Let's research gun violence.

[Direckshun]

I've said this in a couple other threads, but I don't believe that gun control is going to get any traction in Congress. Some Democrats will push for it, some other Republicans will table it, some pro-gun control folks like myself will cry foul, and yet another Congress will pass without any gun control measures seeing the light of day.

But here's one thing that maybe we can start doing: better educate ourselves on gun violence, so we can stop stabbing in the dark as to what we can better do to mitigate it.

The problem is that for a couple decades now, the government has not been able to produce any information on gun violence because the NRA has been threatening war if Congress failed to choke off all funding for gun-related research.

The CDC and NIH used to conduct research for decades, but around the time of the late 90s, the NRA became so powerful it was able to prevent these agencies from granting funds to researchers on those topics. McClatchy DC:

The CDC and NIH award billions in grants. They fund research into cancer, brain injury, tobacco use, obesity, AIDS, abortion, hearing loss, allergies, infectious diseases, back pain and virtually everything else related to human health. But gun violence is the one area that carries that specific language. The effect has been to limit federal funding into research that could be used to shape policy.

This is irresponsible. We pass hundreds of gun-related laws across the country every few years. Like all laws, we should be able to research the impact of the laws we pass, so we can make decisions based on more than pure ideology.

Anyway, there's a ton of stories on this, but here's a really good one from last year in the Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/26/us...anted=all&_r=0

N.R.A. Stymies Firearms Research, Scientists Say
By MICHAEL LUO
Published: January 25, 2011

In the wake of the shootings in Tucson, the familiar questions inevitably resurfaced: Are communities where more people carry guns safer or less safe? Does the availability of high-capacity magazines increase deaths? Do more rigorous background checks make a difference?

The reality is that even these and other basic questions cannot be fully answered, because not enough research has been done. And there is a reason for that. Scientists in the field and former officials with the government agency that used to finance the great bulk of this research say the influence of the National Rife Association has all but choked off money for such work.

“We’ve been stopped from answering the basic questions,” said Mark Rosenberg, former director of the National Center for Injury Control and Prevention, part of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which was for about a decade the leading source of financing for firearms research.

Chris Cox, the N.R.A.’s chief lobbyist, said his group had not tried to squelch genuine scientific inquiries, just politically slanted ones.

“Our concern is not with legitimate medical science,” Mr. Cox said. “Our concern is they were promoting the idea that gun ownership was a disease that needed to be eradicated.”

The amount of money available today for studying the impact of firearms is a fraction of what it was in the mid-1990s, and the number of scientists toiling in the field has dwindled to just a handful as a result, researchers say.

The dearth of money can be traced in large measure to a clash between public health scientists and the N.R.A. in the mid-1990s. At the time, Dr. Rosenberg and others at the C.D.C. were becoming increasingly assertive about the importance of studying gun-related injuries and deaths as a public health phenomenon, financing studies that found, for example, having a gun in the house, rather than conferring protection, significantly increased the risk of homicide by a family member or intimate acquaintance.

Alarmed, the N.R.A. and its allies on Capitol Hill fought back. The injury center was guilty of “putting out papers that were really political opinion masquerading as medical science,” said Mr. Cox, who also worked on this issue for the N.R.A. more than a decade ago.

Initially, pro-gun lawmakers sought to eliminate the injury center completely, arguing that its work was “redundant” and reflected a political agenda. When that failed, they turned to the appropriations process. In 1996, Representative Jay Dickey, Republican of Arkansas, succeeded in pushing through an amendment that stripped $2.6 million from the disease control centers’ budget, the very amount it had spent on firearms-related research the year before.

“It’s really simple with me,” Mr. Dickey, 71 and now retired, said in a telephone interview. “We have the right to bear arms because of the threat of government taking over the freedoms that we have.”

The Senate later restored the money but designated it for research on traumatic brain injury. Language was also inserted into the centers’ appropriations bill that remains in place today: “None of the funds made available for injury prevention and control at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention may be used to advocate or promote gun control.”

The prohibition is striking, firearms researchers say, because there are already regulations that bar the use of C.D.C. money for lobbying for or against legislation. No other field of inquiry is singled out in this way.

In the end, researchers said, even though it is murky what exactly is allowed under this provision and what is not, the upshot is clear inside the centers: the agency should tread in this area only at its own peril.

“They had a near-death experience,” said Dr. Arthur Kellermann, whose study on the risks versus the benefits of having guns in the home became a focal point of attack by the N.R.A.

In the years since, the C.D.C. has been exceedingly wary of financing research focused on firearms. In its annual requests for proposals, for example, firearms research has been notably absent. Gail Hayes, spokeswoman for the centers, confirmed that since 1996, while the agency has issued requests for proposals that include the study of violence, which may include gun violence, it had not sent out any specifically on firearms.

“For policy to be effective, it needs to be based on evidence,” said Dr. Garen Wintemute, director of the Violence Prevention Research Program at the University of California, Davis, who had his C.D.C. financing cut in 1996. “The National Rifle Association and its allies in Congress have largely succeeded in choking off the development of evidence upon which that policy could be based.”

Private foundations initially stepped into the breach, but their attention tends to wax and wane, researchers said. They are also much more interested in work that leads to immediate results and less willing to finance basic epidemiological research that scientists say is necessary to establishing a foundation of knowledge about the connection between guns and violence, or the lack thereof.

The National Institute of Justice, part of the Justice Department, also used to finance firearms research, researchers said, but that money has also petered out in recent years. (Institute officials said they hoped to reinvigorate financing in this area.)

Stephen Teret, founding director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, estimated that the amount of money available for firearms research was a quarter of what it used to be. With so much uncertainty about financing, Mr. Teret said, the circle of academics who study the phenomenon has fallen off significantly.

After the centers’ clash with the N.R.A., Mr. Teret said he was asked by C.D.C. officials to “curtail some things I was saying about guns and gun policy.”

Mr. Teret objected, saying his public comments about gun policy did not come while he was on the “C.D.C. meter.” After he threatened to file a lawsuit against the agency, Mr. Teret said, the officials backed down and gave him “a little bit more leeway.”

C.D.C. financing for research on gun violence has not stopped completely, but it is now mostly limited to work in which firearms are only a component.

The centers also ask researchers it finances to give it a heads-up anytime they are publishing studies that have anything to do with firearms. The agency, in turn, relays this information to the N.R.A. as a courtesy, said Thomas Skinner, a spokesman for the centers.

Invariably, researchers said, whenever their work touches upon firearms, the C.D.C. becomes squeamish. In the end, they said, it is often simply easier to avoid the topic if they want to continue to be in the agency’s good graces.

Dr. Stephen Hargarten, professor and chairman of emergency medicine at the Medical College of Wisconsin, used to direct a research center, financed by the C.D.C., that focused on gun violence, but he said he had now shifted his attention to other issues.

[luv]

Originally Posted by Garcia Bronco

Bah....A 9mm is weak sauce.

Would it kill or at least stop someone if they entered my home? I'd say that's good enough.

Plus, I've NEVER shot a gun before. It would probably be plenty.

[Radar Chief]

Originally Posted by luv

So, I had it all planned to go out to my friend's farm, and he and another friend were going to show me how to shoot. I texted him yesterday morning, and he said it was too cold, and that he and his family would probably nap that afternoon. I decided to stay in and watch movies. He texts me later to say he's mad at me, because him and our other friend ended up shooting his mom's 9mm. WTF? I was so excited to go out there and try it. He tells me no, and then it's my fault for deciding to stay in?

So, no shooting for me. I was really looking forward to it, too.

And, I know, good story...lol.

Your friend sounds pretty flakey, not sure I want to be around that person when a loaded gun is involved.

[LiveSteam]

Originally Posted by luv

Would it kill or at least stop someone if they entered my home? I'd say that's good enough.

Plus, I've NEVER shot a gun before. It would probably be plenty.

You would be better off with a Taurus Judge.

[Radar Chief]

Originally Posted by luv

Would it kill or at least stop someone if they entered my home? I'd say that's good enough.

Plus, I've NEVER shot a gun before. It would probably be plenty.

Yes, a 9mm can kill. A .22 can kill with proper bullet placement.
Story from WWII on the 9mm is that a Nazi officer would shoot an American officer with his 9mm Luger, which would thoroughly piss off the American officer who would pull his Colt .45 and shoot then Nazi officer then limp off to the nearest aid station with a 9mm Luger as a trophy of his kill.

[CoMoChief]

Originally Posted by Radar Chief

Your friend sounds pretty flakey, not sure I want to be around that person when a loaded gun is involved.

what?

[RNR]

Originally Posted by luv

Would it kill or at least stop someone if they entered my home? I'd say that's good enough.

Plus, I've NEVER shot a gun before. It would probably be plenty.

A 9mm has good stop power. There is a whole bunch of macho talk with guns. I can assure you a 9mm hollow point is more than suffice. The part that bothers me about your post is the "I've never shot a gun before" IMO you have no business handling one in a situation where life and death is involved. You need to get some training and plenty of practice. You should be completely comfortable with the gun and very familiar with shooting it. If you have never shot one and ended up in that situation it would most likely end poorly for you~

[InChiefsHell]

Originally Posted by RedNeckRaider

A 9mm has good stop power. There is a whole bunch of macho talk with guns. I can assure you a 9mm hollow point is more than suffice. The part that bothers me about your post is the "I've never shot a gun before" IMO you have no business handling one in a situation where life and death is involved. You need to get some training and plenty of practice. You should be completely comfortable with the gun and very familiar with shooting it. If you have never shot one and ended up in that situation it would most likely end poorly for you~

Dude. I think she was just going to shoot it to shoot it. It's the exploratory phase. I don't think she was talking about going out and buying one like right now...

[RNR]

Originally Posted by InChiefsHell

Dude. I think she was just going to shoot it to shoot it. It's the exploratory phase. I don't think she was talking about going out and buying one like right now...

Cool, there are many options out there. She just needs to do some research. I just want to encourage her to put in the range time on whatever gun she chooses~

[Chief Gump]

Originally Posted by Direckshun

No, the answer I gave was that Switzerland was a country club -- it has 9 million people, and is astoundingly wealthy.



You actually didn't. Not even close, really. You offered a bullshit line in the sand ("people directly affected by gun violence") which isn't even meaningfully measured, without explaining why it must be people directly affected.

As I said, we've all been affected and mourned Newtown, but in your eyes our mourning doesn't count because we're not closely related to the victims.

Answer his ****ing question.

[CoMoChief]

Originally Posted by Chief Gump

Answer his ****ing question.

You're talking to the biggest liberal on the board here....which means common sense is not applicable......good luck

[Radar Chief]

Originally Posted by CoMoChief

what?

Not very well stated but I want to be able to trust the people I go out shooting with. That's all.

[RNR]

Originally Posted by Radar Chief

Not very well stated but I want to be able to trust the people I go out shooting with. That's all.

I agree, I enjoyed it and it is a lot of fun. I will only do it with people I trust and know~

[luv]

Originally Posted by RedNeckRaider

A 9mm has good stop power. There is a whole bunch of macho talk with guns. I can assure you a 9mm hollow point is more than suffice. The part that bothers me about your post is the "I've never shot a gun before" IMO you have no business handling one in a situation where life and death is involved. You need to get some training and plenty of practice. You should be completely comfortable with the gun and very familiar with shooting it. If you have never shot one and ended up in that situation it would most likely end poorly for you~

Oh, I don't own one, and I would never even consider purchasing one until I learned to shoot and knew about safety and maintenance. Since I don't think people should be able to purchase a gun without a recent gun safety course certificate, I would not purchase one without having one.

[CoMoChief]

Originally Posted by Radar Chief

Not very well stated but I want to be able to trust the people I go out shooting with. That's all.

ah i see....can't fault anyone for that.

[Direckshun]

Originally Posted by pr_capone

No "assault" rifles used in Sandy Hook.

Originally Posted by AustinChief

Yes, but Direckshun doesn't care, he wants ALL semi-automatic weapons BANNED.

I would argue against assault weapons because of their capacity for death, not their existence in any particular tragedy.