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My thoughts sent to Ken: ...

Excellent point by counterpoint response, RJL. Thank you. I especially liked what you wrote about the NRA. The ban camp portrays or citizens' organizations like GOA, JPFO, and the NRA as "industry lobbies." There's a three-fold lie in that slander.

We love our country and we have banded together to defend our rights and the rights of all American citizens. This is not an "industry." If it were an industry, so would first amendment rights organizations and privacy rights organizations be. It so happens that the second amendment needs even more valiant defense than others because it isn't as easy to explain; our founding fathers believed it was obvious that after years of disarmament by the British empire, every American would revel in his right to keep and bear arms. But then that pernicious and self-serving tendency for government to step in and protect the people by stripping them of their freedoms began. And so the second amendment constantly needs defending. After the AWB falls, it will come under renewed attack. We must be prepared. These organizations will be there, helping us focus our attention and providing us with a means for having our voices heard.
We have no political agenda that we all share beyond protecting the second amendment. As Tom de Lay has said in interviews with the NRA, gun owners tend to be concerned about other rights as well, though. For example, free speech is just as important to us. This is why many gun owners belonging to these organizations dislike campaign finance reform because it fails to accomplish its goals while silencing us. Yes, silencing us. We have joined these groups in order to send a message to Washington and our state politicians. Yet that very act is smeared as if we were putting patriotic politicians in our back pockets. What does it mean to oppose a constitutional amendment without proposing an amendment that nullifies it? Consider the legal and government largess that has acrued around bans and regulations. Opposing the second amendment is a cottage industry for government bureaucrats and lawyers. Furthermore, striking fear in the hearts of citizens is a good means for getting reelected, collecting donations, and generally staying in the public eye. Who is in whose back pocket now?
Gun dealers and firearms manufacturers are the salt of the earth. They are a hard, brave lot that weathers legal risk and that infrequent situation where their customers make grave mistakes with their products. They put their reputations on the line, and they pony up to the task of keeping Americans armed. How does this help us? It serves our common and mutual defense. It serves our military. It serves our hobbies. And it serves our history. Indeed, these brave souls need protecting and encouragement. Without them, we would be overrun by criminals and barbarians alike. Our arms are our security and our freedom. Again, who is the patriot organization here, the unconstitutional demagogues or the historically critical arms industry? I choose to stand with the arms industry. Without them we would be quickly enslaved by our enemies.

From the sheer dishonesty of the ban camp, many ought to mistrust them. I think their constant attacks on our natural tendency to freely associate for the mutual defense of our rights is almost Soviet in the depth of its slander.