Does NBC New York Reporter Believe in Checking Facts?
There is a role in the media called a “fact checker” but strangely it seems many firearms related stories in the mainstream media just accept anything said by anti-gun types as a “fact.” Case in point, this week NBC New York offered a story on how this weekend a commercial will run featuring Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York City and Mayor Thomas Menino of Boston – who happen to be the founders of Mayors Against Illegal Guns.
Here is what we are talking about:
Bloomberg asserted the (recent) shooting (in New York City) made clear the importance of gun control. He added: “We had too close a brush with death tonight due to illegal guns.”
And the figures prove he’s right. Deputy Police Commissioner Paul Browne told me that about 85 percent of the gun crimes committed in New York City result from gun purchases made in Pennsylvania, Virginia, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, “states with comparatively lax gun laws.”
First question, where does Paul Browne get his information? And more to the point, how do the figures prove Bloomberg is right? This number is widely cited, but without a source. Second, what numbers of those are legal vs. illegal gun purchases? In other words, are these even legal purchases that take advantage of “lax gun laws” in the first place? This point is never made clear and is often very vague. Not exactly the facts now are they?
But the facts get even more twisted:
John Feinblatt, the Mayor’s chief policy adviser, told me that states with tough gun laws are unlikely to be the source of illegal guns. He noted that, in fighting gun crimes, two measures are vital: having universal background checks for gun sales and putting all such data in the FBI files. In the case of the Virginia Tech massacre, in which 33 people were killed, the gunman, Seung-hui Cho, had a mental history that indicated he was dangerous but , Feinblatt said, that was never passed on to the FBI. Some state laws on gun sales, he added “have loopholes like swiss [sic] cheese.”
Again, this is twisting the message and points. Seung-hui Cho’s ability to get a gun wasn’t because of lax gun laws, but rather a failing in the mental health system. But what “loopholes” are like “Swiss cheese” exactly? Would this be private sales? Even in New York private sales are legal, provided both parties have licenses to own the firearms.
But another point we’d like to make on facts. States with tough gun laws may not be the source of illegal guns, but it is hard to know for sure. Illegal guns aren’t exactly tracked the way commercial sales are tracked, so this is somewhat a vague point. It is clear that guns do change hands in New York and Illinois – as there is gun violence. Clearly an illegal black market operates and no amount of gun bans or gun control is going to destroy this black market. But that’s a fact that really pushes the issue – is it Mayors Against Illegal Guns or just Mayors Against Guns, because the way these guys talk it sounds like the latter.
Reuters Gun Story Mixes Apples and Background Checks
This week Reuters, via The Huffington Post no less, offered a business story titled, “Firearm Background Checks Spike in 2011 According to FBI Statistics.” The story is now sort of old news, but there is a problem with this reporting.
The end third of the story has nothing whatsoever to do with sales. It begins with this passage:
The FBI data for 2011 was released close to the Jan. 8 anniversary of the shooting rampage in Tucson, Arizona, that killed 6 people and injured 13, including Democratic Representative Gabrielle Giffords.
The very rest of the story is about background checks, and even includes commentary from the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence that notes “there has been no progress on legislative efforts to tighten gun control following the Tucson shooting.”
What does any of that have to do with sales last year? It is almost as if Reuters wanted to see fewer sales instead!
NY Times Op-Ed Just More Sour Grapes
So ends another year, and how does The New York Times see it when it comes to firearms? Instead of noting a decline in crime, while a booming business in a bad economy the Times’ editors say it as “Another Year for Weapons.”
That’s right, not guns, not firearms, but WEAPONS! And the paper offered this passage:
The F.B.I. reports that gun dealers submitted the names of almost half-a-million customers in the six days before Christmas, with December on its way to surpassing November, which had a record tally of 1,534,414 names submitted for background checks for criminal convictions and mental health issues. Only a little more than 1 percent of buyers are typically rejected by federally licensed gun dealers. No one knows how many more firearms were purchased through the gun-show loophole that enables black marketeering.
It is fascinating that no mention is made of Fast and Furious, nor of the stockpiles of military hardware left in Libya. No the Times is worried about law abiding citizens buying guns! And then of course has to offer the “gun-show loophole” and tie it to illegal guns – without offering any proof that this is ever the case.
But the Times wasn’t finished. It offered this conclusion:
Instead of cowering before the gun lobby, political leaders in both parties should be treating the annual gun death toll as a serious public health and moral problem. Polls show the public is wiser than many politicians on the gun issue. Protest candlelight vigils organized by the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence are being planned nationally for Jan. 8, the anniversary of the Tucson rampage. Nearly 30 cities and towns have signed up, proof that sensible voters are demanding stronger protection from gun violence.
Are the political leaders really cowering behind the gun lobby? The first sentence of the op-ed and the first sentence of the final paragraph don’t add up. Isn’t it legal sales, meaning law-abiding citizens were buying guns? Doesn’t that mean that people – law-abiding citizens that is – want guns?
So what the editors are really saying is the voters, the citizens be damned. The Times editors don’t like guns so no one should have guns!
And that statement “polls show the public is wiser than many politicians on the gun issue” needs to be clarified. What polls exactly? What about the Gallup poll from October that showed that more people are opposed to gun control.
Finally, the gun lobby isn’t pushing for mass shootings as the final passage implies. Yes, cities can have mass vigils and should. But these vigils don’t mean these communities want to be rid of guns, to throw out the Second Amendment. Of course it is hard to understand what the editors think, but in their tall towers in Manhattan do they really know anything about what is going on west of the Hudson River?
Digital Journal Offers Insight on U.S. Gun Laws
Writing this week for Digital Journal, Christopher Wager, in an op-ed titled, “How Does Virginia Tech affect U.S. gun laws?” notes that the ATF enforces laws, and does not create or draft those laws. Wager writes:
The ATF is responsible, not for legislating gun control laws or arguing the second amendment, but for enforcement. One of the primary functions of the ATF is to enforce gun control through inspections of sellers, dealers, and importers. Also, it is spelled out to dealers and resellers who may own a gun and who may not. For example, those with a police or federal crime record, and those with a mental disability are among those who cannot. In addition, it is the business of the FBI to insure background check are being done.
But even when crimes are committed, such as last week’s tragic shooting at Virginia Tech, the role of the ATF needs to be considered. Wager adds:
Police officers and gun dealers, nor the ATF can begin to speculate the intention of a person to do harm at any given moment, regardless of their weapon, a car, a gun, or a knife. Society will never be able to fully protect itself.
This is one of many interesting points Wager makes, and one that many anti-gun zealots seem to forget.
Holder Won’t Apologize to Brian Terry’s Family
Our friends at Big Government have been one of the few outlets to cover Fast and Furious non-stop and noted in a piece, “Holder Thumbs His Nose at Brian Terry’s Family, Says We Need More Gun Control,” how the Attorney General is still trying to turn Fast and Furious into a call for gun control. But it gets worse, Eric Holder has also shown little sympathy for the human toll, noted Big Government:
most sickening of all, Holder said he hasn’t apologized to Border Agent Brian Terry’s family and that he doesn’t plan on doing so. When Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) asked Holder why he refuses to do so, the AG responded: “It is not fair…to assume that the mistakes that happened in Fast & Furious directly led to the death of Agent Terry.” This is outrageous because the ties between Terry’s death and Fast and Furious are not based on assumption, but on fact. At least three weapons from Fast and Furious were discovered by Terry’s body: two of which U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke tried to cover up and one of which the FBI tried to cover up. We even know which straw purchaser purchased them.
Would it kill Holder to apologize to Terry’s family? And why won’t he do so? Could it be that it could open new questions on what Holder knew and when? If he thinks he can continue to dodge those questions he can’t. We are not the only ones calling for his resignation, but the longer he holds on the worse he makes this for other anti-gun zealots including his boss President Obama.
GOA: Rep Walsh Calls for Attorney General Holder to Resign
Gun Owners of America:
Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL) sent a scathing rebuke to Attorney General Eric Holder yesterday and called on him to resign his post at the Justice Department.
Noting that Holder needed to “take responsibility” for implicating the United States as an accessory to violent crimes committed by the Mexican drug cartels, Walsh blasted the Attorney General for the role he played in the “subsequent cover-up” of the failed Fast and Furious operation.
As detailed by Gun Owners of America on many occasions, Operation Fast and Furious is the gun-running scheme where the Justice Department has approved – and in some cases, helped fund – the purchase and smuggling of firearms into Mexico.
The apparent purpose of this gun running scandal was to use the increased violence south of the border as a pretext for more gun control in this country. Sadly, two U.S. federal agents — and hundreds of Mexican citizens — have died as a result of these illegal sales which the FBI approved under the direction of the Obama Administration.
Rep. Walsh takes Holder to task for “knowingly [forcing] licensed firearms dealers to sell guns to violent criminals” and for claiming that he was “not aware” this happening. As Walsh notes, Holder “received no less than seven memos” detailing the creation and progress of Fast and Furious.
“The American people deserve to know the truth regarding Attorney General Eric Holder’s knowledge and role in the Fast and Furious operation,” Walsh said in a statement. “This program was deliberately designed to attack law-abiding American gun-owners and gun-dealers. Why else would an anti-gun Administration force licensed firearms dealers to sell guns to violent criminals?”
Rep. Walsh told Fox News’ Neil Cavuto that Holder “needs to be held accountable.”
ACTION: Please click here to ask your Representative to follow Walsh’s lead in calling for Attorney General Eric Holder to resign.
Gun Owners of America8001 Forbes Place, Suite 102
Springfield, VA 22151
Phone: 703-321-8585
FAX: 703-321-8408
www.gunowners.org
About:
Gun Owners of America (GOA) is a non-profit lobbying organization formed in 1975 to preserve and defend the Second Amendment rights of gun owners. GOA sees firearms ownership as a freedom issue.
NRA: Biden Shoves Foot in Mouth… Again
Americans could have taken little comfort when the man a heartbeat away from the nation’s nuclear launch codes predicted, in another context, “If we do everything right, if we do it with absolute certainty, there’s still a 30 percent chance we’re going to get it wrong.”
This week, however, Vice-President Joe Biden increased his probability of error to 100 percent, making and repeating statements indicating that he’s just about the only elected official in America that doesn’t know that violent crime has been declining for the last 20 years. Read more
The Daily Telegram Notes FBI Report: Less crime despite more firearms
Last week The Daily Telegram of Lenawee County in Michigan had a story that most larger outlets never reported on, namely that crime is down again according to the FBI statistics, yet gun owners is up. The paper noted:
“The statistics show that violent crime actually fell six percent in 2010. Rates are less than half of what they were 20 years ago for murder and non-negligent manslaughter (4.8 per 100,000 population), the lowest since 1963.”
Last week there was outrage over the mass shooting, but this type of coverage is seldom reported. The paper further added:
“In fact, two of the three states with the highest murder levels — California and New York — also have the most restrictive gun laws, denying virtually all citizens the right to concealed carry to protect themselves.”
Again, where is the reporting on this angle of the story? There is no crime, so the media remains mum on the issue.
“Over 100 guns collected in Myrtle Beach buy-back effort”
Several outlets, including The Herald Online are noting that Myrtle Beach had a guy buyback this weekend, and most claims are it was successful. This is usually the case for these type of events, often based on little evidence that these ever get guns off the street.
But what makes this one stand out is that it includes two facts and seemingly ties them together:
First, it offers a thought from organizer Rev. Tim McCray:
“McCray said the inspiration for the gun buy-back was the success other communities across the country have had with similar initiatives.”
The next sentence then reads:
“An FBI report released this month showed the number of violent crimes across the U.S. in 2010 dropped 6 percent from the 2009 estimate.”
To the reader this would imply that gun buybacks are responsible for the drop in crime, yet this fact has never been actually attributed to gun buybacks. The reader of course might never be the wiser.
Hot Air: “Fast & Furious: FBI may have covered up third gun found at scene of agent’s death to protect informant”
This week Hot Air offered more disturbing news regarding Fast and Furious, noting that the FBI may have covered up evidence to protect an informant. But the article offers this thought too:
“If both the FBI and the ATF are involved in the Fast & Furious investigation, and by ‘involved in’ … ‘withholding relevant information from,’ who’s the higher-up at the DOJ that’s overseeing all of this?”
This is a question we’ve been asking for some time. How could this involve both the ATF and FBI and yet Attorney General Eric Holder claims to know nothing? That seems implausible actually.
