Jeffrey H. Birnbaum – NRA Sounds Alarm of Not-So-Imminent Threat By Jeffrey H. Birnbaum
In lobbying, a threat is good for business, whether it’s genuine or not.
This might help to explain the dire warnings being issued by the National Rifle Association as the Democrats prepare to take control of Congress this week.
“The new leadership could be one of the most unfriendly to the National Rifle Association,” declared Andrew Arulanandam, spokesman for the NRA. “If there’s an effort to pursue gun control, we will mount an active defense.”
The famously combative lobby, with 4 million members, is displeased with the voting histories of Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) and other top Democrats in the House and is putting them on notice that it won’t tolerate passage of anti-gun measures.
The only problem: No one expects gun legislation this year. …
The NRA is on high alert, and its latest weapon is a pamphlet designed to send its members into fits of paranoid rage and to inspire them to open their wallets.
A draft of the 27-page document, which was provided to The Washington Post by a source outside the NRA, lashes out at such icons of the left as investor George Soros, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Pelosi. They are depicted as part of “a marching axis of adversaries far darker and more dangerous than gun owners have ever known.”
Few places are less likely to be burgled than the Fairfax County headquarters of the NRA. But Arulanandam alleged that someone recently stole a “working draft” of the pamphlet, called “Freedom in Peril.”
The document is filled with sinister-looking caricatures of supposed anti-gun figures such as filmmaker Michael Moore, comedian Rosie O’Donnell, New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg (R) and CBS News anchor Katie Couric. One chapter attacks Democratic lawmakers such as Sens. John F. Kerry and Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts and derides them as a “Gang of Opportunists.” Other NRA enemies are “One-World Extremists,” “Animal Rights Terrorists” (such as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) and “Illegal Alien Gangs.” …
“It’s inevitable that terrorists will infest America for generations to come. It’s also inevitable that an anti-gun president will occupy the White House, and anti-gun forces will control the U.S. House and Senate,” they write. “Unless we are well-financed to face that moment, the final disarmament of law-abiding Americans will occur beneath the shroud of anti-terrorism legislation.”