NRA Flier: "Prepare For The Storm"
A reader of ours who recently bought a new pistol (Yep -- liberals purchase handguns, too!) sent us this interesting flier from the National Rifle Association, which was included in the box:
(Click image to enlarge.)
Here at TPM, we wondered exactly what the NRA meant by "Prepare For The Storm." Was this some kind of dog whistle -- a hidden extremist message, such as we might see from a white supremacist group like Storm Front?
Mark Potok, director of the South Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Project, informed me that thankfully it's not a Neo-Nazi reference -- but it is batty.
"This to me is typically disgusting NRA verbiage," said Potok. "I mean, what they are really saying is that Obama will destroy the world, that our country is at the edge of a precipice. It's no surprise however, coming from a gang of people that back in the 90s described federal law enforcement agents as jackbooted thugs coming to do in good Americans. It's simple scaremongering."
Phone calls to the NRA, inquiring as to what they mean by "Prepare For The Storm," were not returned.
Josh
Matt
Eric
Prepare for the civil war, the rapture, the ultimate battle between good, god-fearing americans, and those baby-killing, godless, pagan heathens.
Seems clear enough to me
May 21, 2009 4:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
don't miss their 2006 graphic novel: Freedom in Peril
May 21, 2009 6:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
A Katrina reference perhaps?
Just kidding...
May 21, 2009 4:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
NRA including a phrase that creates business for gun retailers, manufacturers, etc? That's shocking!
May 21, 2009 4:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Standard apocalyptic reference, just like NOM's "Gathering Storm" ad.
May 21, 2009 5:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
In North Carolina, that's a coded message for "go to the nearest Harris-Teeter or Food Lion and grab every damn loaf of bread and jug of milk you can get your hands on!"
May 21, 2009 5:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
Been there, seen that.
May 21, 2009 6:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
Perhaps they're going for a double whammy and referencing NOM's "Gathering Storm" message.
So basically Obama is going to take your guns away and force you at gunpoint (with your own gun) into a gay marriage.
May 21, 2009 5:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
^Ah, you beat me to it madmad.
May 21, 2009 5:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
Would that be before or after your forced abortion?
May 22, 2009 9:32 AM | Reply | Permalink
This is a naked attempt to shakedown their members for more money.
Their power in Congress (even among Dems) has never been stronger.
May 21, 2009 5:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
They just forgot to add the line, "It's a hard rain, gonna fall."
May 21, 2009 5:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
check out some of their fearmongering handiwork from 3 years ago: Freedom in Peril
you really gotta click on and download the PDF and check it out. it's graphically disturbing and hilarious all at once. you have the dirty hippy chick with a tattoo and unshaven legs. you've got George Soros, Michael Moore, jack-booted thugs, and a brave dad protecting his children as dark looters menacingly head toward the family abode in a time of social breakdown
May 21, 2009 6:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
And it should be 'ensure' not 'insure,' unless they've actually entered the insurance business.
May 21, 2009 6:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
As a multi gun-owning, liberal legal firearms enthusiast, I really have nothing but contempt for the NRA. They are money-grubbing whores.
Seriously, go to a gun store or sporting goods store and try to buy ammunition these days. See how much you're going to have to pay -- that's assuming (a big if) you can even get what you need. It's mostly because the NRA has created and encouraged the panic buying. Spend any amount of time on firearm related msg boards and you'll see people whining about the threat Obama poses to their way of life and complaining that they can't afford ammo anymore, but then in the next sentence they will tell you how they've cleaned out every Walmart in a 50 mi radius of their home and bought everything off the shelf. Is it any f****g wonder ammo costs so much? Very frustrating.
May 21, 2009 7:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
You could be my roommate's twin. He's a manager in the hunting/fishing department of one of the local sporting goods stores and he says they've had to limit ammo sales to 500 rounds per customer due to all the hoarding going on. Needless to say, he's as contemptuous of the NRA as you are.
May 21, 2009 7:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
The NRA is essentially an extra trade association for gun & ammo manufacturers. Most products & services not being the subjects of their own constitutional amendments, there aren't too many fanatics wrapping themselves in the Constitution to defend the rights of furniture-makers or E. coli laced hamburger grinders.
But w/ the NRA, the gun lobby can add the energies of a few hundred thousand actual gun nuts to the usual bribery/lobbying, merely by making up whatever fund raising shortfalls the NRA has.
May 21, 2009 11:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
I wish these nut jobs would rapture themselves with their own guns and leave civilization to the civilized.
May 22, 2009 12:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
What's really ironic is that the bleeding heart, mostly NRA opposing, liberals are responsible for saving their beloved balled eagle from extinction.
May 22, 2009 12:19 AM | Reply | Permalink
Why is this site giving the NRA free publicity for their flyer?
May 24, 2009 2:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
{discreet cough} Umm -- that's bald eagle, please.
May 25, 2009 1:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
following up on HeraldSquare's point about "ensure" vs. "insure" check out the ALT web address: http://www.ensureyourgunrights.com/ for a tickle.
May 22, 2009 1:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
That "ensure" link is hysterical. Of course I had to see what was up at the "insure" site - and on the banner at the top of the page is that eagle graphic with a slightly different wording - "PREPARE FOR THE STORM IN 2008." Apparently this one's taking a while to develop.
I wonder what these nutballs would have done had McCane actually been elected.
May 23, 2009 5:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
All this posturing to protect the 2nd Amendment is nothing more than protecting their right to manufacture more Saturday-night specials and trade for more old AK-47's which they can then resell for grotesque profits with bloody consequences.
May 22, 2009 9:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
Maybe Chris Rock was right. He has a routine where he says guns can be cheap, but ammunition should be expensive, like $500 a bullet. People would have to be really committed to shooting someone - sort of like Elaine's 'sponge worthy.'
May 22, 2009 12:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Just standard right-wing fear mongering. Fear seems to be the only motivation force effective on conservatives.
May 23, 2009 9:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think this ad is toxic, highly irrational and clearly has dog whistle potential.
I would beg to differ with the SPLC, however:
"Coming from a gang of people that back in the 90s described federal law enforcement agents as jackbooted thugs coming to do in good Americans."
OK, if we are opposed to coercive state violence and programmatic attacks on individual subjectivity, let's be consistent about it. The attacks on Ruby Ridge and Mt. Carmel were cut from precisely the same cloth; the same techniques--sonic warfare, isolation, denigration of religion--were in fact in use. We should be outraged by the Salt Pit mindset as well as the grinning federal thugs we see in "The Rules of Engagement" documentary, heading off to their raid.
What I'll call Cheneyism is disgusting whether it comes in the form of Erik Prince, Charles Graner, or an ATF agent circa 1993.
May 24, 2009 9:06 AM | Reply | Permalink