🚀 go-pugleaf

Nathaniel McIntosh (mcintosh@rice.edu) wrote:
: Do you have any statistics to provide which show the percentages of
: "assault weapons" used in gun crimes?

One stat I've run across, several places, is: the Asst. Chief of the New 
Jersey State Police, testifying before Congress recently.  He stated 
that, since they've been keeping records of gun crimes broken down into 
category, that assault weapons accounted for 0.026% of all gun crimes.

This basically gibes with the experience (albeit, perhaps dated) of my
youth as a cop in Dallas... arrested folks with countless handguns,
knives, sawed-off shotguns....  Encountered exactly one 'assault
weapon'... an Uzi (not an automatic).  I encountered exactly one automatic
weapon. 

I saw more people killed with baseball bats than by automatic weapons.  I 
saw more people killed with a _lamp cord_ than automatic weapons.  This 
obviously has nothing to do with the argument whether or not average folks 
need to have assault weapons....  It's just, the facts are, statistically 
they're a pretty insignificant tool used for crime.

While I'm here... my pet peeve is the media confuses 'assault weapons', 
such as the semi-automatic variety that have been available in gun stores 
for the public to buy, with 'automatic weapons', which have ALWAYS been a 
prohibited weapon for anyone (except those with a Federal Firearm 
license).  The fact is, those juvenile gang-bangers aren't buying machine 
guns in gun stores... but that's the impression left by the media.

Also... amid all this anti-gun hysteria....  Supporter of ban all guns 
seem to think that passing more laws will make all 200 million guns 
disappear.  Even if that were to magically happen, say, all guns suddenly 
vanished from the entire world, and all gun factories were to close... 
you can make a zip gun (remember them) with a piece of pipe, a rubber 
band, and a nail.

And before one argues that, at least, we'll stop the crazed maniac-type
from storming into a location and mowing down folks Rambo-style... I
believe the crazed-maniac record is still held by the yo-yo in New York
who, when thrown out of a dance club, returned with a coke bottle and ten
cents worth of gasoline, set fire to the place, and killed over a hundred
people. 

Maybe, if he'd had a gun, he'd have only shot the one person who pissed 
him off.

And what about the guy who drove his truck into a Luby's, got out, killed 
20+ folks?  If he'd stayed in his truck and drove it _through_ Luby's (or 
say, into any outdoor crowd), he'd have killed many more.

I think most of this anti-gun hysteria is just more of the same liberal 
"No one is really to blame for their actions, let's find a scapegoat" 
mentality.  Whereas the real problem is: some people are just no damn 
good.  And society needs to get serious about protecting the rest of us 
from them.
-- 
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Tim McCanlies                      "Giving money and power to government
timmc@netcom.com                    is like giving whiskey and car keys 
Rosanky TX/Los Angeles CA           to teenage boys."
messages/fax (210) 839-4333	                        P. J. O'Rourke
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