[HTML1]
John Lott reckons more guns equals less crime. FBI crime stats reveal less crime. Gun sales stats reveal more guns. It could be one of those “correlation doesn’t equal causation” deals. Yes but—concealed carry should have an inhibitory effect on crime at some point, shouldn’t it? Case study: Lee County Florida has issued 30,908 concealed weapons permits. The County has 620,151 residents. Assuming one gun, one permit, one concealed weapon, 4.98 percent of the population are tooled-up. (In practical terms it’s probably less than half that). edr.state.fl.us reports that Lee County’s violent crime rate sank 16.6% year-on-year. Murder stats dropped 26.3%. At what point, with what evidence, can gun control advocates argue that the mere existence of armed civilians deters violent crime? I know! Common sense!