L. Neil Smith's
THE LIBERTARIAN ENTERPRISE
Number 269, May 2, 2004
Morons Marching

Thumbs Up (their arses)
by Carl Bussjaeger
samizdat@gbronline.com

Special to TLE

Unless you run a big-time organized RKBA group, you most likely know that liberty and RKBA activist Jeff "Hunter" Jordan is facing a felony charge of carrying a concealed weapon with a license (yes, you read that correctly), and has been fired by Verizon for doing so. In researching the firing, I learned that Verizon has an official (and obviously strongly enforced) victim disarmament/safe criminal policy. I called for a boycott of Verizon Communications.

Since this is an RKBA issue, I decided to clue in various national and regional organized gun owners' groups. I'll be honest: I didn't really expect too much from most of them. After all, it wasn't the formal groups that made fiscal life miserable for Dell, CitiBank, Smith & Wesson (and why are so many supposedly sensible gun owners forgetting that S&W never apologized for what it did, and that it was bought by a pro-gun control outfit that thinks you need to be forced to buy and use their trigger locks?), or K-Mart. It was just us millions of outraged individuals. The formal groups mostly couldn't be bothered.

They still can't be bothered.

Of all the groups that I contacted, hoping just for a brief mention and hyperlink to the boycott page, just three responded positively.

• Armed Females of America: Carma immediately placed two notices on their main page.

• Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership: Aaron put out a special alert about Hunter's predicament.

• KeepAndBearArms.com: Angel set up a donation system and has run articles about the case.

Good people; I appreciate them a lot.

But about those other groups...

• Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA)
  No response whatsoever.

• Gun Owners of America (GOA)
  Frank Pejack (Public Liaison) stated that GOA would not get involved, as they see no value in anything but legislative lobbying. When I made public that position, Erich Pratt wrote to correct Pejack's statement; GOA would try to help. But in the five weeks since, GOA has done nothing, not even posting a URL.

• Gun Owners of New Hampshire (GO-NH)
  Hunter's own state RA hasn't even acknowledged my letters. Though I have heard that individuals who are members have been working behind the scenes. So much for the organization.

• Guns Unified Nationally Endorsing Dignity (GUNED)
  Nada. Nothing. Zip.

• Pink Pistols
  No replies from the group; but an individual said he'd try to talk them into supporting this. Still nothing. Dan must be doing high-speed revolutions.

• Rocky Mountain Gun Owners (RMGO)
  After a few weeks, Dudley Brown simply demanded,"Please remove from your distribution list. NOW." I did so immediately and apologized for bothering him with an RKBA issue. He wrote back,
  
  "I'm afraid this political world is full of barking dogs, precious few of which I have time to kick. I kick the ones I can have an effect on. Sorry if this doesn't fit with what you want to do -- if it were a high-profile case in Colorado (where we base our actions) I'd consider it.
  
  Dudley needs a reality check from gun-owning Verizon employees in Colorado.

• Second Amendment Sisters (SAS)
  Deafening silence.

• Second Amendment Foundation (SAF)
  They initially referred Hunter to an Ohio attorney (James E. Brightbill), but haven't acknowledged the situation at all since. So much for the hundreds of dollars Hunter has given them.

• National Rifle Association (NRA)
  In the spirit of, "Oh, why not try," I initially contacted the NRA. Didn't expect much from them, and that's more than I got. But someone else wrote to inform me he'd contacted the NRA and gotten a response: The NRA would only make a show of support if Hunter's attorney asked them to do so; no support for Hunter or the general boycott. Not that we want them involved now.

• Ohioans for Concealed Carry:
  No answers.

That should be enough to make the point. If everyone wants to ignore these abuses until it becomes high profile, it won't get to be high profile unless some desperate guy starts shooting. I get the distinct impression from RMGO that they aren't willing to work for publicity; they just want to bask in the glow from something that already has publicity. GOA is applying long-term legislative "chemotherapy" while ignoring the fact that the patient is bleeding to death from a severed artery.

As best I can tell, only three pro-RKBA groups in this entire country are willing to acknowledge the boycott (until it becomes high profile enough for them to bask in).The others either don't care, or are actively hostile to the idea. You care to guess which groups will never again receive a penny or second of support from me ever again?

If the do-nothing sorta-semi-pro-RKBA groups want to sit around with their thumbs up their arses, I'm not going to pay 'em to do it.

The rest of us can take care of ourselves, and put that much more effort into the three groups that will work with us.