Should the NRA take the initiative on future gun legislation

Instead of squawking that "the NRA needs to do something" it might be helpful to think of and specify what pro-active ideas you would have them push.

In the past, they have been very instrumental in passing anti-crime and safety legislation. Things like firearms specifications tacked onto crimes, minimum sentencing with firearms used in crime, and other "real" crime bills. Also gunowner protections from unreasonable local laws about transport and possession.

It funny too that someone mentions co-opting bills to control them. When the NRA has been faced in the past with losing on an issue, they HAVE co-opted and assisted in re-writing it to reduce the damage from it, for which they have suffered the wrath of their own supporters. "Armor piercing bullets" and NICS are too things that immediately come to mind.

So instead of asking the NRA to push gun control, especially when gun control is losing, let's thing of some pro-gun issues, anti-crime issues, or safety issues we would like them to push.

One idea I have is that all elementary schools should update their "fire prevention" education to "safety services education" and after the real live fireman tell them all about fire prevention, and "stop, drop, and roll", they then have a real live policeman explain how to behave in a police encounter or traffic stop, with something like "freeze, hands up, wait for instruction". This should be a bi-partisan no-brainer. This is not just a "talk that black fathers need to have with their sons". It is a concept lost on today's generation.
 
TimSr said:
When the NRA has been faced in the past with losing on an issue, they HAVE co-opted and assisted in re-writing it to reduce the damage from it, for which they have suffered the wrath of their own supporters.
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Personally I think it is a bad idea to be in on a bad idea. If something is going to pass anyway, I don't think trying to mitigate the damage is generally going to do anything in the long run. So trying to mitigate the damage is spending time and money on something which will soil your name/reputation.
 
Mitigation - for example, was it a bad idea to insert a sunset on the original AWB? You could still have the bill in force today.

When I lived in Oregon, and the shall issue carry permit came up, there was some minor antigun provision that had no real impact in it. It made the bill acceptable as the antigun folks thought they got something. However, the major task of CCW was accomplished.
 
Glenn E Meyer said:
Mitigation - for example, was it a bad idea to insert a sunset on the original AWB? You could still have the bill in force today.
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If your sunset law example of mitigation fit the majority of cases in the real world, then I would agree with you.

Glenn E Meyer said:
When I lived in Oregon, and the shall issue carry permit came up, there was some minor antigun provision that had no real impact in it. It made the bill acceptable as the antigun folks thought they got something. However, the major task of CCW was accomplished.
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My point was and is that any kind of restrictions on gun rights are a loss. If, for example, the anti-gun types could only get 50 new gun laws passed this year instead of 100, that is a loss even without considering the cumulative effect of all the previously passed gun laws.
 
The original proposal to ban "armor piercing ammo" set the criteria as "anything that would penetrate body armor typically worn by law enforcement". Yes, there was something to be gained by NRA lobbyists changing that definition, even though the whole law was distasteful.

Yes, any loss, is still a loss, but when you lose everything on the poker table, to somebody who wants everything you own, it doesn't mean you throw in the deed to house just because "he'll probably win that someday as well".
 
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