Your quote of the day from Coalition to Stop Gun Violence's Ladd Everitt when asked by Melissa-Harris Perry about the NRA's incoming president, Jim Porter:
EVERITT: If you love Ted Nugent, you're going to love the new incoming president of the NRA, Jim Porter. This guy basically could have walked right out of a militia camp.
Oh joy! Just what we need. Someone at the NRA more extreme than crazy Wayne LaPierre. Here's more on this wingnut from Hunter at Kos: NRA elevates crackpot conspiracy theorist to be their new president:
It looks like the NRA has no intention of toning down the batshit crazy, and calls for "responsible NRA leadership" just got shot in the thigh and left to bleed out behind the ol' shed. The new NRA president (the job rotates every two years, presumably because maintaining such a high level of indignant batshit crazy is a high-effort job) is current NRA vice president Jim Porter, who ascends to the job because apparently every last member of the NRA leadership is entirely off their rockers. Let's meet Jim, shall we?
"NRA was started 1871 right here in New York state. It was started by some Yankee generals who didn't like the way my Southern boys had the ability to shoot in what we call the 'War of Northern Aggression.' Now y'all might call it the Civil War, but we call it the 'War of Northern Aggression' down south."
Oh gawd, it's one of these guys. Two things to note on this: One, the new president of the NRA said this last freaking year, not in the goddamn 1890s or 1930s or 1960s, Two, from the video he appears to be literally blowing smoke out his ass while he says it. That, my friends, is some damn fine camerawork. Whether or not President Buford T. Possumpants here is still pissed off that the northern states ran off with all of his great-grandfather's black help is probably a minor point. His language afterwards on having the "weapons to fight tyranny" is more alarming, since it echoes common militia rhetoric and because every individual nutcases' threshold for defining "tyranny," thus necessitating the patriotic murder of whatever government worker happens to knock on their door, seems to be appallingly low. What Porter really brings to table, however, is a commitment to the same absolutely batshit-crazy "tyranny"-laced conspiracy theories that have become synonymous with America's militia movement, ex-Birchers, tea partiers, certain actual congressmen and other people who shout a lot and wear cookware on their heads: [...]
So the new NRA president is a man still bitter about the Civil War, a man who sees U.N.-backed conspiracies and imminent "tyranny" around every corner, and a man who is dedicated towards providing America's best beer-swilling patriots weapons powerful enough to fend off that invisible tyranny whenever anyone, anywhere wakes up in a cold sweat and decides they want to try. Well, you can't say he doesn't represent their base.
More there so read the rest and check out Media Matters' full report which was linked above as well. Here's one of the clips from their post.
