Kilo_302 said:
How does it work then? I've posted a link that clearly shows higher incidents of gun deaths/injuries in states where it's easy to procure a firearm, and I've posted a link to a study that shows more people with CCW permits appears to lead to an increase in violent crime.
"Gun deaths", as I have repeatedly stated, are a red herring, invented by gun-grabbers to deceive the gullible.
They are irrelevant. The only relevant numbers are OVERALL murder and suicide rates, independent of means.
Of course "gun deaths" can be expected to be higher in areas where firearms are easier to acquire, but overall murder and homicide tend to be lower. Restrictions on lawful ownership of firearms do not lower murder and suicide rates; they only cause people to use alternate methods.
Japan, for example, has almost no suicide "gun deaths" at all - as close to none as anyone can get. Is that really a good thing? Compare their overall suicide rate with that of the US and tell me. They have a tradition of using swords and knives, and that is considered to be an honorable means of death. "Acquisition" also needs to be considered fully and properly. There are many countries wherein private possession of firearms is tightly controlled or even completely illegal, yet criminals have no difficulty obtaining them. There is an unlimited global supply for those willing to flout laws.
There is no CREDIBLE and PEER-REVIEWED study that shows an increase in violence of any kind where CCW has become legal. On the other hand, however, those jurisdictions in the US which have the most restrictive firearms laws also have the highest violent crime rates, including murder.
Kilo_302 said:
The "Violence Policy Center" is a rabidly anti-gun organization that routinely fibs. They also do not care about any other means of committing violence. Stabbings, stranglings, poisonings, and bludgeonings do not trouble them at all.
Kilo_302 said:
There was a time when vehicles were essentially deathtraps, so common sense public policy was enacted that increased safety standards. Public awareness campaigns combined with strict sentencing has reduced drunk driving deaths as well. AND before all that, we made it illegal to drink and drive. NONE of these tools are acceptable to the gun lobby. There simply isn't ANY sensible measure that doesn't provoke outrage. Obama wants to make it harder for people to buy dozens of weapons and turn around and sell them in the streets, and that's somehow transformed into "he's taking all our guns!!." This simply isn't a rational debate.
Firearms, however, are not "death traps". They function reliably and safely, as they are designed to do, and are not therefore comparable to early motor vehicles. Strict sentencing for criminal or negligent misuse of firearms has always existed. "We", long ago, made it illegal to shoot people, while drunk OR sober, except in situations of self defence and ordinary citizens are held to a high standard when doing so, and often to an unreasonably high standard. "These tools" are COMPLETELY acceptable to the "gun lobby" (ie, responsible ordinary citizens). None of the "sensible measure(s) that ... provoke outrage" have any shred of sensibility within them, in reality. They are completely misdirected, useless, stupid, and harmful.
Oldgateboatdriver said:
I think that if you are looking at stats for drunk CCW shootings, you have to look in the "Hunting Accident" column.
CCW - which is for defensive purposes - and hunting are two completely different activities and situations.
CCW people are extremely careful. They tend to be very responsible people, as, in their view, one of the worst things that could ever happen to them would be the loss of their legal ability to carry. They have lower arrest and conviction rates than police, kill more criminals per capita, and kill fewer innocent people per capita in the US.
Oldgateboatdriver said:
Of much more concern to me are cases, like the Trayvon Martin instance, where people carrying but incapable of controlling their personal fears shoot without real cause. Not that the instance occurred - I know it will from time to time - but rather that the justice system in the US seems to be too kind and sets the bar for negligent homicide too high on the sole basis that "packing is legal to defend oneself, so if you are scared enough it is justified to shoot". And don't get me started on those "Stand Your Ground" statutes.
Trayvon Martin's death was unfortunate, yet justified under the circumstances. George Zimmerman's initial actions may have been imprudent, but were not unlawful either before or after he was violently attacked by somebody bigger and stronger than himself, and was in real and possibly mortal danger when he fired. Due to the evidence, including his injuries and eyewitness testimony, police declined to lay charges. Charges were only laid, later, due to unfair political pressure. George Zimmerman was subsequently acquitted, and rightfully so. Anybody who believes that "if you are scared enough it is justified to shoot" applies in the US is wrong. Shootings are investigated and charges laid where warranted. The "Stand Your Ground" laws are also quite reasonable. While they were called into question by politicians, journalists, and certain members of the public who hold anti-firearms agendae in the Trayvon Martin case, they were never a factor. George Zimmerman had no ability to withdraw when he fired. He had a two-hundred-pound-plus and over-six-foot violent person sitting on him, beating him, and bouncing his head off of the hard surface beneath him. Those laws were never raised in his defence for the very reason that they did not apply.
Another article:
http://nationalinterest.org/feature/tell-the-truth-about-gun-violence-numbers-14975
Tell the Truth About 'Gun Violence' Numbers
Understanding firearm ownership in America starts with a clear-eyed look at the data.
David Keene
January 21, 2016
One would get the impression listening to gun control advocates or, indeed, to President Obama and those Democrats vying to succeed him that the United States is in the midst of an epidemic of violence; awash in blood with murderers and mass killers roaming the streets carrying guns they've bought at gun shows, over the Internet or from crazed neighbors. In fact, many Americans share this view. A recent Pew poll asked respondents if they believe the U.S. homicide rate has gone up or down over the last twenty years. Fifty-six percent of those polled said it has gone up and only twelve percent believed we are safer today than two decades ago.
The perception here and abroad has little to do with reality and a lot to do with political grandstanding. In fact, over the last twenty years or so the U.S. homicide rate has not just receded, but has been cut in half. The United States does indeed have a higher homicide rate than some industrialized nations in Europe and Japan, but is very, very different in size and complexity to those nations usually cited by those who wish to blame guns for the differences.
Here is one simple fact for those who blame firearms ownership and availability in this country for the murder and violent crime rate that plagues some of our major cities: while crime and violence were being cut in half, gun ownership was doubling.
It is too simple to claim that there is less violence in the United States today because more of our citizens are armed, but it is clear that there is no correlation between the number of guns in private hands with either the murder or violent crime rates as claimed by most gun control advocates.
The president likes to talk about ‘gun violence’ which is something that includes firearms accidents, suicides and those killed with guns. There are statistically very few firearms accidents in this country thanks to safety training and common sense. Two-thirds of all gun deaths are suicides and while some claim that making it more difficult for potential suicides to get guns would decrease the total number of suicides, international data suggest otherwise. That leaves two additional categories although former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's groups lump those killed by police and even the death of the Boston Marathon Bomber as a firearms homicide. They are criminal gun violence and so-called mass shootings.
Criminals using firearms are the biggest problem, but it is a problem we as a society know how to handle. If a thug walks into a convenience store with a gun and robs it, he has committed both a state and federal crime. Robbery is a state crime, but committing a felony with a firearm is a federal crime and prosecutable as such with a five year minimum sentence. A felon in possession of a gun is also prosecutable and can get five to ten years for having one in his possession.
Back in the nineties, the NRA partnered with law enforcement officials and prosecutors in Richmond, Virginia, which was at that time listed as America's murder capital. The message was simple. Use a gun to commit a crime and you will get five years in a federal penitentiary with no possibility of a plea bargain. The murder rate dropped 32 percent the first year and another 20 percent the next, but the U.S. attorney who participated in what came to be known as “Project Exile” was criticized by Eric Holder, then Deputy Attorney General, for wasting prosecutorial resources.
Today felons or criminals using firearms are rarely prosecuted by the federal government. In fact, today's U.S. murder capital is Chicago, the jurisdiction with the lowest rate of such prosecutions. Before President Obama issued his recent series of “Executive Orders” on gun violence, it was suggested that they would include instructions to U.S. prosecutors to begin charging gun criminals under existing law. That idea was dropped in favor of actions that don't target criminals, but will make it harder for non-criminals to buy firearms.
The final category involves mass shootings such as the killing at the Sandy Hook Elementary School and the Washington Navy Yard. These tragedies rarely if ever involve criminals. They are invariably perpetrated by the severely and dangerously mentally ill. This category of violence is the most difficult to deter or prevent, but beefed up school security, getting the states to put the most potentially dangerous into the background check system and rebuilding the U.S. mental health system are the keys to dealing with them.
The American people are lucky in that the nation's founders wrote the age old right of self defense into our Bill of Rights. Many nations don't recognize such a right, but Americans do. It is estimated, in fact, that as many as 200,000 crimes are deterred in a typical year by armed potential victims. It's why in every jurisdiction that has legalized what we call ‘concealed carry’ has seen a drop in violent crime. Burglars don't break into a house with a Rottweiler in the yard and are reluctant to use violence against a man or woman who just might be able to fight back.
David Keene is the opinion editor of the Washington Times and a member of the board of the Center for the National Interest. He additionally served as chairman of the American Conservative Union and president of the National Rifle Association.
