On the NRA: Let's Go Kill Something Large

My wife was out of town, and I was folding laundry. It’s my habit when doing something mindless like that to watch something equally mindless on TV. So, after surfing around a bit, I settled on one of those hunting shows, brought to you by Blastmaster or somebody, where men in camouflage whisper to each other and shoot animals. I suppose I chose it in part because it made me feel more manly while folding my wife’s delicates.

I did not grow up in a hunting culture. The idea of turning to my wife on a nice, sunny winter morning and saying, “Honey, I think I’m gonna’ go out and kill something large” is totally foreign to me, though I suppose I can understand its appeal. I fully expect that if I had grown up in Fairbanks, Alaska, instead of Fairfax, Virginia, I could have turned out to be a different person. I do love being outdoors and tromping around in the woods. And I have a brother-in-law who required that his daughter master all the skills necessary to shoot, skin, and cook a squirrel, and I quite admire them both. So, just as it is theoretically possible for an effete suburban snob to “get it,” I suppose I could “get it” about hunting.

But then along comes an ad on TV that features a man with rather ugly feral teeth and the urgent fury of someone in a fever dream. It’s Wayne LaPierre, president of the National Rifle Association, warning loyal, patriotic, gun-loving Americans — you know, the “real Americans” — about a terrible plot to take away all their guns. LaPierre’s rant is aimed squarely at President Obama. And his reasoning is so grotesquely tortured, my hair hurts just from watching it.

According to LaPierre, Obama and his fiendish minions have launched a secret and massive conspiracy to take away all gun rights from law-abiding Americans by not doing anything at all to take away their gun rights. How crafty that Obama is! So far, Obama has advanced his plan to take away gun rights by signing into law small expansions of gun rights, such as allowing guns in federal parks and on Amtrak. What is even more alarming is that the conspiracy to control guns has already advanced to the point where Obama has received an “F” from the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. See! What more proof does anyone need about Obama taking away your guns? Huh?

Go on YouTube. Watch a few of LaPierre’s speeches. It is amazing. The wonderful people in outfits like CPAC and the Tea Party who swallowed the claims that Obama was a Muslim, was a Kenyan, was a socialist, was taking away Medicare while simultaneously spending too much on Medicare, was socializing medicine, was socializing Wall Street and the auto industry, are now happily embracing the craziness of Wayne LaPierre.

These days, maybe what we need to be most worried most about is what they must be putting in the water here in America. It sure seems like there are more crazy people than there used to be. And they have more guns. And they like to whisper and kill things.It’s true, and I know it’s true, ’cause I’ve seen it on TV.