Tag Archives: LaPierre

May 6, 2013 · 5:30 AM

NRA Head’s ‘Shameful’ Question Draws Ire

Wayne Lapierre Boston

The Huffington Post

NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre sparked controversy on Saturday when he asked, ”How many Bostonians wished they had a gun two weeks ago?”

The comments came in the middle of his speech at the annual NRA members meeting in Houston, Texas.

LaPierre explained that during the Boston lockdown that took place while police were chasing the bombing suspects, “frightened citizens [were] sheltered in place with no means to defend themselves.”

He said:

“Imagine living in a large metropolitan area where lawful firearms ownership is heavily regulated and discouraged. Imagine waking up to a phone call from the police, warning that a terrorist event is occurring outside and ordering you to stay inside your home.”

“DISGUSTING. Shameful,” one Twitter user remarked. ”SERIOUSLY, BRO?” asked another.

As NBC’s Kasie Hunt points out, this is the first time that the NRA has linked the Boston Marathon bombings to guns.

LaPierre then accused gun control advocates of exploiting tragedies like the Sandy Hook school shooting.

“They use tragedy to try to blame us, to shame us into compromising our freedom for their political agenda,” he said. “No matter what it takes, we will never give up or compromise our constitutional freedom, not one single inch!”

Also speaking at the NRA convention were Second Vice President Allan Cors and chief lobbyist Chris Cox, who offered simliar rhetoric.

“Our gun rights are never safe,” said Cors.

Here’s the full transcript of LaPierre’s remarks.

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January 29, 2013 · 4:06 PM

NRA’s LaPierre: Universal Background Checks A Waste Of Time

National Rifle Association executive, Wayne LaPierre will say and do anything to protect the NRA’s hard-line stance on the issue of gun control…

TPM Live Wire

There’s no point in pursuing universal background checks for firearms purchases, National Rifle Association Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre plans to tell the Senate tomorrow, because bad guys will get guns anyway.

LaPierre is among those scheduled to testify at the Senate Judiciary Committee’s gun violence hearing Wednesday. The NRA sent out his testimony Tuesday. LaPierre once again plans to tout the NRA’s call for armed guards in every school as well as the group’s call for loosen privacy laws the group says keep mental health records from being included in the existing background check system. But when it comes to expanding background checks to cover all firearms transactions, LaPierre will tell the Senate there’s little point.

“When it comes to the issue of background checks, let’s be honest – background checks will never be ‘universal’ – because criminals will never submit to them,” LaPierre’s testimony reads.

LaPierre will say the NRA is ready to pushback on gun control advocates calling for new legislation after Newtown.

“While we’re ready to participate in a meaningful effort to solve these pressing problems, we must respectfully – but honestly and firmly – disagree with some members of this committee, many in the media, and all of the gun control groups on what will keep our kids and our streets safe,” the testimony read. “Law-abiding gun owners will not accept blame for the acts of violent or deranged criminals. Nor do we believe the government should dictate what we can lawfully own and use to protect our families.”

 

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January 23, 2013 · 6:36 AM

NRA’s Bizarre Response To Obama Inaugural Address

Wayne Lapierre Nra Obama Response

Yawn…

The Huffington Post

Wayne LaPierre, chief executive of the National Rifle Association, on Tuesday delivered a strange and strident rebuttal to President Barack Obama’s inaugural address, accusing the president of reducing the U.S. Constitution to “a blank slate for anyone’s graffitti” and lavishly praising a Supreme Court justice who famously ruled to limit gun rights.

Speaking at the annual Weatherby International Hunting and Conservation Awards in Reno, Nev., LaPierre zeroed in on a line in Obama’s inaugural address, delivered Monday, in which the president said “we cannot afford to mistake absolutism for principle.” The line was a subtle reference to the gun control debate, and the tendency of gun rights activists to interpret the Second Amendment as giving carte blanche rights to buy and carry any type of firearm anywhere.

“Absolutes do exist, it’s the basis of all civilization,” said LaPierre. “Without those absolutes, Democracy decays into nothing more than two wolves and one lamb voting on who to eat for lunch.”

Surprisingly, LaPierre renewed a widely criticized argument the NRA put forth last week in an attack ad featuring the president’s two daughters. “We believe that we deserve and have every right to the same level of freedom that government leaders reserve for themselves — to defend ourselves and our families with semi-automatic firearms technology,” LaPierre said. “We believe that if neither criminals nor the political class — with their bodyguards and security people — are limited by magazine capacity, we shouldn’t be limited in our capacity, either.”

Using terms better suited to a talk radio host than to the leader of the nation’s largest gun lobby, LaPierre said Obama’s address “makes a mockery” of the Declaration of Independence and the notion of “unalienable rights.” LaPierre repeatedly addressed Obama in the speech, delivered to a black-tie crowd at the hunting awards benefit dinner. “Words have meanings, Mr. President, and those meanings are absolute,” LaPierre said. “And when absolutes are abandoned for principles, the U.S. Constitution becomes a blank slate for anyone’s graffitti.”

LaPierre told the crowd the president “doesn’t understand you. He doesn’t agree with the freedoms you cherish. If the only way he can force you to give ‘em up is through scorn and ridicule, he’s more than willing to do it — even as he claims the moral high ground.”

LaPierre quoted former Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black, a one-time Democratic congressman who served on the high court in the 1930s. “Justice Black understood the danger of self-appointed arbiters of what freedom really means, like President Obama,” LaPierre said.

But Black is a problematic hero for LaPierre. In 1939, Black and fellow Supreme Court justices ruled unanimously in a landmark gun control case, United States v. Miller, that the Second Amendment does not protect blanket access for citizens to any type of firearm.

The NRA and other gun rights groups groups are gearing up for a legislative battle in Congress during the coming weeks over a proposed ban on military style weapons, and limits on the size of gun magazines.

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December 22, 2012 · 2:36 AM

THE NUTS COME OUT: NRA Responds To School Shooting

Wayne LaPierre , chief lobbyist for the National Rifle Association is so out of touch with reality, that he never even gave the Newtown, CT victims‘ survivors the NRA’s condolences (or his own personal condolences for that matter.)

His speech was a rambling treatise demonstrating  how more armed security personnel in schools will prevent another Sandy Hook tragedy.  He talked about how the media and left-wing organizations are demonizing his organization.

He blamed video games, movies and music videos for exposing children to a violent culture.

Simply put, the man is one sandwich short of a picnic…

The Huffington Post

The nation’s largest gun-rights lobby is calling for armed police officers to be posted in every American school to stop the next killer “waiting in the wings.”

The National Rifle Association broke its silence Friday on last week’s shooting rampage at a Connecticut elementary school that left 26 children and staff dead.

The group’s top lobbyist, Wayne LaPierre, said at a Washington news conference that “the next Adam Lanza,” the man responsible for last week’s mayhem, is planning an attack on another school.

“The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun,” LaPierre said.

He blamed video games, movies and music videos for exposing children to a violent culture day in and day out.

“In a race to the bottom, many conglomerates compete with one another to shock, violate, and offend every standard of civilized society, by bringing an even more toxic mix of reckless behavior and criminal cruelty right into our homes,” LaPierre said.

He refused to take any questions after speaking. Still, though security was tight, two protesters were able to interrupt LaPierre’s speech, holding up signs that blamed the NRA for killing children. Both were escorted out, shouting that guns in schools are not the answer.

More than a dozen security officers checked media credentials at various checkpoints and patrolled the hotel ballroom.

LaPierre announced that former Rep. Asa Hutchison, R-Ark., will lead an NRA program that will develop a model security plan for schools that relies on armed volunteers.

Continue here…

 

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