And the well known outdoor writer Pat Wray--a Sierra Club sympathizer according to his critics?
"AHSA appears to be the answer to the prayers of a lot of shooters and gun owners who have become disillusioned with the NRA and their fear mongering, we're-surrounded-by-enemies-so-hurry-up-and-send-us-money approach to the gun ownership issue," he writes. 6
The AHSA is "at least willing to talk to law enforcement agencies and lawmakers about ways to limit gun violence while protecting our rights to own and use firearms for legitimate purposes. Communication, cooperation, compromise. What concepts!"
One writer even dares to question what happens when the gun grabber is a wife and the gun grabbing is an order or protection.
Domestic violence takes "the glamour out of the crime scene that pro-gun activists love to describe," writes Joan Burbick, author of the recently published Gun Show Nation. "Husbands and wives shooting it out in the living room [doesn't] have the same appeal as the brave homeowner gunning down a crazed burglar. And what about all those ad campaigns to get me to buy guns? The magazine and book tales of masked young predators [generate] gun sales. How do you advertise buying guns when the criminal [is] an exhusband, a boyfriend, or a guy you dated a couple of weeks ago?"
As the NRA loses its ability to scare critics into silence, many are hoping its reign of terror is over.
Because what needs to be pried out of its cold, dead hands is not a gun but Congress.
notes 1 Inside the NRA: Armed and Dangerous Jack Anderson 1996 2. "OWAA loyalty to Sierra Club forces NRA to withdraw support" www.nra.org 3 "Anti-Gunners Don Camo As Elections Loom" Aug 16, 2006 www.nra.org 4 "Pro Gun, Anti-NRA" Washington Monthly June 18, 2006 Christina Larson www.washingtonmonthly.com 5 "Gunning for the Rural Vote" Prairie Star Montana Ag newspaper October 25, 2006 6 "A small pebble making big waves" Corvallis Gazette-Times July 2, 2006
