Bob Cesca: The Gun Lobby Isn’t About The Second Amendment, It’s About Selling More Guns

The number one role of the NRA and other lobby groups is as an advertising agency.

Chet Strange—Getty Images

by Bob Cesca

WASHINGTON, DC -- Here we are again in the aftermath of not one but two mass shootings in as many weeks, shaking our fists and rending our garments over guns and gun control, knowing almost instinctively by now that nothing will be done about it. As I’ve said repeatedly here and elsewhere: if the cold blooded mass murder of 20 kindergartners didn’t change things, I don’t know what will.

Sure, the gun lobby has spent $10-15 million annually on contributions to, mainly, Republicans but also members of both parties. But its primary targets are white male gun owners, the perpetual marketing demographic of the industry’s apparatchiks who are constantly bombarding these fetishists with disinformation and bumper-sticker sloganeering designed to keep ‘em shopping for more guns. And the keyword here is “shopping.”

The gun lobby’s primary goal isn’t to protect the integrity of the Second Amendment. Not by a long shot. The number one role of the NRA and other lobby groups is as an advertising agency. And in that capacity, the mission is to sell as many guns as possible. Contrary to what gun owners believe, they aren’t viewed as patriots in the marketing plans of the for-profit firearm industry. Gun owners are consumers -- customers whose fetish for military cosplay and all things that go bang-bang make them ripe for exploitation.

The Second Amendment just happens to be a convenient marketing gimmick, adding a layer of sacrosanct virtue to the retail plan. In reality, there’s nothing sacred about a piece of hardware -- an adult toy sold alongside 55-inch televisions and diaper genies. So, wrap it in the thin veil of being a “right” that “shall not be infringed” and boom -- you’ve turned a product made of wood and metal into a constitutional entitlement. 

That’s how they draw in these suckers who just so happen to have plenty of disposable income to burn on weapons and, for that matter, a metric ton of completely disposable ammunition. There are costumes now, too, marketed on Facebook and elsewhere as “tactical gear.” Tactical gear for what, exactly? Shooting squirrels and pumping rounds into a paper target? The gun industry and its lobbyist goons are practically building their own military-industrial complex out of weekend warriors and wanna-be soldiers.

And through their marketing campaigns, they frame gun ownership as our patriotic duty as citizens. If we don’t buy guns and especially if we join efforts to regulate firearms, we’re not only shirking our duty as Americans while leaving our families vulnerable to (brown-skinned) attackers, but we’re also turning a blind eye to the threat of government tyranny. In other words, gun owners are convinced by relentless marketing efforts that, with their arsenals of AR-15s and their tactical gear from Facebook, they could ostensibly fight off the U.S. military, which Donald Trump just spent four years telling us is the best equipped fighting force the world has ever seen. 

A few years ago, a gun manufacturer called Keystone Sporting Arms actually produced a real-life firearm that's the perfect size for children (or dwarfs) and, based on the fun family-friendly tone of the commercial, not to mention the zany cricket cartoon mascot, they appeared to be marketing these guns directly to kids, describing the “Crickett” with the first person possessive: "My First Rifle." The commercial tells us that it's "affordable, soft-shooting and accurate." And yes, girls, they made a pink one so you won't have to shoot a gun that's covered with icky-icky boy germs. 

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Meanwhile, all those gun fetishists who voted for Trump twice should probably be informed that the only gun-related ban and buyback program in the United States since the now-expired assault rifle ban, was passed by Donald Trump himself. After the Las Vegas massacre in which a gunman used a “bump stock” to spray bullets into a crowd of concertgoers, killing 58 people, Trump banned the sale of bump stocks, which turned semi-automatic AR-15s into fully automatic killing machines. So, I guess infringing upon the right to bear arms is acceptable to 74 million Republican voters after all -- voters who chose to cast their ballots for Trump a second time despite being responsible for the most anti-gun rule since the 1990s. 

Here’s what’s fascinating about all that: last year the Supreme Court declined to take up a lawsuit to strike down the ban. In other words, the Court with its conservative majority refused to hear the case, tacitly suggesting that it’s not a matter of constitutionality. To my ears, this sounds like an opening to ban other firearm modifications and accessories -- and there are many.

By the way, it’s germane to note that the Constitution doesn’t guarantee the right to manufacture or sell firearms. It also doesn’t guarantee the right to make a profit from gun sales. Perhaps, then, the way to push back against gun violence here is to regulate the retailers, beyond background checks. If a corporate franchise wants to add firearms to its sales inventory, then it should face steep tax hikes or tougher liability in the face of mass shootings and other gun-related deaths.

Yet if anyone with a “D” after their name tries to pass expanded background checks or bans on the deadliest and most unnecessary firearms, they’re immediately pilloried as America-hating tyrants, intruding upon the weekend hobbies and civil war fantasies of millions. The real trespass, though, isn’t the alleged unconstitutionality of such laws. It’s not that at all, though we’re made to think it is. The reasons new gun control laws are opposed is because they eat into the gun industry’s profits. And no one puts baby in the corner. No one takes money out of the hands of the death-for-profit sector. 

Who will step up to try this time? Who will have the courage to stick it to the murder profiteers? And how many people will be murdered (for profit) before that happens? I wish I had a good answer. The countdown to the next massacre is already underway.

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The Filibuster Protects Republicans...From Themselves

With the filibuster in place, Republicans never have to worry about getting anything done. Which is useful because they can’t actually get anything done.

PHOTO: TOM WILLIAMS-POOL/GETTY IMAGES.

by Justin Rosario

After Mitch McConnell abused the filibuster for years to wage a scorched earth war and break the Senate, he’s extremely worried that Democrats may reform it. McConnell is so worried that he’s threatening to...break the Senate by waging a scorched earth war?

Conventional wisdom has it that McConnell and the GOP are terrified of Democrats being able to advance their pro-democracy, anti-1% agenda. There’s some merit (okay, a lot) to that line of thought, but an equal, if not larger problem for Republicans is that removing or reforming the filibuster means they would have to advance their agenda if elected to power again.

It’s hard to overstate what kind of disaster that would be for the Republican Party. Why else would they make such a ludicrous threat?

“Scream While I’m Stabbing You And I’ll Stab You”

The specific threat here is that if Democrats reform or eliminate the filibuster, Republicans will do everything in their power to slow the Senate down. They’ll use procedural maneuvers to drag out everything to the maximum amount of time possible. But they’re already doing that:

“Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), a staunch Trump ally and fiscal conservative, has told colleagues that he plans to force the Senate clerks to read aloud the entire $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill on the Senate floor, which could slow it down by as much as 10 hours.”

And lest you think this is retaliation for Democrats moving the American Recovery Plan through without allowing Republicans to drag out the process, they did exactly the same thing back in 2010. After lying to Democrats for almost two years about how they would cooperate on the Affordable Care Act, not a single Republican voted for it and then they forced the bill to be read out loud “in protest.”

So, when Democrats do not have the votes to get around the filibuster, Republicans use it and go scorched earth. When Democrats have the votes to get around the filibuster, Republicans go scorched earth anyway. McConnell’s threat is like a serial killer promising to kill you if you’re not quiet while he’s stabbing you to death. It’s not exactly an incentive to cooperate. 

That’s not to say there are not severe repercussions for the GOP in the Democrat’s agenda. The most obvious is the elimination of many of the voter suppression methods Republicans use to steal elections. The For the People Act would be an absolute disaster for the Republican Party. It would take years for the Republican-stacked courts to overturn the provisions of the law, and doing so would risk sparking a massive backlash against a clearly corrupted judiciary.

Meanwhile, Democratic programs put into place to alleviate poverty would become entrenched, something Republicans despise. They’ve been trying to destroy Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid for decades. They’ve been unable to destroy Obamacare for over 10 years now.

Without the filibuster, though, should Republicans regain power, they would be free to refashion America in their own image. Why wouldn’t they want the opportunity to fully enact their agenda without those pesky liberals getting in their way?

Well, about that...

The Republican Agenda Is Toxic

Mitch McConnell spelled out what kind of terrible future he has in store for America should Republicans be allowed to pass whatever they wanted without interference from the Democrats:

"We wouldn't just erase every liberal change that hurt the country -- we'd strengthen America with all kinds of conservative policies with zero, zero input from the other side," he said pointing to how the GOP would move swiftly to defund sanctuary cities and Planned Parenthood, add new protections for the right to life of the unborn, work on concealed carry laws, and a new era of domestic energy production."

That all sounds just awful but there’s two problems: First, it would be very unpopular with the public and, second, it would be easily reversed when Democrats gain power again. Neither can be said of the Democratic agenda. If Republicans could “just erase every liberal change”, Medicare would be toast and Social Security would be privatized (ask George W. Bush how that went when he tried it). 

Republicans say their voters want abortion banned and more guns on the streets, but polling says the public wants the exact opposite. Trump spent four years enacting white nationalist immigration policies and it cost Republicans the House, the Senate, and the White House while exposing the white nationalist rot at the core of right wing politics. 

There’s a reason Republicans took 12 months to pass their $1.9 trillion tax cut for the rich and failed to repeal Obamacare during the 2 years they had control of Congress and the White House:….

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