This would be stupid. Nothing against someone caught up in political scandal, who was primarily just the scapegoat, but when you are heading a political machine about gun rights you shouldn't be a convicted criminal that was primarily known for smuggling arms. Might as well have Victor Bout.
Politics is not fair, it is half about reputation and perception, and why negative ads and smear campaigns and destructive scandal plays as big or more of a role than what the person really stands for or how good of a character they have.
Do you think having a guy connected to the Iran Contra affair known for supplying arms to Iran with whom we have a poor relationship, as the face of your gun rights is going to help in keeping them?
Or do you think it will help connect gun owners and the desires of the NRA with weapons smuggling and third world mayhem?
I think you would have a hard time finding someone more helpful to the antis in thwarting the goals of the NRA. Is the NRA trying to suicide? You think Oliver North in power if the Democrats win the next presidential election and get more control of Congress is not going to play right into the hands of passing some really bad legislation?
I can see the ads already, complete with images of Iranian Muslim extremists holding AKs and in Technicals with images of the Ayatollah looking no different to most with short attention span in the west than Islamic State radicals or Al Qaeda.
And maybe toss in a few of the bad things the Contras did as well.
While he is calling for more gun rights and defeating the antis proposed bans.
What better way could you take the support of millions of US citizens and their money and make it do as little as possible?
Zoogster,
For some odd reason, your writing of the Iran-Contra Affair differs significantly with that of recorded history:
Attorney General Edwin Meese launched an investigation into the weapons deal, and found that some $18 million of the $30 million Iran had paid for the weapons was unaccounted for.
It was then that Lieutenant Colonel
Oliver North, of the National Security Council, came forward to acknowledge that he had diverted the missing funds to the Contras in Nicaragua, who used them to acquire weapons.
North said he had done so with the full knowledge of National Security Advisor Admiral John Poindexter.
https://www.history.com/topics/iran-contra-affair#
I am not sure why you wish to portray Oliver North as the mastermind of a political scandal. It does not help anyone to distort the actual events. In reality, Oliver North was following orders of his superiors.
Also, the idea of supporting the Contras' efforts to resist the Sandanistas may have been noble, (though the methodology misguided) as well as consistent with US's historical doctrine of limiting, if not eliminating, communist governments in the western hemisphere and supporting the principles of freedom and democratic republicanism. Central America was just a little too close for comfort for us in the days before the collapse of the USSR.
That the money came from Iran, at a time when that country was fighting Saddam Hussein, in an effort to free Americans held hostage by terrorists in Lebanon is an ironic twist caused by congressional indifference.
Anyway, O.N. came forward in the midst of the investigation and was straight up about his role in the affair. Which is a heck of a lot more than you can say for the typical politician that gets caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
Give Ollie a chance. Stop using misinformation and innuendo to smear someone most people would consider an honorable man. And quit calling him a convicted criminal, because he is not. Our support of the 2A is not assisted with false statements and accusations aimed at anyone, let alone our own leaders.
Personally, I like the guy's sense of honor and duty and would have been proud to have served under his command.
(Not very likely as I spent my time in the USAF.)
)
