Daily Dose of Sultnpapper 03/03/18> Maybe we need to ban groups not guns…

Earlier in the week I promised a reader of the Daily Dose that I would weigh in on all the “controversy” that seems to be going on in the media with the National Rifle Association. Today I am going to make good on that promise, it might be a couple days later than I had anticipated but trust my position hasn’t changed in those couple days.

First things first, I am not a member of the National Rifle Association and have never been. I don’t have anything against guns, and I do own some, my first gun I owned was a birthday present when I turned 12, it was a .22 cal Winchester lever action rifle. The second gun I got when I turned 16, a 12 ga. Winchester model 870 pump shotgun. So I have had guns from early on in my life and continue to have and use them to this day. Neither of my guns have ever been aimed or fired at another human being that includes intentionally and unintentionally.

Next let’s talk about this last shooting that has brought the NRA back in the spot light of the anti-gun crowd here in the USA. The NRA was not the shooter in the Florida school shooting on February 14, 2018. The 19 year old that carried out the shooting that day was not a member of the NRA according to all the media reports. So we can’t associate this shooter in the Florida shooting with the NRA. That really should be enough right there to put a stop to attacking the NRA about school shootings. To the best of my knowledge none of these previous mass shootings has been done by an NRA member.

So, we can’t put an ounce of blame directly on the NRA in my opinion, I don’t believe the case could be made that even indirectly the NRA had anything to do with the shooting. What I do believe is that society has changed and now needs to have a group or association to blame when something bad takes place so society just goes after whatever seems to fit the bill.

So, how about we look at a group that it is reported the shooter belonged too; the ROTC or sometimes referred to as the Jr. ROTC. The Junior Reserve Officers Training Corps is what the initials Jr.ROTC stands for. According to both the New York Times and the Army News website the Florida school shooter was a former member of the school ROTC program.
While there is no commitment to join the Army if you belong to the ROTC, it is taught by former military personnel. The main aspects of the program, according to the research I’ve done, are to teach skills for life. Discipline, leadership and self confidence are among the things listed. Also how to march as a troop and physical fitness is a big part of the training.

It might also be important to note the Army helps fund these ROTC programs. Students as young as thirteen years of age have been known to enroll in the program and nationwide the number of members is estimated at 1,600 members. These students even wear uniforms similar in style to army uniforms. Marksmanship is also an activity that is a part of the ROTC program; the shooter was a former member of the school marksmanship team.

While there is a distinction between the type of weapon used for the training and what the shooter used for the killing, both are considered “lethal weapons” by the military. The training guns use CO2 gas to propel the .177 caliber pellets, while gun powder is the source of power for the .223 caliber AR 15 used in the shooting. It is at this point where we can join the NRA and the JrROTC together though; the NRA has given financial support to JrROTC programs in the form of grant money to support the program.

So just to clarify things; JrROTC program is funded by the US Armed Forces, the programs are taught by former military, and the NRA has given financial support in the form of grants. So why is the NRA the only group that is under attack by the press and the anti-gun folks? If the press and the anti-gun folks are consistent then they need to be raising hell against the military as well, but we know that won’t happen. The government and the military are protecting us is what we are told, correct?

Well the NRA is protecting you as well, they are keeping an eye on government officials who are constantly working to take your 2nd amendment right to bear arms away from the public and exposing each and every time that a bill is working to do just that. While I couldn’t find an exact number of members listed on the NRA website I did find numbers for what they brought in from member dues in 2015 and that number is $165 million, if you divide that by the standard rate of $40 per membership it works out to around 4.125 million members, you can probably add another 200,000 or so life time members who don’t pay annual dues as they have paid a onetime fee that gives them membership for life. So, even rounding up the number to 5 million as members, it is not a large organization by any means, it just happens to be the largest amount of gun owners belonging to one organization.

So we have two groups; JrROTC at 1,600 and NRA at 5 million members respectively, but the shooter only had belonged to the JrROTC. It would only make sense that the group that needs to be attacked and done away with is the JrROTC, since their former member is the presumed shooter. The former military leaders who taught the JrROTC program at the Florida school and the US Armed forces should also be banned from any school properties across the country, since they are the ones who are actually teaching these school students how to shoot. For all we know the NRA grant money could have gone to things like uniforms or pizza parties for the JrROTC members, so is the NRA guilty just by association?

Am I sounding ridiculous? Maybe, or am I just thinking like a anti-gun person?

If having a lot of members is the criteria for wanting to do away with groups we might start looking at church groups, the Catholic church has over 70 million members in the US, the southern Baptist church has about 16 million members, and the Lutheran church checks in at 3.5 million, why is no one trying to break up these church groups?

Surely with membership numbers this large these groups have got to be dangerous, who knows, the next shooter might come from one of them. In fact we had a church shooting not long ago here in Texas, and the shooter had a remote connection to the church, his ex wife or estranged wife was a member there. He also had been in the military and I think was a former mental patient who was AWOL from the military. Yes, we need to get rid of churches and the military right after we get rid of the NRA.

While I am being ridiculous I will also weigh in on these businesses that are now trying to distance themselves from NRA members by cancelling the affinity programs that they have had previously offered where NRA members could get discounts from the business for being an NRA member. Keep your cheap little discounts, you might them to survive.

I might just have to start a monitoring service that watches businesses and see what businesses no longer want gun owner’s money. Even though the membership of the NRA is only around 5 million, the estimated number of gun owners is projected to be about 70 million. If most of those people are like me and they believe in the 2nd amendment, then they will also make an effort to spend their money with companies that are neutral with regard to gun ownership and rights or at least have a board of directors that have enough sense to keep their mouths shut and just provide services that their customers want.

I wonder how the anti-gun crowd would react if the government decided to do away with freedom of speech and the right to assemble? Then they couldn’t get together and hold their gun and NRA protests, which would frost their butts for sure.

If you go back and look at the history of the NRA you will find out that the organization was started shortly after the civil war and the goal was to improve marksmanship. It has been estimated that during the civil war only one musket ball of every thousand shots fired actually hit an enemy combatant. That is about as pathetic as it comes when you are talking about shooting accuracy. The goal of the NRA was to make sure that civilians could handle a firearm and shoot with some sort of accuracy because at some point they may be needed to fight against trained soldiers who practice their marksmanship. The government even provided surplus weapons to help support the program.

The NRA was actually a major player in getting guns laws passed back in the early 1900’s and that continued up until the point that is was clear that the government wanted to be the only ones with guns, at which point the NRA started taking a stand for upholding the 2nd amendment. So, the very group you anti-gun folks are trying to bring down was doing your dirty work of gun control long before you and your group came along, the only difference is, the NRA folks were smart enough to read the writing on the wall.

Until next time,
@sultnpapper

https://sola.ai/sultnpapper