Apathy Spells Doom for Hunting and Fishing Rights in Oregon.
An article by John Commerford, Executive Director, NRA-ILA titled,
“Oregon’s Hunting, Fishing and Agricultural Gambit Accelerates the End Game”
While Mary, a retired hunter of many years, was reading her NRA mag, she shared this article with me and I had to share it as this week’s political post. Commerford argues the following as a warning to not be silent.
“Gun control activists have become increasingly emboldened. The shift from targeting the margins to challenging the mainstream signals nothing is off-limits. Gun bans are being aimed at the most popular firearms in America. Now, even hunting—which survives in countries that ban defensive gun use—is being targeted.
In Oregon, Initiative 28 (IP28), also known as the PEACE Act (People for the Elimination of Animal Cruelty Exemptions Act), is a ballot initiative petition that seeks to ban hunting, fishing, trapping and wildlife management, along with many traditional agricultural practices. Whether it will reach voters in November remains to be seen, but this attempt to eliminate age-old American traditions speaks to the current prohibitionist mentality.
When our opponents drop the pretense of “reasonable regulation” and reveal their true agenda, we should take heed.
If you want to DEFEND your right to own and carry a firearm….. If your FREEDOM to hunt and shoot is important to you……… Then you need to consider supporting the NRA Institute for Legislative Action (NRA-ILA).
According to IP28 websites; “This petition does propose a ban on any intentional injury of an animal except in self-defense and in the case of any veterinary care. That would include banning slaughterhouses, hunting and fishing, and experimenting on animals.” The petition’s advocates, in other words, see wild animals, livestock, even fish swimming in the state’s waterways as extensions of their own house pets. Yet a Rocky Mountain goat is not the same as a toy poodle.
But it’s not just naiveté that drives these efforts. There is also a strategy. Gun-control activists and animal-rights extremists understand that restrictions on firearms or sporting activities create a “new normal” for subsequent generations. Attacks on traditional hunting and fishing have unfortunately become more common in recent years, especially throughout the Western states newly populated by tax refugees from progressive jurisdictions like California. NRA supports and promotes the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation, one of the most successful conservation frameworks in the world, which establishes wildlife as a public trust. That model heavily intersects with not only science-backed conservation but also and with over 150 years of NRA’s advocacy on hunting and shooting sports.
The fact that IP28 has advanced as far as it has should be a warning to sporting advocates nationwide. Hunting and fishing have traditionally been considered the “safe harbor” in gun-policy debates. Hunting and fishing are American ideals inseparably linked to self-reliance, personal responsibility, individual liberty and reverence for our countries national splendor. They are woven into the nation’s very fabric. But for some, including the proponents of IP28, that only makes them higher priority targets.”
J. Commerford
My commentary: As a gun owner and hunting and fishing enthusiast myself, I find this kind of legislation, grossly incompetent, absurd and without merit in Oregon, or any part of the U.S. for that matter. There are more guns in the United States than registered individuals. The fact remains, many of those that believe we should have the First and Second Amendment, do not entertain the thought of stopping legislature that will prevent them from those rights.
I encourage you to get involved, take a look at this website: www.nraila.org and support whatever campaign there is moving forward that fights against those that would seek to take away our rights—given to us by Our Creator and our form of government in America and send a message back: Not here. Not now. Not ever.
J. Fox