New York City/United States – -(AmmoLand.com)- The one group at the forefront of trying to take away our right to keep and bear arms today is perhaps the best-funded such group in history. Despite the attempt to have a grass-roots name, this is a group largely funded by Michael Bloomberg, the former New York City mayor currently running for president.
The Everytown group, which counts Moms Demand Action as its force of grass-roots activists, is proving to be very potent. It’s not hard. Bloomberg’s money has been able to provide a sustained grassroots force that past groups like the Brady Campaign and the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence haven’t been able to really build.
Backed by Bloomberg’s billions, Everytown simply will flood a state with wall-to-wall TV advertising. In addition, Bloomberg’s group has a director of “cultural engagement.” In short, if you want to know why the social stigmatization of gun ownership and support for the Second Amendment has taken off, this is the group to thank for it. The fact of the matter is that Bloomberg’s gun-control empire is re-shaping the political landscape – and not in favor of those who support liberty.
Bloomberg’s resources have been a huge game-changer. For the longest time, the biggest strength that pro-Second Amendment groups had was the NRA’s ability to mobilize thousands of grass-roots supporters in a Congressional district to do all of the little things – really, Democracy 101 stuff – that either supported candidates or who helped educate the public in the legislative and political arenas.
The fight is now a full-spectrum fight. Bloomberg has managed to fuse an offensive on not just the political and legislative fronts, but he also leverages Hollywood, and he leverages “research” into gun violence as a public health problem. While the Violence Policy Center long pushed that, Bloomberg has again packaged it in a form that is delivered by Moms Demand Action.
It should be noted that this full-spectrum fight is also being waged with a long-term plan in mind. He is not only an incredibly wealthy anti-Second Amendment extremist, he also is very strategically and tactically astute – far more so than we’ve seen from other anti-Second Amendment groups in the past. Just how good is Everytown’s strategic acuity?
Well, let’s put it this way, the Brady Campaign was dangerous because it used emotional stories well, and it sought to separate gun owners from the NRA – it passed legislation, it made gains, but it was primarily media-driven. The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence had more of a religious fervor, but it wasn’t as effective, given its past push for outright gun bans. The Violence Policy Center was too extreme, even as it provided the intellectual underpinnings for the “public health” push for gun control. None had real grassroots strength.
Everytown doesn’t just unite those three “legs” of the stool, it has also shown a cold ruthlessness not seen from other groups. Bloomberg’s group has set in motion a chain of events that poses an existential threat to all pro-Second Amendment groups.
According to court filings, Everytown was involved in pushing Andrew Cuomo’s regime to engage in the politically-motivated abuse of financial regulations to financially blacklist the NRA. The resulting legal battle has since crippled the organization, touching off the infighting that we see today, and the needs of the NRA to fight the lawsuit ended up destroying the NRA/Ackerman-McQueen partnership in a very ugly way. Meanwhile, Bloomberg and Cuomo have taken advantage of the infighting they stirred up to win elections.
How can Everytown be beaten? The first step is unity. The infighting has to stop – and the NRA and other pro-Second Amendment groups need to get their act together. Second Amendment supporters must hang together, or Bloomberg will pick off pro-Second Amendment groups one by one and leave us isolated. Once isolated, our rights will be gone.
The second step is to hit Bloomberg – and his group – where it is vulnerable. There are three areas: One is Bloomberg’s nanny-state tendencies in general, ranging from the size of one’s soda to his environmental agenda. The other is the fact that he is an out-of-touch billionaire who is more than little hypocritical on some of these issues. The third is that his group peddles phony caricatures about gun owners – and those who support the Second Amendment.
The third step is to begin a long-term effort of our own. The fact is, we must build a pro-Second Amendment culture in this country, to make the thought of punishing millions of Americans for crimes and acts of madness they did not commit repulsive. We must work every day to prove Bloomberg is a liar about us, through how we address Americans we are trying to persuade to support our battle for freedom, through the approach we take in defending our rights, and being mindful about how we come across.
If we fail, Bloomberg may well succeed where Sarah Brady, Pete Shields, and others have failed.
About Harold Hutchison
Writer Harold Hutchison has more than a dozen years of experience covering military affairs, international events, U.S. politics and Second Amendment issues. Harold was consulting senior editor at Soldier of Fortune magazine and is the author of the novel Strike Group Reagan. He has also written for the Daily Caller, National Review, Patriot Post, Strategypage.com, and other national websites.
Everyday kids are told that if they do not turn over every aspect of their lives to the communist democrat government THEY WILL DIE and the Republicans are the cause. Everyday kids are told that climate change is KILLING them and Republicans are the cause. These types of kids shooting kids started AFTER the democrats adopted the Communist Manifesto in 1963. Democrats read it into the Congressional Record as the planks of progressivism in January, 1963. The democrat SCOTUS made having a Holy Bible and praying in school a crime in July of 1963. Earth Day proved that kids are… Read more »
I had no idea about the reading of the Communist Manifesto into the records. Do you have a citation or link for that?
See https://www.beliefnet.com/columnists/watchwomanonthewall/2011/04/the-45-communist-goals-as-read-into-the-congressional-record-1963.html Or, you could just read it here. CURRENT COMMUNIST GOALS: 1. U.S. acceptance of coexistence as the only alternative to atomic war. 2. U.S. willingness to capitulate in preference to engaging in atomic war. 3. Develop the illusion that total disarmament [by] the United States would be a demonstration of moral strength. 4. Permit free trade between all nations regardless of Communist affiliation and regardless of whether or not items could be used for war. 5. Extension of long-term loans to Russia and Soviet satellites. 6. Provide American aid to all nations regardless of Communist domination. 7. Grant… Read more »
Actually Will, take a moment and set aside our mutual disapproval of Harolds constant chicken little refrain that without the NRA the world will end. Read this one. Even a broken clock is right twice a day.
The NRA is NOT the problem. The PRICKS that hijacked it for their own self aggrandizement ARE. Save the 2nd is trying to fix that. With enough support they can. It’s far better to save a broken arm than to cut it off.
Terry
NRA Life Benefactor Member
Ansel and Terry……well said! Together we can fix it but throwing rocks at each other everyone loses!
Everyone loses except Bloomberg. We got rid of North, thank God, now Wayne needs to go. Clean it up. NRA does the heavy lifting in education and training. They can leave the political activities to others and still make a tremendous contribution to the effort.
NO??? A SERIOUS QUESTION FOR THE NRA https://edwinvieira.com/edwin286.htm
Everytown and Moms are simply the latest iteration of Alinsky-based community organizers. These groups have always depended upon huge bank rolls to fund them. For the most part they are drawing paychecks and move from one “crisis” to another. If you want a good example of how they work in the anti-self defense arena read Dave Cullen’s book “Parkland.” He subtitles it “The Beginning of a Movement” for a reason. As soon as the smoke was clearing in Parkland the Women’s March people were on jets headed to FL to organize a gang of selected victims and begin yet another… Read more »
Re. nrringlee: Your presentation of counter-propaganda procedures is good. These procedures are greatly hindered by the enemy who own and control the means of implementation. That is the means of communication. Debating is futile when there is no argument. There is a conflict that requires fighting.
Will, ALL of the Pro-2nd and Pro-Gun groups need to ban together right now! Stop the division….that is EXACTLY what Bloombitch wants!
Recently, Moms Demand Action sponsored a ‘Town Hall’-style forum in Oklahoma City regarding “gun control.” The forum was not televised directly, but it was recorded by our local Public Television station for later playback. ‘Moms Demand’ had advertised the event only to their own members, not to the general public. Even the Oklahoma 2nd Amendment Foundation (O2A) received less than 48 hours of prior notice. Thus the live audience of about 100 consisted only of about 1/4 conservative firearms owners (roughly half-and-half male and female) and about 3/4 liberal anti-gun advocates (virtually all female, with only 2 males noticeable). ‘Moms’… Read more »
“Moms Demand Action?” She stopped cursing and frowned, but nodded yes. I said, “I remember! It was that famous porn movie in the 1980s… which role did you play?”
I LOVE IT! I’m going to use that whenever I run into the Harpy’s.
Maybe gun owning men and fathers should demand that these self proclaimed pedestal standing women raise their own “perfect” children not commit the crimes they are committing… They raise these no punishment, “time out” only, whacko’s and want those who have done nothing illegal with a firearm to pay for their children, young or grownups shooting or murdering. Yeah ladies you want to know where these trigger pulling idiots are coming from, look in the mirror…. YOU, MOM, have created the apron string clinging, babied, never corrected, timeouts only, spoiled brat, libtard TIMEBOMB… It’s NOT the gun, it’s YOUR kid/young… Read more »
Hutchison, you are a writer, a professional communicator who ought to know who owns and controls all the means of public communications. Bloomberg is one of the six or so owners who controls “how we come across”. These owners control what is said and how it is to be heard. We can address all Americans, but our address will not be presented to all Americans has we address. We must rebuild the culture being destroyed by those we allowed power and those who acquired power. We must stop further destruction of our culture by these people. Our means of doing… Read more »
Mom’s demand action. First they are irresponsible because they don’t think a cops life is worth as much as theirs. They have no problem with a guy who was pushing shopping cars at Walmart one week and then a few weeks later is riding around in a well equipped Darth Vadar cop car to look for bad guys to shoot. Or people who look like bad guys to shoot. Or dogs to shoot. Or homeless people to beat and shoot. Or some guy in a motel room crawling on the floor to shoot. Oh, you get the idea. Those Mom’s… Read more »
Did you have a run in with the police that caused you to be against them? I’m all for having all law enforcement in the country take the same week of vacation. The Purge movie wouldn’t even be close to what will happen. Most LEO’s are good and honest people. Most that I personally worked with I had no problem with watching my back, and have in bad situations. Yes there are bad cops and they need to be fired.
Ah, yeah, I had a run in with the police. My degree is in forensic criminology. I worked FOR a police department in Florida (it was IN Broward County) and found out first hand while working with them how many were psychopathic bullies from the get go. Ever hear of Serpico? Well, GOOD COPS don’t stay being cops. I hearby quote Professor Higgs… The whole good cop/bad cop question can be disposed of much more decisively. We need not enumerate what proportion of cops appears to be good or listen to someone’s anecdote about his Uncle Charlie, an allegedly good… Read more »
Oh, and you SERIOUSLY believe that just because a few cops are running around in any location that the reason we aren’t out doing a PURGE right now is because of them?? SERIOUSLY? So you really think that mankind is that SICK? If they are then why trust COPS? One weeks some guy is pushing shopping carts at Walmart (true story) A few weeks later after “police academy” he is driving round, well you read the statement…How hard if we were that demented of a population would it be for a few of us to get together, set up an… Read more »
No, the review system needs to be made up of your neighbors, not people who have a vested interest in protecting a corrupt system.
Oldvet: What you did there, I saw it.