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NRA Survival Skills, The NRA's Main Target? Its Members' Checkbooks.

Doug Huffman

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/14/AR2007121401328.html

Unfortunately for American gun owners, the nation and the NRA itself, this major lobbying group has become intoxicated with money and privilege. The leadership has lost sight of its mission. Safeguarding the rights of gun owners has become secondary to keeping the fundraising machinery well greased and the group's senior staff handsomely compensated.

I know, because I once worked for it.
http://www.usnews.com/blogs/mashek/2007/12/18/nra-survival-skills.html
Every sincere and open-minded contributor to the National Rifle Association should read the op-ed piece in the December 16 edition of the Washington Post. The writer, Richard Feldman, who once worked for the NRA, explains how the organization is now more about money than hollering about Second Amendment rights.

Feldman accuses the NRA today of morphing from a reasonable lobby group to a money-making machine for its executives and well-placed friends.
 

BB62

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Despite the man's "condemnation", note the reporter's closing statement - "Wake up, NRA members. A day of reckoning may come for a group so unwilling to compromise on any restriction of weapons. Those weapons continue to cause mayhem in our cities, in our offices, and even on once safe college campuses."

Not that I like excesses, but at least the reporter feels that the NRA is hardcore RKBA - which works for me!
 

bplv

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The NRA has competition in the GOA & the SAF. If they get too out of line, they will lose members. Things do seem to be getting better over the last decade or so as far as the RKBA.
 

drkarrow

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, Minnesota, USA
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People who have a job and are not trust fund babies born rich want to make as much money as they can. Yes, this goes for people working at non-profits and charities too.

Every organization is the same to some extent. Even churches try to maximize their income so they can build those extravagant giant buildings.

So the fact that the NRA or any other group is trying to maximize fundraising should not be a deterrent to joining. The question is what group gives you the most "bang for your buck."
 

ECB

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I'm a NRA Life Member. I hate the mail and money requests from the NRA. I don't like any lobbyists, pro or con.

What we're seeing here is the typical divide and conquer strategy. Step 1: Get rid of the NRA. Step 2: Get rid of the guns.

Our choice, not their's.
 

MetalChris

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imperialism2024 wrote:
Well, I gave in and joined the NRA two weeks ago. Shame on me. But, eh... :?
I'm about || that close to joining the NRA...
 

Tomahawk

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USAF_MetalChris wrote:
imperialism2024 wrote:
Well, I gave in and joined the NRA two weeks ago. Shame on me. But, eh... :?
I'm about || that close to joining the NRA...

I'm about that close to quitting...

But since my life membership is already paid for years ago, it is the NRA that spends money to send me a magazine every month, not the other way around.

I figure it's my turn to be a sponge for once.
 

sjhipple

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I don't know, I think that guns becoming more mainstream in politicshas alot to do with the power of the NRA. They've been pushing the Castle Doctrine, emergency powers legislation and shall issue and having some success at it. They've also protected manufacturers from law suits.

We're going to need them in this upcoming fight about the McCarthy Bill.

I'm disappointed at some of their compromises (machine gun ban, background checks, and past support of gun control....that's what irks me the most), but they've delivered on alot too.

This recent NICS bill has been way overblown in my opinion.

I'm luke warm about the NRA...

I feel most positive towards the NRA when I hear about other countries and how their gun owners don't have a voice and are getting railroaded.
 

imperialism2024

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Well, they offered first year's membership for $25 at a booth at the entrance of a gun show, and I got into the show for free. And then proceeded to buy a Kel-Tec Sub-2000 and a Mosin Nagant 1891/30 sniper. :)
 

1st freedom

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Divide and Conquer, thats the plan, If you put out enough BS, people will start to believe it, the anti's have been doing ot for decades.

If you have a valid point just give to us straight talk without all the piled on crap, this article tries to convince you that all NRA staff is abunch of moneyhungry elitist and if theres no gun control, theres no NRA. The NRA-ILA is a small part of the NRA that has only been around sense the early 70's, the NRA has been around for 100 years prior. Education and training and competitions make up the bulk of the Association, not to mention hunter services and publications.

I,m a life member of the NRA and I work in Fairfax, VA and I go to the range a couple of times a month,and Ican see the NRA parking lot from my window during the day, MrFeldman could count the beemers and MB's in the lot and only have to take off one shoe.I also know that the NRA employee's are paid below the average of the county that they work in.Feldman mentions that H B Carter was driven around in a chevy and then talks about Beemer's, now you have the impression that Wayne is driven around in a MB or BMW, but doesn't tell you what Wayne actually drives. I know what he drive, I'v seen it, and I can tell you it was made in the USA.

Feldman also neglects to mention that Wayne has writen four books, THAT HE SELLS FOR MONEY. He would have you believe that his paycheck from the NRA members was close to 1 million $

Feldman makes it seem as though the NRA is using our donations and member dues to pay for for loans for the staff, get health insurance,credit cards and buy houses. Member discounts are given by OUTSIDE componys that give discounts and then make it up in volume by being able to solicit members, basic economics, not a sham, not a pilfering of the funds.

Such blatant deception is normally used by the liberals and anti's, but I guess it's catching on

Dougy and Feldman just hopes your naive enough to suck it all in
 

Doug Huffman

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I believe that those are the years in which significant gun related legislation passed, years in which NRA legislative efforts either succeeded or failed, depending on your pre-existing world view.

You probably didn't recognize them for the absence of GCA or NFA or Brady Bill being attached.
 

1st freedom

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1934:

True assault weapons were banned in 1934, not in 1994. True assault weapons – machine guns or firearms capable of fully automatic fire – were effectively banned through the passage of the National Firearms Act in 1934

1968:

[size=-1]As part of what would become the 1968 Gun Control Act, Congress set up a massive new bureaucratic scheme run by the U.S. Department of the Treasury to regulate all commercial commerce in firearms and ammunition; prohibit mail order sales of firearms; prohibit interstate firearms transfers between individuals; ban outright the importation of surplus military arms; and give the Treasury secretary broad authority to ban importation of any other firearms which it might declare as not "generally-recognized as particularly suitable for or readily adaptable to sporting purposes . . ."[/size]

The NRA had no legislative action in 1934 or 1968, No influance at all good or bad

1986:

BATF interpreted the amendment as a prohibition on the civilian possession of any fully-automatic firearm manufactured after May 19, 1986. The effect of the interpretation has been to "freeze" the number of privately owned fully-automatic firearms at roughly 150,000, an exact figure being unavailable due to privacy protection requirements that apply to tax-based laws such as the National Firearms Act. The crime-fighting utility of the 1986 "freeze" was questionable, since no legal, civilian-owned fully-automatic firearm had been used to commit a violent crime. BATF`s director at the time, Stephen Higgins, had testified before Congress in 1986 that the misuse of legally-owned fully-automatic firearms was "so minimal as not to be considered a law enforcement problem." Farmer v. Higgins

 
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