Are You An NRA Member?

[Alrightmiami19c]

• Yes
• No

I’m just curious.

Personally I am. Are you?

[magnumd]

Nope

[verne]

Their are only 5 million of us or so

[anon50325502]

Nope.

*Thinking about joining the GOA.

[Uncle_Gabby]

No. I go back and forth on joining.

Lopar brought up a good point in another thread about the NRA’s position on net neutrality as if I give a shit about their position on Net Neutrality at all. In fact if I were a member I wouldn’t want them to spend any political capital whatsoever on other nonsense and focus on their core mission.

I did like their take on bump stocks, let the ATF review it. Who cares, bump stocks are trash.

[verne]

The GOA, for those who see the NRA as soft on the gun issue.

[anon50325502]

Lol, is that the case…? I haven’t really looked into it. Someone suggested it to me.

[NickViar]

Not right now. I don’t particularly care for the fact that it supports federal laws regarding firearms(although I understand why). However, I may join again next time there’s a gun show in town that offers free admission for the purchase of a membership…plus: I kind of miss getting American Rifleman every month.

[biker]

I suspect there are fewer NRA members than gun owners.

Writing as both a military veteran and a home invasion survivor, maybe a better question would be “do you support all amendments to our constitution?” Gun saved my family one night while we were watching tv. Cops came eventually.

[verne]

Yeah they’re a little harder than an NRA you got to remember that background checks are an NRA proposal

[thunderbolt23]

Nope. I’ve spent time to try and understand the real 2A, not the mythological one, so I’m not the NRA’s demographic.

[NickViar]

@thunderbolt23

As for me, I want 2d Amendment freedoms to be mainstream and - wait for it - normal - I like open carry, some level of carry on campuses even, and a more fluid gun market, and we certainly aren’t going to get there with a left-liberal Democrat in office. But then ,I have no interest in defining myself as “rebellious” because, well, I grew up.

@thunderbolt23

I just saw this, and I’ll take a shot at it.

First, assuming the really wild fantasy world of basically all the citizens versus the entire government:

The government does not produce the weapons. It buys them. The government has piles of weapons of course, but the private sector - the engineers, the defense companies, the materials companies, etc. - are in private hands. So, in one sense, we are in a different position than having a few muskets to storm the Bastille. The technology and mass production is in the citizens’ hands.

But the government has the advantage of having weapons now along with the logistics and infrastructure to use them. Could the citizens - owners of the economy - survive the onslaught enough to then turn the citizen might against the government? My guess is…probably? In part because…

I suspect that much of the military has a very strong civic duty to the government, but once the government “turned” on its people (in our very fantastical example), I do believe their would be a breakdown in discipline and loyalty, at least enough to cause serious logistical problems that the military relies on. Then, of course, Team Citizen gets legions of trained soldiers joining up.

The population is very, very, very large. And pretty smart.

I guess I would say the citizenry could beat back the government, in large part because every conventional war, there comes a time where it becomes a contest of economic productivity (if you can survive long enough). In that scenario, advantage citizens. And of course, on the non-material side, the contest of wills would go to the citizens. I would never put good money against angry, free Westerners who have made up their mind to beat back tyranny.

@thunderbolt23

No, you completely missed it. Liberals don’t like judiciaries that protect rights - they like judiciaries that invent rights and remove them from the democratic process. They also like the judiciary to take away democratic powers to make law when Liberals don’t like the policy results the laws, by way of majoritarianism, are achieving.

In short, Liberals don’t want judges to be judges - they want them to be all-wise oligarchic rulers that make policy that Liberals prefer because stubborn legislatures won’t, i.e., provide an end-around the legislative process.

@thunderbolt23

Before rushing to applaud them, ask yourself if they are doing anything of substance.

If the USSC finds that the 2d Am is not an unalloyed individual right and more of a collective right that allows states to have higher restrictions on gun ownership - which I think would be wrong - how does that affect Montana’s right to have strong individual rights for its citizens?

A “collective right” win doesn’t mean Montana has to suddenly restrict its citizens’ gun rights - it means that the federal constitution won’t get in the way if states decide to get very restrictive.

What happened in the last eight years or so, tb?

[anon50325502]

Nick throwin down that opposition research, lol.

[thunderbolt23]

@NickViar

What happened in the last eight years or so, tb?

What am I saying that is all that different?

1. On the first quote of mine, if you expand it beyond the text you cherrypicked, you’ll see I said the same thing then I just said in a thread recently: 2A fetishism is driven the juvenile need to feel rebellious and cool, not by any principled understanding of constitutional rights. As I said (quoting same quote):

@NickViar

No, I becoming more and more convinced that what is more important to these folks is not actually stronger gun freedoms, but being able to Rage Against the Machine of people trying to take away gun rights.

And as I have always said, I do think 2A freedoms to be normalized and mainstream, and we should have open, fluid markets for firearms. Guns are like power tools. They require proper respect and regulation, and are part of the normal world. What they aren’t are talismans of freedom free from society’s oversight.

2. Your cherrypicking appears to be no accident. In my second quote, which I encourage anyone to expand to read, I say:

@NickViar

I suspect that much of the military has a very strong civic duty to the government, but once the government “turned” on its people (in our very fantastical example), I do believe their would be a breakdown in discipline and loyalty, at least enough to cause serious logistical problems that the military relies on. Then, of course, Team Citizen gets legions of trained soldiers joining up.

Moreover, as I said, because firearms are produced by private citizens (and their companies), if the government turned on the people (in the fantasy hypothetical proposed), then the owners of the means of production of arms could side with citizens and arm them with things normally restricted to the government (like tanks and jets), giving Team Citizen a chance to win.

Doesn’t affect what I think of the 2A.

3. On 3, I have changed my mind - and the reason why is I have actually studied the 2A, as I mentioned in my first post in this thread. I believe there is an individual right, but it does not preclude states from exercising their traditional police powers in the name of public safety. What’s required is a constitutional balancing act and a healthy dose of respect for federalism.

The 2A was never written with a mind to interfere with a state’s power to regulate firearms and organize its militia as it saw fit. The 2A was not written to protect the citizen from a U.S. state. That’s history, not mythology. And no one can avoid it.

[NickViar]

@thunderbolt23

The 2A was never written with a mind to interfere with a state’s power to regulate firearms and organize its militia as it saw fit. The 2A was not written to protect the citizen from a U.S. state. That’s history, not mythology. And no one can avoid it.

We(you and I) can certainly agree on that. The States were originally only limited in the following ways:

No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.

No State shall, without the Consent of the Congress, lay any Imposts or Duties on Imports or Exports, except what may be absolutely necessary for executing it’s inspection Laws: and the net Produce of all Duties and Imposts, laid by any State on Imports or Exports, shall be for the Use of the Treasury of the United States; and all such Laws shall be subject to the Revision and Controul of the Congress.

No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.

[thunderbolt23]

@NickViar

No, you completely missed it. Liberals don’t like judiciaries that protect rights - they like judiciaries that invent rights and remove them from the democratic process. They also like the judiciary to take away democratic powers to make law when Liberals don’t like the policy results the laws, by way of majoritarianism, are achieving.

In short, Liberals don’t want judges to be judges - they want them to be all-wise oligarchic rulers that make policy that Liberals prefer because stubborn legislatures won’t, i.e., provide an end-around the legislative process.

Oh, and I don’t want to miss this - this criticism of Liberalism (a true one) is exactly, exactly, exactly the same criticism I have of 2A fetishist/libertarians. (And I’ve said so before.)

2A fetishists invent all sorts of “feelings” arguments to try and get around the fact that the 2A isn’t a restriction on states and the 14A was not intended to “nationalize” a right to keep and bear. They don’t like the law and history of the 2A - never bothering to read it - so they insist they have virtually unlimited rights to arms based on something else, a fuzzy notion that overrides democratic action on guns.

I beat this like a drum - libertarians aren’t strict constructionists or principled originalists, they are whatever they want to be at given time on a given issue to get to the result they want.

[NickViar]

@thunderbolt23

2A fetishists invent all sorts of “feelings” arguments to try and get around the fact that the 2A isn’t a restriction on states and the 14A was not intended to “nationalize” a right to keep and bear. They don’t like the law and history of the 2A - never bothering to read it - so they insist they have virtually unlimited rights to arms based on something else, a fuzzy notion that overrides democratic action on guns.

We can also agree on the 14th Amendment.

@thunderbolt23

I beat this like a drum - libertarians aren’t strict constructionists or principled originalists, they are whatever they want to be at given time on a given issue to get to the result they want.

Well, no; libertarianism is unrelated to the Constitution.

[anon50325502]

Well, I sure am glad the incorporation doctrine exists. I’d hate to live in a country were states can decide whether or not they want to allow free speech or the free exercise of religion or cruel and usual punishment so on and so forth.

Ya, know, since the Bill of Rights apparently means nothing beyond the Fed…

[anon50325502]

Oh, hmmmm

incorporation doctrine

[anon50325502]

Ya’ll are gonna be real sorry if a state decides to quarter Marines in your homes, lol.