I’m sure we’ve all heard the plaintive cry from the “practical,” weak-kneed compromise apologists: I know XYZ isn’t the best bill/ law/candidate but if we don’t support it/him/her we’ll get something/someone even worse. You hard-liners/gun-nuts are so unreasonable! A-yup; unreasonable is a pretty darned good way to describe me. Indeed I have written on this subject before and I undoubtedly will again until the Second Amendment (and the rest of the Bill of Rights) is treated as if it were actually the law of the land instead of a laundry-list of items the police state has to tiptoe around (or just stomp right through as the so often do) . . .
It was reasoning like this that led the NRA to support the “cop-killer” handgun bullet ban which meant inexpensive alternatives to lead were banned (hmm, and now they’re going after lead bullets…coincidence?). So an increasing number of what were previously considered rifle calibers are affected since manufacturers are producing rifle caliber “handguns”.
It was thinking like that which got the NRA to support Harry Reid despite his dismal voting record on Second Amendment issues.
It was thinking like that which got the NRA to help write the MD handgun ban.
It was thinking like that which has given us a long line of nominally “pro-gun” politicians who are often ambivalent (if not actively hostile) to the idea of treating the Second Amendment as if it were, you know, the law of the land. Politicians who “support the Second Amendment” but are willing to extend the Clinton ugly-gun ban. Politicians who write bills (and appear in ads supporting state legislation) to close the non-existent gun show “loophole” but still gain NRA endorsements.
Likewise the NRA’s support for the Instant Check system was meant to “save us” from waiting periods reinforced the ineffable monstrosity of prohibited persons which the NRA had a hand in crafting when they helped write the 1968 G.C.A. Now all the antis have to do is slowly but surely expand the prohibited person criteria.
Remember the VA’s stance on vets who needed a fiduciary trustee to help with their finances? Getting behind on your bills should not result in being reported to the FBI as mentally defective.
A few years back there was a movement in some states to add juvenile crimes to their prohibited persons lists, This sounds “perfectly reasonable” on its face. It isn’t. Remember that there are provisions for juveniles to be tried as adults for serious or repeat offenders; these new provisions would have swept up the inept and unlucky.
Remember the poor schlub in Texas who, after a morning of duck hunting drove to school and deliberately parked off-campus because of his shotguns? Parking on the street didn’t save him from being expelled, though. Or how about National Merit Scholar Lindsay Brown who didn’t realize a kitchen knife had fallen out of a moving box until too late and wound up charged with felony possession? Charges were eventually dropped, but given that the presumption of innocence has taken a serious beating in the last few years, it may not be too long before the antis start pressing for people arrested for felonies to be prohibited. After all, everyone knows that most of those scumbags are guilty but got plea bargained down to a misdemeanor because of busy court schedules.
‘But what do you want us to do? Should we just let even worse laws get passed?’ asks the compromise monkey. To which I reply, Hell No! You fight the bastards tooth and nail and you promise that come election time, whoever voted for that “worse” bill will be remembered, and not fondly. Then if it passes anyway, you fight to repeal it. If you had a hand in crafting the damned thing you can hardly A) hold it against people who voted for it or 2) work against it after it passes.
‘But you’ll waste all your political capital that way,’ says the tofu eating surrender-monkey. Except, you won’t. I can’t remember who I heard the story from – somebody’s grandfather I believe – but during the Depression he was in one of those WPA labor camps. The first day he was there, someone tried to start something and Grandpa went after the fellow like gangbusters. He said after that he never had any problems with the bullies and trouble-makers. “Did you kick the dude’s ass,” I inquired? “Oh no,” GrandPa said, “I lost the fight, but the other fellow knew he’d been in a scrap, and word got around that I wasn’t a pushover. So they left me alone.”
The other fellow knew he’d been in a scrap. That’s the key in fistfights and political fights.