Miss Violet raised a few excellent points recently about our Gun Show concept. NRA will not appreciate it if we begin to cut into their membership.
To attract new blood and fold them in as "Members" we have to have a clear set of goals as an organization. I set two political goals and invite your comments on these ideas, and to offer additional tasks for the group. Just keep in mnd that we have to keep it simple, practical, and laser focused.
One: Restore the Constitution, as ratified, and implemented in the spirit of the DoI and BoR.
Two: Repeal NFA & GCA '68. No other 2A group is as "No Compromise" as they would like you to believe.
If we focus on achieving those two goals, we will be the only political organization on the landscape moving that direction. We will find allies and new "Members" which will allow us to grow.
Please weigh-in on your thoughts on those two goals, and offer replacements or a third that you think will help our goal.
Item Two: Political organizations have a very hard time earning space at gun shows. In many cases NRA locks out competitors. In other cases, Promoters (legitimately) worry about letting dangerous people have a booth that can bring in Fed heat.
To that end I have set up a company that will offer tactical gear and nostalgic gear (RevWarI). We will offer RevWarI black powder long arms and pistols to help people remember our roots to RevWar I. Additionally, we will offer Branded III Gear to spread our brand, and practical modern tactical gear.
The up side: I have already set up several dealer/wholesale accounts with serious tactical companies, which means our members can save some real money as you buy gear. I have an account with Condor, Traditions, 5.11 Tactical, Rothco, and I am working on several others, including Cold Steel, KA-BAR, and more. This way we can outfit ourselves while spending less. Let me know what brands you'd like to have us establish dealer accounts with so we can offer at discount.
BTW: Every piece of gear we move through the 527 will be Branded with the III. By that I mean: Every KA-BAR we sell will be laser-engraved with III on it. Every 5.11 Tactical shirt will be embroidered with III on it. Every Kentucy Rifly or pistol will be laser-etched with III on it.
This is intended to be a machine that spreads our name recognition and builds cohesion and morale.
Let me know your thoughts on this path thus far, please.
Kerodin
III
Sounds OK. The GOA is pretty good, though.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.namsouth.com/viewtopic.php?t=2526&highlight=goa
Thank you for the note.
I have forwarded your suggestion to my supervisor.
Our position on this is:
the Second Amendment covers any weapon that our individual infantry soldier ever carried, is carrying or will carry. Naturally, in order to repel "infantry" enemies foreign and domestic, our citizen "infantry" must have competing weapons - ergo, the Second Amendment.
Sam,
ReplyDeleteWithout getting into any arguments about what our real rights should be (no need for permits), I think support of Nation-wide carry, where any state's permit is good in any other state would be a plus. Think of the pain it would cause Bloomberg in New York, or the slime in New Jersey if they had to live with armed citizens - especially from other states - running around on their turf. Imagine strolling down the street in San Francisco packing, maybe something obvious like a S&W 500 on a belt holster under a windbreaker. Makes me hard just thinking about it. I'd love to walk past Boxer and Feinstein's offices with my middle finger raised in their general direction.
Like the NRA or not, suck it up and rejoin, yeah '34, '68, they pulled some bullshit helping write those bills.
ReplyDeleteThey ain't saints but without them, we would be fucked.
Get a buddy to sign up, that would then put us at eight million. 4M now. Sure I don't agree with everything they say but as a lobbying group, they are damn powerful.
As of late we all know the III ain't perfect.
So for 35 bucks join up and get a commercial oriented magazine out of it. Or don't, I know we are not getting out of this mess but with Obama gone we may have a few more years to prepare. At 177T debt, this ain't gonna end pretty with a D or R running the beast, but you know I am right about O....or vote for him and speed up the collapse. Either way it's coming.
I'm an NRA Lifer, but I also get (and often act on) GOA alerts. I support Open Carry and Constitutional Carry, even if TSRA and NRA won't touch them with a ten-foot pole. I am also a patriot, a Tea Party supporter, and a libertarian. If and when I step off and join the Libertarian Party, that won't preclude supporting the Tea Party Movement and specific groups within the movement, at least until a given group wanders off into neo-con lala-land.
ReplyDeleteI understand that brands do compete and that at some point, brand competition is a zero-sum game. A Coke machine and a Pepsi machine cannot occupy the same space. A person cannot be a member of two political parties at the same time any more than a person can spend the same dollar on two different things. However because we're not a party (or even an organization with membership lists and such) and don't want to be one, I think III vs NRA/GOA/2AF/CCRKBA is a false dilemma. If a person can be a member of both GOA and NRA - and to my knowledge, neither organization bars members of the other from joining - why not 'all of the above'?
K I like the what you have said here. I think you have articulated who we are and what we are about quite well. I do think RegT's idea about the Constitutional carry has some valid points to be considered as well. If we're gonna go for the gold, let's take it all. ;)
ReplyDeleteI like the gear idea. Just no III branded wine, ;)
@ Brock, the GOA isn't too bad, but the fact of the matter is this, they can provide me with all the pre drafted letters they want and I can email them to my senators until the hubs of hell freeze over, but all I'll get from those two liberal bitches is a condescending email back from them telling me how hard they are working for everyone.
@ BRIII that makes as much sense as a woman saying, "My husband isn't too bad, he only beats me on Tuesdays and Thursday, not all week."
Finally, RegT, think about it, it's SanFran, you wouldn't even have to wear that windbreaker, just your sandals and your holster/gun, lol.
Miss Violet
I should have gone back and read Miss Violet's comments before responding. I see her point. As a competing organization that takes the '2d Amendment remedy' seriously (Us), instead of just paying lip-service to it (as the NRA tends to do) we will look like exactly the sorts of 'insurrectionists' that the Brady Campaign and the Violence Policy Center (whatever they're calling themselves now) are trying to make us out to be.
ReplyDeleteBTW, I wonder what would happen if a hard-core 2A advocate, if faced with that insurrectionist spin on live national TV, responded with something like 'What's wrong with that idea?' or 'So, you disagree with the Declaration of Independence?' Why the hell we accept playing defence all the time?
The profound irony is that if we pursue these two goals (and they're very good goals), we'll be doing our damnedest to work within the system. We will be trying to forestall the Ruckus, not foment it.
III etched on a KABAR? When?
ReplyDeletehbbill
hbbill: Everything we offer at shows will be branded with II. Some things will simply have the Roman III - others will have III + the Minuteman, and others will have the full Resist logo.
ReplyDelete"When" is harder to pin down, a the moment. I am in the process of setting up all the dealer accounts, then finding the right partner to do the engraving.
So - when we hit our first show, we'll have everything. But as soon as I am able to make an item available (such as a KA-BAR with our logo) I'll let everyone know and list it at IIIGear.com.
K