Fighting the NRA plus the Brave New World of Communicating

The State of the Union

President Obama staked out a bold program in his State of the Union address.  He advocated steps to stop gun violence (see following article in the blog), severely reducing our military involvement in Afghanistan, immigration reform, improving technical education so that jobs going vacant here can be filled by Americans and not shipped overseas, increasing the minimum wage so full time workers earning at that level are not below the poverty line and making pre-school education universally available. He did not talk about how these programs would be paid for, nor did he address the deficit, although he did talk of some spending cuts, including changes in Medicare keyed to the beneficiary’s income.

  

The G.O.P.’s responder, Florida Senator Marco Rubio, did no better than reiterate the talking points which resulted in Mitt Romney’s loss and the Democrats increasing their numbers in both the House and the Senate back in November.  But

that’s what Republicans like to hear.  Rubio
The President doesn’t have to offer very much when the “opposition” offers so very little, and even that with reluctance, to the majority of America’s citizens.

JL

                                                            


Fighting the National Rifle Association

The best way to preserve the rights guaranteed to all Americans under the Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America is to fight the misuse and misinterpretation of those rights.  Such continued misuse and misinterpretation of the Second Amendment will ultimately result in its modification or repeal by an aroused citizenry and that would open the door to further erosion of our Constitutional rights.  That would not be a good thing.  That is why the "hijacking" of the Second Amendment by the NRA must be challenged.

The great misusers of the Second Amendment are the National Rifle Association and the gun industry.  The interest of gun manufacturers is understandable.  They want to sell guns.  Therefore, they do not want the government in any way, shape or form to “infringe” upon the rights of citizens to bear and possess arms.  That is very clear.

  Wayne LaPierre, NRA CEO

The NRA, on the other hand, is an organization supposedly representing millions of American gun owners.  It has many programs promoting gun safety and training, but also gets involved in protecting the rights of its members, and all Americans, to bear and possess arms.  So long as those arms are intended for use by hunters, target range shooters, true collectors of weapons and for purposes of personal self-defense, there is no argument against the NRA’s programs.

          
A Duck Hunter and a  Companion in Bed for Self-Protection

 

Unfortunately, the Association feels that any diminishing whatsoever of Second Amendment rights will open the way for further restrictions impinging on the “legitimate” uses of guns as mentioned above, and hence, they oppose more thorough background checks, restrictions on military style assault weapon, multi-round magazines and registration of gun owners, seeing them as first steps down a “slippery slope” leading to all guns being taken away from their owners.

In reality, more thorough background checks and registration of gun owners would be a great step forward in keeping weapons out of the hands of those all agree should not have them.  And assault weapons and multi-round magazines are intended to kill a lot of people quickly, and certainly hunters, target range shooters, collectors and those whose guns are for self-defense do not plan on using weapons that way.  Only criminals and the mentally unbalanced might want to use them in that manner.  So there is no reason, then, for such weaponry being available. 

Except that the Second Amendment, in the eyes of some NRA members, allows citizens to bear and possess arms so that they have the capability, by themselves or as members of a “militia,” to defend themselves against our government, if it becomes oppressive.   

Those who believe strongly in this interpretation of the Amendment need access to assault weapons and multi-round magazines in the event they ever have to take action.  Such individuals, as well as those who contemplate a break down of law and order and who contemplate retreating to the wilds as “survivalists” are active in the NRA and influence its actions, as do gun manufacturers who donate a lot of money to the Association.  Fortunately, most Americans do not believe that the Second Amendment really allows them to possess the weapons necessary to attempt to resist or overthrow the government of the United States.  Sadly, many gullible and deluded Americans do and in many Congressional districts, there are sufficient numbers of such NRA members to affect the result of elections.  Other issues do not matter to them; only their Second Amendment rights matter. Congressmen know this and vote accordingly.

The only way to battle this "hijacking" of the Second Amendment by the NRA (and the gun manufacturers) is for millions of Americans to contribute money to campaign against the NRA and elect Representatives and Senators to Congress who will not be beholden to the NRA and its continued misuse and misinterpretation of the Second Amendment.   

Over 4,000,000 NRA members each pay $35 in annual dues ($140,000,000) and gun manufacturers are very generous contributors as well.  Citizens interested in preserving our Constitutional rights should be willing to contribute at least that much in order to get the Congress to pass legislation doing away with misuse and misinterpretation of the Second Amendment, thereby protecting its continued existence.  Ultimately, the Supreme Court will have the final decision but first, Congress must act, independent of NRA influence.   You can make that happen.

By visiting http://nraila.org/Issues/factsheets/read.aspx?ID=14 , you will be able to access the mailing addresses of many groups supporting gun control such as the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, two very well respected organizations.  But there are many more, on national and state levels.  I urge you to contribute to one of them to help counteract the vast resources of the NRA which are being used to corrupt the meaning of the Second Amendment.

Jack Lippman

  

                                                      

Brave New World of Communications

We are in the midst of a communications revolution, and it affects more than just communications. It goes much further than the internet merely having an increasingly greater effect upon how we communicate with each other and with those with whom we do business.  Think back, if you are old enough, to the invention of movable type by Gutenberg back in the sixteenth century.  Before then, books were painstakingly produced by scribes, usually monks, and were limited to bibles and other religious volumes.  Novels, for example, weren’t being written. 

      

Business communications were handwritten on parchment or paper, and delivery of such documents took time.  Even after the invention of printing, communications took time.  It took days or weeks for messages to be received and news spread slowly. 
 
Andrew Jackson won the Battle of New Orleans after the War of 1812 was over, but that news had not yet reached him.   With the advent of the telegraph, despite its limited capacity, things speeded up.  Marconi’s sending a signal across the Atlantic Ocean brought faster international communication.   And of course, the telephone enabled people to talk to each other over great distances.

  

    
  

The computer and its successors, the “tablet” and “smart phone,” have compressed the world even further.  This blog is instantaneously available to anyone on the planet with that kind of hardware.  I have purchased many things from “stores” which only exist online and pay for them from a checking account or by a credit card which I didn’t even have to go to a bank to obtain.  I pay my bills on line and all deposits into my accounts are done automatically, bypassing me.  I am irritated when the only way I can pay something is by writing and mailing a check, or having my bank do it.  The days of businesses and organizations which insist on this are numbered. The day is coming when the items I purchase will not even have to be delivered by UPS nor Fedex, but will materialize right in my house via a technology yet to be introduced.  If you doubt this, join with those who believed man would never fly, let alone be able to walk on the moon, travel in outer space or have a life expectancy beyond the biblical “three score and ten.”

The day will come when there no longer will be newspapers nor books as we know them.  Magazines are disappearing at a rapid pace.  But the content of such media remains accessible on your computer, tablet or smart phone at a price comparable to or below that which paper versions cost.

 

The only reason paper publications still exist is because older generations still prefer them and are willing to pay for them.  When their grandchildren reach maturity, old paper versions of the New York Times, for example, will only be available in museums, along with books, in the section where Egyptian hieroglyphics on papyrus are found today.  And those very museums may be no more than an online experience.

Bill paying and banking are readily available on line today.  In the future, banks will not have buildings for you to walk into to do business.  Many do not today.  Most people no longer “write letters” and even talking on the telephone is being replaced by Email and texting.  Face to face contact, and even voice to ear contact, is becoming a thing of the past, leading to an impersonalization of society.   More and more education is being done online as well, so schools, colleges and universities are changing too.  

As the way we communicate changes, we ourselves are subject to changes.  For example, we will not have to use oral skills as much as we do now because fingers pressing on a keypad will replace a mouth voicing words.  Even today, text messaging the fact that one will not show up or be late for an appointment is replacing making a phone call for that purpose, "depersonalizing" the message and precluding the opportunity for its recipient to instantly respond in a "face to face" or "mouth to ear" manner.   Lawyers will present evidence in courts electronically without even having to be there.  And the judge might be a robotic data bank of stored precedent instead of a human being. 

People who can adapt to such changes will be able to survive.  Those who do not, in the Darwinian sense, might not survive to reproduce.  It might be an gross exaggeration, but when the supermarket check-out counter becomes a thing of the past and all food is purchased on line from a “virtual” supermarket, those who haven’t “adapted” to change run the risk of starving to death.

JL

  

                                                                                   

Most readers of this blog are alerted by Email every time a new posting appears.  If you wish to be added to that Email list, just let me know by contacting me at Riart1@aol.com.  

Also, be aware that www.Jackspotpourri.com is now available on your mobile devices in a modified, easy-to-read, format.

Jack Lippman

                                                    * * *   * * *   * * *

To view older postings on this blog, just click on the appropriate date in the “Blog Archive” off to the right, or scroll down until you see the “Older Postings” notation at the very bottom of this posting.  The “Search” box can also be used to find older postings.

To send this posting to a friend, or enemy for that matter, whom you think might be interested in it, just click on the envelope with the arrow on the "Comments" line directly below.