Guns Save Lives
December 27, 2012 by Wayne Allyn Root
Hello, I’m Wayne Allyn Root for Personal Liberty. Happy Holidays to all my readers. My message is pretty simple this week: Don’t believe the hype from liberals or the media (I know I repeat myself). The fact is: GUNS SAVE LIVES.
Not only do liberals lie… they always come to the wrong conclusion, and usually come up with the wrong solution, in response to every crisis.
As an example, we don’t have a “fiscal cliff” crisis because of a tax problem in America. What we have is a spending problem — Obama is a spending addict. Obama criticized Bush for adding $4 trillion to the debt in eight years. Yet Obama added just under $6 trillion in four years. He is on track to add $12 trillion to our debt by the end of his second term– three times more than Bush. And Obama has produced four consecutive trillion dollar plus deficits for the first time in history. Obama is the biggest spender of any politician in world history.
What does this have to do with guns? It’s the same story. Every time there’s a crisis politicians learn the wrong lesson… come up with the wrong solution… and always use the crisis as a reason to take away our freedoms and grow government bigger.
Take the debt crisis: Obama wants to raise taxes, so we lose our economic freedom, and government grows bigger… while we add more debt to solve a debt crisis. That should work out well!
Take 9/11 — Bush spent billions on the formation of Homeland Security, hundreds of thousands of expensive new government employees, started two wars, and took many of our civil rights away.
Take global warming — Obama wants to tax us to death, double our electric bills, take away our freedoms, and put government in charge of business.
Take the health care crisis — Obama passed Obamacare to raise our taxes, grow government, unionize healthcare workers, and put government in charge of our health.
The same story holds true with the gun control issue spurred by the tragic Newtown school shooting. The liberal politicians and media are using Rahm Emanuel’s famous saying, “Never let a crisis go to waste.” They are trying to turn a terrible tragedy into a gun problem. Their solution is to try to demonize and ban guns. But the Newtown tragedy wasn’t a gun problem; it was a mental illness problem.
Thank goodness the American public has more common sense than the politicians and media big shots. The latest Rasmussen poll is out following the Newtown tragedy. While 27 percent think stricter gun control laws are the solution… a dominant 48 percent believe the answer is more action to treat mental health issues.
It is obvious that many Americans feel in their gut what the statistics I’m about to share with you prove — that guns do much more than kill (in the wrong hands). More often than not, they save lives and prevent violence.
Here are a few proven facts that are too often missing from the gun debate (Thanks to Gun Owners of America and ZeroHedge.com for these statistics):
Based on a 2000 study, Americans use guns to defend themselves from crime and violence 989,883 times annually. Banning guns would leave about 1,000,000 Americans defenseless from criminals who have no problem acquiring guns illegally.
A nationwide survey of almost 5,000 households found that over a five-year period 3.5 percent of households had a member who used a gun to protect themselves, their family, or their property. This also adds up to about the same 1,000,000 incidents annually.
The Clinton Justice Department identified 1.5 million cases per year of citizens using guns to defend themselves.
Another survey found that Americans use guns to frighten intruders away from a home break-in about 500,000 times annually.
Armed citizens shoot criminals more than twice as often as police each year (1,527 to 606).
Each year about 200,000 women use a gun to defend themselves from a sexual crime or abuse.
The Carter Justice Department found that of more than 32,000 attempted rapes, 32 percent were actually committed. But when a woman was armed with a gun or knife, only 3 percent of the attempted rapes were actually successful.
Newer studies all point towards a figure of 2.5 million — that’s the new number for how many times Americans defend themselves from violent criminals each year. 2.5 million. Guns save lives.
Now that we’ve polled the citizens, how about we see what the felons have to say:
- A survey of male felons in 11 State prisons across the USA found that 34 percent had been scared off, wounded or captured by an armed victim of their crime.
- 40 percent of felons made a decision not to commit a crime because they feared the potential victim had a gun.
- 69 percent of felons knew other fellow criminals who had been scared off or captured by an armed victim.
- 57 percent of felons polled agreed that “criminals are more worried about meeting an armed victim than they are about running into the police.”
- Statistical comparisons with other countries show that burglars in the United States are far less apt to enter an occupied home than their foreign counterparts who live in countries where fewer civilians own firearms.
These facts (and many more too voluminous to show here) prove that guns — in the right hands — defend citizens, families and children. In short, guns save lives.
By the way… it’s important to note that Barack Obama wants to disarm schools… create “gun free zones.” Yet he spends $60,000 per year to send his precious daughters to exclusive Sidwell Friends School — which has? Drumroll please… ARMED guards. An armed security force of nine to be precise.
And David Gregory of NBC News sends his child there too. Armed guards are necessary for their children. But not yours.
And Michael Moore has armed bodyguards. While he condemns guns.
But for me, it’s always been a personal and emotional argument, even more than a factual one. I’m a proud Jewish American. Over six million of my fellow Jews were enslaved, starved, tortured, and then slaughtered by Adolph Hitler. Before it could happen, in 1938, Hitler banned gun ownership for Jews.
That act on Nov. 11, 1938 was the beginning of the end for German Jews. Millions of Jews were left defenseless from that day forward. Just like the criminals in the studies above, who were far less likely to break into a home or attack a victim, if they feared the victim was armed; Hitler only started his murderous genocide after first ensuring his victims were disarmed, defenseless and helpless.
But why should that surprise anyone. Virtually every dictator in history has started his murderous reign by disarming the population.
The communist leaders of China recently issued a statement in response to our Newtown, Conn., tragedy. They said that Obama must disarm the American people. I wonder why they’re so interested in our people being disarmed? What do you think they have in mind?
I’m a member of both the NRA (National Rifle Association) and JPFO (Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership). Will I support reasonable gun control? Of course.
Should we ensure that mentally ill people cannot purchase guns? Of course.
Should we enforce current gun laws? Of course.
But should we move to ban guns, thereby leaving the law-abiding citizens defenseless and helpless? Never. Not in America.
Should government and law enforcement be the only ones legally able to carry guns? Never. Not in America.
Should government be allowed to take away guns from honest, law-abiding homeowners, business owners, and citizens like me? Only when you pry them from my cold, dead hands.
Thomas Jefferson put it best: “When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny.”*
I’m Wayne Allyn Root for Personal Liberty. See you next week, same time, same place.
Happy New Year. Stay safe and stay vigilant. God Bless.
* While this quote if often attributed to Jefferson, there is no evidence that he ever uttered or wrote these words, according to Monticello.org.–BL
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