AP Article Highlights Pro-Rights Groups Views of Romney

I tend to wonder what is the point of stories like this AP article that ran in today's Richmond Times Dispatch which points out pro-rights groups have not always seen eye to eye with Mitt Romney but that they are fully on board with him this year to defeat Barack Obama.

They repeat the Obama campaign talking point that he has done nothing to restrict the rights of gun owners and actually signed a bill that expanded gun rights (carrying in national parks). I tend to think the only reason to run a story like this is to give some Democrat that also happens to be an NRA member the opportunity to defend Obama.

For Obama, minimizing Romney's apparent advantage among voters who place a premium on outdoors issues is the name of the game.

In Iowa and other states, that task falls to people such as Dick Dearden. He's a Democratic state senator and leader of a group of pro-Obama outdoors enthusiasts.

"The president is not a threat to people who hunt and fish. He's an asset," Dearden said. "I'm a member of the NRA, and they are beginning to more and more embarrass me. I'm a Second Amendment person, but I have not seen anything this president has done for the last four years that has hurt anyone's Second Amendment rights."

First, the AP approaches this as being about "outdoor issues."  True to form, this Obama defender says the President is no threat to people who hunt and fish.  But the Second Amendment has nothing to do with hunting or fishing.  And, I guess Senator Dearden has no concerns about creating a defacto gun registration list along the southern border where multiple sales of long guns have to be recorded.  NRA, which has sent out a similar mailer to the NSSF mailer featured above, focus on issues like carrying firearms for self-defense, and point out that Obama has a record of supporting things like bans on magazine size restrictions, banning modern sporting rifles, and banning the sale of handguns.  So, State Senator Dearden may be embarrased by the NRA, but we know there are real reasons to fear a second Obama term unfettered by the desire to get re-elected.  He has already shown his ability to use executive orders to get what he wants but can't get from Congress.  Do we really think he won't use it to attack our rights further in a second term?