Ron Cohen is the CEO of Sig Sauer, the company that produced one of the guns that was used in Friday's Sandy Hook Elementary school massacre. You have probably never heard of Ron Cohen before. I know I never have. I tried to find a decent picture of him this weekend, but I came up empty. He may as well not exist.

In the wake of the shootings, Cohen's name has appeared in a grand total of one Google alert. This is by design. You aren't supposed to know anything about Ron Cohen or about Sig Sauer. Every time a tragedy happens and you, Mr. Gun Control Advocate, decide to lash out at the NRA, or at "our national obsession with guns," or at the classic straw man hunter who needs a 50-bullet clip just to chase down a squirrel, you're doing Ron Cohen, Sig Sauer, and everyone else at Big Gun a huge favor.

One of the amazing things about the gun control debate in America is the remarkable success with which gun manufacturers—Sig Sauer, Glock, Smith & Wesson, Ruger, The Freedom Group (yes, it's called the fucking Freedom Group)—have been able to avoid being left out of the conversation altogether. When you think of Glock, you think of a gun, and not of the company behind it. That needs to change. We've shit on cigarette companies for lying about cigarettes. We've shit on Roger Goodell and the NFL for underplaying head injuries. We're even making inroads against the sneaky bastards at BIG SUGAR for making us all hopeless fatasses. But here is an industry—firearms manufacturing—that makes products whose deadliness is disputed by NO ONE, not even the people who treasure those products. And yet the executives and shadowy international holding company execs—whose job is to flood the world with as many of these weapons as possible—skate by cloaked in blessed anonymity. Wanna know why nothing ever gets done about gun laws here in the U.S.? This is why.

Gun manufacturers have successfully managed to shift virtually all blame for lax gun laws in America onto their lobbyists and their customers. It's no coincidence that companies like Sig Sauer, Freedom Group and Glock (which also made one of the weapons used in the killings) are privately held. They strive for minimum transparency, and they have achieved it. The NRA, bless its heart, is a front—a perfect little whipping boy designed to wither all of your abuse so that Ron Cohen can drive to and from his office without a reporter shoving a microphone in front of his stupid fucking face. They have taken phrases like "Gun control" and "the Second Amendment" and crafted them into permanent, bulletproof diversions. They've done such a good job of shielding themselves that Sig Sauer doesn't even feel compelled to issue a public statement when one of its weapons is used in a mass tragedy. They don't have to express their regrets or spew some bullshit about being dedicated to making sure guns are used safely. Higher profile companies have to send out public apologies when they send out a bad tweet. Big Gun does nothing and doesn't have to. Isn't that remarkable?

(On Tuesday, the investment firm Cerberus Capital Management announced that it would sell its stake in Freedom Group, the country’s largest gunmaker.)

Gun manufacturers profit off of mass violence in America. See for yourself. Every time a massacre happens, gun sales go through the roof because liberals cry out for gun control, and then conservatives flee to buy as many guns as possible just in case those shady folks in the GUBMINT come calling for their precious arms. They've succeeded in getting gun owners to disguise their love of shooting shit under a bullshit pretense of one day having to form a militia just in case Hitler II gets elected President. And they've succeeded in letting those people fight their flame wars for them. You have to hand it the gun industry, really. It's an ingenious little sales cycle they've created. Every massacre draws attention to the product, yet somehow NEVER to the people ultimately responsible for their production. It's always the hunter that takes the brunt of liberal ire. Or the redneck, or the guy at the gun show selling them secondhand, or Mike Huckabee saying something fucking stupid. Meanwhile, Ron Cohen eats his dinner uninterrupted.

In order to succeed in preventing future massacres, it would be wise to publicly hold these people accountable. Here's how:

1.Do not feed the trolls. Never say the phrase "gun control" or get into a message board argument with Jimbo3421 on Politico ever again. You've done nothing. In fact, you've done exactly what you've been trained to do. You are playing your role to perfection.

2.Re-brand the gun debate. The greatest PSA campaign in the history of advertising is the Truth campaign, which did away with the traditional "smoking is bad for you" ads that proved ineffective. Instead, what the "Truth" campaign did was demonize tobacco companies—NOT demonize tobacco or tobacco users—and say THESE PEOPLE ARE FUCKING YOU OVER. They are lying to you and trying to kill you and they are getting rich while doing it. When you change the language, you change people's perception of what's really at stake. Make this a crime issue, not an endless discussion about what guns MEAN to everyone.

3.Exposure. I suggest you do everything you can to draw attention to Ron Cohen, or Freedom Group CEO George Kollitides (here's a photo to get you started). You're gonna have to work hard, because these people go out of their way to remain hidden from view. Do not send an angry letter to Wayne LaPierre. He eats those for breakfast. Send your letters to THESE men. Why are these men not under any scrutiny? Have you ever seen ANY of these fuckers brought up in front of a Congressional subcommittee? Someone needs to put a microphone in front of Ron Cohen and ask him, "What are you doing to make sure your guns aren't used to kill children?" Then we can all watch him fumble for a decent answer and then we can call him a prick. These men need to be made famous, far more famous than Adam Lanza. People need to camp out by their lawns smoking weed and holding up signs that say OCCUPY GUN STREET.

4.Lawsuits. There's no point in going to a politician to help make your community safer. They're pussies, and many of them helped engineer lucrative government contracts for these companies to equip our armed forces and local police departments. Ultimately, money is the only language the gun industry really understands. Everything else is white noise. Cigarette companies were sued into oblivion. The NFL is currently doing everything short of renaming the sport "tag" to avoid punishing class action decisions. When Sig Sauer sends its products out into the world, their responsibility for them apparently ends. Why? You could argue that it's grossly negligent to create a fucking machine gun—to craft a weapon made for war and then sell it to civilians because it helps expand your market share—and then let it go whenever the wind may take it. At least, some hippie dippy "activist judge" might see it that way, and then people might be forced to actually do something.

That's what needs to happen. We don't need everyone to argue about the same shit they've always argued about. I wanna throw up, it all seems so pointless. I have a three kids and I would like to live in a country where I don't have to worry about them getting fucking shot in the head any time they head off to homeroom. I would like to live in a country where I don't hop on the web and see photos of grieving parents screaming in agony because they are enduring the kind of anguish that will black out everything else they ever say or do. Currently, this country doesn't fit the bill. This is not a safe place. And Ron Cohen—FUCKHEADED ASSHOLE RON COHEN WHOSE NAME SHOULD BE IN BRIGHT SHINY LIGHTS ABOVE TIMES SQUARE SO THAT EVERYONE KNOWS PRECISELY WHO MAKES THE GUNS THAT ARE USED TO KILL PEOPLE—he is a big reason why.

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A cacophony of calls to change gun laws has emerged after last week's tragedy in Connecticut, and the National Rifle Association has kept quiet.

But no one expects silence from the NRA once President Obama or members of Congress make any move to change the laws.

For years, the well-known gun rights advocate and lobbying group has laid the ground work to ward off any move to change national gun policy, spending millions of dollars to kill laws that would make it tougher to buy or wield guns.

Enlisting celebrities such as Chuck Norris and the late Charlton Heston as spokesmen, the NRA is considered royalty in Washington, and is known to easily mobilize its 4 million members.

"The whole fire arms community is very powerful, because gun owners see their relationship to this democracy through the eyes of the gun issue," said Richard Feldman, a former NRA lobbyist and president of a gun rights group called the Independent Firearm Owners Association.

The NRA did not respond to requests for comment and hasn't issued a press statement since the massacre of 20 school children and six adults at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut.

This year, the NRA spent $17 million on federal elections. It's a considerable amount when compared to the size of the industry. Annual gun sales in the U.S. total about $3.5 billion, according to estimates from Wedbush Securities analyst Rommel Dionisio.

Compared to that, Goldman Sachs' corporate political action committee and employees spent a total of $7.5 million on candidates running in the November election. The investment bank raked in $29 billion last year.

"But Goldman Sachs doesn't have 4 million members who are very passionate, vocal and well-distributed from coast to coast," said Sheila Krumholz, executive director for the Center for Responsive Politics, a group that tracks political spending. "Certainly money is part of that, but the NRA is one of the most powerful lobbies in Washington, because they can draw on such a huge base."

The NRA didn't fare so well in the latest election -- only a handful of the candidates it supported won, according to the Center. But experts say the NRA is in strong shape to defend against any move to limit assault rifles like the one used in Friday's school shooting.

The NRA has flexed its muscles well in the past. It managed to push through new laws relaxing gun bans in national parks and Amtrak trains in 2009, a year when Democrats pledging stronger gun control laws controlled both Congress and the White House.

So far this year, the NRA and other groups that lobby Congress and the White House on gun rights have spent close to $4 million, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

And while President Obama has renewed his commitment to reinstating a federal ban on assault weapons, he has shied away from taking on the gun lobby.

"President Obama did everything in his power to keep from making the gun issue the defining issue in the past campaign," Feldman said. "If Congress goes after the lawful ownership of guns, they'll deal with very difficult re-election campaigns in coming years."

But on Sunday, two days after the shooting, Obama said in a speech at Newtown: "If there is even one step we can take to save another child, or another parent, or another town, from the grief that has visited Tucson, and Aurora, and Oak Creek, and Newtown, and communities from Columbine to Blacksburg before that - then surely we have an obligation to try."

Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California on Sunday said she would introduce a bill next month to ban assault weapons and limit magazines to 10 rounds. Sen. Frank Lautenberg, a Democrat from New Jersey, also said he would reintroduce legislation to get rid of high capacity magazines.

Jennifer Liberto , CNN Money