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An editorial published by the editorial board Minneapolis’ StarTribune is beats what has become a familiar drum by claiming guns and COVID have a great deal in common:

Nothing will bring back the loved ones we’ve lost to the pandemic, but at least we’ll be worrying about our old familiar foes — heart disease, for example, and cancer.

And guns.

Gun violence remains one of the more potent threats to U.S. public health. Firearms play a role in most of the murders committed in the United States each year, and in more than half the suicides. More people die from gun violence than from traffic accidents.

Hold up there. According to the CDC “road traffic crashes are a leading cause of death in the United States for people aged 1-54.”

The National Safety Commission lists approximately 38,800 deaths from car accidents in 2019 and says the numbers are much worse in 2020. Apparently there’s been a massive reduction in cars on roadways due to lockdowns but our traffic accident rate is high meaning the percentage rate of accidents per drivers on the roads has rocketed.

According to the Association for Safe International Road Travel the United States has a 50 percent higher fatal-crash rate than similar countries such as Canada, Australia, and Japan. That death rate in 2019 was 12.4 deaths per 100,000 people which was actually a two percent reduction over 2018 (but now, in 2020, it’s gone up).

In 2018 NPR reported on deaths related to gun violence – not suicide or officer-involved shootings – with the following:

The United States has the 28th-highest rate of deaths from gun violence in the world: 4.43 deaths per 100,000 people in 2017 — far greater than what is seen in other wealthy countries.

If you count every gun-related death ever from 2017, meaning suicides, officer-involved shootings, accidents, drug deals gone back, gang shootings, and so on, you get 39,773 or 12 per 100,000 people, says the CDC.

Bottom line, the traffic accident idea of guns being worse than cars isn’t accurate. Even the CDC admits traffic fatalities are among the top three leading causes of death in the United States: heart disease, cancer, and accidents including motor vehicle traffic deaths.

And don’t even get us started on the number of deaths due to medical errors each year, a number that dwarfs firearms-related deaths (including suicides).

Here’s how the Strib’s editorial compared COVID to guns regarding what they feel is an inability to comprehend facts by the average and apparently stupid citizen:

A survey reported this month by Pew Research found that about 4 Americans in 10 say they would not take the COVID vaccine if it were offered to them. Then there is the small but growing population of children whose parents refuse to vaccinate them against once-common diseases like whooping cough. And let’s not forget the people who refuse to wear a mask during the pandemic, or who insist that the pandemic itself is a hoax. Their antipathy to scientific fact — perhaps it’s just antipathy to facts, period — may help explain why the United States has lost more people to COVID than any other country on earth.

In the gun debate, there are similar contradictions between demonstrable fact and stubborn belief. For example, in a new survey commissioned by the Joyce Foundation and the George Family Foundation (bit.ly/JoyceResearch), two-thirds of likely Minnesota voters say they believe the presence of a gun makes a household safer. In fact, people who have a gun in the house are at considerably greater risk. For every anecdote about a homeowner’s defense of his castle, there are instances of tragedy — a toddler dead, a suicide completed, a domestic dispute turned fatal.

Yes, it’s “antipathy to scientific fact” that’s causing people to eschew the COVID vaccine and to feel guns are a good idea for self-defense. Totally.

What do you think, are people just dumb and uneducated, unable to comprehend scientific facts? Is that the problem here? Or is the issue perhaps that the other side of the aisle enjoys fabricating information and twisting details to suit their needs?

 

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72 COMMENTS

  1. (undeniable) FACT: Life is a lot easier, and more fun when you put truth ahead of facts. Once you get over/beyond the “fact” that thinking you are one thing or another makes is truth, a whole new and exciting world opens up. I can decide I am a magic frog, and kissing you will make you a billionaire. If you don’t believe the truth, you will remain poor forever; your fault, not mine.

  2. “…More people die from gun violence than from traffic accidents….”

    Whoa, hold your horses, there, StarTribune. I think even the most low-informational, anti-gun Leftist, tie-dye shirt wearing Walmart shopper would raise an eyebrow at that statement. Are you trying to tell me that with all the dingbats out there on the roads who fly by me on the highway doing Warp 7 and changing lanes without a signal, or navigating four-way intersections while looking down at their phones and driving with their knees (just saw another person doing that this week), AND all the drunk drivers (and now cannabis impaired), there are more gun-related deaths than vehicular?

    Links to supportable facts, pleez.

    • “Are you trying to tell me that ….there are more gun-related deaths than vehicular?”

      The ranking may change, from time to time, but if the count of deaths due to firearms is simply one more than the number of deaths from vehicle accidents, then, yes, there would be “….more gun-related deaths than vehicular.” This is how the enemy deals with “facts”.

      • Never mind that they include suicides in with that figure.
        Your body…your choice…just like the 800,000 or so abortions every year…right?
        Suicides should NOT be included unless they were part of a murder-suicide.

        • I guess you’re right, someone dying violently from a self-inflicted gunshot wound is not gun violence, OK.

        • Miner, by your logic we should also be talking about rope violence, pill overdose violence, running a car engine in a closed garage violence, etc. etc.

          Ascribing violent intentions to inanimate objects is just one more pathetic attempt at disingenuous leftist wordplay. Stop using the tragic deaths of suffering people as props for your immoral policy agenda.

        • “I guess you’re right, someone dying violently from a self-inflicted gunshot wound is not gun violence, OK.”

          It’s a *voluntary* fatality, not imposed against someone’s will, moron…

        • Sorry, Miner, I have to go with the crowd on this one. Violence is something inflicted by one person against another person or thing, not a self inflicted harm. Further, the “violence” is the act, not the instrument.

          Self-inflicted deaths by firearm, as even the Star Trib recognized, account for something less than half of all successful suicides, and in Japan, account for a very small fraction of all suicides in a country with one of the highest suicide rats in the world, establishing that guns are simply a means to a desired end. Where there is a will there is a way, and banning guns will not have any appreciable effect on the suicide rate. A suicide will simply choose another instrument of self-destruction among the thousands of possible choices.

        • Mark, thanks for your rational reply.

          The problem with guns and suicide is the finality of the act. And many people attempt suicide as an unconscious plea for help, rather than a rational and thought out plan.

          There are very few gun suicide attempts that fail, as opposed to drugs, etc.

          And the fact is, every time a person attempt suicide with a gun, we have a case of an individual who should have never been allowed access to a firearm.

          The large number of firearm suicides means, by definition, our system to keep guns out of the hands of those who would hurt themselves or others is failing.

        • “Our system to keep guns out of the hands of those who would hurt themselves or others is failing.”

          I actually agree with some of what you wrote, Miner, but here’s the problem: it isn’t possible to predict the future. You don’t know – and can’t know – who *would* do anything, and this is the problem with leftist social engineering. It’s tempting to think that if we could just make the system “better” or “smarter” somehow – if we could just find the exact right algorithm, inputs, technology, or set of rules – we could prevent harm to certain, specific people while protecting freedom for other certain, specific people. But you can’t, because government systems don’t (and can’t) account for the profound complexity of individual thought, emotion, and behavior. Government systems are macro-level social systems for a reason, and as a result they’re crude, imprecise, and often unfair. This might be worth putting up with for certain core governmental responsibilities, but not for most things – and definitely not when individual liberties are on the line.

          If you care about people, you should care about them as individuals and treat them as such. That’s where you can actually help someone… not with social engineering and a cracked and broken government crystal ball, but with your own compassion, intellect, time, and resources.

    • I’m sorry Haz… I just figured since I was doing Warp 7 there would be no reason to signal as you wouldn’t have any time to react anyway….

      And has for steering with my knees, I have plenty of experience has I have been doing it for over 45 years now… It’s how I used to read the newspaper before cell phones came along!

    • Don’t forget weaving in and out of traffic while simultaneously chugging down a coffee and using a battery powered curling iron.

  3. “Facts” (scientific or not) are objective things. “Objective” is the embodiment of privilege. Many cultures around the planet do not accept “objective” as a cultural norm, or, indeed, anything of value. Reality is not what “is”, but what I think “is” is.

    Being “objective” is blatant discrimination against whomever doesn’t believe the same “objective” you do. Discrimination, selecting, choosing, deciding, evaluating anything is harmful to those who do not share your “objectivity” because these are hallmarks of exclusivity. Excluding people, things and ideas makes those excluded feel bad. Denying people the freedom to believe and think what they want is unconstitutional, and a form of violence against others.

  4. “Excluding people, things and ideas makes those excluded feel bad. Denying people the freedom to believe and think what they want is unconstitutional, and a form of violence against others.”

    Hahahahahahahaha….someone actually said this.
    I guess there is snowflake born every minute……

    Besides, there is NO WAY to deny people the right to believe what they want, even if they believe such drivel as this: Dementia Joe is sane, smart as a whip, and honest…

    • “Besides, there is NO WAY to deny people the right to believe what they want,….”

      Oh yeah? Oh yeah?

      If you tell me I am not a magic frog, you are denying my constitutional right to believe as I wish, and by making me feel bad, insulted, inferior, unworthy, different, excluded, you are doing me violence.

      So there; take that you meany.

      I hope your mother gets holes in her combat boots.

        • “And I believe I’ll have a Boxing Day beer.”

          Understand the sentiment, but you are selling yourself way short: you could believe you are a boxing day beer.

      • ” I hope your mother gets holes in her combat boots”
        That is a statement that makes both somebody’s mother and their combat boots feel excluded,inferior,unworthy, insulted and different.
        And please dont get me started on you calling someone a meany.
        Methinks someone is due for some reeducation😀
        HAPPY 2021

  5. “Science” is the new religion. If you don’t believe in “science,” you will be shamed, marginalized, persecuted and eventually tortured.

    • “If you don’t believe in “science,” you will be shamed, marginalized, persecuted and eventually tortured.”

      “Science” is what I say it is, when I say it is.

      The Rabbit had it right.

    • Depends on whose science, and at what point in time, I guess. 🙂

      Fauci? CDC? WHO? The Governor’s? John Hopkins?

      At the beginning of 2020? Mid-year when it was bad to congregate for church, but okay to protest for BLM in tightly packed groups down the streets? Pre-election? Post-election?

      My favorite was when our CA Governor Newsom declared that masks must be worn while exercising, even during treadmill or jogging. Within only two days of that posted statement, the WHO itself posted on its own website that masks should NOT be worn during strenuous exercise.

  6. “If you tell me I am not a magic frog, you are denying my constitutional right to believe as I wish, and by making me feel bad, insulted, inferior, unworthy, different, excluded, you are doing me violence.”

    I never told you that you are not a magic frog. I’m sure you are , with warts, long tongue, and like to eat bugs.

    As far as my mother and her boots, she died in 1964, and there are no holes in combat boots when you’re in heaven, which I doubt you will ever reach.

    Meany??
    My biggest problem is the kindness I show to those with low mental acuity and inability to express themselves logically. I have always been taught, by my sainted mother, to be kind to the helpless and inarticulate.

    I can just imagine how difficult life must be for you….
    In any case, whether your post was satire or real, I am still laughing… 🙂

    Since I have never been know to be wrong, I can sincerely say that the plane on which I exist is so much higher than your own, I can only urge you to work hard and do your utmost to try to reach a higher elevation in your life. This will bring you contentment, peace, and finally the state of mind to accept the reality of what I have said.

    • “….I can sincerely say that the plane on which I exist is so much higher than your own, I can only urge you to work hard and do your utmost to try to reach a higher elevation in your life.”

      That, right there, is what I’m talking about. You make me feel bad through your expression of superiority. If people would stop being mean to each other, we could all get along, like Rodney said. Have you no shame, man; no shame?

      “Satire, you say? I would remind you that I do ridicule and mockery. Satire is well beyond my capability.

      Condolences on the loss of your mother. Mine passed twenty years ago, as did my Dad. Still sometimes uncomfortable being an orphan, after all these years.

  7. Lol
    Laughable!

    Interesting that no one seems to care much about the lives of the unborn.

    Interesting that no one seems to care much about the lives lost in Antifa/BLM riots.

    Interesting that no one seems to care much about the lives lost to drugs, alcohol, human trafficking, or any thing else.

  8. The anti-2A bunch have twisted facts, misrepresented their intentions and out right lied for decades. Surely no one is surprised that they are still doing it.

  9. Enough with the bullshit already. Obviously when people wrap their politics around their ability to accept facts, it all gets warped and distorted. Anti-vaxxers can believe the most idiotic crap, as can anti-gunners.

    There’re still those who think the world is either flat or hollow, we did not land on the moon, the Earth revolves around the Sun, Chem-Trails are a thing and Donal Trump leads a covert army fighting a global pedophile ring which itself operates out of the basement a pizza joint in D.C. that has no basement.

    There’s nothing new in this.

    So? What’s next?

      • Had Trump’s opponent been a Ham Sandwich,
        or a crack addled chimpanzee,
        Or a fucking witch on a broomstick,

        I will always vote for the opponent of a seditious traitor who attempted and continues to attempt a coup against the USA.

        The Never Trumpers warned you people about Trump and still you nominated the least competent human being claiming to be from the right wing.

        Shit, even that idiot Sarah Palin would have been a better choice in 2016!

        • enuf says “The Never Trumpers warned you”

          Oh the “Never Trumpers …” like Bill Kristol? …. Kristol made the attempt to promote the concept of forming a third political party, and the result could not have been more dismal. His proposal was to come up with The Owl Party as a centrist alternative and he nearly broke his nose, stumbling so magnificently. Once he realized there has already been a satirical Owl Party – one that stood for Out With Logic- he wavered on his cause, and once he was met with complete apathy it was mere hours later when he had abandoned his plan entirely.

          How about Jennifer Rubin she talked about the President and his supporters as people that need to be shunned and basically destroyed: she said… WHAT WE SHOULD BE DOING IS SHUNNING THESE PEOPLE. SHUNNING, SHAMING THESE PEOPLE IS A STATEMENT OF MORAL INDIGNATION. THESE PEOPLE ARE NOT FIT FOR POLITE SOCIETY.” “IT’S NOT ONLY THAT TRUMP HAS TO LOSE, BUT THAT ALL HIS ENABLERS HAVE TO LOSE. WE HAVE TO COLLECTIVELY IN ESSENCE BURN DOWN THE REPUBLICAN PARTY.”

          Or Sarah Longwell, publisher of The Bulwark Sarah says her next task is to support any Republicans who break with Trump or who work with….. Democrats.

          How about One of the loudest grousers out of this pack … MSNBC fixture Steve Schmidt. The man still clings to the mantle of “GOP strategist” although his electoral track record is not one he should invite people to look into. Last weekend Schmidt sent out a pathetic appeal to AOC, pleading with her to work together

          When AOC never gave Schmidt the strokes he desperately looked for, days later he came out to declare that he was now moving to…. the Democratic Party.

          After years of promoting Democrats and left-wing policies Schmidt’s suggested exodus has been followed by other figures. Staffer at The Bulwark Tim Miller made his own announced departure, and co-founder of The Lincoln Project, Jennifer Horn, bravely took to the airwaves of MSNBC to state that after years of battling the GOP she was leaving the GOP.

          Seems these “Never Trumpers” are (like you) nothing but vile, and hateful Democrats. Perhaps you should send them some more money.

        • Interseting coup using court challenges that your legally entitled to. As opposed to say conducting illegal spying with false information given to a court under oath. Oh the logic of a Quisling.

        • enuf says “Obviously when people wrap their politics around their ability to accept facts, it all gets warped and distorted…”(Then without a shred of self awareness says) “.If you supported Trump in the 2016 GOP Primary, this mess is your fault.”
          .
          enif; I’m pro gun and 2nd Amendment

          Biden/Harris/Beto:: We want to Confiscate guns!

          ebuf; You get my money and my vote!

          Tell us again (you self-righteous moron) about “Warped and Distorted”

        • Mess? She would of continued the destruction Obama started. We are much. Better off and your fucking welcome I supported him.

  10. Let’s see…you mean like 65% of gun deaths every year are suicides? Your body your choice…right? Just like those 800,000 or so abortions every year…RIGHT?
    And how most of the rest are brown on brown or black on black gang related shootings? Oh wait…that is racist…but FACTUAL
    How many are by legal gun owners?
    Oh…and how about 90-95% of those are by handguns…and NOT scary black “assault-style” rifles?
    Hmmmm………..
    Seems like the left/libs are the ones ignoring…quite blatantly…the FACTS…at least when it comes to legally owned firearms.

    • Leigh,

      You are touching upon the fact that feelings command the world-view of approximately 50% of the world’s population. When such people express “facts” or their positions, they are merely vomiting words in a desperate attempt to say something that resonates with you and compels you to either join their side or shut up.

      It should be obvious that feelings are whimsical and fickle and therefore positions and “facts” based on feelings will be all over the map — often inconsistent with parallel things in life and sometimes downright inconsistent with the same thing.

      The net result: it is just as impossible to reason with a “feelings” person as it is to reason with a serial rapist. Act accordingly.

  11. They might as well be announcing on billboards that the covid tyranny playbook is getting deployed against guns next.

    The war was over the day Americans allowed themselves to be literally muzzled without a peep of protest.

  12. Americas a wealthy country.Evidenced by a $600 stimulus check and billions in foreign aid. Spread er thick but my slice first.

  13. We hit a magic number a week ago. 100,000 covid cases reported and 1,304 deaths due to covid. Across all age ranges.
    I took their numbers as factual to do some simple math.

    Yeah. I like my immune system just fine.

    I still don’t understand why we’re locked down.
    Just glad I have a job where I rarely see anybody so no mask for me.

      • A 99% survival rate means potential casualties of 3.2 million US citizens, tilted towards 70+ age range which places the majority of mortality squarely in the Trump voter demographic.

        So that would be less Trump voters and less load on the Social Security system, interesting.

        • This bullshit would be laughable if we knew you didn’t actually believe it… but since you do, that just makes it pathetic and sad.

        • Where have you been? Trump voters have decided to go the way of Democrat voters and continue voting long after they’re dead.

        • You idiot. A 99% survival rate means of those who have contracted it, not 99% of the entire population.
          You use figures just like “experts” in our government. They throw so many numbers around, they have no real idea what they are talking about. The funny part is, it really doesn’t matter because enough people are too stupid and eat it all up.

        • You don’t think eventually everyone in the US will be exposed to Covid?

          I thought you guys were all about herd immunity, which would require that over 70% of the US pop would need to be exposed in order to develop a useful social immunity population.

          Face it, Trump dropped the ball on Covid and hundreds of thousands of Americans have died.

          Everyone here is familiar with Australia and hate their government, but their leaders do a much better job of keeping their citizens alive.

          Australia with 25 million inhabitants has 900 corona deaths. Therefore America with 330 million inhabitants should have 11,880 corona deaths. There are more than 330,000.

    • Hey Tom, GasdenFlag sent me a pic of a gator his buddy shot, 11footer, you need to fly down south.That sucker looks scary , whew I wouldn’t even make an appetizer.

  14. ‘The United States has the 28th-highest rate of deaths from gun violence in the world…’

    Wait, we’ve got more guns than the rest of the world combined but we only rank 28th in ‘gun death’ rate?!? Doesn’t that pretty much prove that guns don’t kill people, people do?

    The only thing that ‘gun violence’ and ‘COVID-19″ have in common is the significant number of people who died of COVID who also just happened to have the co-morbid condition of ‘gunshot wound’.

  15. The Star-Tribune would probably argue that men can transition to become women, because Science!

    It isn’t guns that kill people, it’s stupid people doing stupid things with guns that kills people.

  16. Not sure of your point here. Yes heart disease, traffic accident deaths are terrible, but they in no way reduce the tragedy of the hundreds of thousands who died preventable deaths from Covid. Had our beloved president, Fox News , and all the other legislators who followed both mentioned, endorsed social distancing and face masks from the start there would be many less dead right now. The argument these people would have died from something else anyway is not a valid argument, unless you feel it’s OK to push a 15 year old into oncoming traffic because he’s going to die someday.
    Additionally, had we begun social distancing and masking sooner, no one would need be upset by lockdowns not instituted with the lower numbers of infected and deaths. 🙁
    If you haven’t felt the pain of friends, family or coworkers dying from Covid, I am glad for you. I have lost 2 neighbors, and a very healthy RN coworker to Covid. My aunt was just hours away from death from Covid. We had trailers behind our hospital storing the bodies of people who died from Covid.

  17. The only salient “fact” from this article is that the left hates liberty and desperately wishes to remove it from you. The TRUTH is that ONLY Liberty will keep you safe.

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