In almost all things, I tend toward believing Friar William of Ockham - a 14th century English logician - who said, "When you have two competing theories that make exactly the same predictions, the simpler one is the better."
The overly-simplistic theory of the left is essentially, "If we pass more laws eliminating private ownership of firearms there will be fewer murders." However, the flaw in that kind of logic is that laws are written for, and adhered to, only by the law abiding. In this country, crimes are defined by law. A criminal is a person whose general behavior is composed primarily of ignoring and/or breaking laws. New York City, has one of - if not THE - toughest gun-control law in the country - The Sullivan Act - a "law" which has been in effect for over 100 years. Yet between 2003 and 2011 there were 4,161 homicides in NYC, of which 69% had firearms listed as the weapon of choice. I say ""weapon of choice", because anybody with sufficient dedicated intent to take the life of another person will find the means to do so. If a gun is not available, weapon of choice #2 is a knife (23%), with "other" (poison, golf club, baseball bat, large rock, suffocation, garrotte, etc.) coming in a distant 3rd with a combined total of 8%.
"Gun Free Zones" - such as schools - are not "gun free" once a gun is introduced from outside that zone. At that point, the zone should be renamed the Victim Abundant Zone..., because the "rule followers" (that's us) are all unarmed. The premise that "eliminating private ownership of firearms" will result in "fewer murders" sounds (at least superficially) theoretically reasonable. If 69% of all murders are committed with the use of firearms, then we should reasonably expect to see a 69% reduction in murders. Right? However, the part of that statistic that is fallacious is the assumption that guns are committing those murders. Guns are inanimate objects - they possess neither will nor motivation. Guns are tools. The true statistic is that 100% of all murders are committed by murderers! Their choice of tool with which to commit murder is irrelevant.
In China yesterday, December 14th, 2012, "... a knife-wielding man slashed 29 children, two teachers and a security guard Thursday in the second such school attack in China in two days. Initially officials had reported that 28 children had been hurt but they later realized they had miscounted.
Experts called it a copycat rampage triggered by similar incidents Wednesday and last month. They said the wave of school attacks falls amid poor care for the mentally unstable and growing feelings of social injustice in the fast-changing country.
Thursday's attack at the Zhongxin Kindergarten left five students hospitalized in critical condition in the eastern city of Taixing, said Zhu Guiming, an official with the municipal propaganda department. Two teachers and the security guard were also hurt.
We cannot legislate sanity, or even a sense of morality. The knee-jerk reaction to violence is to create more laws - laws to be ignored - while the more logical reaction would be to create fewer victims. If protecting our children in school is the only goal, then arm and train at least 50% of the school staff in student protection, situational awareness, use of deadly force, marksmanship, and threat recognition and elimination. If protecting the public at large is the goal, then recognize our Constitution's Second Amendment as being the law of the land, and deprive no law abiding citizen of the right to keep and bear arms - within his/her property or publicly. There has never been a murder at an NRA Convention or at a Gun Show. Nobody attacks a "Gun Friendly Zone"... think about that.
Over 65 Million guns in the U.S.A. killed nobody today!
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