The Empire Strikes Back: The Trace and New Yorker Attack John Lott’s Methods and Influence

By
Grace Stevens
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61

john lott

In recent years, gun companies have aggressively marketed semi-automatic AR-style rifles to civilians. Manufacturers now produce as many as two and a half million such firearms per year, and they routinely show up in the country’s deadliest and most horrifying acts of mass violence, such as the rampages that occurred, less than two weeks apart, in Buffalo, New York, and Uvalde, Texas, in May.

Last year, a federal court addressed the question of whether California could ban such guns. The state was one of eight, along with the District of Columbia, that had a prohibition in place. Multiple plaintiffs, including a handful of gun-rights groups, argued that the California statute was useless, relying on the statistical expertise of an economist named John R. Lott, Jr. Lott, who is sixty-four, with wispy gray hair, authoritatively delivers blizzards of empirical conclusions in an unthreatening Midwestern monotone. In a sworn statement to the court, Lott summarized his research on assault-weapon bans, writing that there is “no credible evidence” that such laws “have any meaningful effect of reducing gun homicides and no discernable crime-reduction impact.”

After a brief bench trial, the judge reached his decision in June, 2021. He overturned California’s ban, and quoted Lott’s assessment verbatim. Afterward, Lott published an op-ed in The Hill. The ruling “primarily concentrated on public safety,” he wrote, and “the judge relied on my research.”

For almost thirty years, Lott, who has a doctorate in economics from U.C.L.A., has provided the empirical backbone for the gun-rights movement. Virtually every statistical argument against regulation—made by lobbyists, Republican lawmakers, and National Rifle Association members alike—is based on his research, which reaches two conclusions: guns make Americans safer, and gun restrictions place them in danger. He stands against droves of distinguished academics who have determined that the opposite is true. But, in the scientific debate over firearms, no one has had greater influence.

Lott’s first and most famous book, “More Guns, Less Crime,” was published in 1998 by the University of Chicago Press, one of the country’s most prestigious academic publishers. The book has been republished multiple times, and offers one seemingly irrefutable statistic after another. It specifies that when states relaxed laws restricting the concealed carrying of handguns, counties saw a roughly eight-per-cent drop in murders, a five-per-cent reduction in rapes, and a seven-per-cent decrease in aggravated assaults. The text is the basis for arguments blaming “gun-free zones” for mass shootings, and the notion, popularized by the N.R.A., that only a good guy with a gun can stop a bad guy with a gun. “Overall,” Lott writes, “my conclusion is that criminals as a group tend to behave rationally—when crime becomes more difficult, less crime is committed.”

Eight books have followed “More Guns, Less Crime,” including “The War on Guns: Arming Yourself Against Gun Control Lies,” and “Gun Control Myths: How Politicians, the Media, and Botched ‘Studies’ Have Twisted the Facts on Gun Control.” Lott has also produced a steady stream of scholarly articles published in academic periodicals, along with op-eds that appear in regional newspapers and the Times and the Wall Street Journal. He has had appointments at Ivy League schools, and his work is touted by leading Republican politicians, including Donald Trump and Senator Ted Cruz, of Texas. “What makes him so invaluable,” Cruz has written of Lott, “is his ability to go beyond philosophical arguments and to engage opponents of gun ownership on the facts.”

Lott’s findings and methods have generated scathing criticism from prominent academics, who have questioned his veracity and exposed flaws in his work. But the critiques have not diminished his stature. Instead, they have fed the conspiracy-oriented mentality of the gun-rights movement. In the eyes of its adherents, and in the messaging of the gun lobby and trade groups, attempts to discredit Lott are really attempts to suppress the truth. …
 
Without Lott, there would be no counter-narrative for those who have come to need one. Gun rights represent a way of life, an identity tied to ideas about individualism that, for many Americans, fill a void. Republicans like Cruz recognize the potency of the issue, and use it to mobilize voters, reinforcing the notion that they are protecting society by arming themselves—a noble calling. During the pandemic, Americans have bought more firearms than ever before, and, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, gun homicides have surpassed their previous all-time peak, reached in 1993. In Philadelphia, the number of permits issued rose from seventy-four hundred, in 2020, to fifty-two thousand, in 2021. Last year, there were five hundred and sixty-one murders in the city—the highest number ever recorded there. The violence has been normalized. In October, a fifteen-year-old boy shot to death four adults and a teen-ager in a middle-class neighborhood in Raleigh, North Carolina. The event hardly registered.

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61 COMMENTS

  1. Mr. Lott is obviously a target because his scholarship is correct.

    Empirical evidence versus “feels” or as they would say “follow the science”.

    • Funny that. The so-called Party of Science oft purposefully ignores the Science when it doesn’t follow their narrative. Amazing, isn’t it?

      “and they routinely show up”

      Routinely? “I do not think that word means what you think it means.” Like. At all. Nice disinformation campaign you have going on there, truly a shame I have to stamp it out.

      My name is Inigo Montoya, you killed my father. Prepare to die.

  2. “Instead, they have fed the conspiracy-oriented mentality of the gun-rights movement. In the eyes of its adherents, and in the messaging of the gun lobby and trade groups, attempts to discredit Lott are really attempts to suppress the truth. ”

    In the immortal words of the great American philosopher Major Frank Burns “I am only paranoid because everyone is against me!”

    Maybe if there wasn’t such an ongoing, open, and obvious effort to suppress the truth in all areas not in agreement with the government/socialist/fascist narrative we wouldn’t think every new effort to shut down something that doesn’t agree with the government/socialist/fascist narrative was a conspiracy.

    Something about thing doing duck stuff.

  5. THE PROOF IS IN THE HISTORY.

    The Paranoid Far Right consistently ignore what other nations have achieved in passing sane gun control laws. European countries as well as the industrialized countries of the Far East have ALL succeeded in reducing gun homicides to far lower levels than in Capitalvania where life is considered cheap and expendable, especially the lives of its own children.

    Gun control does not necessarily mean complete bans or confiscations. Universal Background Checks take no one’s guns from them nor do they prevent one from acquiring approved firearms either, yet the sick minds of the paranoid Far Right cannot be reasoned with.

    Safe Storage laws take no one’s firearms either and prevent needless child deaths as well as reducing the theft of firearms by quicky smash and grab robberies which are what the majority of firearms robberies are yet the paranoid sick Far Right cannot be reasoned with.

    The Far Right have also ignored our own gun control law the NFA act which vastly reduced crime and mass murder with full auto weapons.

    • Fuck you and your “approved” firearms. If the gun functions properly, it’s approved.

    • The government is to blame for the use of automatic weapons by gangster during Prohibition. Booze was banned, the demand for booze did not go away, and gangsters filled that demand. The gangsters fought each other with automatic weapons to gain sales territory for their booze.

      Ergo, no Prohibition, no demand for an “illegal” substance, no need for gangsters to use automatic weapons. As usual, the government screws everything up.

      • “Ergo, no Prohibition, no demand for an “illegal” substance, no need for gangsters to use automatic weapons”

        Brilliant! So when prohibition was repealed, gangsters never used automatic weapons ever again?

        Hilarious!

        • Bad people eat food, drink water, and breathe air. Therefore, it should be illegal to eat food, drink water, and breathe air, amirite.

        • minor49iq…Are you trying to say prohibition did not bring about rampant crime and violence? I mean even I could become a mobster if scumbags tried to prohibit guns. After all there is a Constitution to Defend…Drink to that bozo.

        • Up until Glock switches became popular amongst Urban Youth the illegal use of fully automatic weapons in the United States could have been counted on one hand. it’s not that people weren’t willing to use guns illegally, it’s just that very few fully automatic guns were available which also points out how few guns in general are actually used in crimes.

        • @Miner49er

          “Brilliant! So when prohibition was repealed, gangsters never used automatic weapons ever again?”

          that’s not what he said.

          He was positing a critique of the false correlation=causation lie in the article. In other words it was intelligent critique.

          Of course you didn’t know that and jumped to your ignorant confirmation bias.

        • No, you effing brain-dead simpleton, the Mafia moved on to OTHER “controlled substances” and other government-mandated “prohibitions” – drugs, sex workers, gambling. Whatever the government prohibited, but people still wanted, the Mafia supplied.

          And they retained the need to protect their territories. So EVERYTHING that happened after the repeal of Prohibition was entirely predictable . . . for someone who wasn’t dumb as a box of rocks. Unfortunately, that would mean you. And once the Mafia PROVED the efficacy of this strategy, it was adopted by drug cartels, local criminal organizations, etc.

          If you weren’t as stupid as a brick wall, you would be aware of that. “If” – what a lovely word. If MajorStupidity wasn’t a drooling, uneducated moron, he would be less offensive. “If” MajorStupidity knew s*** from Shinola, he wouldn’t make such a complete fool of himself. “If” MajorStupidity had ever actually LEARNED anything, he wouldn’t make such an ass of himself every time he posts. “If’, MajorStupidity, “if”. Unfortunately, every time you post your stupid, uneducated, partisan bulls***, the rest of us are forced to deal with the reality of your abject, partisan, uneducated stupidity.

          We aren’t laughing with you, MajorStupidity, we are laughing AT you. Go vigorously and forcefully compact crystalline sodium chloride into your anal cavity.

        • For bad hat harry: No, the problem was that local laws had prohibited handguns, but there were no restrictions whatsoever on submachine guns, which sold for about $25. This was PRIOR to NFA 1934, and criminals knew it was better to have a perfectly legal Thompson than to go to prison for mere possession of a .38 revolver. ie, the Mob’s use of full auto weapons was attributable to government common-sense prohibition of handguns.

    • To dacky boy’s Counterfactual Contrarian Copy-Pasta (CCCP), I have only two words.

      Duck season!

    • darcydodo…As much as you would like you cannot rewrite the confirmed chiseled history of Gun Control. You look silly trying to put a smiley face on Gun Control when Gun Control has more baggage than an International Airport.
      To prove how silly sick you are…Get yourself a box and go door to door in your neighborhood and demand occupants put their guns in your box. Don’t be surprised when some lady of the house slams a frying pan upside your crap filled head.

    • Other nations have achieved jack-shit, you moron.

      Why don’t you visit London, or Paris, or any of the other “cultural centers” you lefties worship. No, don’t go to the tourist traps. Instead, do as I did during my Navy career. When you go into a city, take off walking. Visit the slums and the barrios, the ghettos. Get out there and meet the real people who make the city work. Pack all those tourist traps up your arse, and get into the real world.

      Oh yeah. There’s a lot of London, Paris, and every other city where it is unsafe for you to walk alone. Gangs want to rob you, or beat you to death, or whatever. My walks through cities aren’t for pansies. Get down to the docks, the warehouse districts, the manufacturing and all the other things that put real life into the city.

      I say, you don’t have the balls. One foray, and you’ll be running back to the tourist traps, and those nice safe hotels that most Americans see when they travel abroad. Few see the nitty gritty, and the city itself certainly isn’t advertising their dirty laundry.

      Violence and crime are really no worse in the US than it is in Europe, or all the rest of your fantasy liberal world. Guns don’t make it worse – guns are just a tool. When you’ve been gutted with a fish hook in a fishing town, you may well wish the bastard who gutted you had used a gun instead.

      Here, have some toilet paper. You may want to wipe your mouth after spewing the smelly filth that you’ve just finished with.

      • In my many years and many travels I’ve discovered that the criminal element typically has a much higher level of situational awareness than a typical person does. I get sized up and left alone because of that. I’ve even had the pleasure of making friends with people that are heavily into the criminal element of their host countries. They respect me, and I respect them.

    • Lol you are just the worst. Such smug pseudo intellectual garbage anytime I read anything posted by you.

      It’s alright though. I remember when I was a young leftist myself. I will never forget how hollow and empty the life of a leftist is. Wrapped up in an insecure blanket of self superiority and ego. I had an excuse of only being 18-20 yo though…….

    • The trouble with people like you is that you trust other people you think are like you, with controlling power over your life.

      History is replete with lessons in this regard. Once you believe that those in power actually care about you, they have you right where they want you.

      That’s not right wing screwballery, it’s a fact. Our founders actually understood this. THEY didn’t trust such people even though it was THEM.

    • @dacian

      “Gun control does not necessarily mean complete bans or confiscations. Universal Background Checks take no one’s guns from them nor do they prevent one from acquiring approved firearms either, yet the sick minds of the paranoid Far Right cannot be reasoned with.”

      1. Gun control is an infringement. It always leads to “complete bans or confiscations” of something in some fashion to some extent. For example, that failed 1994 ban on so called ‘assault rifles’ was an attempt. Another example, more recently, the stabilizing brace. Another example, the ATF attack on 80% firearm kits. Another example, the confiscation during hurricane Katrina with a hastily declared and illegal and unconstitutional ‘gun control’ scheme of confiscation by the NOPD, aided by National guard on title 10 orders which means they were on federal active duty working for the U.S. government – door to door confiscation with literally armed police and armed federal troops. There are literally thousands of examples over time where ‘gun control’ has led to “complete bans or confiscations”. Is it dark in that cave you live in?

      2. Universal Background Checks do take guns from people. Yep, because it infringes ones right to do with their personal property as they choose and establishes a registry. This “approved” firearms thing – are you really serious? Do you even realize what you said with that word ‘approved’? Do you even know what an ‘approved’ firearms list does? An approved firearms list is specifically to ban firearms by allowing a ‘state’ approved item in lieu of. An “approved” firearms list is a ban in disguise with another name and an intentional infringement.

      The rest of what you wrote is just as obviously ignorant and delusional as your stupid I replied to above so i’m not going to even bother with the rest.

    • dacian the demented dips***,

      Sorry, I couldn’t discern if you were making an actual POINT through all the spittle.

      Do you have a SUBSTANTIVE rebuttal to Lott, or his statistics?? If so, please state it, so it can be discussed and evaluated. Your babbling incoherency of your typical “Reich-wingers are WRONG” idiocy is neither substantive, nor empirical, nor factual, nor persuasive.

      Try again, or shut up and go away.

      You are too stupid to be stealing oxygen. You are a walking, one-man argument for retroactive abortion.

  6. You don’t have to take his word for it. DOJ funded study said: “The Ban’s Reauthorization or Expiration Could Affect Gunshot Victimizations, But Predictions are Tenuous • Should it be renewed, the ban’s effects on gun violence are likely to be small at best and perhaps too small for reliable measurement. AWs were rarely used in gun crimes even before the ban. ”

    The gun control crowd can only make their case based on clever data manipulation, so they can’t have anyone questioning them. Most people honestly wouldn’t care what guns people own or can buy, if they don’t choose to buy an AR, why care if someone else can? The gun control crowd has to outrage machine responses to stuff like bump stocks, background checks, or pistol braces because otherwise no one would care. Government by study is a bad way to live, studies are frequently inaccurate or missing the whole picture, and our rights and constitution shouldn’t depend on the latest study release.

    So instead of just letting the facts if they have them speak they attack the man.

    • I agree. I really liked the XM177-E2 I carried in Vietnam, but never considered buying one, mostly because a worthwhile copy would be both full auto and a short barrelled rifle. So I did without until the AWB passed, I was at my dealer the next morning before it opened to buy a 16″ carbine, which cost twice what it had the day before. I have several more now, in a variety of calibers, but I guess I’m not doing it right since none have committed any crime, much less murdered me.

  7. Only people lower than home invasion scumbags are the Gun Control zealots whose sick Gun Control agenda ties the hands of the law abiding and rolls out the red carpet for all sorts of criminals.

    Make no mistake about it…The confirmed diabolical history of Gun Control confirms Gun Control is a Threat to you and yours. Therefore anyone promoting Gun Control should have to register their location like child molesters, etc.

  8. “He stands against droves of distinguished academics who have determined that the opposite is true.

    …

    In Philadelphia, the number of permits issued rose from seventy-four hundred, in 2020, to fifty-two thousand, in 2021. Last year, there were five hundred and sixty-one murders in the city—the highest number ever recorded there. The violence has been normalized.”

    Of course he “stands against droves of distinguished academics who have determined that the opposite is true.” – its because what those “droves of distinguished academics” claim isn’t true.

    This is a trick of the left uses to discredit, wording slight of hand.

    Lott has a doctorate in economics from U.C.L.A. – he too is a “distinguished academic”, but now suddenly he is implied lesser than these “droves of distinguished academics” who have determined that the opposite is true only because they say so. In short its a way to imply that Lott is lying, despite those “droves of distinguished academics” research having been discredited and debunked as false by independent researchers and even in some cases by some of those in those “droves of distinguished academics”.

    And on top of that Lott has worked for the DOJ (which the author of this hit piece didn’t even bother to mention, as it qualifies Lott even more) and has more first hand and empirical information and knowledge and saw first hand how the DOJ disregarded actual fact and chose those other “distinguished academics” to produce studies that satisfied the narrative the DOJ wanted.

    Then the author of this hit piece goes on to try to continue to push the, already many times dis-proven, narrative that because more people had permits the number of murders went up in Philadelphia. That is not true, the number of murders did not go up in Philadelphia because more people got permits. That’s the old correlation=causation lie. First, correlation can never equal causation, its impossible – its two different things by the way. Second, the number of violent crime events and murders were already on the rise in 2020 before the permits issued in 2021, it just wasn’t addressed until 2021 so it doesn’t appear in records and stats until 2021 which makes it look like an increase in murders with an increase in permits issued.

    • Well, Booger, I’ll just point out what you didn’t explicitly state.

      “Of course he “stands against droves of distinguished academics who have determined that the opposite is true.””

      That is an argument from authority. They don’t have a real argument against Lott, so they are trying to establish some kind of authority from which to dictate what they want.

      Or, stated another way, liberals are the authoritarians in this country. “Do what I say, because I say it!”

      • well, of course Paul. That’s part of the word slight of hand games the left plays, trying to argue from a position of authority that doesn’t exist. Anytime such an argument has to create an ‘authority’ it means the argument is false.

  12. When Albert Einstein heard about “100 Scientists against Einstein”, a collection of essays attacking his theory of relativity, he’s said to have remarked, “If I’m wrong, one would be enough.”

  13. The United States – the only country in the world where the government defines guaranteed constitutional rights for the law abiding by the acts of criminals.

    And here is a (presumably staunch) defender (New Yorker writer) of the first amendment trying to use their constitutional right to help that happen. Maybe he forgot why originally there is a first amendment and that its intent was also to protect the the constitution and ALL the rights guaranteed in the constitution by warning the public about infringements on their guaranteed constitutional rights. Instead, here he is trying to tear it down.

  14. This reminds me of Yamhill County Oregon Judge Ladd Wiles giving a marijuana bootlegger a free pass for shooting at his landlords’children in retaliation for efforts to evict because he used a politically correct, President Biden recommended, shotgun (Remington 870, tactical express with a 7 round magazine tube allegedly loaded with “harmless” buckshot rather than slugs). The pedigree of the bootleggers’ psychopathic attorney is priceless:

    https://casetext.com/case/state-v-silverman-19

    I believe that Jacob Silverman is the great grandfather of Geoffrey Silverman.

  15. For the life of me, I do not understand why anti-gunners think that the # of permits and the death toll equate to one another. Do they think that the inner city gangs and thugs go down to the sheriff’s office to apply for a carry permit??? Why don’t they prove that people who have carry permits cause the crimes…..because they cannot prove any such thing.
    Besides, if they hate guns why are they not SWATting gang members and taking their guns?

    • What they fail to see is that citizens are arming up BECAUSE of the high number of murders. Cause and effect.

  16. Billin didn’t you know that one needs a permit before using a gun to do a crime!
    Wonder how many are waiting in states that don’t have some form of permitless carry for a law to be passed before they do any crime. According to the left the number is huge. The fools think everyone else are fools too.

  17. “In Philadelphia, the number of permits issued rose from seventy-four hundred, in 2020, to fifty-two thousand, in 2021. Last year, there were five hundred and sixty-one murders in the city—the highest number ever recorded there. The violence has been normalized.”

    The author of this hit piece goes on to try to continue to push the, already many times dis-proven, narrative that because more people had permits the number of murders went up in Philadelphia. That is not true, the number of murders did not go up in Philadelphia because more people got permits. That’s the old correlation=causation lie. First, correlation can never equal causation, its impossible – its two different things by the way. Second, the number of violent crime events and murders were already on the rise in 2020 before the permits issued in 2021, it just wasn’t addressed until 2021 so it doesn’t appear in records and stats until 2021 which makes it look like an increase in murders with an increase in permits issued.

    But do you ya notice whats missing also from his delusional missive?

    1. How many of those murderers were not permit holders?
    2. How many of those murderers were permit holders?
    3. How many of those murderers were violent repeat offenders?
    4. How many of those murders were not conducted with guns?

    The same things missing from the research of “droves of distinguished academics who have determined that the opposite” of Lott says is true. Lott includes these or accounts for these in his research, he also includes ‘causality’ in his research which is missing from every one of the research ‘missives’ by “droves of distinguished academics who have determined that the opposite” of Lott says is true. Without that ‘causality’ included the conclusion of the research can not be true, that ‘causality’ factor includes 10 different points that determine if the conclusion is true. That’s how we know Lotts research is true, the ‘causality’ factor proves it to be true thus empirical, which is why independent researchers have been able to verify Lotts research and reach the same conclusions Lott did.

  18. The glaring fallacy in the New Yorker piece is that it is totally focused on self defense/crime. The 2A is not about either. Nor is it about hunting, sport shooting or anything else. It merely forbids a government from infringing on a natural right. The government does not grant Rights – at least not in this country. No different than any of the other Rights. The New Yorker and the author this piece can go hump a rope.

  19. Bottom line, you have to take them, I’m not afraid of death anymore. I think I will need them next week. Traitor Joe told us in his speech that if they don’t win, they will stay in power anyway. Like Bill Mahr said “They all have guns and know how to use them”. They figure they have it dicked, but they will shit themselves when they start talking fire.

    • With all of the talk about having to accept the election results and that it might take a few days to get results, was he priming the country for another steal? Why didn’t he just discuss solutions to problems? That’s what people are looking for.

  20. Be careful relying too much on the sorts of evidence and facts that John Lott presents.

    There are *always* nuances to this kind of data and many interpretations. If you play this game with rights, then you *always* lose. Why? Let me show you:

    Oh, so guns make you safer? Sure, you can have your black powder single action army like my great-grandad. When your data proves that a different gun makes you even safer, then you can have that, after a few decades of debate and skepticism.

    By the way, even your data actually shows some pockets and subgroups and special situations where guns are a net loss of safety. So we’ll ban them in those cases.

    See what I mean? Ultimately, looking at nuanced data is essentially begging for your rights. At every turn, people will challenge nuances of your data and, if at any time they show some slight advantage to taking away your rights, and you don’t refute it quickly enough, then you lose by default.

    Overwhelming reasons are a reason to take away rights (e.g. nuclear warheads); nuanced reasons are not. That’s where John Lott comes in: if someone tries to say there’s an overwhelming reason, you say “wait a minute, look at this data, it’s actually showing real advantages to gun rights”. And then THEY get in the weeds, and you tell them it’s not enough to consider limiting fundamental rights, and they go back to their ivory tower and waste THEIR lives looking at meaningless differences in huge volumes of data. And you can spend your life enjoying freedom.

    So thank you, John Lott, for looking at that data for us, to contradict the narrative that guns are some overwhelming plague that should cause us to forget our rights. But honestly, I don’t care whether they reduce crime a little or make crime a little worse. I care that the government can’t make us 100% reliant on government for our safety, and then just step back and let the criminals have their way with us when they decide that punishment is in order.

  21. This shoddy Philippic announces itself as exposing Lott’s “shoddy methodology”. Yet, beyond alleging that anti-gun researchers have “debunked” Lott’s method, math, and “mendacity”, he gives zero citation of a single “fact” from the other side. In addition, he relies on confusing cause and effect. I would wager that not a single Philadelphia holder of a legal carry permit committed a violent crime in 2021. Instead, the violence came from criminals, mostly out to kill each other, and continually revolved back on the streets via “Bail Reform.” This is the same old lying crap masquerading as cogent argument of which the Left is so doggedly inept.

  23. The most misunderstood (misdiagnosed?) elements of the war on guns, is the difficulty of defining a single influence on crime rates. If there are more than one conditions influencing the data set, the result is problematic; not useless, but problematic.

    Another serious limit to “doing stats”, is stretching the result to cover too much ground. For instance “averages”. Too often, the resulting conclusion from “averages” is such data represent a universal “norm”. An example? The US stock market. While it is provably true that, over a long horizon, the stock market always rises. Yet, if the market was at 35,000 on 01Jan, and again on 31Dec, but in between fell by half and recovered, statistically one could validly arrive at the understanding that nothing much happened in that year.

    Gun control is not about statistics, safety, good/bad; gun control is about politics. Politics is not about truth, but belief. Politics is war by other means.

    “A man convinced against his will, is of the same opinion still”.
    – M.W. Shelley (“A vindication of the Rights of Woman”) 1792

  24. Criminals don’t follow laws. That’s really the only argument necessary.

    You don’t need a Ph.D., but it’s also convenient that the data agrees.

    • “Criminals don’t follow laws. That’s really the only argument necessary.”

      Yes, they do. Yes, they do. You’re wrong. You’re wrong. You’re lying. You’re lying.

      And making me afraid, and fearful, and unsafe, and sad, and uncomfortable. Your words are hate speech, and an actual violent attack on my peace of mind. You should be arrested for being mean to me.

      Data? We believe in truth over facts.

  25. And not to forget there are literally millions of events in real life which have proven Lotts research time and time again to be correct, in many different aspects, and although sometimes it may not be a nationwide thing for all aspects its is certainly proven millions of times annually to be correct and true… yet not one thing to prove the assertions of “droves of distinguished academics who have determined that the opposite is true.” and not one event where a law abiding defender successful in DGU ever validated this false stuff put forth by these “droves of distinguished academics”.

    To date, over the years, I have never seen one of the “droves of distinguished academics” research pieces that has proven the opposite of my own real world experience and I’ve been through hundreds of them over the years trying to find even one thing in them that convinced me. Several self defense DGU’s later in my life has proven to me personally that Lott was right, literally millions alive today who used a firearm for self-defense, just in the last two years over 2 million alive today because they used a firearm for self defense or defense of others, have proven Lott right.

    The left complains that Lott is wrong, the alternative they offer to the reality we suffer is that we be disarmed. This is not reality, the law abiding are not responsible for the criminality yet the left anti-gun seek to make the law abiding responsible and pay for it thus when a criminal commits a crime it is the law abiding rights that need to be controlled or restricted or removed so that the criminal may not exist according to the left anti-gun. That’s the most stupid argument in the world, the only people who are obeying your laws are the law abiding and now you want to make it so they are disarmed and defenseless against the very criminals who do not obey your laws and who’s goal is to harm. There is a reason police have guns, its because there is a threat or will be a threat yet you want to disarm the law abiding populace and subject them to the very same threat of crime because they are not as important in your ‘studies’ as the criminal you embolden and facilitate by disarming the populace. Ya notice something left out in the research of the “droves of distinguished academics” who claim Lott is wrong because they say so – whats always left out is the overall of the real law abiding people out here in the real world who have had to use real DGU for self-defense, when it comes to these the “droves of distinguished academics” claiming Lott is wrong because they say so resort to ‘adjusted data sample sizes’ or ‘data samples of victim pool’ which is the ‘junk science’ way of fudging to fill a void because they didn’t use real data in relation to real people in the real situation and the reason for this junk science approach is because they did not include ‘causality’ and now need to fill the void to make their conclusions seem true to match their beginning theory when they aren’t true. That’s how we know Lotts research is true, he includes that causality factor and its that factor that shows a research conclusion to be true or false and in every case it has shown Lotts research to be true.

    You so called “droves of distinguished academics” who claim that Lott is wrong because you say so, the only distinguished thing about you is that you are delusional.

  26. As we have seen over and over and over again, when they can’t debate the merits, all they have left is ad hominem, attack the man.

    Nothing screams “You Win!” louder than ad hominem attacks.

  27. Lott uses solid data sets and tends not to use a narrow field which many gun control orgs use to make a point. Appealing to feelings doesn’t work when crime is spiking, and you no longer feel safe.

  28. “last year there were five hundred and sixty one murders in the city” Notice that the author wrote out the numbers because it looks more scarry than 561. The author also omitted how many of the 561 murders were committed by the” fifty two thousand” new legal concealed carry permit holders in the city. Considering that the local prosecutor lets felons go without bail or court appearance I would assume that those “MURDERS” were done by CRIMINALS.

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