Dave, you cannot debate an emotional battle with logical points.
It's not about convincing someone the NRA is a good organization. It's about telling someone you're part of it, and if that person wants to believe you'd belong to an organization that wants people dead, or even you're on board with that . . . there's no persuasion possible.
My point was exactly what it was. Don't read into it. It's easy for someone to declare faceless political opponents evil. It's alot harder to carry on with that rhetoric and tell someone we know - face to face - you're an evil person.
Last Christmas at the in-laws my wife's sister and her husband had a conversation with me and my wife, and they are both very left of center. The Sandy Hook debate was raging, and they made similar statements about the NRA. I pointed out that her father and I am the NRA, and she backed off a bit on her rhetoric. But when her sister, my wife, spoke up and said, "Jenn, I belong to the NRA, too," she was floored. It totally challenged her preconceptions about who an NRA member was.
The blanket statements and the rhetoric ended right there, and we all began to have an honest discussion about civil rights, the dangers centralized power has against the minority, and that the people who own or carry guns really aren't wackos.