Unfortunately they’ve been doing that for decades and to me it’s really poor marketing.
Yes our rights are under assault daily but every day is not a life/death emergency.
I don’t blame the NRA so much, just the idiots they hired to do the mass mailings and now email who probably get paid based on how many they send out monthly.
Another point of disconnect between US and the organization and them and the marketing firm.
So you believe our children that serve in today’s military will bomb and strafe their parents and family? I guess you don’t remember when the USSR was as powerful as we are and had more control of their citizens? Where is the USSR today?
That of course is totally off topic. Assault weapons are not sold to private citizens in the US today. And even if you took all the Semi auto 223 and 5.56 semi autos off the market how would that stop mass shooters from getting AKs, Uzis and M-16 or even M-4s.? It isn’t like banning Cocaine has kept people from getting it. Drugs flow into the country like water and we have a drug problem even with all the bans placed by the government. The criminals will have no more trouble getting the weapons they want tomorrow than they do today. It is a fact that is proven in every country it has been tried. All banning a weapon does is takes it out of the hands of people that didn’t kill masses of people and allow people that do to walk boldly into their next arena of opportunity.
I also was in the military. My weapons were assault weapons, they had a selector switch and in some cases could launch grenades So far I haven’t seen anything like that in my local sporting goods store.
You are entitled to your opinion and I respect that. But if it were ever put to a vote I would not vote to restrict either the first or the second amendment.
You say the constitution never anticipated the weapons we have today. How about the internet, cell phones and satellite technology. If we limit guns to muskets we need to take the media back to the Gutenberg press and communications back to the pony express. I believe the founding fathers anticipated technology to develop in ways they could not imagine and wrote the constitution with those developments in mind. They did not limit the second amendment to muskets or cannons but prohibited the government on infringing on the right to bear arms.
And as for the people being able to fight the government, it worked in 1776 in the US. It worked in the US Civil War and has worked many times across the world where tyrannical governments have been overthrown by the people.
Do you want the truth?
#1, I hate to be the bearer of bad news but there are 1,000’s of attempted mass murders in the USA every year and it’s just a miracle that the number of mass murders is not in the 1,000’s yearly. The top 6 largest cities in the US run by Democrats every weekend have multiple shootings by a single gunman.
#2, take those 6 cities and find a way to drop their violence and the USA drops to the bottom 10 countries for violence. But it is going to be very tricky due to #3.
#3, it is a cultural issue, because those 6 cities have a “prison culture.” They do not go to church. They do not work. They have judiciaries that turn hundreds of people loose with 20, 30, 40 misdemeanors and multiple felonies every month for serious crimes…and they are loose on iBond or with very low bail. What culture is it that pervades those 6 cities? Who is it that it out of control? The FBI crime stats may help you.
Answer these questions and you have a solution.
The libs run on a narrative regarding “mass shootings” only. It plays much better to the masses than a culture of individual violence and culture. And the liberal media only sells comercials when something big happens. The rampant crime in these 6 cities is not “news”… but the libs will include them in gun related statitics. Basically, they are hypocrites, using only what stirs the pot to an uninformed public.
Mass shootings scare the hell out of people because they are essentially “senseless” crimes and frequently rather random.
We can all understand what I call “transactional crime”, robbery etc and we can do things to protect ourselves from it.
Random mass casualty events are pretty well completely beyond our control and we can do little to avoid or prevent them unless we avoid all public spaces.
We in the US have another problem that the statisticians foist upon us. In the US Suicide is not crime but it is added to the gun Homicide rate. there are a lot of countries well above the US in Suicides per 100000 that have a lower homicide rate than we do Like Japan. But they tend to not list homicide by method in Japan. Look at Japan on list A. then look at it in list B. Criminals and people motivated do not need guns to kill. But people that are being attacked do need a way to defend themselves from criminals that intend them harm.
A: Countries ranked by Intentional homicides (per 100,000 people)
B: Suicide Rate by Country 2023
The suicide by firearm in the US might go down if all firearms are banned in the US. However, look at what happened in Australia to overall suicide rates when firearms were banned: Do Australia's Gun Laws Reduce Deaths? - #2 by Dawn
Bingo; excellent!
^^^ and that is one of many ways the stats get manipulated. 
Just like many E-Learning Courses, they have a problem with listing the percentages, rates,
comparing from year to year, the numbers of deaths and damages done. Also, covers
from blocks of years that have gone by and comparing the facts and numbers of the crime
and suicide rates.
Where am I going with this? What are the cases; does anyone care? If the issues are not
registered and listed, subjects are lost and records incomplete. Don’t you think ? How can we
change these bits and pieces of records, files, and the information that fills up our computers.
I know that people have to want to overcome the drugs, alcohol, and every abuse list in the world,
but maybe if we try, maybe we can help and recover a human being, lock up the bad enemies, and
close down a reason for someone choosing suicide or hell. I know everyone, that I am not God.
Thank you !!!
Impeach CONGRESS, not the President !
That’s a straw man argument and has no bearing on the discussion. You are acting like an anti-gun nut troll.
Folks, I I have had really good luck arguing the fact that taking the guns out of the hands of people is not the solution. The solution is to take anybody that’s too dangerous to own a gun off the streets out of the homes and lock them up I don’t care if it’s a felon I don’t care if it’s a mental problem if they’re too dangerous to have a gun they’re too dangerous to be on the street. Taking a gun away from somebody and leaving them free to walk the streets allows them to use other means to harm people are themselves and it allows them to even find a way to get another gun the problem is the people not the guns. This argument has worked very well for me with a number of anti-gun people they come to the realization it isn’t the tool it’s the person using it and if we allow them people to stay on the street we are allowing them to commit whatever acts that people are afraid of.
You have an interesting suggestion regarding those who want to harm others with a gun will do it with some other weapon If we take the gun away, @Herbert2.
However, we cannot see the future, we do not know what someone will or won’t do. If they have a mental illness, they should get help just life if they had cancer or heart disease.
Your point was drastically weakened for me when you started off bashing someone else’s viewpoint and insinuating they’re a troll. We can disagree with someone without personal attacks and bashing.
I’m not asking everyone to agree, I’m asking for respectful conversation.
I’ll say, I agree with Herbert, to a finite point. If, someone has been incarcerated for a crime, when they have paid their debt to society, I believe their rights should be restored. If we don’t trust them with a gun, should they be released back into society at all. Be it because they are violent, or not mentally stable enough. I do NOT support taking their rights, or personal property because them might commit a crime. If they have mental issues, then they need help, and that is where the system is sorely lacking. Good, quality mental healthcare. The other place we are lacking, is enforcing the penalties for crimes involving a gun we have now. Look at Chicago. A high number of crimes, with a gun, are repeat offenders that were released with little more than slap on the wrist.
Don’t mess with Texas!
It’s been quite a while since we started this discussion and we may not be able to reconnect but here is my assessment after a long hiatus:
There never was a way to motivate people who are not under some type of stress, real stress that deeply effects their lives “up close and personal”. One can see this type of stress in USMC boot camp, Army basic, SEAL and SF training.
But, please define “useful waves”. The lead up to the American Declaration of Independence took years as the American representatives to the Crown labored at petitioning the King with their grievances. Were they making “uselful waves”? Looking back one could definitely say that they wasted their time. For in the end it was only a long war that made the point to Great Britain. The Revolution is documented as having lasted from 1775-1783. Eight years of struggle and sacrifice against what was then one of, if not the most powerful nation on earth.
How easy it is to suggest doing these “nice” little things. I, too, train people who want to learn those techniques of “normal” carrying of firearms and for most that is as far as they ever want to go. Here again peace is so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains.
I cannot, by any argument I can conceive, convince those who are not desperate for change. Those who will succumb to the first hint of fear or suffering. Those who love slavery more than real Liberty. How many taxes? How many incursions on privacy? How many unlawful wars that never end? How many “rights” will have to disappear in a bureaucrats chambers?
I will trouble you no more.
@DOUG12 I’m flattered that this conversation was even still on your mind.
I agree with a lot of what you say… there’s a moment of crisis where a lot of people make a hard turn into a different way of seeing the world.
But that’s not the only way it works. One of my students, someone I was training just a couple of days ago, is making the change from a very liberal view of firearms (no need for anyone to carry, more restrictions are better, universal background checks and red flag laws are a highly desirable thing) into someone who is training for self and home defense, has done 180 turns on many of the laws, and is picking out their first conceal-carry gun. They are working on a for-real home defense plan and skills. They are reading different sources and sending the emails that make them part of what will hold the line for the second amendment. Its an evolution that has happened over months of contact and classes and conversations and trips to the range. And it is Real Change.
There’s more than one way to effect change. That’s one. There are others.
You seem pretty dismissive of being “nice”. Nice is one part of a strategy that also includes smart, persistent, strong, subtle, creative, resourceful, influential, and effective. I don’t have a problem with being “nice” if it makes an entry for me to be all those other things as well.
That student’s change didn’t come from radical events, it came entirely from the “nice” little things that I’m doing. With them. They are evolving, and I can see they’re far from done. I don’t know if they’ll become a radical revolutionary, and you are right, most likely not. But then, that isn’t for me to create, that’s entirely theirs to decide.
And yes, it’s easy for me to suggest those “nice little things”. I actually do them. And yes, they are actually working. I’m really ok with that.
Had a conversation this weekend with a woman in the salon where I was getting my hair done. She went from “NOPE! Not interested, guns are my husband’s thing and I don’t want to even try” to “Can I come take lessons? When can we start?” in about 45 minutes. That’s a nice little thing right there, and it works. Pretty sure my being radical wouldn’t have moved her in that direction at all. So I’m good with being “nice”. She turned her ideas about shooting and firearms 180 degrees. I think that’s a legit outcome, and it is not diminished by not having turned her into a revolutionary. 
Real change doesn’t only come from having your life turned upside down. Real change can happen through exposure to new ideas and experiences, and in a less traumatic, gradual way.
Different processes, but both will take you there. You may prefer one over the other, that’s fine. When people come looking for radical change, because they’ve had a radical event, I’m ok with that. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) I have no power to instigate radical change in other people’s lives… I’m certainly not making a radical event for them, that is something their life has to provide. That change happens because of external events and I can facilitate its direction but not start the process.
Where I can start the process of change is in evolution. By bringing people “nicely” into new experiences and new ideas and then facilitating the process of their evolution. THAT I can actually start without waiting for them to have a personal disaster, become a SEAL, or undertake boot camp.
I don’t have to wait until their life gets broken to help them move in this direction. I can do it now, today, with “nice” little things and time.
Yes, I’d say the founding fathers made useful waves, that was not wasted time… although it ultimately failed, there was a process they were pursuing, and it could have worked. Ultimately it laid the ground work for what they did next. I’m good with all that. I have an ancestor who fought in the revolutionary war (a woman, by the way) and I’m entirely good with that.
In both cases they were applying their labor to things they could influence. In the company of many others who were also putting their energy to the same task. There was (obviously) a possibility of influencing how things turned out.
You originally said this:
I do not believe that the “Great Experiment” is reparable at this point without another “Declaration”. The communists are infiltrated too deeply and control too much.
As far as creating more “polarization” is concerned I can only say: “GOOD!!” Our Lord told us to be hot or cold and we can be useful. But if we are lukewarm He will spit us out of His mouth. There is no room for “lukewarm” in the defense of Liberty.
"…“extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice! And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue!” Barry Goldwater.
Megan, you espouse the very concepts that have brought us to this stage of deterioration of the greatest nation that God ever saw fit to bless. Head down, don’t make waves, pay your taxes…If your happy with this country the way it is then you cannot conceive of anything better and it sounds like your satisfied with Trump because, once again, he is the lesser of the presented evils.
You made a lot of statements about what I espouse, and what I’m happy with that 1) aren’t accurate, and 2) aren’t what I said. I’ve said nothing about keeping your head down (I don’t), not making waves (I do), the entire topic of taxes (how did that get in there?), how I think the country is perfect just the way it is (I don’t), or what I think of Trump. << checking… yeah didn’t discuss any of that 
>>
Personally I don’t thing greater polarization is going to help us. It’s going to make what is already bad worse… not because of left/right or red/blue but because there is so little cohesion now on “our” side of the issues that we can’t get a darn thing done in ANY direction. It takes getting groups of people willing to work TOGETHER and to come to enough agreement on enough points that they will sacrifice their personal wellbeing for the cause.
If you’re irritating everyone in sight with your approach, it’s really hard to get enough people together to push a truck out of a ditch, much less change a nation. 
And that was really my point. Change on that scale doesn’t happen simply by being radical - it happens by getting people to work together.
If what you’re doing is effective, and you’re moving people to action, and getting them to work together, then by all means keep doing it. IIRC part of your complaint was that it wasn’t working. Maybe that’s because people are sheep and don’t care and can’t be bothered. Or maybe your technique needs a tweak or two.
If there was a message in this conversation, I guess it would be this… you can choose any method you like, but as the saying goes, you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. I might wish for revolutionary things, but if I don’t have the power to make that happen, any radical energy I spend is simply lost. If I change the things I CAN influence, then my effort is not wasted. It might not be spectacular and full of fireworks, but if I can move part of a mountain an inch, and you move it an inch, and the people I’m nice with move it an inch, then we all gain.
If the people I’m nice with run away because you’re scaring them with radical polarization, we all lose.
Thunder is good, thunder is impressive; but it is lightning that does the work. ~ Mark Twain
I don’t choose to thunder much.
And each of us have to make our own choices about that. I hope you have a peaceful night.
@Zee
It works for you because you are a nice person (but I would not want to be the one that gets you pissed off).
@DBrogue my friend, you have no worries on that score 
One of my ex bosses used to call me “velvet-over-steel” … I can’t imagine why 
because, you know, I’m nice 
I should be more clear about my views. I admit that my views towards government in general are “radical” towards less governmental interference in our lives but I don’t pound that point to individuals. I don’t start every conversation with, “We need another revolution.”
It appears to me that I have been misleading to you and I thank you for bringing it out.
I used POTUS as just an example of how too many people tend to think that government is an answer to problems. I apologize for putting words in your statements. The best government is the least government and the effect we can have on our cities and counties can deliver more tangible results than any action in D.C.
We may be discussing apples and oranges on our views of interaction with people. I am always respectful of people’s views if the conversation goes there. I listen to people when they “loosen up” and begin to talk freely about their beliefs and even fears about our national gov’t. What frustrates me is their lack of will to change things because that takes cohesion, cooperation and action. One person can start a movement, I know, and I have seen it done for numerous causes other than securing our rights, i.e. “Ice Bucket Challenge”
I think the point I am trying to make is that I see that over the term of my life how many “rights” have been relegated to “privilege” and that to exercise these rights one must seek permission from some governmental agency. So many little things as just collecting rain water have become unlawful in many areas…really? The list goes on and on and it is difficult for me to understand that people seem to be alright with it.
Doing the “nice” things is ok and I am not an “un-nice” person I simply believe that government will continue to encroach on humans until the humans are pushed to desperation and respond accordingly. Until that time let us both make our inroads to people’s thinking using our best methods.
Thank you kindly for your courtesy and thoughtfulness (see, I’m being nice).
I’m a former active duty Marine and that has a lifetime effect as you may already know. I have mellowed in the last few decades somewhat but even as I age my fire for Liberty is still stoked. I am more limited in my physical capabilities but I can still teach and preach, lol. I am as passionate about teaching shooting and tactics as I am about Liberty and that tends to be misunderstood as anger or some other emotion other than just passion for the purpose. When people dane to place there welfare in my hands I am as serious as it gets and that dog/wolf thing comes out. I feel as if they are my family and I am responsible to teach them rightly so it may someday save their lives or the lives of one’s for which they care.
I believe our discussion has been about two different things; Your point, to me, seems to be focused on changing an individuals thinking about guns and gun culture one on one… My point is centered on abusive government policies and laws and the detrimental effect they have on our everyday lives and our posterity. So, here again I apologize if I have misled or responded poorly to the discussion.
My belief still remains that desperate circumstances effect the most change regardless of the change sought. When one begins to envision those possibilities they can come to the conclusion similar to your lady in the salon. I imagine that most people keep a fire extinguisher in their homes. They have life, homeowners and automobile insurance. All of these things are bets against one’s safety and life. The policy holder is betting something bad is going to happen and the issuing company is covering that bet that it won’t.
When I began "packing heat’ it was because I bet against my own safety. I realized that bad things can happen to good people and I bet it could happen to me. To offset that possibility I began carrying a gun. To this day, thank the Lord, I have not been forced into a position to use deadly force. I avoid poor circumstance and places where poor circumstance may reside.
I hope I have clarified any misunderstandings and, once again, I thank you for your courtesy and your thoughtful responses.
