"Firearms WILL NOT Be Allowed In Hall"

A small but startling sign welcomed the gun lovers who arrived at the National Rifle Association's annual gathering Friday.

"Firearms WILL NOT be allowed in Hall A during the Celebration of American Values Leadership Forum."

Beyond this sign at the Kentucky Exposition Center was a row of 10 metal detectors. They were manned by uniformed Secret Service officers deployed because the scheduled speakers included presumptive Republican nominee John McCain.

Read the whole story here.

Comments

[FZliveson]

The illusion of security that the "piss on the NRA minds" have here is terrifying.
First of all, probably 80% of all firearms are owned by non-NRA members.
2) In many locations police and sheriffs will not respond unless there is already an injured person or
felony already committed.
3) There are very few statistics on how many robberies, rapes and murders are NOT committed, because would-be perpetrators go elsewhere if they suspect people are prepared to defend themselves and their property with lethal force.
4) I would love to hear what the "anti-gun" creatures have to say about how they would defend themselves in the event of any or all of the following"
a) Food riots
b) Home Invasion Robbery
c) Anarchy in the home town
d) Natural disaster that interrupts law-enforcement
e) Well-armed private armies
It's all nice to sing Kumbaya and mean it. but it is Hell to be accosted and think that a wink and a song is all that is needed to stay alive and protect ones-self and/or family.

[Quaoar]

You seem to be assuming that being anti-NRA is the same thing as being anti-gun. Such a conclusion is not warranted.

It's possible to be pro gun owner and against most gun control legislation while being turned off by the NRA's extremist rhetoric (cold dead hands, jack-booted government thugs).

[BluesDogLefty]

Please, the real threat to American lives is a fundamentally failed health care system. Far more people will die from our failed health care system than by boogie-man-home-intruders.

[FZliveson]

Pray....very hard....that you are right.
Our founding fathers are tumbling in their graves over what is happening now.
And look, Mo---r F----r I have friends who have been killed by said "boogie-men, so
don't go all Joan Baez on me. I have experienced the truth of my words and you....Sesame Street Big Bird bull shit???

[biffer]

In reference to ( #4) I will defend myself by voting for Barack Obama, because otherwise all of these things are probably going to happen.

[FZliveson]

So you think Mahatma Obama is the panacea for all that ails our nation?
You think that wonderful man of peace has the POWER to fight the big corporations?
Better read up on your JFK, RFK, MLK history and see what has happened to man people who sang songs of hope and peace. There is real danger in the air Biffer, but you must be too young to sniff it out. Read,

[wm1066]

Even Tombstone Arizona circa 1880 had a law you couldn't walk around town with your guns. Wasn't that why Wayatt Earp went to yhe OK Corral ? To get the Clantons to give up thier guns?
The problem for the NRA is they don't want ANY gun laws, and that is just insane.

[shengirl]

"Do as I say, not as I do."

[dannyS]

why would the NRA not allow guns at their event?
I thought guns made everything safer...

[1will]

You are in good company. About half of the anti gunners posting on this column never read or understood the story.
The Secret Service banned guns at this event not the NRA.

[biffer]

Then if that was the case and if the NRA people are such great proponents of their own rhetoric they should have canceled the event altogether to show their solidarity towards their cause. Every single person that gave up their gun, pen knife, or whatever else they had taken from them to attend this event is nothing but a hypocrite. Preach and preach some more about how you should have the right to carry a firearm in any situation then have it taken from you at your own event? The Secret Service may have initiated these rules, but these people chose to follow them instead of following their own beliefs that they constantly preach. It's pretty funny how such hypocritical behavior seems to be okay by the NRA masses when they're all trying to get in to see the head hypocrite himself John McCain.

[StinkyPete]

There are rights and privileges. Attending a speech by a Presidential Candidate is a privilege subject to conditions set by the Secret Service. Prohibiting firearms and other weapons, even empty casings, is a reasonable restriction to eliminate cover for an assassin. The prohibition was limited in time and location, not submitting to a search was OK without prejudice - you just can't attend.
Prohibiting concealed carry at a shopping mall is unjustifiable by any stretch of the imagination. Other times and places , well we can quibble about those.
While I am not a fan of the NRA - you might familiarize yourself with their positions rather than listen to what others tell you to believe.

[ErikW65]

I don't think your charge of hypocrisy against NRA members who gave over their weapons to the Secret Service is valid. NRA members, and gun owners in general must relinquish their right to carry their weapons at various places, including the US Capitol (remember Rep. Jim Webb had a staff member forget he had a concealed weapon and got caught going through a metal detector...)

[dansama]

I can hear Alanis Morissette warming up to sing the national anthem, and then breaks into Isn't it Ironic, LOL welcome to life after the death of the constitution.

[JimGroom]

I feel sorry for the former Navy Seal Marcus Luttirell who told the audience that he had been briefly detained after slapping an individual who insulted America. Apparently even after serving our nation he still does not understand the rights of all Americans to express their views. He did not like what the other individual said so he struck out in anger. That is just so un-American of him.

[Dannydel]

That is one thing the rabid right ringers still can't grok. The freedom of speech thing. Oh well, they'll have 8 years to fulminate about it.

[sweetchuckd]

I read a story on http://detentionslip.org about a mother who brought loaded guns to a school conference!

[totalliberal]

["I will tell you that. The goal of the anti-gun crowd is NOT to REGULATE but to PROHIBIT gun"]


At least Wayne LaPew tells you. His job depends on making you paranoid and keep those overpriced memberships flowing in. Nobody has ever suggested eliminating guns but Waynes job is to extrapolate that threat upward. You can't buy machine guns, so their are restrictions now. If you are so terrified in life that you feel the need to carry a hand-gun around, get a permit.

[StanDaMan]

Now that's telling! It says: "I support your right to bear arms, but not when I'm around." Well, I'm asking for the same thing!!!

There's a simple and elegant solution for enacting responsible gun control laws: Pass a constitutional amendment which obligates every lobbyist or politician who promotes the right to bear arms or opposes gun-control (1) to give all Americans without criminal records access to his/her office and all work/public meetings, appearances, etc., and (2) to make fully-loaded guns (including automatic and assault rifles) freely available to all persons in attendance on those occasions. It"s called putting your money (or, in this case, your life) where your mouth is. I guarantee that the pro-gun lobbyists and politicians would very quickly realize the errors of their way and fall over one another in their haste to reverse their positions.

[1will]

I prefer to have everyone that supports gun bans or donates to anti gun groups to have a decal on their home and car windows saying "Gun Free Zone." I'd also like to see Rosie O'Donnell and Paul Helmke live in the most dangerous, crime ridden neighborhoods of DC and Chicago for 6 months without firearms or bodyguards.
I wonder how many anti's would be willing to broadcast their defenselessness.

[JeanPaulSatire]

Well, well, well.

The takeaway is we now know that the official Secret Service position is that an armed citizenry does NOT make everyone safer by causing would-be violent miscreants to refrain from acting out of fear of annihilation from all sides.

Or maybe it's that they think McCain't opponents are so completely opposed to him that such fear is irrelevant to their calculus.

Or that they believe there is so little love for McCain't from the NRA that its members wouldn't care to expend the effort and of drawing and aiming, and the expense of firing their weapons at the miscreant.

Whatever the actual rationale, the irony is freakin' sublime.

[pitman]

Holy moly, what the hell did Ted Nugent do? He must have crapped and urinated his pants again like he did to avoid serving his country. McCain appeared on the same agenda with Nugent? They must have kissed and made up.

[GrandmaSue]

How ironic, we have a right to bear arms unless it's too dangerous to let us bear arms.

[ByersL]

Ya gotta love the irony!

[hypnotoad72]

There is an irony to this development. Is the NRA afraid of their members?

Are they leasing a building with an anti-gun policy?

Or is it worry about an anti-gun nut with his own insipid irony by trotting in and shooting everyone with his Saturday Night Semi-automatic? Most gun people would (should) advocate responsibility...

[1will]

If you read the article you'll see that it was the Secret Service that banned guns from the meeting. Evidently from the number of people that showed up armed at the meeting this is not a usual occurance. I guess the NRA trusts it's members to be safe, responsible and legal even if the Secret Service does not. The funny thing is you've never heard of any killings or mass murders happening at these NRA meetings. What does that tell us about Gun Free Zones and their effectiveness?

[JulieSA]

Or...if you read the article you'd know that the Secret Service banned guns from the hall where McCain was speaking. They do this at every event that every candidate they're protecting attends. If you want to have a candidate speak at your convention you have to put up with the Secret Service procedures, no matter who you are.

[spicegal]

For shame. Why would they do that, after all it's not guns that kill people, it's the person that pulls the trigger. What, they don't trust their own people. These are the same nimrods that think college students should be allowed to pack weapons on campus.

[StinkyPete]

Why would be allowing concealed carry on campus be a problem? The usual restrictions of age and background commonly applied to issuing a carry permit seem to work very well. By what mechanism would merely 'being on campus' cause a breakdown with multiple shootings caused by permitted individuals? I can't see it, help us out.

[1will]

Do any of you anti gunners actually read through an entire column?
It was the Secret Service that disarmed those attending the meeting (not the NRA).

[Johnagain]

And why would the secret service disarm those attending the meeting? If those in opposition to gun restrictions are correct, this situation should be self-correcting. The presence of so many other armed citizens (especially morally upstanding, America loving NRA members), should deter anyone with bad intent. Unless of course it is possible that there are some situations where some restriction on guns is necessary. But that puts us on a 'slippery slope', and that can't be allowed to happen.

[JulieSA]

Johnagain

There are only a few people under Secret Service protection, and they have that protection because history shows, unfortunately, that these political candidates are uniquely targeted. It's rare that the average citizen attends any event that's screened by the Secret Service, so I reluctantly accede to the requirements for these events. I've only attended one event where i had to go through SS screening, and i didn't mind that one time, because the president is always in real danger. The country would be damaged if any of candidates or the president were harmed.

I went to a McCain event in early March in a very small, intimate venue. Before the event, i removed the gun for which I have a permit from my purse, because I thought they would be checking. I didn't realize that McCain hadn't yet accepted Secret Service protection. To my horror, there was no security whatsoever. Everyone could easily get within an arms length of the candidate, and I kept thinking of what happened to Bobby Kennedy. I'm just a housewife, but i started trying to size up the other people there, in case someone started to act like a whacko. All it takes is one crazy person, and President Ford was saved by a civilian who smacked the gun so the shot was deflected.

I never said anything about this before he came under Secret Service protection, because i didn't want to give the nuts any ideas.

[Johnagain]

JulieSA

I guess you missed my point. Why do you think the Secret Service does this at all events? Could it be that totally unrestricted carrying of guns, even if by non-felons, is in some circumstances not safe? The Secret Service certainly must think so. And if they are right, then the NRA, in its categorical opposition to all forms of gun control, is in disagreement with the secret service.

[JulieSA]

The Secret Service does this at all events. Why should there be any exceptions? If Obama appears at a church or a kindergarten, every attendee is screened for weapons.

[shanghaislim]

Because........deep down, they know..............

................how crazy most of there own gun-totin' members are!!!!!!

[mspiglet]

cold. dead......... minds.

[nin]

What's wrong with these NRA Kooks? Bunch of liberals. WHy do they hate their country so much? Don't they know that the only thing protecting the first ammendment is the second ammendment?

LOL

[neoconsareliars]

Such a responsible group of nuts being denied their God given right to pack heat must make Charleston Heston roll over in his grave.

[pfc1369]

Perhaps Charlton is doing the Charleston.

[likeicare]

This article kinda says it all, don't ya think?

[CaptainVideo]

The reality is that, given the ingrained gun culture in the United States, bringing about effective gun control will require a long, drawn-out struggle that may take more than a generation. But it must be done to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous and/or irresponsible people. Getting meaningful gun control into effect may take as long and extended an effort as abolishing slavery or giving women the right to vot