Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/06/10/robbed-at-gunpoint.html
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Do they accept rubles?
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According to Mariia Buttina, Da!
Also accepted: sexual favors from foreign operatives.
(Despite the rumors and statements of Montel Williams, Dana Loesch is a tease and won’t go near NRA leadership in that way)
*These are rumors I am spreading on purpose
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Why do you hate success!!??!!?!?! (non-profit edition)
This Ted talk always rubbed me the wrong way. The guy seemed to be arguing for big salaries and consolidation of power. Maybe I didin’t pay enough attention, but his examples were breast cancer non-profits and serving children with desabilities, which are hard(er) to argue with (I still take issue that juggernauts are a positive) but when you consider orgs like think tanks and the NRA?
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I can see the NRA rank-and-file membership rolls forming the basis of Il Douche’s intial sucker list for 2016. The dues-paying members have been a reliable bunch of rubes for a quarter century.
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The demise of the NRA is one of our few silver linings in the day of tRump Co.
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So the NRA is basically like a mega-church, but with bump stocks and black rifles? They’ve taken an original sacred text, built an extremist gospel on top of it, and now they’re soliciting donations from the faithful so that the cult leaders can live large and fly around in expensive jets?
Their willingness to cozy up to the Russians notwithstanding, I think that’s the most American thing I’ve ever heard. Bless.
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Now a Russian Agency
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The only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun is more of your money in Wayne LaPierre’s pocket.
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I don’t have much faith that the NRA will go away entirely – it’s too deeply entrenched for that, I fear – but I deeply hope that all of the revelations stemming from the Oliver North / Ackerman McQueen debacle will lead to them losing their tax exempt/nonprofit status.
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Three things that the USA needs to do to curb Foundations and Lobbyist Groups…
- If you want a tax break for being a non-profit and you turned over more than $1,000,000, then you have an independent audit. The auditor must change every three years.
- If you want a tax break for being a non-profit, you must do real things in the physical world. Just being a mouthpiece isn’t enough, and we have universities to do research, thanks. If less than 66% of your budget goes on physical works in real communities, then you lose your tax break.
- If you want a tax break for being a non-profit, you must publish your accounts - in full - yearly, within one year of claiming said tax break.
Failure to conform means not only no tax break, but the entire board of the non-profit gets their names put on a list. Any non-profit with one of those names on its board is not eligible for tax breaks.
(It’ll never happen, because too many lobbying groups would simply cease to exist, and that sweet sweet money supply to the politicians will dry up. 
)
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The Auditor must be paid and selected by the government. Too many times the auditors have a conflict of interest and end up not doing their stated job. It would be even better if the auditors were on the government payroll straight up. This is no guarantee that they will be free from corruption, but it at least doesn’t create a marketplace of corruption for companies to shop around in before they find an auditor that will produce the results they want.
Nonprofits already publish their tax returns. Publishing their “accounts” is unfortunately a vague idea that still opens up a lot of area for corruption and embezzlement.
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Ted Nugent got $50k for playing the NRA convention …
Fair enough, and consider the benefits.
When the Nuge plays an NRA conference, you know exactly where he is — confined to a single right-wing venue. Which is far preferable to Free-Range Nuge.
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Average dues paying members, however wilfully blinkered they might be about what their dues are paying for, aren’t generally the sort to voluntarily donate extra funds to the NRA. They pay the dues, get the card, and use the access to ranges, competitions and training. And among the members I know personally, Trump is pretty unpopular.
Cory is basically right on the musketfuckers and gun nuts. Its the hardcore true believers who toss extra money at these fools for explicitly political work. But I’m willing to bet those people are already on GOP and Trump donor lists, and there’s a decent chance the NRA is buying that info from conservative Campaigns rather than the other way around.
This seems to have shaken said complacent members much more than their obvious political/lobbying roll and the bad feelings coming out of it. So while I don’t think they’ll go away, as they’re basically an industry lobby. It could erode membership enough to finally kill the “sporting organization” excuse and control over training and ranges. Which might finally see one of those non-insane actual sporting alternatives grow large enough to push back on their horse shit.
Basically bifurcate actual gun owners from the industry lobby, which could seriously shake up fire arms regulation.
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Even the average members are paying dues to an organisation that’s more than well-funded by the industries it lobbies for. That there are technically two branches of the organisation is a convenient fiction that doesn’t change the fact that the NRA could hand out cards to its members for free and still be awash in cash for the firearms manufacturers it really serves. Maybe being fleeced of their money will wake them all up to the NRA’s toxic nature in a way that all its racist and fascist rhetoric hasn’t.
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Exactly what I was getting at. That sort of member is already frustrated or uncomfortable with the organization and what their funds are used for. Along with how little they get out of it, and the fact that in many places you are functionally required to join to access the hobby.
But they very much bury their heads is the sand about it, and refuse to acknowledge the conflict of funding nasty shit they don’t actually support. And never really consider starting or joining something else. The “two levels” excuse is a key way they do that. And if even more clearly being ripped off can finally drive these people off. Based on polling of membership on specific issues, like universal background checks and other “common sense” gun control proposal that would seem to be most of their members. If they break off into a group willing to push for such things, or just stay out of it, that could really effect the NRA’s ability to influence policy.
It won’t much impact their funding. The fire arms Industry will still fund them, and the true believers who are more than happy with the state of things will keep donating and paying dues. So they aren’t going anywhere.
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Rubles are preferred.
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Since the mid-70’s the NRA has been undergoing a long transformation into a fear-mongering organization fueled by racism and grift and now that’s all that’s left. The marks who haven’t abandoned it by this point never will.
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Ya gotta spend money to grift money.
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Wait, I’ve obviously not been paying attention. The NRA is actually being run by Oliver North?
Wow, I never would have guessed that the “well-regulated militia” referred to was actually the Iranian Revolutionary Guards.
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