The bias against handguns: Boston Globe EDITORIALS/OPINIONS

DOES DOMESTIC gun ownership pose a more serious threat to Americans than foreign terrorism?

That's what New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof seems to be saying in a recent article. Alarmed by reports of a surge in gun sales after Sept. 11, Kristof cites familiar statistics on the perils of guns. Japan, where handguns are practically unavailable, had only 29 gun deaths (both murders and suicides) in 1999, while the United States had 26,800 gun deaths in 2000. England, another country with a strict handgun ban, has higher rates of assault and burglary than the United States but a murder rate only one-sixth of ours.

Yes it's a good thing that the victims of Bundy, Gacy, the Hillside Strangler etc. didn't have guns. You know they could have hurt themselves terribly. I'm being sarcastic, but what is the total number of deaths that could have been prevented by murder victims who DIDN'T HAVE GUNS when they were being killed if they'd have had them? The aforementioned mass killers slaughtered their victims without benefit of those awful handguns. Yes and certainly someone who was contemplating shooting someone else with a handgun would never consider using a shotgun if they couldn't get a handgun right? Or a knife, or poison, or whatever. It's laughable the logic of the these liberals. I should say, what logic?

The cold reality is that America produces far more people who think killing someone else is a very good way to slove a particular problem. There is a huge difference in psychology between us and those nations who have very low murder rates. But talking about that, my section of the country (western Wisconsin) has a very low murder rate, equivalent to most European countries, and a very high gun-ownership rate. How do the liberals explain that?

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