By LESLEE KULBA

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To say it was a conservative rally would be oxymoronic. By definition, conservatives want to preserve the status quo, and rallies are generally the purview of the oppressed and underrepresented.

 So what radical purpose drove more than 100 so-called conservatives to disengage from their families and employment to congregate downtown near Asheville’s Vance Monument on Feb. 22, a Saturday afternoon?

 Guns.

 In opening remarks, Kevin King, rally organizer and one of the founders of the Mountain Area Citizens’ Political Action Committee, reiterated that keeping and bearing arms is not a privilege — it is a right.

 The Second Amendment of the Constitution reads, “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

 That was why several protesters carried posters with messages like, “What part of infringed don’t you understand?” and, “Free men don’t ask permission to bear arms.”

 Asheville City Councilman (and Daily Planet columnist) Cecil Bothwell was the target of several signs. Before the election, a Bothwell resolution was approved by council — purportedly — supporting the “rights of citizens.”

One rally sign read, “Bothwell helps abort babies, but calls our guns dangerous.” Another, alluding to a comment Bothwell made during a candidates debate, asked, “Do you think Bothwell supports the Second Amendment? Bull dinky.”

Paul Yeager of Waynesville was dressed in a tricorn hat and knickers and carrying a Gadsden flag. “We have a government designed by several brilliant men over 200 years ago for the purpose of protecting our rights, and those rights are being slowly taken away from us, and apparently some of us like to accept this,” he told the Daily Planet.

 Meanwhile, Bill Whitehead’s sign was more alarmist, stating, “Socialist dictators like Stalin and Hitler took away the peoples’ guns, and hundreds of millions have died as a result.”

 A few carried signs reading, “Molon Labe,” which is Greek for, “Come, take,” a phrase purportedly uttered by King Leonidas when the Persian army asked him to surrender his weapons.

A couple of demonstrators carried full-size flags with AR15s and the American phrase, “Come and Get It,” at the bottom. Jim Reeves added, “Hey, Obama,” to his sign.

 “Why were more people killed by their own government than by individuals bearing arms in the last century?” Reeves asked.

 Former Asheville City Councilman Carl Mumpower, who was the first to address the crowd, discussed the irony, if not the absurdity, of how those elected to office must take an oath to protect the rights of citizens, not the least of which are enumerated in the Bill of Rights. Then, they proceed to enact all forms of gun regulations, he said.

 “Our rights at all levels are under persisting assault by three groups: elitists who think they are smarter, more gifted and more privileged than we are, those who are indifferent to our founding document (the Constitution), and those who believe they can more surely make servants out of unarmed citizens than armed ones,” he said.

 Mumpower argued civil society is adrift. The government of this country is no longer bound by the very document that is supposed to limit the reach of government, he said, adding, “When a civil and Constitutionally-governed society ceases to be such – we are the primary protectors of our liberties, opportunities, and responsibilities.”

 Like others at the rally, Mumpower emphasized that the common enemy bringing everybody together that day was tyranny. He told how government buildings have become fortresses with armed guards and metal detectors.

 Mumpower urged those present to not go silently. Referring to a gun, he closed his remarks saying, “Make no mistake – liberal-progressive-socialistic Democrats of the left will empty this – if we let them.”

 The headliner of the event, Dr. Greg Brannon, whose campaign bills him as” the constitutional conservative candidate for Senate in North Carolina.” Several people at the rally were gushing over national talk-show host Glenn Beck calling Brannon, in a recent interview, “the real deal” — and saying he “had a man crush” on him. 

Brannon began his talk with a rehash of basic civics that, he said, is lost on many legislators now serving. He said the proper role of government is protecting rights.

“The Bill of Rights declares rights,” he said. “It does not create them,” he reinforced, “Governments derive their powers from the consent of the governed.”

 “The Constitution is six pages long!” Brannon noted. It was designed “to protect the individual and the state” from “the overbearing leviathan of the federal government.” He contrasted that to an infamous thousand-page law people still are trying to understand. Then, he launched into a swift synopsis of the illegal actions Congress undertook to make Obamacare law.

 A couple in the audience tauntingly waved Thom Tillis signs. Tillis will be running against Brannon in the primary. At one point, Brannon called out to them and asked about Tillis’ flipflopping on the subject of toll roads. He asked how Tillis allowed Common Core to become law in the state on his watch as speaker of the House.

As Brannon continued his attack booing against Tillis’ support of a bill that would have created health care exchanges in North Carolina.

 Then, acting as if Tillis would be an easy out in the primary, Brannon turned his attacks against incumbent U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan, D-N.C. Again, reviewing what he termed the proper role of the federal government, “national defense, negotiating treaties, and regulating interstate commerce,” he challenged her support of cronyism.

 Hagan had voted in favor of the Dodd-Frank Act, which essentially put the wealth of Wall Street in the hands of government rather than leaving it to any semblance of market vulnerability.