The NRA is Now Fighting Against Elephants

[SecularMotion]

The National Rifle Association (NRA) recently came out against a White House ban on the commercial sale of ivory, a rule which was designed to protect the world's endangered elephant population.

The February announcement from The White House was part of a National Strategy for Combating Wildlife Trafficking, a larger Obama administration plan designed to address both American conservation concerns as well as security threats posed by the illegal wildlife trade. Specifically, the action would prohibit the import and export of ivory as well as significantly restricting its sale inside the United States, except in the case of “antiques,” which refers to items that are more than 100 years old.

The National Rifle Organization’s strong opposition only reinforces their absolutist, dogmatic, and draconian views on gun ownership, which reacts to any action taken by Washington regardless of the intention as a historic assault on civil liberties and individual rights.

Unfortunately, their opposition usually comes at another’s expense. In this case the victims are tens of thousands of African and Asian elephants being slaughtered each year for the ivory in their tusks, an issue that has little to nothing to do with American gun rights.

http://www.policymic.com/articles/84821/the-nra-is-now-fighting-against-elephants

[pipoman]

1. The antiquities (100 years old) aspect is silly. .

There are many items not 100 years old that were perfectly legal when produced. I suspect members concerns are about inlaid ivory on stocks and pistol grips. There are lots of them around and people have money invested in them. My interest is in collectable tools, Stanley for instance made ivory carpenters and machinists rules into the 1940's iirc.

[hack89]

2. So grandfather in existing ivory handles and inlays - problem solved. nt

[DonP]

3. Well yeah, but then you can't whine about the NRA again

That's the real objective of almost all of those Google dumps.

How miserable and depressing must things be for you to spend your time in the wee small hours of the morning screening the web for any negative article from some cockamamie blog or obscure newspaper to cut and paste mindlessly.

All that, when you have your own "safe haven" group to run ... that nobody ever really visits?

In the meantime I have 2 more classes starting this week for CCW in Illinois, including one of all Chicago firemen and their wives and a few cop wives. I'm doing a lot of couples training.

Real world activity versus online whining seems to be a big point of difference between "us and them".

[Token Republican]

4. LMFAO

How miserable and depressing must things be for you to spend your time in the wee small hours of the morning screening the web for any negative article from some cockamamie blog or obscure newspaper to cut and paste mindlessly.

You owe me a cup of coffee and a monitor.

[SecularMotion]

5. Wow! Hostile much?

Judging from the tone of your comment, you probably shouldn't be carrying a lethal weapon in public, much less teaching others about carrying in public.

Can't you simply comment on the NRA's position of the issue without the personal attack?

[Token Republican]

6. Orlly

SecularMotion (4,422 posts)
28. Hey, wake up!!

You're on a website for liberal & progressive Democrats.

You're really going to try and argue against linking to HuffingtonPost & MSNBC on DU?

This isn't "both sides need to play nice."

This is get the fuck off of DU

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1172&pid=139605

[SecularMotion]

7. "This is get the fuck off of DU with your radical right wing views!"

was the complete quote.

And you forgot this

[DonP]

9. Not hostile at all, I just think it's really stupid and funny

But I have about the same problem with the NRA drafting laws that I'm sure you have with Bloomberg writing the law for Colorado that cost us 3 seats and may cost the Governorship seat this fall.

Gun control as evidenced by your extensive efforts, is waging a campaign almost totally bounded by threads on internet boards and funded in the real world by one egocentric billionaire.

Gun owners on the other hand, all live and do things in the real world, millions of them.

That's why you're getting nowhere except in your own minds and every class we teach brings more new people to our way of thinking.

BTW, if Skinner agreed with you, that this is all RW garbage, we would have all been gone years ago.

We're still here and you might want to either respect his judgement a little more and stop whining or start your own website.

[SecularMotion]

10. Bloomberg & MAIG are just getting started

There will much more legislation and opposing the NRA in elections. Get used to it.

Meanwhile the NRA positions are becoming more extreme and absurd. They are the PETA of the radical right.

[Token Republican]

11. LMAO

Bloomberg and what's left of MAIG will keep sacrificing democrats who are stupid enough to be MAIG's useful idiots

http://www.stopillegalmayors.com/

But do go on. I'd love to hear how you support groups that gets democrats kicked out of office.

I find you amusing.

[DonP]

13. Yeah, sure, we've been hearing that same sad story for over a decade

"The NRA is dead and they just don't know it", "Things are changing", "The backlash is coming"

When you actually get anything passed, be sure and cut and paste somebody's op ed on it so we'll know it actually happened..

The really stupid mistake gun control fans make is thinking the NRA is the only face of gun rights. They either ignore the other 75 million + gun owners, or outright piss them off, foolishly thinking that they already agree with them.

You just keep hoping and we'll just keep teaching hundreds of classes with thousands of students, including police, across the country every week.

[HALO141]

18. you mean they're just getting started

serving their prison sentences. Bloomberg's hedging his bets with his new bunch of sluts.

[HALO141]

17. .. stop whining ..

"We're still here and you might want to either respect his judgement a little more and stop whining or start your own website."

Meh... wouldn't get any more traffic than his group does. Even if it did it's no fun complaining to clones of yourself. That's the reason for all the google dumps.

[HALO141]

16. not that easy.

There are already strict laws governing the importation of ivory and it's already a problem traveling with rifles or shotguns that have an ivory bead in the front sight. Customs officials sometimes demand you prove that the ivory was obtained legally. Such documentation is usually impossible to produce on the spot and documentation that the item was purshased domestically may not be sufficient. (Remember Fish and Wildlife's raid on Gibson Guitars a couple years ago.)

[clffrdjk]

8. That is really going to hurt the elephants

By banning the legal trade you stop sending all that legal money which helps firstly the elephants and secondly the local economies. Elephant populations will start falling and a few people will wonder why but you will have moved on to your next target.

[Eleanors38]

12. "fighting elephants?" I thought the NRA was Republican.

[gejohnston]

14. the problem with hacks passing themselves off as journalists

Importing ivory into the US has been banned for years. The NRA is not opposing that. The NRA claims that the law prohibits one from selling or buying anything that has ivory in it that is less than 100 years old. IOW, if a collector has one of George Patton's revolvers, he can not donate it to a military museum or sell them for a few years.
http://www1.american.edu/ted/elephant.htm
This is the disputed part:

Significantly Restrict Domestic Resale of Elephant Ivory: We will finalize a proposed rule that will reaffirm and clarify that sales across state lines are prohibited, except for bona fide antiques, and will prohibit sales within a state unless the seller can demonstrate an item was lawfully imported prior to 1990 for African elephants and 1975 for Asian elephants, or under an exemption document.
Clarify the Definition of “Antique”: To qualify as an antique, an item must be more than 100 years old and meet other requirements under the Endangered Species Act. The onus will now fall on the importer, exporter, or seller to demonstrate that an item meets these criteria.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2014/02/11/fact-sheet-national-strategy-combating-wildlife-trafficking-commercial-b

This is how the NRA interpreted it:

Any firearm, firearm accessory, or knife that contains ivory, no matter how big or small, would not be able to be sold in the United States, unless it is more than 100 years old. This means if your shotgun has an ivory bead or inlay, your revolver or pistol has ivory grips, your knife has an ivory handle, or if your firearm accessories, such as cleaning tools that contain any ivory, the item would be illegal to sell.

If I had the kind of money that could afford such a collection, I can afford a lawyer to figure it out for me.
That doesn't really match the OP's claims does it? This isn't a case of right or wrong, it is more of a case of which is the least full of shit, PolicyMic or the NRA? Good question.

While the NRA and others misuse the word "draconian" due to hyperbole (like calling the Colorado law "draconian&quot , the writer doesn't even know what the word means.

The, if you will excuse the pun, elephant in the room really is: will this proposed change in law have the desired effect (curb the illegal ivory trade and save elephants)? If the answer is yes, then great. If not, the next question is "what will""

[krispos42]

15. So....

...arguing that the 100-year-old-or-older rule is excessive is "absolutist, dogmatic, and draconian"?

Maybe reflexively those kinds of terms with respect to the NRA is "absolutist, dogmatic, and draconian".

Maybe labeling any gun law, no matter how ineffective, restrictive, or burdensome as "reasonable" is also "absolutist, dogmatic, and draconian".

I see that discussing the limits and perhaps negotiating a slightly different timeframe or other method of grandfathering in old ivory did not occur to the author of the article. He simply reached immediately for the "absolutist, dogmatic, and draconian" canard.