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Saturday, April 06, 2013

Washington Post Spin: NRA Tactics To Blame For Democratic Overreach On Gun Control

By Susan Duclos

NRA warns members, supporters and Americans that liberals like Barack Obama, Dianne Feinstein and progressive Democrats are gun grabbers, then Obama, Feinstein and company propose gun bans proving them right, but it is the NRA's tactics that "erode"  support for gun control.

Liberal Washington Post spin in action.

Headline "NRA tactics erode post-Newtown support for gun-control measures."

The first page of the two-page article shows NRA's unwavering battle to protect Americans Second Amendment rights:

Over the past two weeks, while Congress has been in recess, Begich said he was approached repeatedly by constituents who echoed NRA views, telling him not to, in his words, “mess with our gun rights” or “ban anything.”

The NRA’s recent successes on Capitol Hill — as well as a string of victories in state legislatures across the country — demonstrate the effectiveness of the group’s strategy to overcome a post-Newtown tilt toward gun control. The organization has drafted and circulated legislation, mobilized its members and continued to put pressure on politically vulnerable lawmakers. At the same time, groups attempting to promote stricter gun- control measures have faltered.

New restrictions that a couple of months ago seemed possible, even likely, such as bans on assault weapons and universal background checks on gun purchases, are now in doubt.
 
 More blame is assigned to NRA throughout the piece, continuing along that same vein on page two:

Spurred by e-mail alerts from the group, NRA members and other gun rights activists jammed legislative committee rooms, deluged lawmakers with e-mails and phone calls — and succeeded in killing proposals that were once widely expected to pass.

“I was sabotaged by the NRA,” said state Rep. Michael Paymar, a St. Paul Democrat who authored the gun-control package he thought had a good shot at passing the liberal state House and Senate.

The Minnesota measures had been supported by the White House, with President Obama paying a visit in January and Vice President Biden calling legislators in March.

But their efforts were not enough to counteract gun rights advocates. NRA alerts warned that the background checks proposal would result in increased costs and could lead to the establishment of a government gun registry, while achieving no provable reduction in the crime.

Republican state Rep. Tony Cornish said he received 2,897 e-mails about the bills while they were being considered last month. “Only five were in favor,” he said.
 It is not until the very end of the two page article where the Washington Post piece inserts the truth of the matter..... NRA's warnings that the headline claims "erodes" support for gun laws, were proven true, by Democratic overreach.

In other words NRA saying Democrats want to take guns away, worked so well because Democrats then starting proposing to take guns away.

Some gun-control advocates wonder whether the Bloomberg ads — coupled with aggressive proposals by Democratic senators and state lawmakers to ban assault weapons and impose other restrictions — have helped feed NRA warnings to its members that their gun rights were in danger.

Rep. Mike Thompson (D-Calif.), a hunter and gun owner who had been tasked by party leaders to design a strategy to woo NRA members into backing gun-control measures, said in an interview that his efforts have been frustrated in part by overreaching from the left. Some of the people he had hoped to win over now recite the NRA’s oft-broadcast concerns about government intrusion into the private rights of citizens. Thompson said a new ammunition tax and record-keeping proposal moving in the California Legislature is giving even his constituents pause.

“I have to have three meetings today with gun owner constituents who are livid about what the state is proposing,” he said.

Therefore it is all the NRA's  fault for daring to warn citizens that Democrats were doing...... exactly what they were doing.

When the citizens then rise up, speak out and oppose those gun laws, it is the fault of NRA's tactics.

That is like saying it is the weatherman's fault the hurricane hit because that bastard told us it was coming.