Gun banning advocates use false statistics, logic-free arguments

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A neuropsychologist with a Ph.D. runs into a guy wearing a MAGA that agrees we should ban AR style rifles and suddenly, 99% of Americans want to ban it. That’s solid math, right?

It goes along with several other “facts” the left wants you to believe about guns. Evidently they didn’t count gun owners in this survey.

One would think someone with a Ph.D. would be able to sort fact from fiction, logic from emotion, and math from fuzzy. Let’s see if we can toss some facts into the mix.

Other than cosmetic differences, the AR style platform is no different than any other semi-automatic rifle made in the past 100 years. It is neither an assault weapon nor a weapon of war and it is not a weapon of mass destruction as some would have you believe. It is not classified as a “high-powered” rifle. It doesn’t have legs and cannot operate without human involvement.

The Armalite Rifle, model 15, also known as the AR-15 is a gas-operated, semi-automatic (self-loading), medium powered rifle chambered in .223. It has an average muzzle velocity of 3,370 ft/sec with 1,250 ft.lbs of energy, making it an excellent varmint hunting rifle.

It fires one round per pull of the trigger. It cannot fire automatically. The trigger must be pulled to fire a round, released then pulled again to fire the next. All semiautomatic firearms operate this way.

The military adopted the AR rifle in the late 1950s and designated it the M-16 after several changes were made. First and foremost, it incorporated a selector switch allowing the rifle to fire in full automatic mode, making the M16 light machine gun capable. It will fire as long as the trigger is held back.

This mode of operation has been illegal to own (without proper documentation, fingerprints, fees, and ATF approval) since the 1934 National Firearms Act. It is extremely expensive to purchase a fully automatic firearm.

There are hundreds of semi-automatic type rifles, shotguns, and pistols that are used in various capacities. They are the standard, common firearms purchased in the United States since the 1930s and there are nearly 300 million firearms of all kinds owned by law-abiding citizens.

That breaks down to 106 million handguns, 105 million rifles, and 83 million shotguns. Of that, they estimate there are 16 million AR’s owned by Americans. That is around 5% of the total or 15% of the number of rifles.

If our Ph.D.’s premise was correct that more ARs equals more shootings, there would be vastly more mass shootings than there are. The fact is 99.99% of gun owners, including those with AR rifles, are law abiding and do not engage in criminal activities.

Maybe a small fraction of those would agree to ban the AR rifle but 99% of them? Not possible, regardless of how they try to spin the math. The “99% of Americans want the AR rifle banned” is a fabricated number the gun banners and media want everyone to believe.

We’ve had mandatory background checks for quite some time now. The only time a check is not required is when I hand down my grandfather’s Winchester to my son or I purchase/sell a firearm from/to another trusted individual. Background checks are always required at gun shows – unless one is purchasing from a private individual. This is what they want to call the gun show loophole.

If I wanted to sell a rifle, I can sell it at a gun show to either a private individual (for more money) or to a gun dealer (for less money). That is what these shows are all about, lawful buying, selling, and trading.

Criminals are not there wandering about looking for guns as the industry does a pretty good job of policing itself as do the individuals selling their gun. Criminals getting their weapons from gun shows is another myth.

Criminals typically obtain their weapons illegally and a background check will not deter them just as the “gun free zone” signs do not stop them. Anyone set on causing mayhem will do it regardless of any laws.

So, rather than figure out how to prevent these shootings, we just want to outlaw all guns and take them away from those who haven’t committed any crimes. Then the world would be safer because only criminals and the government would be armed. Ask the residents of London how that’s working out for them.

The banners also like to throw out the 33,000 gun deaths a year number. This figure is misleading in the conversation as it includes suicides, which account for 64% of the total gun deaths.

According to the FBI’s homicide data table 8, in 2012 there were only 8,855 firearm related deaths in the US. 6,371 were handguns, and only 322 (3.6%) were rifles of all kinds.

The scary AR rifle is part of that subset, indicating that the AR is not used for much at all, yet the media wants you to believe it a “weapon of war” on the streets causing chaos.

It doesn’t make sense to ban a specific rifle because it accounts for less than 300 deaths a year while knife homicides were 1,589, blunt objects 518, and hands/fists/feet homicides were 678.

Where is the uproar to ban kitchen knives, baseball bats, and extremities? Just to compare, there were 33,782 automobile deaths that year and nobody blamed the automobiles or pushed to ban them.

Since guns have always been around, why were there not mass shootings in the 1940s ‘50s, ’60s, and ’70s? During that time, we legally hauled rifles and shotguns around in our vehicles to school and around town and nobody went on killing sprees back then.

What has changed? It’s certainly not the gun.

The answer may point to the root cause and possibly lead to a real, viable solution. But no one wants to look there as they are afraid of what they may find. They’d rather blame the inanimate gun than deal with reality. They’d rather blame and vilify law-abiding gun owners and the NRA than look in the mirror and find decades of liberal policies to blame.

The fact is, gun owners scare the left. Gun owners stand in their way to transform this country into their socialist utopia where everything is free. Free after their government has used force to take your wealth away to redistribute to the “less fortunate.” No? Just look at the history of Russia and the rise of the USSR.

If anyone pays attention to history (something missing these days), they will find it riddled with despots, tyrants, dictators, and just plain evil governments. Those entities went on to murder millions of their citizens for various reasons, some simply because they questioned something or spoke out.

Our Founders sought protection for the free people of this country and formulated the Second Amendment as the people’s defense. Its purpose is not to protect hunting with muskets, but to protect freedom from those that would take it away.

It is the one civil, God-given right that protects all other civil rights and guarantees freedom for all throughout this nation.

Here we are at a time when a party is pushing for open borders where MS-13 gang members and the like can walk into this country and kill innocent citizens, a time were Antifa is allowed to violently protest and assault people on the streets, and the left is screaming to disarm the people.

No, I don’t think anyone with “common sense” is going to disarm during these tumultuous times. Many of us choose dangerous freedom over peaceful slavery.

You can see it happening all around. This nonsense about PC speech, the hate-filled rants, suppressing conservative speakers, censoring, the list goes on.

The left is labeling anyone that supports or voted for Trump all sorts of bad things. The accusations run from nasty to nastier and doesn’t appear to end anytime soon. How long before those of us not wanting to participate in the demolition of freedom are marked and sent to reeducation camps or simply executed for our views? Does any of that scenario sound familiar?

We cannot sacrifice our freedom just because a few murderers used commonly owned firearms to perpetrate heinous crimes. Our freedom is a freedom from government overreach, a dictatorship, or any other form of oppressive government or group as well as any foreign or domestic invaders.

All one must do is look at Venezuela. They were once a thriving, rich, free country until socialism took over. Look at them now. No guns, no freedom, no food, no hope. Is that what we want for our grandchildren?

Jim Blessitt

Peachtree City, Ga.

2 COMMENTS

  1. Please don’t mistake Gun Control advocates for Gun Banning advocates. I’m not certain there are any who are calling for a complete ban on guns. And am I a “gun control nut” because I don’t want my neighbor possessing RPG launchers, C4 or even a functional tank?

    I think there are limits to what types of “arms” should be allowed, but that does go against what the 2nd amendment states. 2nd amendment notwithstanding, if we can find a rationale allowing the government to prohibit private citizens from owning biological weapons like Ricin, or to infringe upon our rights to own fully automated weapons, then why can’t they also ban semi-automatic weapons under a similar rationale?

    I’m not suggesting that such bans are constitutional, just that they exist. And we will continue to go back and forth over what “2nd Amendment rights” entails until such time – if ever – as another constitutional amendment is passed overriding the 2nd amendment.

  2. Thousands still want to ban the AR. That’s right Jim, even after your excellent analysis there will be thousands of “we have to ban those scary AR’s”. Of course that means banning a brand name – like saying Pepsi is ok but not Coke. In fact that’s a good analogy. Envision some southern sheriff type swilling Pepsi and carrying an AR or non AR weapon knocking on your door in Atlanta demanding you surrender your Coca Cola. That should end well.

    The good news about all this nonsense about banning guns, AR’s or something does highlight the illogic of the Democrat anti-gun stance. It also flies in the face of logic to ignore the easy to verify fact that there are 300million legal and privately-owned firearms in this country – matching up pretty nicely with the 330million legally here population. As this illogic becomes clear to the undecided center and sensible socially conservative Democrats – many of whom are gun owners, we will see Trump easily reelected and many Congressional seats going back to the Republicans. The gift that keeps on giving. Just like the impeachment push. Keep it up guys and gals. Only 14 months to go.