During my nine terms in the U.S. House of Representatives, I had
a 100 percent voting record with the National Rifle Association.
Not once did I
vote for gun control; not for the Brady Bill, nor ammunition
registration, not for the assault weapons ban nor any of the other
futile attempts to fight crime by simply putting people's name on a
list.
The NRA endorsed me in each of my election campaigns. For a time
following my first election, I was a bit of an NRA poster boy and
adorned the cover of one of their magazines. The honor was not because
of my anti-gun control voting record, but because of my legislative
efforts to improve game animal habitat here in Montana and West.
Thus, I
have been both saddened and alarmed to watch that organization's
three-decade-long lurch toward the political Far Right.
Beginning in the
1980s, the NRA has done a disservice to both its members and the
historic legacy of hunting and game habitat in the United States.
Far
too much of the NRA's time and its members' money are consumed in the
seemingly insatiable effort to elect candidates on the political fringe
who also happen to oppose gun control.
The organization's primary focus should be on vastly improving
game habitat in America, advancing hunting fair play and the safety of
our youngest hunters.
But this is not your grandfather's NRA. This
organization has eagerly espoused the politics of resentment and become
a pawn of one political party.
In this there is good news and bad news for gun owners. First
the good news: The federal government, your elected officials, never
have and are not now conspiring to take our guns. No such legislation
has ever been introduced in the U.S. Congress.
The bad news? Groups such
as the NRA have been hoodwinking you about that very issue--wastefully
spending your hard-earned dues money on politics, and useless protesting
by having people like Charlton Heston give that phony "pry it from my cold dead fingers" speech.
A case in point is the recently publicized rush by some gun owners to "stock up" on assault weapons before they are banned by the NRA's latest boogey man, Barack Obama.
The urge to blame President-elect Obama is a transparent example of how utterly partisan the gun groups and far too many of their adherents have become.
Sen. John McCain, not Barack Obama, is the person with the Congressional record of voting for gun control.
McCain is for registration at gun shows, supported a ban on assault weapons and, prior to his run for the presidency, was working with his friend Joe Lieberman to mandate trigger locks and close the gun-show loophole.
Obama's votes in the Illinois Legislature have also been somewhat pro-gun control, but it is McCain, not Obama, who cast the pro-gun control votes in the Congress.
So, why don't more gun owners understand what is really happening?
That's a good question for the NRA and the other so-called pro-gun groups who are lining their pockets with your money.
Pat Williams served nine terms as a U.S. Representative from Montana.
After his retirement,
he returned to Montana and is teaching at The University of Montana
where he also serves
as a Senior Fellow at the Center for the Rocky Mountain West.
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