Monday, September 18, 2017

“What Happened”: Clinton Recognizes NRA’s Power, Rewrites History, Urges Dems to Double-down on Gun Control by Dr. Rich Swier


This week, twice-failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton released her new book, “What Happened,” which chiefly serves to assign blame to the myriad politicians, journalists, organizations, countries, prejudices, and technologies she claims caused her defeat. Gun rights supporters will be happy to know that NRA is featured prominently.
In addition to apportioning NRA its well-deserved share of the blame, Clinton seeks to rewrite her own history on the gun issue and urges her fellow Democrats to ignore political reality and continue to champion gun control.

NRA’s Power

Clinton repeatedly acknowledges NRA’s influence on the 2016 election and the broad political landscape.
Pointing out the grassroots power of gun rights supporters, Clinton explains, “The politics of guns has been toxic for a long time… The vocal minority of voters against gun safety laws have historically been more organized, better funded, and more willing to be single-issue voters.”
Recounting her first policy speech of the 2016 campaign, where she attacked NRA, Clinton admits, “Going after the NRA is dangerous for candidates…”
Reiterating some of the same points Bill Clinton made about NRA’s power in his 2001 autobiography My Life, Clinton writes,
In the 1990s, my husband fought hard to pass both a ten-year ban on assault weapons and the Brady Bill, which, for the first time, required background checks on many gun purchases at federally licensed firearms dealers… The NRA funded an intense backlash to the new safety measures and helped defeat a lot of Democratic members of Congress in the disastrous 1994 midterm elections. Then, in 2000, the NRA helped beat Al Gore.
Discussing NRA’s contribution to her 2016 defeat, Clinton notes, 
As for the NRA, it kept its promise to do everything it could to stop me. All told, the gun lobby spent more than $30 million supporting Trump, more money than any other outside group and more than double what it spent to support Mitt Romney in 2012. About two-thirds of that money paid for more than ten thousand negative ads attacking me in battleground states.
Clinton’s recognition of NRA’s role in her and her husband’s defeats should motivate gun owners in the continuing fight to defend the Second Amendment and serve as a stark warning to anti-gun politicians.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Fact; There are over 100 million Gun Owners in this Country;
This is what happened the last time the Dem0rats push for Gun Control.
In his autobiography, Bill Clinton described the effects of the Last Democrat Anti-Gun push:
Neither Brady nor the mayors got all of their wishes, but they certainly got some. The Brady Act, the “assault weapons” ban, and the driving of small FFLs out of business represented their major successes.
Then came the midterm elections.
“On November 8, we got the living daylights beat out of us, losing eight Senate seats and 44 House seats, the largest defeat for our party since 1946. … The NRA had a great night. They beat both Speaker Tom Foley and Jack Brooks, two of the ablest members of Congress, who had warned me this would happen. … The gun lobby claimed to have defeated 19 of the 24 members on its hit list. They did at least that much damage, and could rightly claim to have made Newt Gingrich the House Speaker.”

ExpatNJ said...

What happened? Politicians at EVERY level who think "Gun Control/Safety/Whatever" activism will be conducive to their ballot-box longevity need only remember these few eloquent words:

"When you mess with me, buddy, this is what you get"

(character 'Dr. Edward Bailey' (portrayed by noted actor Anthony Hopkins), movie "Red 2" (2013), https://www.springfieldspringfield.co.uk/movie_script.php?movie=red-2).

Anonymous said...

That is 100 million people that admit to owning guns. how many own some kind of weapon that is not a fire arm? Most Americans believe in self defense. It makes no difference what weapon you use for self defense as long as it is effective. when only the gun grabbers own guns the death rate of gun grabbers will greatly increase. Very few people will bother to register a weapon taken from a cold dead hand. very effective booby traps are used to get firearms when none are available. Vietnam proved the effectiveness of booby traps.

Anonymous said...

We have a population in this country of 330,000,000 give or take several million illegal aliens. all of the 100,000,000 gun owners are voting age adults. Problem is a good portion of that 100,000,000 are incompetent morons that can not read or understand the constitution and the laws of this country. I'm damn well disgusted with the pukes running around that think they know or understand what they are talking about when it comes to the constitution and the laws of this country. A couple of months ago I finished helping a friend write a civics course for tenth graders. Maybe the next generation will not be so damned ignorant.