It's a few steps shy of proclaiming, "Gun Ban an Abject Failure at Curbing Crime," but today's Washington Post Metro did trumpet on the front of its November 13 Metro section that the 31-year old D.C. handgun ban has not proven to be a crime deterrent.
With his somewhat subdued headline, "Crime Data Underscore Limits of D.C. Gun Ban's Effectiveness," staff writer Paul Duggan unearthed the political calculus for the 1976 gun ban, as well as the Post's role as chief journalistic cheerleader for the law the federal D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals found unconstitutional earlier this year.
In making by far their boldest public policy decision, the District's first elected officials wanted other jurisdictions, especially neighboring states, to follow the lead of the nation's capital by enacting similar gun restrictions, cutting the flow of firearms into the city from surrounding areas.
"We were trying to send out a message," recalled Sterling Tucker (D), the council chairman at the time.
Nadine Winters (D), also a council member then, said, "My expectation was that this being Washington, it would kind of spread to other places, because these guns, there were so many of them coming from Virginia and Maryland."
Duggan quotes other politicians who eagerly supported, and continue to support the ban, noting that at the time even they admitted the ban would do nothing to make citizens safer (emphasis mine):
"The bill should not be looked at as a panacea to solve all gun-related crime problems that we have in the city," warned then-council member John A. Wilson (D), after the council passed the measure, 12 to 1, and the mayor signed it into law in July 1976. "But maybe it will save some senseless accident at somebody's home," Wilson said.
Marion Barry (D), a council member then as now and a supporter of the bill, put it bluntly at the time: "What we are doing today will not take one gun out of the hands of one criminal."
But it wasn't just the overwhelmingly liberal Democratic city council that cheered for the liberty-limiting gun ban. Duggan notes that the Post editorial page cheered the ban and urged a more comprehensive national one be instituted by Congress:
There was no more ardent supporter of the ban in 1976 than The Washington Post editorial page, which asserted: "One shortcoming of local laws . . . is that they can't work well when guns are moving freely in immediate adjacent areas." That is why, the editorial said, a federal handgun law was needed.
Duggan's article has some shortcomings, among them: no quotes from gun rights groups or scholars like John Lott, the economist who found a correlation between states with minimal gun control and low crime. Even a quote by liberal constitutional scholar Laurence Tribe, who himself now admits the 2nd Amendment guarantees the individual's right to keep and bear arms, would have provided a good balance to the pro-ban sound bites from yesteryear.
That said, it's not every day you see in the pages of a major liberal newspaper the admission that the very same paper has been a cheerleader for a gun control policy that's only disarmed law-abiding citizens while leaving the city more dangerous in its wake.
—Ken Shepherd is Managing Editor of NewsBusters
Editor at Large
Comments Policy
I have never understood a
November 13, 2007 - 16:52 ET by Subsailor599I have never understood a liberal's logic (or lack of) for gun control. The best that I can come up with is... they are more afraid of a law-biding citzen with a gun than they are a criminal. Thankfully I live in Texas.
Yeah, thank God (and
November 13, 2007 - 17:06 ET by MikeBYeah, thank God (and certain state legislatures) for shall issue concealed carry permit laws and Castle doctrine laws. Now THERE are some crime reduction incentives.
"A communist is someone who reads Marx. An anti-communist is someone who understands Marx." Ronald Reagan
The Masses As Morons
November 13, 2007 - 17:10 ET by Repeal 16-17To Liberals the average American is stupid and so can't be trusted to take care of himself, much less possess any type of weaponry. Only the sophisticated members of the intelligencia (i.e., rich Liberals) can be trusted to take care of and defend themselves.
It exemplifies their
November 13, 2007 - 17:16 ET by mattmIt exemplifies their inability to look beyond the primary aspect of any issue.
Guns are used to kill people; therefore they should be banned. SUV's destroy the planet; SUV's must be banned. People die in wars; war should be banned. Taxes bring in money for government programs; taxes should be raised.
It goes on and on and on. To be blunt, they're simpletons. (Or they have some alterior motive, such as amassing power, and they use simplistic arguments to get simpletons to give them power - which explains why they want 12 year olds to vote)
Actually the whole point
November 13, 2007 - 17:37 ET by JungusActually the whole point may be that they prefer criminals because those they can be locked up at any time. So there is a leverage that they have on criminals that isn't quite extended over law abiding types.
You could say that us middle class Joes just don't know our proper place.
I have never understood a
November 13, 2007 - 18:21 ET by MidAmericaI have never understood a liberal's logic (or lack of) for gun control.
They are against individual initiative. All problems are to be solved by some entity of government.
The libs want the general public to be in the same position as Schools that are 'Gun Free Zones'. When a shooter appears the helpless victims wait until the shooter either runs out of ammo or kills himself or, when they finally arrive, is shot by police (after many are already dead).
After all what if the murderous shooter is gunned down by another student and then later we find out the murderer was distraught because his father walked out on him and his mother when he was three which makes the 'acting out' of his rage very sensible. How could we live with ourselves for not taking the time to try to understand and comfort him in his pain?
Senator Feinstein said that
November 13, 2007 - 17:07 ET by JackrvSenator Feinstein said that very thing in the Senate.
They are not concerned that the criminals have guns because they will use them on themselves.
It is the ordinary folks they are afraid of.
Jack Van Nostrand
Marion Barry (D), a council
November 13, 2007 - 17:25 ET by motherbeltMarion Barry (D), a council member then as now and a supporter of
the bill, put it bluntly at the time: "What we are doing today will not
take one gun out of the hands of one criminal."
Well, so what? Don't you get it? Results don't matter. It's the intention that counts. They are trying to do something.
<sarc off>
But maybe it will save some senseless accident at somebody's hom
November 13, 2007 - 17:32 ET by kbworkmanSo... They admit that it won't do anything about crime, but we still need it to keep accidents from happening.
What are the stats on this? I know they get reported a lot, but what are the actual numbers?
I have had guns in my homes since I was a child. We were taught what a gun was and what it could do. We never played with real guns. We had our toys. We knew the difference.
My children never played with my guns. They also new what they were and what they were for.
Part of the problem is that the anti-gun league doesn't even want the kids taught about guns. That is what is causing problems in the home.
This should provide some
November 15, 2007 - 13:24 ET by BeowulfThis should provide some perspective to your question:
Firearm accident deaths have been decreasing for decades. Since 1930, their annual number has decreased 80%, while the U.S. population has more than doubled and the number of firearms has quintupled. Among children, such deaths have decreased 89% since 1975.
Firearm accident deaths are at an all-time annual low, while the U.S. population is at an all-time high. Therefore, the firearm accident death rate is at an all-time annual low, 0.2 per 100,000 population, down 94% since the all-time high in 1904.
Today, the odds are a million to one, against a child in the U.S. dying in a firearm accident.
Firearms are involved in 0.6% of accidental deaths nationally. Most accidental deaths involve, or are due to, motor vehicles (39%), poisoning (18%), falls (16%), suffocation (5%), drowning (2.9%), fires (2.8%), medical mistakes (2.2%), environmental factors (1.2%), and bicycles and tricycles (0.7%). Among children: motor vehicles (45%), suffocation (18%), drowning (14%), fires (9%), bicycles and tricycles (2.4%), falls (2%), poisoning (1.6%),environmental factors (1.5%), and medical mistakes (0.8%).
http://www.nraila.org/Issues/FactSheets/Read.aspx?id=120
The Closed Mind Erects Strong Barriers
I had about a dozen handguns
November 13, 2007 - 17:35 ET by BruzillaI had about a dozen handguns when I lived in Maryland, and they all moved down to Florida with me. I never had any trouble with any of my handguns trying to sneak across the state lines into DC. They always just hung on their rack, and never made a run for the border. So maybe it's not guns that are travelling across the lines, but the people who are carrying them that need to be eliminated.
While not directly related to this.....
November 13, 2007 - 17:44 ET by Prester John....here is another good example of the liberal mindset. From a Washington Post article about a recent rash of teenage deaths from automobile accidents in MD:
A Maryland law enacted in response to those deaths (from another rash of deaths in 2004) could have prevented two of the most recent wrecks -- including the one that killed Cruz --if the teens had obeyed it.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/12/AR2007111200394.html?nav=hcmoduletmv
Well no kidding. And if criminals would just obey those gun control laws no one would get shot. But then they wouldn't be criminals, would they?
Lord have mercy.
These are the same
November 13, 2007 - 18:15 ET by Chris NormanThese are the same people who wonder why prisons are so full when crime is down...
Chris... Spooky isn't
November 13, 2007 - 18:27 ET by bigtimerChris...
Spooky isn't it?
I just remember the totally
November 13, 2007 - 20:49 ET by lnthompI just remember the totally laughable crap coming from the current Mayor of D.C. (whose name I'm not going to bother looking up) telling the world how the gun ban supposedly saved lives, yet all the while that the gun ban was in effect, D.C. was the murder capital of the country or at least in the top 5 for most of those years.
Lee T.
U.S. Navy (ret.) / Vancouver, Washington
The history of the race, and each individual's experience, are thick with evidence that a truth is not hard to kill and that a lie told well is immortal.-- Mark Twain
I'm of 2 minds on this one.
November 13, 2007 - 23:22 ET by pbthinkerNo, it's not whether to ban guns or not, it's whether the Supreme's should take this case. On the one hand, if they were to clarify the 2nd Amendment, even for just a while because liberals will never give up on this, it would be good for the country. On the other hand, if they rule against the individual right, stand by for an assault on all states that have conceal carry laws, etc.
Somehow, I just can't see them saying there isn't an individual right to own a firearm, in the U.S. Constitution. That being the case, let's settle it and move on.
Democrats: Specializing in "high tech lynching" since 1987.
DC vs. Parker
November 14, 2007 - 08:23 ET by fosstenThis case needs to be decided in the SCOTUS. There hasn't been a decision on the 2A in SCOTUS since 1939 and look what's happened since then: 20,000 gun laws. It's about time the tide started to turn. If the SCOTUS doesn't hear the case, the Circuit Court decision will only affect DC law as mandatory precedent. At the Supreme Court level, it affects all laws across the country.
Forget 911, I dial 10MM.
}}---> I dunno fossten
November 14, 2007 - 08:30 ET by Cool ArrowUp in DC, the word "infringe" means to decorate with doilies.
It just bothers me every time SCOTUS decides to interpret something as vague as "Congress shall make no law . . ."
It's as though we don't realize the Bill of Rights is a limitation placed on the Legislative rather than on the people.
Except, CA, the second
November 14, 2007 - 13:08 ET by MikeBExcept, CA, the second amendment doesn't say that Congress shall make no law. It says that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
One could conceivably argue that the first amendment allows the states and/or municipalities to establish a religion for their jurisdiction. But the second does not prohibit just Congress, it prohibits any government body from infringing on the right to keep and bear arms.
"A communist is someone who reads Marx. An anti-communist is someone who understands Marx." Ronald Reagan
If someone decided to break
November 14, 2007 - 09:11 ET by JseitlerIf someone decided to break into my house at night, you better believe they're going to have a weapon of some kind on them. Between my protectors of the canine persuasion and the SW99 in my night-stand, I can sleep a little sounder knowing that the precious one sleeping beside me is going to be safe.
Liberals don't understand that you need to fight fire(arms) with fire(arms). Well, maybe they do. They just don't own the guns themselves; they hire armed security for that. </rosieref> It's another version of carbon credits. They still get the benefit, but they can claim that they're not part of the "problem".
}}---> Libs and guns
November 14, 2007 - 09:15 ET by Cool ArrowInteresting point.
Much like President Clinton turning turning arab terror suspects over to the Egyptians for "questioning" rather than anguish over the ethics of waterboarding.
2nd Amendment
November 14, 2007 - 12:56 ET by TBARThe RTKBA is for when seconds count and the police are only minutes away.
Life is too short to be serious
2nd Amendment
November 14, 2007 - 12:58 ET by TBARSorry double post
While most arguments for
November 14, 2007 - 14:19 ET by BeowulfWhile most arguments for the RTKBA are lucidly addressed here, a fact for which I applaud NBers, I figured I'd do a little consolidation.
In the 2nd Amendment, like all others, "the people" are a collective reference. Otherwise, only in the 2nd are "the people" meant as individuals.
The intent of the 2nd, as in all the others, is to put restraints on the government, not the people, in fear of the repression the founders were fighting at the time of writing the Constitution with the Bill of Rights.
Gun control has been proven, over and over, to be a failure. Anti-gunners know it. Marion Berry admitted it - "What we are doing today will not take one gun out of the hands of one criminal." The gun control agenda has two groups of supporters. Those who know it for the fraud it is, but want it for their own agenda. And those who are woefully uninformed and don't know much, if anything about the issue.
Criminals make their living by breaking the law. This cannot be refuted. Why is it so hard to understand that making guns against the law will not, for one second, deter a criminal from further lawlessness. In point of fact, restrictive gun laws encourage criminals to arm themselves. If a criminal knows a potential victim is extremely unlikely to be armed themselves, they are more likely to commit a crime, often violent, against them.
It has been documented that a criminal's greatest fear isn't incarceration or even the death penalty. It is the worry that a targeted victim might be armed. This is from the mouths of criminals themselves.
There are over 2 million legal, legitimate defensive uses of firearms per year, many more than illegal uses. Yet only illegal or accidental use is ever publicized. Is it any wonder that so many sheeple go for the anti-gun rhetoric?
Those that are the most rabidly anti-gun are usually themselves armed (legally) or employ armed protection. No one questions what makes them more important than the average citizen.
Police are, by the nature of their job and the laws of this country, re-active. A crime must have already been committed before they can react (it's not at all common for a cop to be in a position to head off a criminal act, especially a violent criminal act). Once a person is murdered or violently assaulted or raped, then police can respond and hopefully catch and convict the perpetrator. This does nothing to prevent the crime, bring the person murdered back to life, mend the broken bones, restore the dignity of the person violated, or promote the mental well-being of the victim of a crime that the victim could have prevented by owning and knowing how to use a firearm.
None of these are difficult concepts to grasp, but the lies, disinformation, and lack of knowledge compounds to confuse the issue for many.
I used to scoff at the notion that anti-gunners were out to take over the country by force. I thought of it as alarmist and damaging to legitimate arguments for gun ownership. But after the last few years, seeing the lengths to which Lefties are willing to go for their philosophy, it really isn't so far-fetched. I can visualize (especially after some of the conjecture about the Clinton's "careers") armed and brutally enforced government control and violent enforcement of political policy on a combative populace by the current or near-future crop of liberal politicians.
It is also historical fact that, throughout history, the first step to tyranical government has ALWAYS been disarming the populace. Otherwise, there is no way for the tyranny to succeed. It really is that simple.
The Closed Mind Erects Strong Barriers
BW: you have some good
November 14, 2007 - 15:34 ET by PKBW:
you have some good points.
i would hope that you could get paid for the things that you say, paid a lot hopefully.
the criminal element (that includes wannabees) can be scared off by the juducious use of threats. however those threats must be backed up by the actual possibility of the threat takeing effect.
when i was a batchlor in my middle twenties i lived in a small apartment house in an urban center. the place had central air shafts and a burgler was burgling the apartments through the windows on to the air shafts.
as i had no interest in having my goods stolen i went to the local police pistol range, borrowed a .45 and shot a 98 score on a standard nmra target.
i took it home and tacked it up where it could only be seen by someone in the airshaft. although the apartments all around me were burgled i had no problem.
about a month later the guy tried to do an apartment in another building and the fellow living there punched his ticket with a 38.
sadly enough this did not stop the air shaft burgleries. they continued and in another building a couple of blocks away another fellow slipped and fell to the bottom of another airshaft and broke his leg and hip. the good folks living there let him scream for about a week before calling the police and he ultimately lost his leg for his troubles.
after getting out of the state prison he then went to the local veterans administration hospital and even though he was not a vet asked for a prosthesis. they said "no vet, no leg". he made an attempt through the local fiswrapper to extort them into it but failed.
for years we would see him begging on the various streets and freeway offramps with a sign reading viet nam vet, please help.
C
It truly is sad that the
November 14, 2007 - 17:16 ET by BeowulfIt truly is sad that the criminal literally has more rights and is shown more compassion than the victim. This in itself could likely be one of the items on the agenda of some anti's. The bleeding heart hanky stompers often feel more empathy for the criminal.
This recalls a story from many years ago from New Jersey (and now finally being eliminated through "Castle Doctrine" laws being enacted around the country). A single woman with a 5 year-old daughter lived alone in the pine barrens. A man forced entry into her home waving a knife and detailing the heinous things (sexual and other) that he was going to do to her. She grabbed a 12-guage shotgun from just inside her door and warned him off. He advanced on her, backing her clear through the home until her back was literally against her sleeping daughter's bedroom door. As the armed intruder was still advancing on her, she shot. Unfortunately, she only blew his leg off at the knee. He sued her - AND WON! The reasoning was that she had opportunity to leave the house through the back door, so therefore didn't have to shoot.
Disregarding that leaving the home would leave her small child alone with a psychopathic intruder, and the mother out in the pine barrens at night with a probable killer after her, nothing was addressed about the guy breaking into her home, armed, and threatening her with rape and murder (something most would take seriously in this scenario).
And this is but one of thousands of such stories people don't hear. There are so many instances, using your story as an example, where someone is shot (or otherwise killed or injured) while committing a criminal act. Often the family of the criminal sues the homeowner and wins. There is something seriously wrong when something like this can happen. It totally defies sense and logic.
This is the same situation we are in with the anti-gun crowd. Their philosophy defies common sense. Their "solutions" are so blatantly inept and their methods verge on, and often cross the line into the illegal. They lie, distort, cheat, steal, misinform, and do anything at all to push their agenda. And all this when only criminals can benefit (unless the tyrany conspiracy comes true).
The facts are out there, and from unimpeachable sources such as the FBI and DoJ. Cities with strict gun laws have high violent crime, whereas cities with laws such as concealed carry and high firearm ownership are comparitively low. Guns are used legally dozens of times more often than illegally. Criminals will get guns regardless of what the law says. Cops cannot be everywhere all the time, so defense falls to individuals. Finally, is there ANYONE who would want to watch their family abused and murdered if they were able to prevent it from happening? Are any of these concepts so difficult to understand? Yet we still have this "debate". It boggles the mind.
The Closed Mind Erects Strong Barriers