Comments on Gun Violence

Obama, in front of a bunch of children for sentimental and dramatic effect, announced a bunch of "fluffy" executive orders for gun control.  Read them here on ZeroHedge.  I tend to agree with the need for better background checks which, with another focus on mental health, was a big theme in the "action items."

There is nothing that strikes me as "unconstitutional" despite Republican fears to the contrary.

Obama,with his rhetoric and recent history, has invited this kind of fear. He has indeed pressed and exceeded the limits of his authority to NOT enforce laws in the case of unilaterally not enforcing a few existing immigration laws. He also unilaterally changed existing welfare work requirements embodied in laws passed by Clinton and the Republicans in the 1990s. Recently, Obama has publicly threatened to increase the debt limit without Congressional approval.  Good luck with that!!  See my blog Obama Ignoring The Constitution.  This President seems so traumatized by the ordinary political process!

It doesn't matter that mental illness was the root problem of the Newtown massacre, legislators must be "seen to be doing something"---anything.  So, now the target are so-called assault weapons--a ban on such guns would have to be approved by Congress.  I don't know why people need those weapons, but I doubt banning them would have much of an effect except on political perceptions.

Let's face it, Liberals would love to ban guns.  In fact they'd also prefer to ignore the 2nd Amendment to the Constitution or "interpret" the law to presume the founding fathers would be appalled by the types of weapons available.  I guess they might have a point.

Interestingly, in Socialist Britain, guns were seized in 2007.

UK Experience With Gun Seizures

It's weird because you don't think of the UK as a "gun oriented" society where even the police are unarmed.  I managed to find some recent UK data about gun offences from the UK Home Office. Have a look at the graph below:

UK Gun Offences

Caveat:  When you read the report from the Home Office,  the number of 'offences' might appear high, the number of fatalities is very low--58 fatalities in 2010/2011, up from 40 fatalities the year before.  Most of the offences were air gun offences. Therefore pay attention to the "non-air gun weapons" category in the figure above.

This data also means that the rate of homicide in the UK iis 0.12 homocides per 100,000 persons. This is low compared to most countries including the US which is 2.97 homicides per 100,000 persons (Year 2000).   It's been low in the UK for a very long time.   The data also shows that the 2007 seizure of registered guns was fairly irrelevant to gun offences in the UK.  There was already a downward trend in place at that time.  

So the rights of people were trampled by legislative fiat for minimal effect.  Let that be a warning to hyper-active legislators who want to be seen to "acting."  They are acting all right!

Here's some US homicide data from Wikipedia's: Gun violence in the US.  Handgun homocides peaked in 1994 and have come down since.  Also, there is a downward trend in other homicides.

Chicago and Washington DC gun violence should be the focus of examining gun violence!

Supposedly Chicago has the toughest gun laws in America, but over 500 people were killed there last year--one of the most violent cities in the US.  A great deal of this violence stems from gang activities.  Chicago should be a focus of the debate on gun control. Obama, get your own house in order!

But Washington DC has an even higher rate of gun-related homocides---at 35 per 100,000.  D.C. has one of the highest homicide rates in the WORLD (except Columbia, which in the year 2000, according to Wikipedia, in the middle of a drug war, had a homicide rate at 51 per 100,000).   Washington DC gun violence should be the focus of examining gun violence!  It's one of the most dangerous places on earth!

African American Males Are Most Responsible For Gun Homicides

The unfortunate fact for President Obama and the The Left is that it's African Americans who are disproportionately responsible for gun violence, crime and gun deaths.   See Gun Violence in the United States.   Over 7000 black people are killed each year and 94% of the killers are black.

African Americans make up only 13% of the population but are responsible for 56% of gun-related homicides. Let's face it, only black males are committing the crimes, so the reality is that 6.5% of the US population (black males) are responsible for 54% of gun homicides. From Bureau of Justice Statistics, here's the data for homocides by race.  The good news is that it's trending down.

Gun Homicides By Ethnicity

According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, between 1976 and 2011, there were 279,384 black murder victims. 94 percent of those murder victims were murdered by other blacks.   From Walter Williams at Townhall, says that all of the black fatalities in Korea, Vietnam and all recent wars put together were 18,515, or a number that palls in comparison to black-on-black homicides in that same period.

Homicide Type By Race 1976 to 2005

Conclusion:  Gun violence is most associated with drug abuse, felony crime and African Americans are vastly over-represented relative to their share of the population.  But even if there were no African American homicides, the US homicide rate would still be one of the highest in the world.  When over 1/2 of gun violence is due to African Americans, shouldn't that be the focus of attention?

Sorry Mr. Obama, the truth hurts.  So "Where is Obama's Plan to Lift Afro-America?"