AHSA - Change 50 BMG Policy?

Status
Not open for further replies.
I am saying that it is against the law to talk to ANY politician about these issues, in any manner.

That seems odd - are you claiming that no non-profit organization may speak to any politician in any manner?

So for example, it is illegal for the Red Cross to ever speak to any politician - to express thanks or to ask for help? That doesn't seem to make sense to me.

I don't know exactly where the tax laws draw the line between eduction/lobbying/expressing the views of members for non-profit organizations. If you are correct, then I would expect AHSA to lose tax exempt status - if they are chartered that way. That would prove your point to be true.

In either case, that doesn't make a lot of difference to me. I joined because I supported their policies (with the exception of their 50 BMG policy). I don't really care about the profit/non-profit status.

Mike
 
Of course, I believe that's because they're trying to drive a wedge between the hunting community and the SD/HD/RKBA communities, but that's just me being cynical again.

I guess calling hunters "Fudd" and deriding their choice of weapons and hobbies is just way of spreading brotherly love. :)

Mike
 
That seems odd - are you claiming that no non-profit organization may speak to any politician in any manner?

So for example, it is illegal for the Red Cross to ever speak to any politician - to express thanks or to ask for help? That doesn't seem to make sense to me.

You are doing that thing you do in these threads, where you avoid the actual questions by playing games.

What I said was you cannot speak to politicians about the ISSUES as a 501c3.

Look, it's clearly written in the IRS code and you can look it up if you want.

The point is the AHSA has no influence, and doesn't plan on having any, which as usual shows that their only purpose is to be a wedge group.

Unless the AHSA has a separate division organized as a for profit to engage in lobbying there is simply no pressure that they can legally exert to make any changes to gun laws in any manner.

You're welcome to read the tax codes yourself, I'm not simply making this stuff up.

I don't know exactly where the tax laws draw the line between eduction/lobbying/expressing the views of members for non-profit organizations. If you are correct, then I would expect AHSA to lose tax exempt status - if they are chartered that way. That would prove your point to be true.

Their tax status is publicly available information.

In either case, that doesn't make a lot of difference to me. I joined because I supported their policies (with the exception of their 50 BMG policy). I don't really care about the profit/non-profit status.

Which gets us back to where we always start. If you don't care about their tax exempt status then you don't care whether or not they can influence changes, which means you

a) don't really understand what it is they do and
b) have no idea how they would get done the things you claim to want

It matters VERY much, the tax status of groups like this. They can't get anything done otherwise.

And if they can't get anything done, what is their purpose?

And of course you still refuse to answer the question I posted numerous times in your other threads:

Can you explain why all the board members of AHSA were/are also involved in Handgun Control Inc, and Americans to Stop Gun Violence?
 
Last edited:
Well then they will, or already may have, lose/lost their 501c3 (or maybe 4) status.

They show to still have it in the IRS records. 4 would allow some lobbying. We'll see if they file a status change in this tax year.

If that's the case we'll see what they do next. I see no information regarding actual legislation on their website.
 
Last edited:
I guess this means you won't be asking Ray whether AHSA would/does support or recommend any additional restriction on the sale/ownership/use of semi-automatic hunting rifles.

Pity. That would have actually been useful.
 
to the OP ...

FWIW, although I don't trust AHSA as far as I can fling a watery turd without my hands ...

...thanks for at least speaking to them and voicing your concerns.
 
I am happy to report that he expressed strong opposition to an assault weapons ban. He did argue that when used for hunting, AR-15s would have the same magazine limitations as other hunting weapons. I actually don't know how that works for hunting rifles - I am not a hunter. I assume that you must be able to buy "hunting capacity" magazines for Mini-14s, but I don't know how the Fish and Game people make sure you only hunt with the "hunting capacity" magazines. Maybe some of you hunters know how all of that works.

Yep.

That means they'll support my right to 100 round Beta drums, because they're legal for hunting here.

There is no magazine restriction in this state for hunting.

Glad to see they'll be supporting us.
 
I guess this means you won't be asking Ray whether AHSA would/does support or recommend any additional restriction on the sale/ownership/use of semi-automatic hunting rifles.

I don't see any indication on their gun policy web site that they have intention of supporting or recommending any additional restrictions on semi-automatic hunting rifles. I feel very confident that the AHSA does not recommend any additional restrictions on any semi-automatic rifles (hunting or sporting) - so asking the question is a bit like asking "When did you stop beating your wife"?

However, I would encourage you to contact the AHSA directly with a question if you are concerned. Relying on what the NRA-ILA says about AHSA is a bit like relying on what Sarah Palin says about Barack Obama. It might be better to get it from the directly from horse's mouth. Here is a link to their "Contact Us" page. Note that it takes a long time to get a response back (or it did in the past when I contacted them). I made the suggestion about presenting a Sharps Shiloh to Obama in September or October, and only heard back recently.

AHSA Contact

Mike
 
What's the "sporting purpose" test for a Civil War musket or rifle? For that matter, what is "sporting purpose" as applied to the ATF Curio and Relic list?

Gun owners own guns for different puposes: hunting, target shooting, self-defense, historical relic, and some I have probably missed.

I use muzzleloading rifle, cap'n'ball pistol, vintage and modern military rifles and .22 rimfire in target shooting, and I really don't want to limited because someone else sees no need for this or that for hunting.

Robert Sherrill pointed out in The Saturday Night Special (1975) that after all at the most, crime use represents 1 of every 400 guns. The NSPOF 1994 survey (Cook & Ludwig 1997) showed that only about one-third of gunowners cited self-defense as their primary reason for having a gun. Yet all the gun law discussion centers on (a) crime and (b) self-defense.

Any thing you can do wrong with a gun is already against the law (malum per se); the malum prohibitum--bad because banned--gun laws don't really affect criminal behaviour, but can criminalize gun owners who have no malum per se criminal intent. If Wright & Rossi (1983), Lott (2000), CDC (2003) and NAS (2004) are correct, there is no measurable benefit from any of these gun control laws, which means billions of dollars and millions of police man hours have been wasted for no benefit.

Besides, the founders of AHSA were gun control supporters, not gun sportsmen, and AHSA existed as a website before it had any membership. Feels like Astroturf to me.
 
They show to still have it in the IRS records. 4 would allow some lobbying. We'll see if they file a status change in this tax year.

How do you get to those IRS records? I'd like to read them.

Thanks,

Mike
 
I am happy to report that he expressed strong opposition to an assault weapons ban. He did argue that when used for hunting, AR-15s would have the same magazine limitations as other hunting weapons.

he did not want AR-15s regulated any differently than any other of what he would call "semi-automatic hunting rifles
So as long as my AR-15 doesn't have 2 or more of the following features:, a pistol grip, a bayonet, a flash hider, a threaded bbl, or bbl shroud, a detachable magazine that accepts more than 10 rounds, I should be okay? And I can have those if it's manufactured prior to 1994, right?

Yep, that's really against a '94 ban right there, uh-hu! :rolleyes:
 
How do you get to those IRS records? I'd like to read them.

I found an old reference on Google a while back to the tax status of AHSA. Not sure how you go about getting them directly, though it's said to be available.

That's why I do say they may have changed to 501c4. The NRA is now a 501c4 and there are differences in the amount and techniques of lobbying but I don't know exactly how all that works.

Or they might not be a 501 anything, maybe just a simple corporation. The tax status I saw was before they had any members, when they first "opened" with the private donations from their board of directors.

Look, I would love to be 100% wrong about everything I've posted on AHSA.

But at the end of the day most of the board members at one time or another were associated with Handgun Control Inc and there's no way you can spin that as a pro gun organization.

If they are only about hunting, and say "screw handguns and assault weapons" then fine, be up front and honest about it.

But, they continue to try to tie every use of firearms back to hunting in some way, yet claim to be proponents of the Second Amendment. That piece of writing doesn't use the word "hunting" anywhere in it.

So, AHSA is made up of all the former Handgun Control Inc people and that tells me all I need to know until I see real action taken otherwise.

Til then its just talk.

Whether they endorse Obama or not doesn't really bother me, many people believe Obama will not be an enemy of guns, and that remains to be seen as well. NRA has supported candidates that came back to bite them, wouldn't be anything new in the lobbying world.

My anti AHSA feeliings have nothing to do with Obama, they are based on the attachment of the board to HCI and Americans for Gun Safety in their past.
 
I guess calling hunters "Fudd" and deriding their choice of weapons and hobbies is just way of spreading brotherly love.
We don't hunters in general "fudds", a fudd is a name for a hunter who wants to ban all "not sporting enough" guns. The AHSA is the brady campaign pretending to be fudds.

deriding their choice of weapons and hobbies
Again, that's not true. I don't even like weapons with pistol grips or that are "tacticool",(But strongly oppose banning them) and prefer hunting-type guns.
 
Last edited:
I don't see any indication on their gun policy web site that they have intention of supporting or recommending any additional restrictions on semi-automatic hunting rifles. I feel very confident that the AHSA does not recommend any additional restrictions on any semi-automatic rifles (hunting or sporting) - so asking the question is a bit like asking "When did you stop beating your wife"?
They used to have on their website, as pointed out in the other thread, support for another AWB. That would regulate all semi-auto rifles, including hunting rifles. The AR-15 could still be purchased, but it would have to be in "sporting" configuration. (no non-Hillary-approved features, magazine capacity 10 rounds or less.)
 
''I guess calling hunters "Fudd" and deriding their choice of weapons and hobbies is just way of spreading brotherly love... ''
I just read the whole thing,and didn't see the Fudd calling you referenced?
 
What's the "sporting purpose" test for a Civil War musket or rifle? For that matter, what is "sporting purpose" as applied to the ATF Curio and Relic list?

As a "legal test" we are in complete agreement.

As a persuasive tactic, demonstrating that a weapon has a legitimate hunting/sporting purpose helps to persuade people who disagree with you.

I have seen your name on THR ever since I have been around here. I think that we might both charitably conclude the most THR posters are possessed of a deep mastery in creating arguments that convince people who already agree with them - what we in the south call "preaching to the choir".

I understand that phenomenon - it's a lot easier to persuade someone that you are correct if they already agree with you before you start. For me, it's not as intellectually interesting as trying to persuade someone who disagrees with you, but different strokes for different folks ...

The reason that I brought up "sporting purpose" is because that's the common argument folks who are opposed to a particular weapon cite, "I don't know why you want a xxx. What will you use it for?"

One answer that question is "None of your business". While I think that's probably a correct answer, I would suggest that its persuasive power is zilch - at least with regard to persuading people who disagree with you.

Another answer is "It used in yyy by sportsmen." That is generally, I think more persuasive to people who may disagree with you.

Mike
 
Thanks for the link Jorg.

This goes back to what I was saying.

Here is the list of executives from the latest filings there:

Ronald Schuman - Former ATF agent who works for Crime Gun Solutions. This company testifies against gun manufacturers in lawsuits, and has worked extensively for the Brady Campaign.

Joseph Vince, Jr. - President of Crime Gun Solutions and former ATF agent who helped write the Clinton AWB from a technical perspective.

Ray Shoenke - The "Ray and Holly Schoenke Foundation" is listed as a high dollar donor to Handgun Control Inc and both Ray and his wife have attended HCI fundraising dinners in the past. Not just his wife as some have argued.

Dave Evans - Never heard of this one :) He's treasurer, maybe just an accountant, dunno.

Robert Ricker - previously employed as lobbyist for HCI and I believe Brady Campaign. Ricker also testified on behalf of the City of New York in at least one of Bloombergs lawsuits. He reports his other work is with "Educational Fund to End Handgun Violence" and "Virginians for Public Safety". You can look those up for yourself and see what they are.


So that is the makeup and the financial backing of AHSA. According to the 2007 tax records right at 20% of their money came from members, the rest donated by these men right here.

These are pro gun?

You just can't make that argument in any way at all no matter what they might put on their website.

Again, for at least the 10th time, maybe more, I will ask you to explain this and why you believe these men are pro gun.
 
I just read the whole thing,and didn't see the Fudd calling you referenced?

I was joking about a general proclivity on THR for calling hunters "Fudd". Search will show lots of instances. I tjhink that calling someone names and making fun of their abilities - as a group - drives a wedge.

Mike
 
Mr. Schoenke wanted to talk to me about my suggestion that we give a Shiloh Sharps rifle to President Obama - my suggestion to him by email had been that we present an all American rifle like Shiloh Sharps in an all American caliber like 45-70 to President Obama.
Sounds like a political stunt to garner support for the AHSA organization. I can see the news headline now, “Obama accepts all American firearm from gun rights group AHSA.” “I believe Americans have a second amendment right, and the AHSA is a group I support,” says the newly elected president Obama :barf:
 
I can look at the 990, how do I tell what kind of corp they are?

The 990 is required for non-profit organizations of all types except churches I think.

Form 990 and Form 990-EZ are used by tax-exempt political organizations and nonexempt charitable trusts. Parts
organizations, nonexempt charitable trusts, and section 527 I through XI of the form must be completed by all filing
political organizations to provide the IRS with the information organizations and require reporting on the organization’s
required by section 6033.

Pretty vague. Covers lots of stuff; 501 and 527. Could be c3, c4 of 527. c4 and 527 can lobby so I suspect they have changed to one of those. The board members are smart enough to know how this stuff goes, they have years of experience doing it.

527's are, as I understand it, what you'd traditionally call this stuff and I think that's what the NRA-ILA is.

Not that it changes things much.
 
Mike said:
I was joking about a general proclivity on THR for calling hunters "Fudd". Search will show lots of instances.

A search showed me no such thing.

I did find many examples of people using Fudd as a term to describe hunters who only support the 2a when it is framed as a hunting issue. IOW it is a very specific term. Based on my searching, there is no "general proclivity on THR for calling hunters 'Fudd'."

Mike said:
I tjhink that calling someone names and making fun of their abilities - as a group - drives a wedge.

I'd agree; that is, if what you wrote were accurate.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top