[Marxism] Re: Guns, Gun Rights, NRA

["Hunter Gray" <hunterbadbear@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Thanks for your comments, David.  Yours is generally polite -- other than a
bit of a slip with terms like
"right wing " and "cheap way" -- and hardly, in the relative context, any
stereotype of the anti gun zealot. [BTW, "more cops" was Clinton's so-called
panacea!]  I'll try to respond in kind -- "do so politely" as they say in
Mississippi.  The NRA is obviously a very old and always tough organization,
and it, and  gun owners and gun rights advocates, responded to the full
scale Clinton/Gore anti-gun witch hunt of the '90s [which in a very strong
sense presaged the current assault on civil liberties in this country]  by
becoming much tougher -- and, in the case of the organization, much much
larger.  None of this can be neatly stereotyped and pigeon holed.
Essentially, NRA is a non-partisan, single issue outfit which endorses many
Democrats as well as Republicans [and occasionally Libertarians.]  Given the
frequent anti gun tilt and often outright anti gun thrust of the national
Democrats [in recent years], it has, to be sure, endorsed many  top level
Republicans [in recent years] -- although in '92 it endorsed no presidential
candidate: neither Clinton nor Bush.

[As you most likely know, Howard Dean is a Life Member of NRA; so is John
Dingell of Michigan [the most liberal, so I gather, of the House members];
so is Gene McCarthy.]

On the firing capabilities of the semi-automatic so-called "assault rifles:"
A firearm is either semi-automatic [one pulls the trigger with one's
physical finger each time to fire] or it's automatic [one trigger pull by
one's finger.]  The recently banned weapons were/are semi-automatics and I
reiterate, no different in action -- structural action -- than a kid's semi
automatic .22.  This distinction was deliberately blurred by the Clinton
people and the media during that bitter period and has only been made a
little publicly clearer  in this day and age.   Any modification of the semi
automatics would require very substantial internal work -- far more than
just a trigger adjustment -- and, if it resulted in a fully automatic
weapon, it would be in direct violation of the 1934 law.

As I've often said, the causes of crime are complex and involved: urban
congestion, racism and ethnocentrism and economic poverty, interpersonal and
value alienation.  They can't be touched by gimmicky legislation -- but
gimmicky [and self serving] legislation can certainly hurt good people and
the whole cause of civil liberty.

Best - Hunter


HUNTER GRAY  [HUNTER BEAR]   Micmac /St. Francis Abenaki/St. Regis Mohawk
www.hunterbear.org
Protected by Na´shdo´i´ba´i´
and Ohkwari'

In our Gray Hole, the ghosts often dance in the junipers and sage, on the
game trails, in the tributary canyons with the thick red maples, and on the
high windy ridges -- and they dance from within the very essence of our own
inner being. They do this especially when the bright night moon shines down
on the clean white snow that covers the valley and its surroundings.  Then
it is as bright as day -- but in an always soft and mysterious and
remembering way. [Hunter Bear]









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