NRA stops the UN from gun treaty

[gym]

http://moran.senate.gov/public/inde...ecord_id=2b02a67f-2179-41fc-be55-3502163c8510.


NRA worked with our allies in the U.S. Congress and successfully assembled strong bipartisan opposition to any treaty that adversely impacts the Second Amendment. On two occasions NRA was successful in convincing a majority of the U.S. Senate to sign letters to President Obama that made it clear that any treaty that included civilian arms was not going to be ratified by the U.S. Senate.

 

[dogtown tom]

Here is the NRA's press release:
http://www.nraila.org/get-involved-locally/grassroots/grassroots-alerts/2012/vol-19,-no-30-07272012.aspx?s=&st=&ps=

This should serve as a wakeup call to the NRA bashers.....exactly what role did NAGR and GOA play?

 

[Birch Knoll]

I'm no NRA basher, but I'm not so sure that NRA brought this about. From what is reported elsewhere, the UN conference working on the ATT was unable to reach agreement on a treaty, due to disagreements between nations.

 

[clamman]

The "NRA" stopped it? Yeah right. Hogwash!

 

[Centurian22]

Great work NRA!!!

 

[jimmyraythomason]

Great work NRA!!!

Absolutely!

 

[Fremmer]

Good job nra!!!

 

[Sam1911]

Hold the phone...flag on the play!

Read the link given. The NRA encouraged a bunch of Senators to write a letter to the President and the Sec. of State telling them that ratification would be blocked if the treaty ever came to be.

That has NOTHING AT ALL to do with the treaty failing to be hammered out by the various nations' delegates.

So let's not say, or encourage the NRA to say, that they "STOPPED" anything. What they're doing is important. Let's not minimize or cloud that by over-aggrandizing what they actually are doing.

 

[calaverasslim]

Hold the phone...flag on the play!

Read the link given. The NRA encouraged a bunch of Senators to write a letter to the President and the Sec. of State telling them that ratification would be blocked if the treaty ever came to be.

That has NOTHING AT ALL to do with the treaty failing to be hammered out by the various nations' delegates.

So let's not say, or encourage the NRA to say, that they "STOPPED" anything. What they're doing is important. Let's not minimize or cloud that by over-aggrandizing what they actually are doing.

too true. This conference/treaty garbage will be back as long as there are enough anti-American politicians in the UN to try and shove this stuff down our throats.

It will be back

 

[dogtown tom]

Sam1911 Hold the phone...flag on the play!

Read the link given. The NRA encouraged a bunch of Senators to write a letter to the President and the Sec. of State telling them that ratification would be blocked if the treaty ever came to be.

That has NOTHING AT ALL to do with the treaty failing to be hammered out by the various nations' delegates.

So let's not say, or encourage the NRA to say, that they "STOPPED" anything. What they're doing is important. Let's not minimize or cloud that by over-aggrandizing what they actually are doing.

Did you miss the part where the NRA got certified as a "non governmental organization" by the UN? This gives the NRA the ability to sit and be heard by the UN.

Thats a little more complex than merely writing letters to Congressmen.

 

[Birch Knoll]

Yes, but the ATT talks collapsed internally, and not because of anything the NRA had to say. Now, I appreciate the NRA's work on this, and had a treaty been produced and ultimately signed by the U.S., I think the NRA's opposition would have been invaluable in defeating ratification of the treaty.

But it never got that far. And given how it failed, it's hard to see that the NRA had a lot to do with it.

 

[Sam1911]

My point exactly.

We have a good (maybe GREAT) organization working for us. Let's be very clear about what they CAN and ARE doing.

The hype (theirs and our own) wears a bit thin.

 

[pat701]

I am a life member of the NRA. I don't care who did this, just that it worked out in favor of the 2nd Amendment.

 

[Fremmer]

The lobbying the nra did to help that treaty implode wasn't mere "hype ".
The nra has the lobbying power to encourage senators to write to the president and essentially signal that the scheme wouldn't be tolerated by the senate. Thats not hype, or insignificant, and it didnt happen by luck. The nra is the main group helping prevent certain politicians from implementing gun control legislation and treaties.

 

[Sam1911]

Yes, and that's all very well. It is NOT why the treaty was not completed by the UN delegates, however.

 

[Texan Scott]

It's good to have the NRA - they are a very powerful lobby on our behalf (and I hope people will remember this whenever someone starts using 'lobbyist' as a dirty word (to short-sightedly advance their own polictical interests). A lobby is a group that pools our support and speaks with our voice to people in our own government who wouldn't listen to us individually. The NRA has done its job, and done it well. Good Job!

That said, they have nothing to do with the internal workings of the UN- I doubt delegates from any of the other countries give two cents for their opinion. The simple fact is, the UN (for all its pretension to international harmony, brotherhood, and goodwill) is hopelessly and irredeemably divided. This treaty is suffering the same fate as UN efforts to define terrorism. All their non-binding resolutions and condemnations notwithstanding, they've been trying to reach a binding agreement in international law on terrorism since before I was born. They've succeded in agreeing that certain acts, like hijacking airliners and cruise ships, are terrorism (Really? Good for them!) but can't come up with a comprensive definition of what terrorism is overall because as soon as someone tosses the term 'state sponsored' into the debate, a dozen countries throw up their hands and walk out in noisy protest.
The odds of them agreeing on what is or isn't 'appropriate' international arms dealing were never very good to begin with.

 

[bikemutt]

It does sound a bit as if the NRA is taking more credit than it's due for this thing imploding. Like an undriven car that that cuts loose down a street, simultaneously hits a curb and a phone pole and stops. The curb and the pole both helped stop it, and maybe one would have without the other, maybe not. Sometimes roadblocks are a good thing, even if they overtoot their own horn from time to time.

As a proud life member of the NRA I feel better when they stick to the facts and suppress the rhetoric, but, nothing is perfect, myself included.

 

[highlander 5]

In the long run anything the UN passes/proposes is bacled by a toothless organization anyway. It has no enforcement capabilities other than the sorry troops who for the most part are cowardly bullies they get from third world countries.I willing that the best they got would have a heart attack if they came up against an armed and probably better trained citizenry.

 

[Fremmer]

Well I'm not sure exactly why everyone threw in the towel on that steaming pile of treaty, but that letter, telling obama and the rest of the world that the treaty was dead in the senate, certainly didn't hurt. And the nra lobbying the senate to send that letter isn't trivial, it was very important, and I think the obama administration had to tell the un that the treaty was going no where as far as the US was involved. No support from the US probably doomed it.

So we are all speculating about why the plug was pulled on it, but I contend that the nra effectively lobbied to kill the ratification of it by getting the senate to send a letter. Which is impressive and appreciated.

 

[Texan Scott]

+1 Fremmer.

We EXPECT laughable incompetence and impotence from the UN... but we would be foolishly complacent to RELY on it. If the UN treaty hadn't blown up on its own end, that letter from the Senate would have been the all-important last line of defense against the ceding of our civil liberties to a foreign power. As it turns out, it may have been unnecessary... but it is ALWAYS worth reminding whatever administration of the day that the Senate answers to the American people, and the NRA speaks for a LOT of us.

 

[Sam1911]

Maybe the fault is entirely with the OP's choice of title.

 

[viper7342]

I don't care who was responsible for getting it done, I'm just thankful that those Commie Fascists at the UN were stopped from getting their slimy mitts on our civil rights. I really had my doubts about whether or not this would fly and for a while I thought this country just might end up engaged in another Revolutionary / Civil war.

 

[gym]

Sam's picking on me.

 

[Carl N. Brown]

I recall from the days of the 2004 proposal on small arms and light weapons that the NRA registered as a NGO nongovernment organisation with the UN, to oppose that other NGO, IANSA, that was lobbying for using the UN treaty to impose Australian-style gun control on the USA. (The Great Gun Debate, Kings College London, Oct 2004, Motion: "Should the United States Senate Support the Proposed UN Treaty that Bans Private Ownership of Guns?" Moderator: Paul Lavers; Pro: Rebecca Peters IANSA; Con: Wayne LaPierre NRA.)

Plus, the NRA is credited/blamed with defeating the proposal to ban firearms in Brazil.

Don't doubt that IANSA is blaming NRA opposition with the defeat of the arms trade treaty.

(For what its worth Peters has conceded that the NRA supplied technical information helpful in addressing actual illegal trade in weapons, black market smuggling.)

 

[ConstitutionCowboy]

We folk out here belonging to the NRA are in fact OWNERS of the NRA. I have no hesitation praising the NRA's leadership/functionaries successes, and I have no compunction for blasting the NRA's leadership/functionaries when they make bad calls and foul plays. They are, after all, your and my hired hands. I'll hold them to the fire each and every time. They don't do any of this out of the goodness of their hearts - they get PAID/SUPPORTED by us!

The leadership/functionaries of the NRA are not royalty and must remain humble - which means not claiming victory when victory is not ours(We the NRA's) to claim. No sir. We'll support them and thank them with their paychecks and and give them no quarter for grandstanding. Grandstanding only detracts from our(We the NRA's) credibility.

Woody

Though we may still exercise our Right to Keep and Bear Arms after filling out a bunch of paperwork, the real issue is the unconstitutional infringement the paperwork represents. That is where the infringements upon our right began. Look what those infringements are today... B.E.Wood