Who does Gun-nut nation fear more than anyone else? Who is the one person who represents Armageddon when it comes to all those beloved gun ‘rights?’ It’s not Hillary, it’s not Bloomie, it’s not those twenty-odd Presidential wannabes vying for the attention of blue-team donors like me.
It’s a little lady from Indiana named Shannon Watts, whose organization, Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, represents a real threat to the nonsensical narratives about the role of guns in American society peddled by various pro-gun noisemakers and their friends on the alt-right.
This gang of fools launched an organized assault on Shannon last week, which started after Shannon posted a tweet criticizing the NRA‘s announcement that they would continue to fight against regulations that ban ‘armor-piercing’ ammunition since, according to America’s ‘first civil rights organization,’ all centerfire ammunition will pierce ‘soft’ body armor. As soon as Shannon’s post went up (and btw, the NRA‘s statement about the lethality of ‘all’ centerfire rifle ammunition is totally and completely full of sh*t) the boys in Fairfax responded with posts on Instagram, telling their supporters to send negative comments to Shannon. This resulted in a flurry of threats, insults and profanity which has become the staple of how the alt-right deals with anything that even remotely smacks of gun control.
Once the semi-literates who flock to Instagram started going after Shannon, the big boys and girls on the alt-right weighed in with more. Breitbart got in on the act, so did Townhall. And just to makes sure that the alt-right audience wouldn’t miss a trick, the NRA named Shannon as ‘Bloomberg’s chief lobbyist.’ Why not try to kill two birds for the price of one, right?
Not that Shannon has ever been anything other than a pain in the you-know-what to Wayne-o and the rest of the NRA gang, but I suspect that maybe, just maybe, her tweet about armor-piercing ammunition may have given the boys from Fairfax exactly the issue they needed to avoid discussing another threat to the organization’s leadership which has just cropped up. I am referring to a pile of documents anonymously leaked to the internet, which are letters sent to the NRA Counsel, raising questions about payments made to a law firm, as well as expenses run up by Wayne-o himself while allegedly engaged in travel activities for the NRA.
Most of the latter charges were for clothing bought at a clothing boutique, Ermenegildo Zegna, where a polo shirt can run as much as $495 bucks. Right. A short-sleeve polo shirt. Since 2004, Wayne-o has run up $275,000 in charges at the Zegna store in Beverly Hills, including a $21,000 charge in February, 2017. All of these charges were billed to (and paid by) the PR firm, Ackerman-McQueen. No wonder the NRA and Ackerman-McQueen are now battling each other in court.
Maybe there’s an innocent explanation for why Wayne-o has run up wardrobe costs which outstrip anything Sarah Palin did in 2008. On the other hand, if he used his Ackerman-McQueen account to hide purchases for personal items which were then covered by invoices paid by NRA to the PR firm, someone’s going to jail. Using tax-exempt dollars to pay for goods or services not directly related to the tax-exempt entity’s approved affairs happens to be fraud. And $275,000 ain’t chopped liver, even in my book.
Getting back to our friend Shannon, there may be a more innocent reason why she’s getting blasted again by the NRA. Go to the MOMS website and type: https://momsdemandaction.org/take-action/. Then go to the ‘Attend’ link, put in your zip code and see what comes up. Now go to the NRA website and type: https://explore.nra.org/interests/events-and-entertainment/. Then click around and look for ‘friends of NRA‘ events in the same code. I guarantee you’ll find more grass-roots events sponsored by MOMS. I did it for Maryland – NRA has three upcoming events, MOMS has nine.
Know why the NRA hates Shannon and her gals? Because MOMS is now a true, grass-roots organization in every sense of the word.
Right on Shannon, right on.
May 13, 2019 @ 12:08:43
I’m part of the Moms Gun Sense Action Network. I wouldn’t say the NRA fears the Moms. In fact, I think the NRA’s brass benefit from the existence of the GVP community. According to the NRA’s highly profitable fear mongering campaign, the GVP people are out to destroy America & everything that’s good (all of which could not exist w/o lotza’ guns).
If the GVP folks went away the NRA brass would be out of a lucrative gig. Seriously.
May 13, 2019 @ 13:02:20
On the other hand, Shannon blocked me on Twitter and I’ve yet to have anyone accuse me of being unruly on Twitter. But if she is getting bombed by nonsense, it could well be that anything coming from a gun owner is treated as an attack.
May 13, 2019 @ 23:42:42
It’s sad when you’re so bent you can’t even bother to do a modicum of research. MDA is not really a grass roots org, it’s a Bloomberg organization since 2014. It may have started as grad roots but it couldn’t gain any traction until Bloomberg brought in some big money. Nice try though. Lol
https://philanthropynewsdigest.org/news/bloomberg-to-launch-50-million-gun-control-initiative
May 14, 2019 @ 09:32:56
The NRA’s position that centerfire rifle ammo will defeat standard(soft) body armor is full of shit?
I’m curious as to the rationale behind that statement.
May 14, 2019 @ 14:51:10
Folks can Google the NIJ “Body Armor Protection Levels” or “Body Armor Performance Standards” for the performance of different classes of body armor. One page compares the penetration of 9mm, 44 magnum, 5.56×45, 7.62 NATO, and M2AP into different levels of body armor. The ‘soft’ armors are designed to protect against most handgun and small arms ammunition, whereas ‘hard’ armors are designed to stop high caliber and armor piercing rounds.
From a “Total Security Solutions” site.
“Just like bullet resistant glass, ballistic body armor is rated for levels of protection:
Most Commonly Used Levels: II, IIIa and IV.
Levels II and IIIa protect against common firearms (9mm/ .44 Magnum)
Level IV is generally worn for higher level of protection (long guns)
SWAT and emergency response teams typically wear Level IV, whereas regular patrol likely utilize Level II or IIIa.”
I didn’t mean to write a dissertation. Just lay out some information for those who wonder what this all is about.
May 14, 2019 @ 15:09:55
I guess the real question is whoreally needs AP compared to the potential risk?
If I want to go through a lot of ammo, I might buy 5.56×45 green tip only if it is cheaper than other plinking ammo (and the TulAmmo seems dirty to me based on the number of patches I put through my Mini-14 to clean it) but recently, one of my gun club buddies says its a rule violation to use green tip at my club. Google this: “What Makes M855 “Green Tip” Ammo So Controversial?”