Washington, D.C. — The National Rifle Association has endorsed Senator John McCain for president, despite years of attacks on his gun-policy positions. Here are three examples:
- In America’s First Freedom Magazine, July 2001, in an article titled, “What’s Happened to John McCain,” James Bovard wrote on page 29, “The gun control debate in Washington has hit center stage because Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., has now become one of the premier flag carriers for the enemies of the Second Amendment.”
- And later on page 29: “Now McCain has joined with Al Gore running mate Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn.–a gun ban advocate rated “F” by NRA’s Political Victor Fund–in championing legislation to close the so-called ‘gun show loophole.'”
- Then on page 31, column 2, last paragraph: “Thus, according to McCain and AGS [Americans for Gun Safety], the only safe gun is one that is completely inaccessible to the owner in an emergency. The notion that all guns must be locked up all the time fits with the anti-gunners’ notion that guns can never be efffectively used for self-defense.”
- In America’s First Freedom Magazine, February 2002, in an article titled, “What Doesn’t John McCain Want You To Know?” on page 43, the article’s subhead read, “Anti-gun groups, led by Americans for Gun Safety, have teamed with U.S. Sen. John McCain to exploit terrorism in order to advance their gun control agenda. Their first target of opportunity is the traditional American gun show.”
- The first paragraph of the story, written by James Pate, says, “Gun shows in the United States–as John McCain and the former Clinton administration staffers at Americans for Gun Safety explain it–have suddenly become an irresistible magnet for foreign terrorists.”
- Then, in America’s First Freedom Magazine, September 2002, in an article headlined “Two-Faced,” Dave Kopel wrote: “Instead, AGS [Americans for Gun Safety]/McCain/Lieberman offer mendacities about a ‘gun show loophole’–a warm-up for claiming that any gun that isn’t registered by the federal government was obtained through a ‘loophole.’”
