Gun Talk Radio Press Release, by Tom Gresham:
The FBI released its crime stats for the first half of 2010. We have more guns, more concealed carry folks, and we are almost six years past the expiration of the stupid Clinton “assault weapon” ban. The last two years have seen record increases in gun sales. So, with all these guns, how bad has crime gotten? It will come as no surprise to those with more than a room-temperature IQ that crime continues to go down.
According to the FBI, violent crime is down 6.2 percent over the same period in 2009, and homicide is down 7.1 percent. Further, robberies are down 10.7 percent, rapes down 6.2 percent, aggravated assaults down 3.9 percent, and burglaries dropped 1.4 percent.
Crime stats are subject to “tweaking” by police departments (who have been knows to downgrade crimes as a way of improving their performance numbers), but these are impressive numbers.
Just a touch more food for thought . . . homicides rose in the Northeast (can you say “harder to get a carry permit?”), but took a dramatic 12-percent dive in the South with expanded access to guns, like constitutional carry in Arizona.
It’s not possible to directly attribute these drops in crime to the increase in guns — there are just too many variables at work. But, we can say with absolute certainty that more ARs, more pistols, (we’ve seen two years of record gun sales), and more people carrying guns for their own protection (Alaska and Arizona removed the requirement for a permit!) has NOT resulted in an increase in violent crime or homicide.
