GRPC

A contractor at the air traffic control center serving Chicago started a fire there and then attempted suicide, shutting down air traffic at both O’Hare and Midway.  Thousands of incoming/outgoing flights were disrupted, with the effects rippling outward from this key airline hub.

Thus, as you might imagine, actual turnout at the Gun Rights Policy Conference was well down from the 731 who were pre-registered, but the “show did go on.”  Today, Sunday, Tom Gresham will be broadcasting his GunTalk radio show live from the conference and continuing thereafter with interviews with participants.  The regular GRPC speech schedule will run 9 AM to 1:00 PM, after which they’ll hold an ad hoc grassroots workshop through the rest of the afternoon.

This was a big focus of Saturday’s presentation, with several of the state-level gun owners’ civil rights organization leaders sharing the advances and setbacks “on the ground.”  Any such effort can be “two steps forward, one step back,” but we are winning here: it seems to this observer that the state-level activists are getting way more than two steps forward for every one step back, with significant victories being scored even in battleground states such as California, Connecticut, New York, and Maryland.

Julianne Versnel and others involved at the International level briefed us on the dangers of certain treaties currently ongoing. On the national front, we were briefed by superstar Second Amendment lawyer Alan Gura on several cases both won and ongoing which can ultimately impact all law-abiding gun owners.  Professor John Lott detailed the misinformation coming out of the Bloomberg organization, fifty million dollars worth of twisted propaganda disguised as fact, which goes far beyond their notoriously listing a dead terrorist shot by police as “a victim of gun violence.”  Microstamping, smart guns, universal background checks that would lead to de facto registration, and other Trojan Horses were dissected.  The dangers of “gun-free zones” were delineated.

Stephen Halbrook ran out of copies of his new book (though I ordered a copy). His talk focused on the research for that book, “Gun Control in the Third Reich.” This authoritative resource will make a great companion text to the work of the late Aaron Zelman at Jews for Preservation of Firearms Ownership (JPFO).

Speaking of which, the taking over of JPFO by Second Amendment Foundation, which along with Citizens’ Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms hosts the GRPC, was announced to strong applause.  A new board for JPFO has been constituted, and plans are in place to make that organization stronger than ever. More on this shortly in a future blog entry.