Pictured from left to right - Matt Poe, Me - Mike Sessa, The Man - ATTORNEY GENERAL MIKE COX (center), Chuck Madurski, Phil Sheridan.



Picture was taken last night Friday March 10, 2006 at the Attorney General's Everybody's Irish Party. Please - no wise cracks about me and the AG having our arms wrapped around each other - LOL! WE ARE PROUD AND HAPPY MEN!

We were invited to join the Attorney General's party as a result of our actions relating to opening up Michigan to becoming an NFA state as opposed to our now historical C&R only status. This is because we support our friends and in supporting our friends we have become team members committed to working for our man Attorney General Mike Cox! As a result we will be kept informed of whats going on with the campaign and called to action when needed to perform the grunt work in getting our man re-elected.

Our presence was duly noted by the AG's staff and distinguished guests. We were only a handful of guys but our presence preceeded our reputation, of that I am sure. Our reputation is positive based on our group lobbying the AG, heaping praise and generally providing moral support and encouragement. It was a shame more of our core group of NFA activists could not show up as our political power would have been more noticed.

We were very well received, comfortable and welcomed. We did not present our award but instead made contact with the AG's Chief of Staff to make arrangements to coordinate an award presentation in the near future, which seemed to be the right thing to do at the time as opposed to a surprise presentation.

The AG was quite moved by our personal thanks of gratitude and recognition of his opinion 7183. In fact both myself and Chuck Madurski asked the AG to autograph our copies of the opinion in which the AG most graciously signed them "To Mike - Keep Fighting For Our Rights, signed Mike Cox". These will be framed and treasured by myself and Chuck as a testament that sometimes dreams really do come true and sometimes MEN OF HONOR will stand up, assume their responsibility and do the right thing!

In a room full of Republican Big Shooter's, Elected Public Officials, The AG's Staff people, big money people and the general public we made a good impression. Those MG guys were very nice, respectful and complimentary. And, guess what? - Nobody felt threatened or intimidated by those MG guys and nothing happened! I believe we are respected.

I hope the next time we get the opportunity more of our core group will attend and make their presence known.

I personally invited the AG to come out with us one day and to have some fun with us - if you know what I mean!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!He was receptive yet he stated he was very busy but did not rule it out.

It was a very good experience for me to be there last night. It gave me a chance to not only put names and faces together of the people we see here on the boards, but also gave me a chance to proactively engage the political process under which we live. The evening afforded us the opportunity to talk briefly with AG Cox about the issues important to us, and then later again in greater detail with his people. Things like their approach to CCW reciprocity(past and present efforts), and the silencer clarification that we are all waiting to hear about.

Many of the people in attendance were faces that I had seen before, even though I have never been politically active. The overall feeling I got from the dinner was that we (firearms owners) were welcome supporters and important to him as anybody else.

Mike Cox is a man on the move with a greater calling than his current job as AG... In a head's up contest, I think he's win against Granholm.  Let's hope that day comes, and help him as best we can to see to it.

Dave

Not definitely since we kind of beat around the bush in order to avoid putting him directly on the spot. But, he did acknowledge it is in the works and they have alot of other work going on but it would be done shortly. Generally, the AG is not directly involved in writing it. However his staff member said it is up for its first initial review, and I believe he thinks it looks good. The AG's taff member said he had about 40 phone inquiries from people interested in the opinion so we are having impact. Keep up the good work guys! Keep pushing the flyers I made up. And keep pumping the donations and volunteerism with your comments in to MikeCox2006.com

To further clarify, we were told that it is already being looked at by the preliminary panel which is standard procedure. They have a group of lawyers review the issue first and decide on a course of action. Just a reminder, this "clarification" is not just about silencers but also about DD's, AOW's, all things NFA. The impression I got was that they were surprised that they were having to issue another opinion, and that this one would be as unambiguous as possible.

Talking to his staffers and discussing the rationale behind Opinion 7183, they looked at the existing law and Opinion and said to themselves:

1)We already have enough "bad actors" out there that we don't need to create any more.
2)Other states are allowed to own NFA items so it's an unfair Equal Protection issue.
3)The State of Michigan shouldn't even be in the business of regulating NFA items.

With those three thoughts in mind, I personally don't see how it would be "ok" for a Michigan resident to own a Machine Gun, and "not ok" to own a suppressor or other device. A lot of thought went into Opinion 7183... it definitely wasn't a 5 minute hash-out in the AG's office and slipped in under the radar. The cool thing is that when we talked with AG Cox, he expressed surprise because he thought he "knew the landscape" when forming the opinion but the 40 phone calls and our presence at the dinner caught him off guard. I suspect that forty telephone calls to his office is a substantial number for any advocacy group. While I would like to have seen more of us at the dinner, even 5 people who came to support him was a noteworthy effort. It was the best money I've spent in a long time (the dinner was great, as were the band and dancers). There will be plenty of opportunity for others to do this later-I don't want to sound like a cheerleader but this is a politician who welcomes our support and is worthy of ours.

Dave

ETA: Overall, I was very pleased with the practive way his office engages 2nd amendment issues. How many people here know that EVERY SIX MONTHS his office sends out CCW Reciprocity letters to other states that currently do not excercise it with Michigan?

I'm glad you decided to come to the party Dave. This is why it's important to have more than just a few people at such an event. We need to network and mingle with the players in order to pick up all the information we can. Different perspectives help to convey a larger message and make sure our issues are being heard and that we're hearing their issues as well. This is why I urged guys to turn out to this event.

Dave was telling me he was having a hard time making an online donation to Mike Cox. I told Mike Cox that and Dave played off my lead and the AG said "we're going to have to fix that"!!!! It shows we are concerned, our thoughts are genuine and that we are committed! These kinds of things help to shore up our position.

I was standing right next to Dave when he was telling the AG's main man that his interests were more inline with suppressors. And the AG's man came out and told Dave everything he just stated in his above post, and that's a whole lot of information. And now Dave has provided information to better inform this message forum as to what's going on. This is what its all about folks! Get involved next time - please.

This is great, just look at the ACCESS we got out of this. Amazing, truly amazing! Get involved guys!

And let me say one more thing. The Attorney General gave a brief opening speech in which he talked about engaging your government and getting involved in the political system to help make needed changes. He talked about how he has the greatest job and that it gives him great pleasure to be able to serve the people of the state. I believe he was talking about us! WE GAVE HIM A CHEERING STANDING OVATION. Can you believe it!

Can you guys imagine attending a Fundraiser for say..... Jennifer Granholm.... as a group advocating private ownership of fully automatic weapons and destructive devices? Not only would we not be welcome, but probably escorted out of the building.

Kind of puts it in perspective....

Personally, I'd much rather see MC as our U.S. senator & send that commie Levin packin'.  

Believe me - we get Cox re-elected and in 4 more years we will put him there or where ever he wants to be and maybe in the Governors Office.

We just need to keep him where he's at for right now at all costs and that means organizing an ARMY of us guys to go to work for him to insure his re-election.

I tell you guys I think the Marine Corp really had a great impact on Mike Cox. If your a member of the brotherhood please drop Mike a line and tell him how you appreciate what he's doing at mikecox2006.com

thanks for the update.