The NRA has won the battle but lost the war. The best thing that happened to gun control is its defeat in Congress. Today's losers (Obama, Democrats, the 90 percent of Americans who support sane legislation) will be tomorrow's winners. Today's winners (NRA and its corporate backers and Republican puppets) will be tomorrow's losers.
Losers: The NRA. Heady with victory, no doubt Wayne LaPierre and his colleagues were belly-laughing, high-fiving, and guzzling down bottles of Dom Perignon to celebrate. After all, they showed the President of the United States who's boss — or so they think. Surely, for a "job well done," LaPierre will ask for — and receive — a raise on his $1 million salary.
If the NRA had the smarts to think strategically, it would have thrown its critics a bone and supported background checks; after all, on that issue the proposed bill was just an expansion of existing law. That way, it would have appeared rational and disarmed many of its fiercest critics — at least temporarily.
Instead, drunk with power, the NRA stupidly opposed any and all restrictions on gun sales — and violated the first lesson of "war": Don't humiliate your defeated enemy. Thinking/knowing that it "owns" Congress, it wouldn't give an inch. By its hubris and intransigence, it has inflamed its opposition.
So, the next time there is a murderous rampage the NRA will be blamed. And the backlash against it will be unrelenting, fierce — and successful. Congress will cave in to overwhelming public pressure, and we'll finally get sweeping gun-control legislation, beyond anything that might have passed recently.
Makes sense to me. Basically this is what Jon Stewart said. I think it'll go just like that.
What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.
"So, the next time there is a murderous rampage the NRA will be blamed. And the backlash against it will be unrelenting, fierce..."
ReplyDeleteYeah, that will be real different, because nobody in the media blamed the NRA for Newtown--and Nobody in the media blamed the NRA for the bombs--yes, bombs, not guns--in Boston.
A full media blitz against the NRA will be a NEW thing and a Game Changer!
Also, regarding that first rule of warfare...I've never heard that seriously postulated anywhere near the top of a list before, and you anti-gunners certainly don't abide by that. Yall were celebrating your assured victory earlier this year and rubbing it in our faces. Hell, this article is preemptively gloating again, saying that we have assured your victory and that you will capitalize so as to get "sweeping gun-control legislation, beyond anything that might have passed recently."
Which brings me to my next point: When you trumpet that you're now going to go for sweeping legislation, you do realize that you're putting us on notice that you want far more than you're claiming you want.
You tell us we should think strategically and toss you a bone. Why would that be strategic for us? Giving you another increment toward that eventual new landscape that you want? When we're stronger than we've ever been--strong enough that we stopped your momentum COLD?
Tossing you that bone would have been the dumbest exercise in appeasement in the history of this fight, and that's saying something.
So keep telling yourself that this victory was Pyrrhic for us, and that you are the real winners. You sound just as foolhardy as the right wingers who claimed that Roberts had won us the long game with his Obamacare decision, but don't let that stop you.
What Tennessean said.
ReplyDeleteCracks me up--only forcible citizen disarmament advocates would try to argue that their own crushing, ignominious defeat is just what they needed to put them on the road to victory (a road you had seemed pretty confident you were already on before it became clear that S. 649 would go down in flames).
Question, Mikeb: if your side had managed to be something other than losers on S. 649--say you'd gotten nearly everything even the most ridiculously optimistic among you had hoped for (Schumer's version of background check/registration, and a ban on 11-round magazines, even Feinstein's ban of so-called "assault weapons," if you want), would you have been writing that now you were in trouble? That you had won "too much," and that your hubristic overreach would be your downfall? Or would you be cheering and gloating?
Come on--deny that you would be cheering and gloating. You know how much your ridiculous assertions appeal to my sense of humor.
I would have been cheering and gloating.
DeleteI would have been cheering and gloating.
DeleteAh--so you're going to deny me that fun. I shouldn't be greedy, I suppose--you provide me with so much fun as it is.
For example, it's fun to observe that you see "victory" in having had your asses handed to you in the S. 649 vote, but you would also have claimed such a victory if S. 649 had passed.
Whatever happens, you've won. Baghdad Bob has nothing on you ;-).
Tennessean gave lots of good points. I'll add this. When have the gun control freaks ever been willing to give us anything? They take and take and take, and when that's not enough, they take more.
ReplyDeleteMikeb, what you don't realize is that there's a good reason why this country is divided up into states. California and New York have population advantages and could overwhelm the free states if it weren't for a system that intentionally breaks up power into manageable units. Until your side can invalidate the entire Constitution, we have the means to stop you.