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Illinois State Rifle Association
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CHAIRMAN'S COMMENTS
The New Year is finally upon us and the weather makes it seem more like spring than winter. We have only had a few really cold days and really no snow to speak of, so it is really hard to imagine that it’s early January. But, the start of the New Year brings out a lot of other things. The first event that I am preparing for is the Shot Show in Las Vegas which will be held January 16th thru 20th. It is a phenomenally large event. It literally takes days to go through the Show and, still, it is almost impossible to see everything. All of the firearm manufacturers are there as are the suppliers of hunting equipment, clothing, optics, air gun accessories, reloading supplies…I could go on forever. Then, there is all the stuff for military and police which is a huge show in itself. I go to the Shot Show every year to visit with the manufacturers to encourage them to attend our annual Range Open House, an event that the ISRA does in conjunction with the NRA. Besides being a very busy and tiring trip, it is very satisfying. To see all of the latest stuff, the hundreds of manufacturers and the thousands of attendees and buyers there, is truly gratifying, knowing that there are millions of “gun people” out there. It is not quite like the anti-gun spokesmen say, that we are a warped minority of US citizens. And, speaking of the ISRA Range Open House, this year it will be held on Saturday June 23rd. We had the biggest turnout ever in 2011, with 2,058 people attending. We hope to make it even bigger…and better…with even more participants and attendees. Mark your calendars! Last Saturday, several of us attended an Outdoor Show in Kankakee. There was a huge amount of attendees and we were able to sell many new ISRA memberships and a lot of raffle tickets for our Three Rivers Friends of NRA dinner. It was good to see so many people willing to put out the money to join the ISRA and to buy raffle tickets. It was disappointing, though, to hear that many people didn’t know about the ISRA, but said they belonged to the NRA. We have got to spread the word out about the ISRA and what it does for not only the citizens of Illinois, but for those throughout the country. The elections are coming in November and the presidential election is going to be the most important one in history, as whoever is President for the next four years is going to probably have the opportunity to appoint two new Supreme Court Justices. Since we have won two Supreme Court cases in a 5-4 decision the last couple of years and the President has already appointed two anti-gunners who said they were open-minded (yea right, we knew before they were even confirmed that they were anti-gun; for example, Justice Sotomayor, appointed by President Obama, voted against the Second Amendment in the McDonald case), we need to keep informed and be mindful of what’s going on in Washington, DC. Let’s face it. If the President were to appoint one more anti-gun Judge to the Court, it will make our job a lot tougher to win any pro-2A cases. The last thing we need to happen is to have our firearm rights go down the drain just like they did in Australia and England. Besides that, the new president will also have the ability to appoint many federal judges. I believe we can draw from our experience of three years with Obama that he appoints people that are strongly anti-gun to any judgeship or any position at all. I think that this can be proven by reading the bio of any person that Obama appoints; they are consistently against gun rights. Eric Holder is a perfect example of this. I believe that he is so involved in Fast and Furious and continues to stonewall and lie about his involvement. I, as do many others, consider him extremely anti-gun and this “gunrunning” he allowed and actually insisted that the gun shops sell to the “baddies” even when the gun shops called the BATF, telling them of their suspicions. If this hadn’t gotten revealed by certain occurrences including the unnecessary death of a border patrol agent, Holder would have been able to say something like, look at these illegal sales – let’s close the gun shops. Besides the great importance of the presidential election, we have the importance of the Senate and House. It seems to me that the Republicans will hold on to the majority in the House, which will not allow Obama to force his will through Congress…at least without a good fight in the House. But, there is a fair-to-good chance that the Senate will also turn Republican. That, alone, may stop a real bad anti-gun person from being confirmed to the Supreme Court. Unfortunately, we currently have two very anti-gun senators in Illinois. Keep in mind that these state-wide elections are going to be very important for us in getting our concealed carry rights in Illinois, the only state in the Union with absolutely no way for a person to legally carry a gun on them for personal protection. A few months ago, when we had a vote on a bill for concealed carry, we almost had enough votes to make it veto proof. This was not thought to be possible even a couple of years ago. Thankfully, we are getting more and more pro-gun legislators in Illinois. We must work very hard at getting pro-gun legislators elected and reassure those pro-gum legislators already in office that we support them. One great way to do that is to attend IGOLD, to be held this year on Wednesday, March 7th. Get every friend you have to attend. And your relatives, too. Every year, this event gets bigger and every single legislator takes notice. I can’t help but think that all but the most diehard anti-gunners have got to realize that gun rights are in the Constitution and should be honored….and that we have enough clout to get them unelected. As the saying goes, freedom isn’t free, so let’s pay the price and do all we can to support our pro-gun legislators and do all we can to get rid of the anti-civil rights legislators. Doug Mayhall *** All opinions expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the ISRA, Will County Grassroots, or any of it's members or officers.*** ------
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