Good Ol’ Al Sharpton, he never misses an opportunity to race bait.  Over the weekend the supposed “reverend” who doesn’t believe in the commandment about bearing false witness, criticized the National Rifle Association for not defending the gun rights of two black men killed by police last week. Sharpton claimed the NRA believes  “the Second Amendment is for whites only.” But today the NRA is fighting back against Sharpton’s idiotic and unsubstantiated charges.

In his weekly address the self-important professional bigot gave at his Harlem headquarters, Sharpton as usual declared himself judge and jury declaring that punishing police officers for misconduct is the only way to prevent incidents like last week’s fatal encounters involving Alton Sterling in Louisiana and Philando Castile in Minnesota. Apparently the leader of two anti-Semitic pogroms in NYC already knows what happened in those two cases, even though the investigations are not nearly close to being completed. “Both of them were killed by police based on ‘they had a gun,'” Sharpton said.

Now I missed the NRA coming out and defending the gun rights they legally had. Where is the NRA? Where is Mr. Pierre [NRA president Wayne LaPierre] now? Do you have a Second Amendment right or did you not get down, Mr. Pierre, to the 14th, 15th and 16th amendments? Maybe you mean the Second Amendment is for whites only.”

 

Where was the gun rights for Castile? Where were the gun rights for Sterling?” You came to fight for gun rights when gays were played in Orlando. But are you going to meet me in Baton Rouge to stand up for Alton Sterling?

HUH? What does that have to do with the price of a hot dog from a street vendor in Harlem?

As a member of the NRA I can vouch for the fact that the organization encourages everyone to own a gun for self protection not just one race or the other. I’ve never seen a mailing that said only whites should have guns.  The NRA sign up form doesn’t even ask for the member’s race (see below) Whenever I’ve called the NRA about my membership, the’ve never asked abut my race or ethnic background (but they do ask me to upgrade my membership).
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Sharpton is also wrong when he says that both Alton Sterling in Louisiana and Philando Castile legally had guns. While Castile had a legal carry permit, as a convicted felon Sterling was probably not legally permitted to have a gun or a concealed carry permit. During the incident in which he was killed Philando Castile identified himself as carrying a gun and that he had a legal permit, Sterling did not. Based on the videos we know that guns had some role in the killing of the two (as you hear the policemen scream about the guns) but as of now as the investigation is ongoing we still don’t know the full roles the weapons had in their deaths.

All we know is the the only supposed Christian minister I know of, who does not believe in the 9th commandment “Don’t bear false witness against thy neighbor” is calling the NRA racist for not getting involved in two incidents they had no right to get involved in as they are still under investigation. If they did make a statement perhaps they would blast Sterling for carrying without a permit.  While they advocate everyone who wants to arm themselves do so, the NRA also advocates gun safety programs and following existing gun laws.

 

The NRA fought back against the silly charges made by people like Sharpton. First with a written commentary from then with a video commentary from NRA News Commentator, Colion Noir.  Both Temia and Colion are African-American

Temia’s commentary said in part:

To accuse the NRA of not defending citizen’s gun rights because they are black men is ridiculous. This is what I mean by incoherent. First, approximately 18% of gun owners are non-whites and the NRA has made efforts to increase their outreach to the African American community. So the answer to your absurd question is NO, Al Sharpton, the NRA doesn’t believe gun rights are for whites only. When they advocate for gun rights, they do it on behalf of all gun owners. Second, it hasn’t been investigated nor established that both men in the recent shootings, Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, were (legally) carrying a gun. Finally, it is the NRA’s practice to wait for an investigation and review the facts before speaking on these matters.

 

However, I can see why it is difficult for Sharpton to understand this because both he and Obama have a habit of speaking before an investigation is done and have no regard for the facts in a case. Stoking racism and division seems to be the only thing they know how to do. It would be too much to ask them to express words of healing instead of jumping to conclusions based on pure emotion and opportunism. These two men, Sharpton and Obama, is the very reason why African Americans have suffered the most over the past 7 years.

Colion’s video is embedded below: