Should I join the NRA?

Let's avoid wandering into pure politics. That's outside the scope of this forum.

That said, there are some politicians with good positions who are lukewarm on the 2A, and there are some vocal 2A supporters who are truly abysmal on other civil liberties. It's not always a good idea to vote on a candidate's position on one issue.
 
It's not always a good idea to vote on a candidate's position on one issue.
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I respectfully disagree. If you value your 2nd Amendment rights you need to be a single issue voter. It's just that important. If you vote for any candidate that is even luke-warm on 2nd Amendment rights over one that is for gun owners rights, then you really do not stand with those that value their 2nd Amendment rights.

Unfortunately, there are too many billionaires who can easily give away $100,000,000 to lapdogs and movie stars who can and will persuade the uninformed to snatch your right to own firearms away from you.
 
you really do not stand with those that value their 2nd Amendment rights
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Well as long as you say so. Because "You're either with us, or against us" has worked so well for anyone and everyone throughout the years. It doesn't matter how much someone aligns on one issue with you. If they can't build relationships and coalitions on the other issues, they're not going to be able to pull one together on the 2A when you need them to.
 
If you vote for any candidate that is even luke-warm on 2nd Amendment rights over one that is for gun owners rights, then you really do not stand with those that value their 2nd Amendment rights.
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There are two problems with this, and both apply to one of my US Senators.

He said all the right pro-gun things to get elected, but when Manchin-Toomey came up last year, he planned to vote for it. It took some real pressure, both locally and from the NRA, to get him back in line.

Second, his record on almost every other civil liberty is dreadful. He has voted for every FISA expansion, every internet censorship bill, and a host of other problematic legislation. Is all that OK because he's pro-gun? Nope.
 
Yes you should join. It's $25 annually if you find a discount. Otherwise $35. That's pennies per day.

A life membership can be found for $300 during regular sales. Otherwise it's like $700.

The NRA is the biggest and loudest and strongest pro-gun organization out there and does a LOT for your gun rights.

Consider this. In the last decade, without the NRA, gun rights and the 2A would have surely lost DC v. Heller, which was a narrow 5-4 victory with significant NRA backing for Heller's legal team, and media, public opinion, and lobbying. Without Heller, we gun rights folks would have likely lost McDonald v. Chicago too.

These narrow wins effectively saved gun rights for 'the little guy' and the individual.

I'm 100% sure that if we had lost Heller and the rest since then, the anti-gun forces in the current and future organizations would have seized the moment, and killed the 2A and your and my rights to own guns, requiring total registration, centralization, confiscation schemes, magazine restrictions, etc. and effectively neutered the 2a unless you're currently a member of a militia, with some central armory, etc. And forget about concealed carry.

The NRA is a HUGE lobby organization in DC, and without them, we would have long ago lost our 2A rights.
 
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Consider this: When a bill comes up for consideration, the media usually say something like "The NRA has sent letters to all eleventy bazillion members to call their congresscritters on this issue." Do you think if the NRA had 50,000 members, anyone would listen to this news?

How about joining the NRA, sending a check to ILA, and another check to SAF? That way you can surely feel like you are making a difference in the best way possible: covering all bases. And all that for the price of a couple of bricks of .22LR, which you can't find anyway.
 
"As much as the NRA would like me to believe that, I don't believe that to be true. If they disappear, another group will step up and take their place."

With all due respect, that shows absolutely no knowledge of the history of the Second Amendment fight.

The genesis of the modern NRA fighting for your Second Amendment rights began in the 1960s.

After the Kennedy, King, and Kennedy assassinations, there was an enormous movement towards unbelievably draconian gun control/bans at the Federal level.

NRA had, at that time, an office of maybe three people who handled the politicial end of things.

And at that time, there were no other groups fighting for your Second Amendment rights.

NRA did what it could to combat what finally became the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968, and it got some of the absolute worst provisions removed from that bill, but it was still pretty bad.

Through the 1970s things became progressively worse for gun owners. I don't know how many of us remember the abuses that happened during the 1970s, but there were some really incredible ones.

At that time, NRA was still the only real player in town (SAF was founded in 1974, GOA in 1975, and it was a long time before they drew in more than a handful of members), and it wasn't the player that it would become, either.

Worse, in 1976 NRA's then leadership decided that protecting your Second Amendment rights just wasn't worth the effort. Apparently they thought that if all of the "bad guns" were outlawed, and we gave the politicians what they wanted, they'd leave us with our sporting guns and everyone would be happy. (That's a strategy that worked out just great for British and Australian gun owners, by the way).

That stance is what led Harlon Carter, Neal Knox, and others to seize control of NRA at the annual meeting of members, giving birth to the modern, pro-Second Amendment rights NRA.

The ugly truth is that had NRA not been around in the 1960s and 1970s as the ONLY organization to fight GCA 1968 and some of the follow-on legislation, and had NRA's old leadership been allowed to surrender, many of the rights and firearms that we enjoy today would be gone.
 
Mike Irwin,

my point was not to take away from the NRA but highlight that there are other groups out there doing the same thing (more?) as the NRA is doing.

A quick search brings up:

Gun owners of America
Second Amendment Foundation
JPFO (Jews for Preservation of Firearms Ownership)
Citizens Committee for the RKBA
National Association for Gun Rights
Texas Rifle Assoc.
NSSF
The Ohio Gun Collectors Association
Safari Club International

That's 9 groups right off the bat that are fighting the same fight as the NRA.

Just because the NRA has been there, done that and now sells T-shirts and caps for it doesn't mean they are the only group in town. That was all I was saying.
 
Just because the NRA has been there, done that and now sells T-shirts and caps for it doesn't mean they are the only group in town.
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Right, but aside from the SAF and NSSF, what have those other guys really accomplished?

I'm not aware of any major legislation or successful litigation coming from GOA, JPFO, or the NAGR.
 
Ruger,

"my point was not to take away from the NRA but highlight that there are other groups out there doing the same thing (more?) as the NRA is doing."

That's the entire point, Ruger.

In 1968, when the governemnt got serious about banning guns, there wasn't anyone else.

NRA, as poorly equipped as they were at the time, WAS IT. As far as I know, NONE of those other groups that you list existed in any form that had an ability to affect the political process.

DT Guy was 100% correct when he said this (and which is what you disagreed with)

"And without them, there would certainly NOT be private gun ownership in this country, IMHO; so you can agree, support, approve or whatever, but if you own guns, you owe them."

Senator Dodd's initial plans for his gun control vision included outright bans, confiscations, a "sporting purpose" that would have essentially ruled out about 99.9% of all firearms, and a host of other provisions that, had they passed, would have effectively made the Second Amendment go away.

Yes, other organizations have come along (as I noted above, both GOA and SAF came along some years after GCA 1968 became law), and it took even longer for them to have a presence that registered with elected politicians.

But DT is largely correct. Had NRA not existed in the 1960s and organized to fight against the worst parts of what eventually became GCA 1968, all of those other groups that you mention likely woudln't even exist today because they wouldn't have much of a purpose to stand behind or a membership to organize.
 
Tom Servo said:
Just because the NRA has been there, done that and now sells T-shirts and caps for it doesn't mean they are the only group in town.
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Right, but aside from the SAF and NSSF, what have those other guys really accomplished?

I'm not aware of any major legislation or successful litigation coming from GOA, JPFO, or the NAGR.
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The Safari Club has also done some good work. But like the NSSF, its focus is narrower than, and different from that of the NRA or NRA-ILA. And the SAF has a somewhat different, and more litigation and scholarship focused, approach.

I'm also not aware of anything the GOA, JPFO or NAGR has actually accomplished.
 
In the last decade, without the NRA, gun rights and the 2A would have surely lost DC v. Heller,
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I tried, but I can't let this go. Saying the NRA did was at all positive in this case is a joke. From trying to torpedo it at the beginning to taking up Gura's time at SCOTUS NRA's involvement was shameful. If you haven't read or listened to the arguments you can't understand the difference in caliber of the attorneys. If the NRA took back seat in the courts and focused its efforts on legislation, election, and members cases when requested, I would be ore supportive.

Which brings up a negative of SAF. It isn't really a very strong organization. Its success is due to a limited number of very talented people. Losing one or two people could result in significant degradation of its capabilities. The NRA-ILA not so much.
 
I tried, but I can't let this go. Saying the NRA did was at all positive in this case is a joke. From trying to torpedo it at the beginning to taking up Gura's time at SCOTUS NRA's involvement was shameful.
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There's a great deal more to the story than that. The NRA was justifiably concerned with Parker. Why? Because, at the time it started building steam, Rehnquist and O'Connor were still on the bench. We may very well have lost.

And what would that have done? A ruling from the Supreme Court that says the 2A is limited to collective service in the militia? The administration could have run wild with gun control in 2009, and certainly after Sandy Hook.

I don't blame them for counseling caution. I think it was the wrong call, but I'm not going to burn my membership card over it.

Don't get me wrong. I adore the SAF. If I were a woman, I'd kiss Alan Gura. But their focus is much narrower than the NRA.
 
I've been a member of the NRA for most of my life. Even back 45 years ago when it wasn't the "in" thing to do, nor did most folks feel like it was needed. I haven't always agreed with everything they have done and don't always think their marketing is the most tasteful/tactful, but IMHO, they have done more to promote legal and responsible gun ownership than all the other groups combined. Donate to them or not, your choice. When it comes to protecting my gun rights, I consider them cheap insurance.
 
If I were a woman, I'd kiss Alan Gura. But their focus is much narrower than the NRA.
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It's 2014. It's not limited to just women anymore.

I wouldn't say their focus is narrower, but maybe their road is. Or their toolbox is smaller. Whatever analogy you want to say they have the same goal and focus, but the use fewer pathways to get there and pick and choose their steps much more carefully and circumspectly.

I consider them cheap insurance.
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I consider them free insurance. Any LEO, Hunter, Competition shooter, and gun or bow owner who doesn't have a membership is missing the boat.
 
I've been a member for 25 years or so. Annual member-I keep paying yearly, as I never came up with the funds to go life. Last couple renewals though, were for 5 years, as they made me great offers.:D I'll always be a member of the NRA.
 
You know they've got a thing called "Easy Pay Life" or EPL right? something like 25 bucks a month for 40 months?
 
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