The reality is that, if everybody carried a gun, nobody would be able to hold up a bank, or a restaurant, or an airplane again because a weapon would give a criminal no strategic advantage over law-abiding citizens.

I would say "See what happens when only criminals and police have guns?"

And, in this case, the two groups overlap nicely.

Also the New Orleans citizens who had guns were not robbed, raped or beaten.

You really want everyone in New York carrying a gun?

New York has the lowest murder rate of any big city in the country. In fact, our murder rate is lower than the country at large.

New Orleans has a murder rate 8 times higher than average.

So why is that? Obviously the funs ain't helping.

I believe in the right to bear arms, because that's what our constitution says. But I'm not going to make the argument that guns makes people safer, just because that's what I WANT to believe, despite all evidence to the contrary.

Actually, I recall a letter in the NY Post a couple years back, noting that the reason you never see tragic massive school shootings (a la Columbine) in NYC is because if a student pulled out a gun, other students would likely answer back with equal or better firepower.

DL, guns do make people safer and I didn't always believe that. My favorite example is Kennesaw, Georgia. It is the law that every head of household has a gun. They have zero crime. They've had 2 murders in 20 years and one was a stabbing and the other was a beating. Yes, it's a small place and yes, it will be hard to duplicate in a city like NY. But, if a criminal thinks there's a chance his victim has a gun, he'll think twice.

The flipside of this argument is that DC has outlawed all guns yet still has a very high murder rate, most using guns.

Population 25,816. Which means one of every 10,000 people has been murdered.

Tell me Karol - why don't you do some research and tell me which is more dangerous:

White suburban Georgia town. Or Manhattan below 96th street?

And let's face it. Guns are a hell of a lot less prevelant below 96th street than they are above it.

Here are some stats:

Ten worst states for murder, 2003:
1) Lousiana
2) Maryland
3) Mississippi
4) Nevada
5) Arizona
6) Georgia - Yes, your beloved, bucolic Georgia Karol.
7) South Carolina
8) California
9) Tennessee
10) Alabama

Ten Safest States for Murder, 2003
1) Maine
2) South Dakota
3) New Hampshire
4) Iowa
5) Hawaii
6) Idaho
7) North Dakota
8) Oregon
9) Massachusetts
10) Rhode Island

I have a hunch the gun control laws are stricter in the safer states than they are in the more dangerous states. Maybe not necessarrily states like Idaho, but let's face it - that is an overwhelmingly rural state, which you would expect to be safer.

http://www.benbest.com/lifeext/murder.html

A think a well-paid and effective police force is about 100 times more important in reducing crime than is having a gun.

I don't own a gun now, and I have never really felt unsafe in New York.

Thank God New York has some of the finest police officers in the world.

God, guns, and drugs made America great. Let's keep all three!

So, what do you suggest be done? Make all the big bad guns disappear by passing a law? Do you think all murder would just stop if guns magically disappeared? No, if that were to happen, you'd be spouting statistics in an argument against knives. After knives you'd be crying about baseball bats or claw hammers or golf clubs or Barbara Streisand concerts or ligatures or any number of inanimate objects used to commit murder. All the while purposefully remaining ignorant to the real reason these people were murdered. The reason being that they were murdered because another human being decided to murder them, not because they had possession of an inanimate object either legally or illegally.

Gun control has little effect (or it has the opposite effect intended) on violent crime

"Gun death" statistics are frequently cited, in the manner above, to strongly suggest that guns are the cause behind the high violent death rate in the U.S. As in the case of the Los Angeles Times article, no mention is made that over half of those violent deaths are suicides. The CNN article mentions gun homicides and gun suicides, but fails to show us the total violent death rate of other countries, not just gun deaths. For example, in Japan, where gun ownership is rare, its total suicide rate is higher than our total suicide rate.

Combining gun suicide and homicide deaths creates a sensational comparison with other countries, but only clouds and distorts the many factors actually behind violent death rates. Looking at only gun deaths, it is easy to get the false impression that, because of guns, the United States is the most violent country on earth.

Rather than being the "league leader" in violent death rates, as the sensational and misleading media reports suggest when focusing exclusively on guns, though the U.S. is still high, its violent death rate is not orders of magnitude higher than other countries.

The United States' violent death rate is below the violent death rate of Estonia, Finland, Brazil, Denmark, Austria and Belgium.

Since Britain enforced laws that outlaw guns and any other form of self-defense, their crime rate has been rising fast.

Self defense isn't a "right", it's a necessity. In the natural world, the word that describes those who can't adequately defend themselves is "food".

Downtown Lad:

Anyone who hates guns as much as you do should post this sign on your front door.

WARNING No weapons of any kind are allowed in this home.

Put up the sign and if you live till March of 2006, I will give you $500. Don't put up the sign and we will all know you are a hypocrite.

Can I just say that cc178 and Jake are complete morons and have an IQ of about 70. What part of "I believe in the right to bear arms, because that's what our constitution says." do they not understand?

Downtown Lad:

Put up the sign or shut up. Why I am sure you would be killed is Australia's experience with gun control:

Australia banned private ownership of most guns in 1996. As of the year 2000, these are the results.

Countrywide, homicides are up 3.2 percent;
Assaults are up 8.6 percent;
Amazingly, armed robberies have climbed nearly 45 percent;
In the Australian state of Victoria, gun homicides have climbed 300 percent;
In the 25 years before the gun bans, crime in Australia had been dropping steadily;
There has been a reported "dramatic increase" in home burglaries and assaults on the elderly

DL, if you believe in the right to keep and bear arms, what exactly are you arguing here?

Karol - I'm arguing that there is a strong correlation between gun ownership and crime levels. Just a cursory glance at crime rates in the Northeast with the South will prove that out. As will murder rates between the U.S. and Europe.

But the constitution says that we can bear arms, so that's the way it is. I have no problem with that, as I think it's important for the populace to be armed to fight an oppressive government. If the consequence is more crime so be it.

As I suspected, Jake does indeed have an IQ of 70. In fact, he has zero understanding of the word "hypocrite".

He thinks that if you believe something, then you have to have a sign in your window stating ALL of your beliefs, or you're a "hypocrite".

If mean if that were the case, then Jake should have to have a sign in his window stating that "Jake has a 2 inch penis", or he's a hypocrite.

Of course, we all know Jake has a 2 inch penis, but I don't think it makes him a hypocrite just because he doesn't want to advertise that to the world.

Downtown Lad:

So you won't put a sign up saying "I don't have a gun so you can rob me at anytime".

But by being for gun control, you want everybody else to put that sign on their door. Because that is exactly the message that gun control tells every criminal.

By the way, Lad you have an unhealthy interest in my penis. I could give a shit about yours.

Ask any Korean shopkeeper.

Sorry Jake - no matter how many times you want to twist my words, I won't put up a sign saying I favor gun control, when I unequivocally don't. Like I said - you have a 70 IQ, so I'm not surprised that you have zero comprehension of what I'm actually writing.

And trust me - I have zero interest in two inch penises.

DL--

It depends on your definition of crime; in the United States, we consider all violations of law in our crime index; in many European countries, including Britian and France, "crime" is often equated with homicide and rape; in other words, the statistics that we don't see might reveal--as I suspect that they do--that petty crimes are more common, per capita, than we think in Europe precisely because of their anti-gun laws.

Second of all, would you have wanted to be in New Orleans without a gun during this horrible time?

Forgive me, because I forgot where I saw this tidbit, but someone was quoted as saying on a blog or news story that those with the sense to own a gun also had the sense to get the heck out of N.O.

"Karol - I'm arguing that there is a strong correlation between gun ownership and crime levels. "

DL please check out the number of guns in the US and the direction of that trend. Then please check out the crime rates. Hint - the number of guns is increaseing while the crime rate has been decreasing. This has been about the same trend for the past 20 years. More guns does not cause more crime.

Secondly, look at the states that enacted CCW laws and look at their crime rates compared to the national aveage after the law change, most has dropped compared to the national average though I think a few have not

As to the states that are higher in murder: How are those states ranked compared to poverty? Also, how did those murders happen, there is more than one way to skin a cat as they say? Also, I would be willing to bet those states have always been higher in murder, regardless of the number of guns?

It is good to see you actually qoute real stats and not just made up ones.

Yeah, I would look very closely at the facts surrounding those murders. If a large number of people are getting shot while patronizing their local crack house, I'm not personally too concerned about it. If it is a domestic murder, usually there is a warning and if the dead spouse had gotten a gun and defended themselves, they may well not be a statistic today.