I think your ideas are mostly on target, but you give way too much credit to the NRA.  They are only the legends the left has made them.  They don’t vote, and are at most three to four million single issue voters.

Where I think you missed the point is that most Americans don’t have a problem with gun ownership.  They don’t need the NRA to tell them how to feel, they want the option of buying a gun if they want to do it. 

Maybe we should focus on keeping the guns out of the seriously mental ill’s hands and away from criminals.  There is a lot of work to do in that regard, so maybe we should try harder.  I would bet that would have a real and measureable impact.

Zuma once again shows that he leans heavily toward the “Stupid” part of his column title. That isn’t to say that this piece is wall-to-wall idiocy, but most of it was.

As usual, Zuma doesn’t let facts get in the way of a good piece. He fails to mention one group of gun owners…the kind that want it for personal protection. He mentions these people, sort of, the Dale Gribble on King of the Hill types. But he doesn’t mention those who want to protect their person and their homes and who don’t think the sky is falling. There are many of those people around.

In today’s society where the justice system caudles criminals instead of punishes them, and police response times can take hours, the need for a gun is greater today then it has been in the last 75 years or so. Imagine if someone would have used their gun at Safeway…then Loughner would have actually been held accountable for what he did, and we wouldn’t have to endure this circus with Larry Burns as ringmaster for a year and a half now…and counting.

Perhaps Zuma recommends a ban on guns like Mexico has…and it’s working really well down there, isn’t it? It’s an old argument, but an air-tight one, as well…if you outlaw guns, only outlaws will have guns. When you make a law, it only affects law-abiding citizens. Your criminals and your crazies are going to find a way to obtain guns and ammunition regardless of what laws and what rights are on the books. As I commented in another opinion piece, my rights should not be trampled because someone else is an asshole.

The framers of the Constitution knew what they were doing when they wrote the Second Amendment. They knew that an armed citizenry would keep the government in check. Now, Zuma and other Obama supporters obviously prefer the tyrannical approach to government, but that’s not what our Founding Fathers wanted.

As to Holder, the contempt vote was the right thing to do, regardless of NRA commentary or involvement. That was a stupid, idiotic plan which resulted in the death of at least two of our own. Those involved with Fast and Furious would be held criminally liable if there were any justice around here.

@Bret Linden

Guns aren’t banned in Mexico. Handguns up to a .38, shotguns and rifles are all legal, as are private-party sales.

I don’t know the current state of Jimmy’s arsenal - I’ll let him speak to that - but I do know he’s got a bit of familiarity with a firearm or two.

Food for thought (for everyone, not just Bret): Why is it the same people who treat the 2nd Amendment as sacrosanct and an individual right to bear arms as absolute are generally the same people who are fine when the 1st Amendment is restricted when it comes to Occupy protestors?

“There are three levels of crazy in the gun community” was where Jimmy indicated that he has no idea who he is talking about, what they think or feel, and no interest in finding out. The biggest issue that we face today is that need to win, or beat the opposition in a contest that combines dick-size and Keyboard Kommando tactics.
(And that goes for whomever tossed the ‘occupiers’ non-sequitur grenade too.)
The problem is that Jimmy and his look at the tragedy and see a gun doing harm, carried by a person. I see a person doing harm,carrying a gun. The problem is that the person is desperately trying to influence things using a tool. He’s nuts, granted, but you have decided that it’s the tool that he has chosen that is the issue, not the society that drove him nuts, and is too cheap (selfish, actually) to help him to not be a danger.
There are forty-million gun owners in this country, a vast majority of which fall into the third category; sportsmen, hunters, target shooting enthusiasts, plinkers, etc. None of them has ever entertained the thought of using their gun to harm another human being. To suggest that they have their gun rights removed to insure that crazy people have to use their second choice of dangerous tool to harm people is ludicrous.
It would take a lot less effort to get Congress to pass legislation to insure that crazy people get help, and the at desperate people have a shot at economic security, than it will to get them to change the Constitution. It would take less red tape, and fewer dollars. Plus it would see less opposition (still a lot, but less).
Not to mention that there would be great side effects, only one of which would be a huge reduction in violent crime. ALL violent crime.

And he’s forgotten the fourth group. They are a small group that has taken the Founding Fathers seriously, They keep guns in their homes; not to shoot, to hunt,  for sport, or to harm others, but as a symbol to the Powers-That-Be that United States citizens are, and have a right to be armed in case that power decide to become tyrannical. And they may have to take Jefferson’s advice, “The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive.” Which was in response to, “Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms (of government) those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny”.
To these, he predicted that revolution would, and should be about every generation.