Standing
guard
The Company He Keeps
With a mob of 1,000 gun-ban radicals cheering
him on, a Southside Chicago priest screamed a clear death threat
against a law-abiding suburban gun dealer on the afternoon of May
27, 2007:
“John Riggio. R-I-G-G-I-O. We’re going
to find you and snuff you out ... You’re going to hide, but
like a rat, we’re going to catch you and pull you out. We are
not going to allow you to continue to hide ... We’re going
to keep coming back ... whatever it takes to shut this gun store
down ... We’re gonna snuff out John Riggio.”
Then the priest hoarsely shouted for the deaths of Illinois firearm
rights legislators.
“It’s insane that we have the legislation
that we do. We’re gonna change it ... We’re gonna snuff out legislators
who are against our gun laws.”
In all the years I have been working to safeguard
the Second Amendment, I have never encountered such hatred.
Although Chicago’s Cardinal George issued a rebuke, saying, “Publicly
delivering a threat against anyone’s life betrays the civil order
and is morally outrageous, especially if this threat came from a
priest,” the original rant was not carried in the city’s mainstream
media.
The priest’s venomous rant took place in front of Chuck’s Gun Shop
and Range in Riverdale, Ill., a suburb of Chicago. It was one of
several ugly demonstrations mounted by Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow PUSH
Coalition, one of which ended with the arrest of the priest and Jackson
for criminal trespass.
Why is this so important today, with the coming election?
The answer is: Barack Obama, the company he keeps, and the extremists
around him.
The priest in question is the Rev. Michael Pfleger, a key long-time
advisor to the Presidential candidate, whom Obama has helped over
the years by procuring $225,000 in grants from the state and a $100,000
earmark from the federal government. And he is a financial contributor
to Obama’s campaigns.
In 2001 Pfleger, a mainstay of the most radical Illinois gun ban
crowd, told the Chicago Daily Defender, “We must declare war on guns
and anybody who buys or possesses a gun has to be an enemy to the
community.” This mirrors Obama’s personal handwriting on an election
questionnaire demanding a ban on all semi-autos and endorsing a ban
on the manufacture, sale and possession of handguns.
election? The answer is: Barack Obama, the company he keeps and the extremists around him.
In a Chicago Sun-Times article touting Obama’s faith
and in which Obama stressed the importance of close advisors in “maintaining
your moral compass,” the newspaper declared,
“Friends and advisors such as the Rev. Michael Pfleger ...
who has known Obama for the better part of 20 years, help him keep
that moral compass set, he (Obama) says.”
Moral compass? “Snuff” this person or that?
Most Americans had never heard of Michael Pfleger until the last
days of Barack Obama’s successful bid for the Democratic presidential
nomination when he finally, but narrowly, bested Hillary Clinton.
Pfleger became major national news when videotapes surfaced
of a racist rant on Obama’s behalf mocking Hillary Clinton. The performance
by Pfleger was at the invitation of Obama’s Trinity United
Church of Christ, made infamous by its America-hating pastor Jeremiah
Wright, with his diatribes declaring, “God Bless America ...No!
No! No! God D--- America.”
After weeks of dithering as to whether to leave Wright’s church,
it was only Pfleger’s Hillary-smearing rant that ultimately caused
Obama to quit.
Compare that to Obama’s silence on Pfleger’s “snuff” demands. But
then, closing down law-abiding gun stores is part of Obama’s real
Second Amendment vision. He has proposed a law banning federally
licensed firearm dealers from operating within five miles of a school
or park. Think about almost any community in America and what that
would mean: closing down 90 percent of the gun shops in America.
There are those who say guilt by association is unfair. To them I
would say, it fits. Twenty years with these men as his closest confidants
and spiritual advisors cannot be discounted. The only reason Obama
publicly jettisoned his friends is because their radical presence
made politics too hot for Obama, the candidate.
Association is important.
Among the many wonderful things the NRA reflects is love of our country.
Love of our traditions. Love of freedom that the Second Amendment
protects.
As NRA members, our pride in America is a key part of our lives.
Unlike Barack Obama’s condescending words about Americans in small
towns clinging to religion and guns because we are too ignorant to
understand our ... What was the word? “Bitterness.” I’m not bitter
about America. I am proud of it. And so are you and your family and
friends.
That clash between the mentality of the Second Amendment-hating elites
and the bedrock beliefs of ordinary Americans will doubtless be magnified
as we close toward the November elections.
It is critically important to know this man—Barack Obama—by the company
he keeps.
