All guns should be registered.

They are. At least in my state. Been to Detroit lately?

continues to fight to the death any attempt to bring sanity to the manufacture, sale and possession of guns.

Emotional tripe with no basis in reality.

more than one million Americans were killed by firearms

You mean one million guns have shot someone on their own. What kind of gun is that? Is that like "Johnny 5" in Short Circuit?

deter the N.R.A. from its fanatical course

And nothing deters the NY Slimes from lying, Jayson Blairing, and using whatever tactics it can to its fanatical anti-freedom agenda out of step with mainstream America.

A former N.R.A. lawyer has admitted in an affidavit in a lawsuit that distributors and gun dealers have for years been illegally diverting guns that end up in the hands of criminals

Ricker's testimony didn't work in court.

would protect the practice by granting special immunity from liability to gun manufacturers and sellers.

Finally something to put the tort ambulance chasing Fascists in their place.

nrablacklist.com, created by a group called stopthenra.com.

Thanks for the Free Press. I'll make my business decisions based on that.

BTW - Your paper sucks.