A columnist for a major American newspaper has called for the State Department to include the National Rifle Association on their list of state sponsors of terrorism. Let that sink in for a moment. New York Daily News columnist Linda Stasi wants America’s oldest civil rights organization classified as a terrorist group. Which would make NRA members terrorists or, at the very least, supporters of terrorism. Commentators have snickered and pointed out the delicious irony of someone named Stasi advocating the use of federal power to roll back an enumerated civil right. But branding the NRA a terrorist organization could well be a sign of things to come. Check out Stasi’s “logic” . . .
One terrorist group is responsible for more civilian deaths since December 2012 (the Sandy Hook massacre) than Al Qaeda, Boko Haram, Hamas and the Taliban. Yet it is the only nearly-state sponsored terrorist group that is not listed by the U.S. State Department as such.
It is the National Rifle Association and for their unending lobbying that’s kept a lid on gun control we now have 428 times more American deaths by gun than deaths by foreign terrorists.
Stasi’s column totes up 87,423 deaths since Sandy Hook, then credits the pride of Fairfax with the deaths of every random mugger’s target, every gang-banger’s rival, every disarmed pizza delivery dude who’s been gunned down. Not to mention suicides and all the victims of broken specimens like Adam Lanza, Dylann Roof, Jared Loughner, Vester Flanagan and Chris Harper-Mercer. Got that? The NRA is to blame for all of those deaths, by actively and deliberately supporting the conditions that led to those deaths.
But wait, you say, the State Department’s list is restricted to foreign governments that fund and promote terrorism to further their twisted ideological goals. Don’t bother Linda with bureaucratic details.
…(T)he NRA should take its rightful place on the State Department list of terrorist organizations, because its influence is more of an immediate threat to the lives of our citizens than foreign terrorists.
Although the NRA is not an officially state-sponsored organization it is the supporter of the state with its massive member and lobbyist donations to our elected officials.
After the last no-vote on gun control, the British newspaper The Guardian did an analysis that showed 45 of the 48 senators who torpedoed gun control in Congress “have received money from firearms lobbyists.”
Stated more clearly, lobbying legislators in support of an enumerated civil right is a terrorist act. Surprised? You shouldn’t be. If it’s OK to call for charging those who don’t believe in the theory of global warming with racketeering, calling out the National Rifle Association for support of terrorism isn’t much of a leap. But it is deeply worrying….
If and when a spree killer is revealed to be an NRA member, an anti-gun Executive could take Stasi’s advice and then unleash the full force of the nation’s enormous anti-terrorist apparatus against the NRA and its members, using pre-existing unconstitutional legal powers. All hell would break loose – justifying further federal violence. Unlikely? Yes. Inadvisable? Certainly. Impossible? No.
I’d like to hear a CNN journalist ask Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, Martin O’Malley to disavow Stasi’s suggestion at the first Democratic debate. Meanwhile, keep your powder dry.