From: John De Armond
Subject: Re: why we don't boycott Colt
Organization: Dixie Communications Public Access.  The Mouth of the South.

rats@ihlpm.att.com writes:

#|We hear persons proposing that we boycott Ruger for a comment Bill Sr.
#|made, but we rarely hear that we should boycott Colt because the stopped
#|the sale of AR-15's for a while when some congressmen proposed that they
#|ban "ugly" military-looking guns.

#Maybe because the "Colt" that originally implemented the temporary
#sale ban of the AR-15 is not the "Colt Manufacturing Comapny" that today
#makes the Colt Sporter...

There's a fundamental difference between Ruger and Colt.  The difference
is Colt has not to my knowledge gone to Congress and proposed any gun
control laws.  Bill Ruger has.  He is the person who started all this
high capacity magazine ban stuff.  The cynics (myself included) say
that his proposed ban was carfully crafted to affect all his competitors
while leaving his product line unscathed.

Though I'm unhappy that Colt folded under a little government pressure,
I don't really consider it a reason to boycott them.  When viewing
Colt's actions, one must remember that they were in Chapter 11 bankrupcy,
struggling to recover and likely were threatened with the loss of
government business.    Taking unpleasant actions necessary for survival
are at least a bit more palatible to me than outright treason, which
is what Ruger did.

john