Reply #78: Those of you who have known me for a while...

[derby378]

...know that I'm not a member of the NRA. I started something just for Democrats instead, a little grassroots thing that's finally starting to attract attention from Democrats across the spectrum, and now it looks like we've got a caucus at the upcoming Texas Democratic Party state convention in Austin.

But I do talk with NRA folks once in a while. I've helped them with news on local events and campaign races, and they've helped me by putting me in touch with local organizers. Republican, yes, but glad to see at least one Democrat who understands their concerns.

And about that NRA comic book released in early 2007, I downloaded a copy from Wonkette and read it once or twice. Sure, there's a lot of alarmist rhetoric about environmental extremists, minority street gangs, and RKBA-hostile legislators. But the comic also touches on some very valid concerns, such as police abuses and forcible confiscation of guns from law-abiding denizens of New Orleans in the aftermath of Katrina.

Amendment II Democrats will never be a satellite of the NRA. I insist that we've got to chart our own course as Democrats, try to build our own networks. And I do have my own philosophical differences with the NRA. But we continue to talk. And they're aware that some prominent Democrats such as Jim Webb are also NRA members. One day in the near future, you may see the national paradigm on gun politics shift dramatically. And that will largely be due to Democrats joining the debate - not as Third Way compromisers, but as bona fide Second Amendment activists who believe that government still needs to provide opportunity for the little guy.