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One of the most interesting facts in the debate about guns and crime in the United states over the last 20+ years is that the murder rate has fallen in half while the number of guns per capita has increased from .89 in 1993 to 1.18 in 2014, an increase of 33 percent.  One of the thesis that is put forward for the decrease in murder rates is better medical technology.  Clearly, there have been significant improvements in the availability of emergency transport, access to emergency personnel through the ubiquity of cell phones and emergency providers, and better surgical...

Strict controls on the ownership and use of guns have been enacted in a number of polities in the United States.   One of the supposed purposes of such laws is to reduce the murder rate.  Murder rates in the FBI Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) consist of murder and non-negligent manslaughter.When strict controls do not produce low murder rates, such as in Chicago or Washington D.C., the claim is made that the problem is the easy access to guns in areas outside of the polity with the strict controls.  In Washington, D.C., it is claimed that criminals can easily obtain...

You may recall that earlier this year, Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake was named President of the US Conference of Mayors for her outstanding work in serving the people of her city and demonstrating innovation in turning things around. As part of that process, she decided to summarily fire Police Commissioner Anthony Batts back in the beginning of July. To say the least, I expressed some reservations about the move, particularly considering that most of the questionable tactics employed by the cops during the Freddy Gray riots were handed down from City Hall. But who am I to second guess the...

It’s time to fact-check the fact-checkers. The Washington Post’s Michelle Yee Hee Lee gave Donald Trump four Pinocchios for saying, “They’re bringing crime” across the border from Mexico. The Post scribe added, “Trump clarified that he was referring to cases where undocumented immigrants commit violent crimes or smuggle drugs.” First off, Trump did not put any numbers on his statements. All he said was that some undocumented immigrants commit crimes in the U.S. And we know that is true. Secondly, as even the Washington Post admits, Trump was not talking about all Mexicans, especially not Hispanic citizens. He was...

Baltimore police say a man was fatally shot in the western part of the city, continuing the month’s spike in homicides. Sgt. Jarron Jackson said in an email Friday that officers on patrol found a 19-year-old man with a gunshot wound to his chest about 4:30 p.m...

prior to this change “Russians were only allowed to own firearms for hunting or target practice.” Because of this, there are only “13 million” privately owned firearms in Russia compared to approximately 310 million the US. On the other hand, “there were 21,603 murders in Russia” in 2009 compared with just over 13,600 in the US, “which has a population almost twice as large [as Russia].” In other words, in the past few years fewer guns equaled more murder in Russia while more guns equaled fewer murders in the US. Under the new law, Russians can acquire a license to...

Earlier, I reported that an illegal immigrant from Honduras entered the country on June 26th and three weeks later had already been charged with 2nd Degree Murder. Pedro Alberto Monterroso-Navas entered the country with two children and was allowed to stay under Obama's "catch and release" amnesty policies. Not many people read the article, likely because I was about 12 hours behind the bigger media sources which reported it and we get significantly less traffic to begin with. [Oh, the joys of being a small potatoes blogger!] However, there was some very important research in that article and I would...

New FBI statistics show the vast Navajo Nation [180,000 population, size of West Virginia] saw a sharp increase in the murder rate in 2013 and finished the year with 42 homicides, eclipsing major metropolitan areas with less space and far more people, like Seattle and Boston.

Even Chicago isn’t hopeless. Just its politicians. In July of 2013, Illinois became the last state in the union to enact a concealed carry law. In January of this year, the state began accepting applications for permits. This week, Chicago police announced that the city’s first quarter murder rate was the lowest since 1958.The first three months of the year saw 6 fewer murders than the same time frame in 2013–a 9 percent drop–and 55 fewer murders than 2012, according to a statement from Chicago Police.There were 90 fewer shootings and 119 fewer shooting victims, drops of 26 and 29...

As his first month as police commissioner under Mayor de Blasio winds down, Bill Bratton is already facing some sobering news — a 33 percent spike in murders across the city. According to the latest statistics released Tuesday, there have been 28 homicides so far this year compared to 21 in the same ­period last year. That puts the city on course for at least one murder a day.

Authorities say a 15-year-old boy faces 2 counts of murder in the Christmas night slayings of two Newark children. […] The juvenile was apprehended in connection with the fatal shootings of a 13-year-old girl and a 15-year-old boy outside a home in the southern end of Newark near Interstate 78. […] Newark will end 2013 with more than 100 murders, the most the city has had since 2006. …

Mexico City And Washington, D.C., Are About Equally Safe Mexico’s travel industry has been hurting, as crime waves have swept the country and scared tourists away. But is traveling in Mexico any less safe than traveling in the United States? It depends on where you go and what you do, of course. But if you compare tourist destinations in both places, you might conclude you’re better off heading to Mexico. Take Orlando, Florida, home of Disney World. There were 7.5 murders per 100,000 residents there in 2010. Cancun, on the other hand, saw 1.83 murders per 100,000 residents, and...

Someone stopped by searching for “why are white people terrified of minorities?” Good question – If I thought “white people” were actually terrified of minorities, and if I just had a socially acceptable answer to support that belief. So let me scratch my head and walk around that one, while I search for an answer – and a suggested solution should the premise prove viable. Of course, if the surmise is correct, the problem is called xenophobia, “stranger fear” in ancient Greek. Having seen many competent minorities of all varieties gladly accepted both socially and professionally by whites, I cannot...

Someone stopped by searching for “percent of people who will commit murder.” That varies widely between societies, and within the same society depending on conditions. In particular, the incidence of murder declines as the population ages, so an older population will have a much lower murder rate. And while I could load this post up with graphics, I see little point since murder rates vary so widely between societies. And that being the case, the best I can do is to give the maximum and minimum – and the percentage for the United States. The major factors involved in murder...

One of the most obnoxious liberal talking points on guns involves the idea that guns, in and of themselves, cause gun violence. Apparently, as this argument goes, guns or “gun culture” cause law-abiding citizens to transform into murderous nuts. In other words, more guns must mean more gun violence. The argument was famously made by sports writer Jason Whitlock and forwarded by Bob Costas on Sunday Night Football after a player reportedly murdered his girlfriend and killed himself. … According to the latest Small Arms Survey conducted by the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, the U.S. tops the...

Dear Mr. Obama, This week Hadiya Pendleton was shot and murdered in Chicago just days after performing with high school marching band at your second inauguration. She was a majorette in addition to playing volleyball and being an honor student at King College Prep High School. My plea to you is you attend her funeral. My plea is that after the funeral you address the entire nation in prime time and discuss an epidemic that's eroding our nation and destroying millions of dreams. That is the real epidemic of violence in black communities There is no better example than your...

Forget Wal-Mart and skip your local gun show. The murderers of tomorrow will not be found wearing orange vests at your local sporting goods store. They won’t have NRA memberships or trophies on their walls. You won’t find them in America. Look for them in Obamerica. 67% of firearm murders took place in the country’s 50 largest metro areas. The 62 cities in those metro areas have a firearm murder rate of 9.7, more than twice the national average. Among teenagers the firearm murder rate is 14.6 or almost three times the national average. Those are the crowded cities of...

Shortly after Hugo Chávez won his first election as Venezuelan president in December 1998, a lawyer from the western state of Barinas, which was then governed by Chávez's father, delivered a prescient warning to Newsweek magazine: "Venezuelans are dreaming of a savior, but Chávez is a dictator. People don't know what they are getting."  More than 14 years later, a cancer-stricken Chávez is reportedly near death, but his autocratic legacy is very much alive. Venezuela long ago ceased to be a real democracy: The ruling regime effectively controls the Supreme Court (which in 2004 was expanded and packed with Chávez allies), the National Assembly...

There are no gun shops in Chicago, so they say, but murders are on pace to hit 730 for 2013. Guns are usually the weapons that the killers choose to use.Two teenage boys were murdered over the weekend, and guns were the weapons used by the killers. One victim, 14-year-old Rey Dorantes, was reportedly shot while sitting on the front porch of his home. Fifteen-year-old Victor Vega was reportedly walking with another male when they were approached by an armed man who opened fire, killing Vega. In separate incidents, four other people were wounded via gunfire, and all but...

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras — Every Saturday morning, one of my taxi drivers pays about $12 for the right to park his cab near a hospital, about two blocks from a police station. But it's not the government that's charging. An unidentified man pulls up in a large SUV, usually brandishing an AK-47, and accepts an envelope of cash without saying a word. Jose and nine other drivers who pay the extortionists estimate that it amounts to more than $500 a year to park on public property. During Christmas, the cabbies dish out another $500 each in holiday "bonuses." Meanwhile, Jose pays...