He keeps the revenues flowing — now well over $200 million a year — by using those time-honored tricks to rile up a crowd.

The letter I received, for example, announces that my constitutional right to own a gun is under attack by "anti-gun politicians, global gun ban diplomats at the U.N., militant anti-hunting extremists, radical billionaires and the freedom-hating Hollywood elite."

Interestingly, the most serious attempt at gun regulation in recent years was an attempt to require universal background checks of gun buyers, including those who purchase firearms at gun shows, which are now exempt from the requirement. It hardly rises to taking away "my constitutional right to own a gun."

But that's not the point. You raise money by scaring the bejeebers out of your audience. Those anti-gun politicians and freedom-hating Hollywood types, according to LaPierre, will never surrender until "they've banned, confiscated and destroyed our guns, just like they did in England and Australia."

That's the first I've heard about that plan, simply because there is no such plan.

But if LaPierre is to keep those dollars flowing from the people who fall for such nonsense, it's an important tactic. So what if it's dishonest?