Since the recent Starbucks anti-gun protests, I thought the public might want to know the results of two recent studies on private ownership of guns in America. The studies were delivered by Harvard University and the Centers for Disease Control (at the request of the White House.)
The CDC’s report (launched immediately after the terrible school shootings in Sandy Hook, Conn.) was filled with facts such as: between 2000 and 2010, more than six in 10 gun-related deaths were suicides; accidental deaths from firearms has fallen to less than 1 percent of all firearms deaths in 2010; and firearms “turn-in” programs “are ineffective” in reducing crime.
The Harvard study reported: while gun ownership has soared since 1991, firearms-related crimes have dropped by 69 percent; on average, each year 200,000 American women save themselves from sexual assaults by use of a gun; by an 80:1 ratio, Americans use guns to stop crimes rather than commit crimes; and Kennesaw, Georgia, requires its homeowners to have a gun, (since declared unconstitutional and therefore now the law states it will never be enforced) has seen an 89 percent drop in burglaries since passing its ordinance.
When guns are not banned from public places and businesses, a person with a concealed pistol license carrying their handgun is more likely to be a reliable source of public protection than a police officer just happening by. Keeping in mind that criminals don’t pay much attention to the law, much less a sign in a business’s window, the only reason for banning guns from a business is to give a false sense of security, just like creating “gun free zones” at schools advertise to the criminal mind that it is a pretty safe place for them to go shoot people.
Tom Green
Lake Stevens
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