IMO, the problem with the NRA is those in charge. Not the organization. The NRA has set some great safety and training standards used at most ranges. With 100 million gun owners and only about 5 million members, those other 95 million gun owners seem to believe the NRA must do as they want, protect their rights how they want them protected. Why? The NRA represents the members. I support the NRA to the point that I'm a certified affiliate. I take $5 from each new membership I sell and either donate right back to the NRA or with a large number of sales I will purchase and gift vets or disabled people unable to afford a year membership. Just to make it a bit over the top, I do this in the name of David Hogg, Shannon Watts, and the Coalition to stop gun violence.
Fair statement, it IS the leadership, but as I've said in the comments section on certain Ammoland articles, the membership bears some (not all) responsibility by not holding the BOD accountable. The BOD bears a greater deal of responsibility than the members, however as they have a legally binding responsibility to take care of the fiduciary well-being and other legal duties of the association with respect to nonprofit law and the bylaws of the organization. They have been as asleep at the wheel as the members. While members put trust in the BOD to pay attention to detail, members cannot expect the strength of 2A to be served by being absentee stakeholders!! Moreover, the BOD should ALL be removed (save for a literal handful, 6-15 BODs) for their willful ignorance of WLP's malfeasance and their incompetence in allowing WLP to hire an antigun lawyer who donates to antigun groups & Dem politicians. Many of the BOD members are so compromised it's hard to tell where their conflicts of interest end and WLP's corruption begins.
At present, the estimate of total lawful gun owners in the USA is 120 million. Now, one must ask themselves, with 2A rights in the balance why don't more people join?? It may have something to do with NRA's historic and documented (even celebrated) record in promoting ALL of the major federal gun control bills we've seen since 1934. I believe that for non-fudd gunowners, that explains why the VAST majority of gun owners WON'T send a dime to NRA. Jus' sayin. And the NRA does NOT represent ANY gun owner, at least NOT THE WAY THEY OUGHT TO, WHICH IS NO COMPROMISE.
If you are willing to accept being sold down the river on gun control, if you're willing to accept various & sundry infringements for whatever reason, if you're OK with guys like WLP and Josh Powell badgering a politician (but ESPECIALLY THE POTUS) into accepting NRA-approved gun control like bumpstock bans, etc., then sorry I hurt your feelings - BUT IN THAT CASE, YOU'RE PART OF THE PROBLEM.
I get that people who are heavily invested in the NRA feel compelled to defend the organization, but let's face it, rank and file members have ZERO control or ability to directly influence what happens at HQ, especially when HQ has gone rogue... But let's also remember that NRA's history of embracing and even promoting gun control goes back almost 100 years!! So either people are on the side of NRA-branded gun control, or they're being willfully ignorant even when forced to confront the FACTS. Facts dont care about feelings, either.
, my mind is with FPC. I see what they're doing with so little and so few, and their 'footprint' is outsized. Their results are far out of proportion to their size.