If members of the National Rifle Association (NRA) and their guns are the root cause of gun violence, as the Left would assert, then why did nothing happen when almost 82,000 of them showed up in Atlanta this past weekend?
If something did happen, finding a news story about it is nearly impossible. Several searches including terms like "gun violence at NRA" and similar terms produced - you guessed it - nothing. Zip. Zero. Nada.
As a side note, one can learn everything he needs to know about the left-leaning nature of the press by attending a conservative event in person and then watching how it is reported on in the news. While a local "reporter" immersed herself in the middle of the few dozen protestors, as if it were the big event to report on, the 82,000 gun owners moving here and there were ignored. There were probably more gun owners and NRA members in the bathrooms inside the convention center at any given time then there were protestors outside. Imagine filling most any stadium in America to capacity, and that's what you had in gun owners crammed into the Georgia World Congress Center. Additionally, the acres of booths were manned by even more gun enthusiasts displaying firearms and accessories in their spaces.
On top of the overplay of the protestors, misleading reports about the NRA not allowing guns at their meeting were widely circulated by the Left. In actuality, only the venue where President Donald Trump was speaking was off limits to members carrying arms. In the main hall and everywhere else, gun owners could easily be seen openly carrying their firearm. It is also very safe to assume that many of the others were carrying concealed. The Secret Service instigated the weapons ban for the venue where the president was speaking, not the NRA.
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This question remains, "If NRA members, gun owners, and guns are the problem, then why does no one ever get shot at the NRA Annual meeting, where literally tens of thousands of each are present?"
It will take a few days, but we will soon know about the crime rate in the general area of the convention center over the past weekend. Is there anyone on the planet who wants to bet that violent crime increased while over 80,000 gun owners were in the area? If so, I'll take that bet all day long. The safest wager anywhere is that, just like every other year, rates of violent crime went down in the vicinity of the convention center during this year's NRA Annual Meeting in Atlanta.
Here are other things that did not happen this past weekend that we know of: The police did not see someone legally carrying a gun and mistake them for a criminal and shoot them. No innocent bystanders were shot or killed by gun-wielding private citizens. No gun-carrying individuals shot anyone. No one got mad at anyone and shot them in anger, because they had a gun handy. There were no gun fights between the fans of Glocks and those who prefer 1911's. No guns were taken from their owners and used against them. No guns jumped off tables and attacked anyone. No high capacity magazines killed anyone. No children handling firearms were hurt or killed. And - most hard to believe - not one person fired his gun in the air in celebration of something said from the NRA stage.
If guns and the NRA are the problem, then how could this be?
NRA's slogan "Freedom's Safest Place" is true. Not only is it freedom's safest place, it is the safest place period.
Tens of thousands of ardent gun rights supporters came to Atlanta to celebrate one of their favorite liberties: the 2nd Amendment and the right to protect themselves from anyone who would do them harm. They saw some of their favorite celebrities, browsed through hundreds and hundreds of firearms displays, heard great speeches, saw the President of the United States, met with old friends and made new ones, and traveled home safely.
Yes, 81,846 NRA members showed up in Atlanta, and nothing happened.
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