Strategy Error: Defending the Right to Keep and Bear Arms

I swear, I'm going to shoot the next person who uses the catch-phrase
"defending your 2nd Amendment right" or "defending your right to keep and
bear arms!"

Why? Because I think that they don't understand the problems we
face.

Our anti-gun friends, from here in referred to as HCI, et al., they're in
this fight for the long haul -- until they see every last civilian-owned
weapon melted into slag. And, as their track record indicates, they will
stop at nothing to make sure that they see that occur..

From the Brady Bull to the mayor of Philadelphia trying to file a class
action suit against firearms manufacturers, from firearms owners being
arrested, imprisoned, and/or sued for defending themselves, to ranges
being closed due to 'hazardous waste' laws, from unConstitutional 
ex-post-facto laws being passed against gun-owners to bills making
firearms owners criminally liable for crimes, HCI, et al., are fighting a
TOTAL WAR against our natural rights to life, liberty and property.

A total war is just that -- using any means available to completely
destroy your opponents and achieve your objectives, and that is what they
are doing.

And that, my friends, is where we play right into their hands -- by
only waging a campaign to "defend" our rights. The singular objective of a
defensive campaign is to make the cost of achieving the goal too expensive
to bear, to make your enemy not want to pay the cost, and pursue a more
peaceful compromise.

THAT ISN'T GOING TO HAPPEN HERE!

HCI, et al., have practise at milking every tragedy, using the raw
emotions surrounding death, and turning them into dollar signs and
soundbites for the camera. As soon as they hear of another
schoolyard shooting, they're already counting the money, as they shake
down America yet again, with faked statistics, grisly photos and empty
promises of a better tomorrow.

No matter how much we spend "defending" our rights, even if we win the 
round, they'll be back next chance they get, with more resources and
more refined tactics, and the siege begins again.

If we lose the round, they quickly amass to slice off yet another aspect
of our rights, then another, then another, then ...

We need to change our strategy, or else the future -- be it us, our
children, or our grandchildren -- will see the complete revokation of
the right to live free.

No more defense. It's time for offense. It is time that we, as firearms
owners, mobilized for the counterattack.

It is time that we trashed over fifty years of ineffective, immoral and
illegal gun control laws.

It's time we restored the unrestricted right to carry concealed weapons,
and it's way past time that we passed a Constitutional Amendment regarding
the right to keep and bear arms that even Sarah Brady can understand.

How? Our opponents have taken up the concept of total war, and so should
we. We, as a whole, must use every tool available to honest men and women,
on every front, to throw back their attempts.

We must elect pro-firearms politicians at every level of government, and
continue to support them as they execute their offices, as well as push
them forward in our fight to regain our rights.

We must use the pro-freedom politicians to appoint pro-freedom civil
servants and judges, who will execute their offices in the advancement of
liberty.

We must counteract the HCI propaganda, by public debate, by letters to
the editors, by protests to local TV stations, by staging counter-protests
at anti-firearms demonstrations, by challenging the Brady Bunch on every
cooked statistic they manufacture, and exposing their operation for the
propaganda machine it is.

How? Simply, it begins with you. And you. And you. And you, over there.
And me, and you too.

Step One: Get involved. Even if it just to send a postcard to your
politicians, that says "Gun control is for the birds," enough of them will
start getting attention. Phone calls, letters, faxes, e-mail and face to
face meetings are even better venues for driving your point home.

Step Two: Organize. Contact your local gun-club or grassroots 
organization. If you don't have one, or don't agree with their views on
the issues, get together and organize your own.

Step Three: Recruit. Men, money and material -- the three M's to winning a
total war. Get new members, recruit politicians to your cause, hold
rallies and fundraisers to help get them elected.

Step Four: Reach out. Reach out to the community, for membership and
support. Reach out to other area pro-firearms and pro-freedom groups, to 
let them know that you're there, and to get cross-communication,
feedback and coordination. At the very least try to avoid accidentally
working against each other.

Step Five: Fight. Yes, while you're organizing, you will be in a defensive
position, trying to do what you can to counteract the anti-firearms
deluge. But as you gather more and more of the three M's, you can start
setting and obtaining aggressive goals: start with stopping anti-firearms
legislation; then move up to replacing anti-freedom politicians with
pro-freedom ones; then use the pro-freedom politicians to reduce/negate
anti-freedom politicians (a pro-freedom supermajority in a legislature
works very well to negate an anti-freedom executive); using a pro-freedom
majority to push through pro-freedom laws; and finally, using a 
pro-freedom majority to push through state or federal amendments that will
completely destroy any possibility of the Brady Bunch's anti-freedom
agenda.

We *can* do it.

"Never Stop Fighting"

--
"Frankly, Agent Mulder, alien abduction is the more believable option."
			Agent Skinner, X-Files, 3/09/98 [paraphrase] 
-- John E. Jasen  // DNRC Ambassador to Earth \\  jjasen1@umbc.edu --
-- My views are those of the DNRC only. Prepare to be domesticated --