If Initiative 594 can teach us anything is that there is a new game being played and that is the massive dumping of money on carefully selected states to pass gun control laws. This kind of stuff works on a limited basis and usually starts backfiring when reality sets in and Unintended Consequences make their appearance. However, it is easier to institute this crap than it is to get rid of it as history has taught us.
So, the obvious answer is to raise money to beat them at their game. But instead of brute force funding, we need to do it in a strategic manner and focused as we obviously do not have the Bloomberg & Gates resources. Our advantage is still in the numbers and the noise we can make at the local level.
I have been unrelenting on trying to make the point that you must belong not only in the NRA but your state gun rights organization. But now we have to make things a bit different: We need to donate at least once to the organizations and this is a simple way: Donate at least the amount of the membership.
How does that go? Take the NRA as example: Membership is $35 so set aside another $35 for one of the two working sub-divisions, the NRA-ILA if we are aiming at legislation or NRA-PVF if we are dealing with elections. If your local Gun Rights organization, like Florida Carry has a Sustaining memberships of $25, set aside another $25 as pure, 100% unadulterated donation.
If your budget cannot do both membership and donation at once, go for the membership (because numbers do matter when lobby time comes) and then make the donation whenever your pocket can afford it. If they are offering trinkets of stuff, tell them not to send you a thing and to save that money for the fight…OK, maybe one sticker, but that’s it.
The Opposition has already mentioned they will repeat the I-594 model in other states. We need to cut them off at the pass and this is one of the steps to do so.
They already did it here in Colorado. We may have managed to get a Republican into the Senate, but locally? We lost all the ground we gained in the recalls last year and failed to unseat Hickenlooper because the Republican candidate was a barely purple Crony hand-picked by party leadership.
An upsetting majority of Republicans have bought the garbage that “candidates campaign to the middle” and the ones that haven’t are growing corrupt with power and aren’t any better than the worst of Democrats.(I’m talking to you, McCain, McConnel, and Boehner.) Nobody seems to remember that every time we run an “extreme” candidate, he seems to win in a landslide.(Reagan, anyone?)
Hey Republicans! Quit taking advice from Democrats! That’s the rabbit asking the wolf what his favorite places to eat are.
What was the messaging like in Colorado? I’ve noticed in quite a few places the various races flipped red, it was less about “elect the Republican” and more about “punish the Democrat”. (And I suspect this might have been the case for your Reagan analogy, too; less about being “pro-Reagan” than “anti-Carter”)
It’s a dangerous message if the newly-elected Repubs aren’t clear on why they were elected, but it motivated a LOT of voters.
Here in Oregon, there were only a couple anti-Kitzhaber ads. Dennis Richardson (GOP candidate for Governor) ran a largely clean campaign; very few attack ads, mostly just “vote for me” ads. Kitzhaber’s direct campaign was also mostly clean, but the Democratic Party of Oregon ran a metric CRAP-ton of attack ads against both Richardson and Monica Wehby (GOP Senate candidate), and the message of “the Dems are doing it wrong – vote them out” was non-existent.
The Low-Information Voters listened. They voted against both GOP nominees, and if anything, Oregon is a bit BLUER after this election than it was before.
It was mostly attack ads against Hickenlooper for pushing his anti-gun legislation, including a particularly chilling radio ad featuring the rape victim who testified before the state senate just before they laughed at her.
I have a very hard time contributing to the NRA PVF. After their past performance with Reid and other half-assed “Second Amendment supporters”, I cannot in good conscience give them anything. Instead, I give to GOA, SAF and Virginia Citizens Defense League.
The whole idea of funding is to give money to people that actually accomplish stuff, not that talk purty.
Doing that… And apparently they are going after Nevada next.
Seriously, a box of FMJ pistol ammo costs about the same as yearly dues to the NRA or SAF.
Being a Life Member, I contribute the yearly dues anyway so as to help the fight.
And remember kids, the ILA doesn’t get a dime from your normal NRA dues.
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