4um: NRA Finds Paul Amendment Problematic

The National Rifle Association informed Senators on Thursday that it opposes Sen. Rand Paul’s gun-related amendment to the USA PATRIOT Act reauthorization.

The gun-rights organization described the Kentucky Republican’s proposal as well-intentioned but problematic. The amendment would prevent federal investigators from using a provision of the PATRIOT Act to review gun buyers’ background records. The underlying measure would reauthorize expiring provisions of the anti-terrorism law, which was enacted in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks.

NRA lobbyist Chris Cox explained the organization’s position in an email to Senate offices. Paul’s amendment, which faces strong bipartisan opposition, is expected to be tabled, meaning the proposal will technically not receive a vote. The NRA is not taking a position on the motion to table.

Thank you for asking about the National Rifle Association’s position on a motion to table amendment # 363 to the PATRIOT Act.

The NRA takes a back seat to no one when it comes to protecting gun owners’ rights against government abuse. Over the past three decades, we’ve fought successfully to block unnecessary and intrusive compilation of firearms-related records by several federal agencies, and will continue to protect the privacy of our members and all American gun owners.

While well-intentioned, the language of this amendment as currently drafted raises potential problems for gun owners, in that it encourages the government to use provisions in current law that allow access to firearms records without reasonable cause, warrant, or judicial oversight of any kind.

Based on these concerns and the fact that the NRA does not ordinarily take positions on procedural votes, we have no position on a motion to table amendment # 363.

The NRA are establishment lackeys. they don't care about people's rights. they made that clear when they supported CARA, government land grab.

The NRA openly supports intrusive unwarranted searches of prospective gun buyers and the PATRIOT ACT.

I think Congressmen should wear uniforms like NASCAR drivers so we could identify their corporate sponsors.

"If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.”—Samuel Adams

NRA takes a back seat to Gun Owners of America!! If you want a militant group watching out for our 2A rights, this is the group to support.

I scrapped the NRA for the GOA long ago after one too many sell outs on a right I'm not willing to compromise on.

" If you cannot govern yourself, you will be governed by assholes. " Randge, Poet de Forum, 1/11/11

this is but one of the reasons the NRA sucks, the others are all the other BS gun restriction laws they helped write, tens of thousands of them.

(raises hand) *Former* member here. I've still got their sticker on my rear window.

I'm *former* because of the erratic meanderings of the NRA over the years that I was a member. Besides, the organization is primarily a competitive shooting organization at base. Hunting and all that other jazz is only to keep up membership numbers and an income stream from non-competitive gun owners.

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"This man is Jesus,” shouted one man, spilling his Guinness as Barack Obama began his inaugural address. “When will he come to Kenya to save us?"

I think Congressmen should wear uniforms like NASCAR drivers so we could identify their corporate sponsors.

They sold us out on the National Firearms Act back under FDR before we were born, and again back in 1968, and again in 1987 when they supported the limit of full-auto weapons in circulation.

edit to clarify: *Useless as a defender of the people's right to keep and bear arms but I suppose they are very useful to the establishment.

Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end. Lord Acton

He (Gordon Duff) also implies that forcibly removing Obama, a Constitution-hating, on-the-down-low, crackhead Communist, is an attack on America, Mom, and apple pie. I swear these military people are worse than useless. Just look around at the condition of the country and tell me if they have fulfilled their oaths to protect the nation from all enemies foreign and domestic.
OsamaBinGoldstein

The only difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has it's limits. Albert Einstein

NRA Discourages Board Members From Testifying Against Kagan

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On the eve of confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan -- and for the second time in two weeks -- the National Rifle Association (NRA) is under fire from conservatives.

According to RedState's Erick Erickson, a prominent conservative blogger, "internal Senate emails confirmed by NRA Board Members show that the National Rifle Association's management team has explicitly and directly told the NRA's board they are prohibited from testifying about second amendment issues" during the Kagan hearings.

It turns out that during the confirmation hearings for then-Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, the testimony of former NRA President Sandy Froman angered current NRA leadership, because she didn't obtain permission to appear at the hearing – and because she appeared as former President of the NRA (she's also a Harvard Law grad a practicing attorney). The situation worsened when several members of the NRA board of directors also signed a letter opposing Sotomayor.

National Rifle Association

As one prominent board member (who asked not to be named) told me, Chris Cox, the executive director of the association's lobbying arm, NRA-ILA, "was livid because he didn't 'authorize' them to speak directly to Congress." After the Sotomayor hearings, a letter was sent to all NRA board members reminding them they did not speak for the NRA or the board.

Of three NRA board members I contacted, only one confirmed "explicitly and directly" receiving any sort of directive that could be interpreted as a "gag order" regarding Kagan. But all three sources confirmed that NRA board members actively opposed to Sotomayor's confirmation have been severely chastised "to the degree that they would not speak out against Kagan" (as one board member – who requested anonymity – told me).

Because most members of the NRA's board of directors are also heavily involved in numerous other conservative organizations, it seems unusual the NRA would expect board members to remain silent on the Kagan nomination (in fact, many have already spoken out).

More likely, the NRA, which is heavily involved in lobbying in Washington, does not want board members representing themselves as speaking for the organization without its approval. And it's reasonable to assume that testifying in a Senate hearing against Kagan would be frowned upon more than simply writing a column that does not mention any affiliation with the gun group.

But even that explanation is not likely to satisfy a growing number of conservatives who believe the gun group should vehemently oppose Kagan's nomination based on the fact that as President Obama's Solicitor General, she did not weigh in on what they consider a landmark Second Amendment case involving the constitutionality of the city of Chicago's gun ban.

These conservatives also see the NRA as having become too much a part of the "Washington scene" in recent years.

It is also important to note that it was only after pressure from conservatives that the NRA agreed to "score" the Sotomayor vote. Deciding to score a vote is important because it means Senators who voted for confirmation received a lower grade on the powerful gun lobby's scorecard.

And this perception was reinforced just a couple of weeks ago when the NRA came under heavy public criticism from conservatives – including a member of their board of directors -- for working with Democrats on a "carve out" exempting the NRA from proposed campaign finance disclosure rules that conservatives view as limiting free speech. The conservative critics say the NRA protected itself but left other, smaller advocacy groups subject to the law because the exemption applies only to groups that have been in existence 10 years or more and have more than a million members.

Regardless, it appears obvious a major schism has developed between the NRA-ILA executive director and several members of the board of directors. As one board member told me, "The bottom line is Chris (Cox) wants to have all decisions go through him and have no board involvement in decisions about or communications with Congress. He was the problem with the DISCLOSE Act. He's the issue re the SCOTUS nominees."

"Now more than ever, we need access to the crucial authorities in the Patriot Act"