A study from the University of Chicago

[SpringerXD]

No kidding. It really is from the University of Chicago. This will blow your mind:

http://www.law.uchicago.edu/files/fi...tt_.final_.pdf

[DefensiveCarry.com]

[cmdrdredd]

here's one excerpt I like when talking about people with a CCW rarely committing crimes using their firearms. This should make a statement to everyone that CCW holders follow the rules and are very safe.

The rarity of these incidents is reflected in Florida statistics: 221,443 licenses were issued between October 1, 1987 and April 30, 1994, but only 18 crimes involving firearms were committed by those with licenses. While a statewide breakdown on the nature of those crimes is not available, Dade county recordsindicate that four crimes involving a permitted handgun took place there between September 1987 and August 1992 and none of those cases resulted in injury

[SpringerXD]

here's one excerpt I like when talking about people with a CCW rarely committing crimes using their firearms. This should make a statement to everyone that CCW holders follow the rules and are very safe.

Yeah, I caught that part. There's nothing I love more than the fact that the study was conducted by a very liberal university, so no one can say that it's unfounded Internet rumor or NRA "propaganda."

[zonker1986]

John Lott, the co-author of the paper is a very well known advocate of concealed carry.

John Lott - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

John Lott

John Lott
Born (1958-05-08) May 8, 1958 (age 54)
Alma mater UCLA
Occupation Author, political commentator

John Richard Lott Jr. (born May 8, 1958) is an American economist and political commentator. Lott was formerly employed at various academic institutions including the University of Chicago, Yale University, the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Maryland, College Park, and at the American Enterprise Institute conservative think tank. He is currently a Fox News opinion contributor.[1] He holds a Ph.D. in economics from UCLA.

Lott has written for both academic and popular publications.[2][3][4][5] He is a frequent writer of op-eds, and has written six books, including More Guns, Less Crime, The Bias Against Guns, and Freedomnomics. His most recent book, co-authored with Grover Norquist, is entitled Debacle: Obama's War on Jobs and Growth and What We Can Do Now to Regain Our Future.[6]

Lott is best known for his role in the gun rights debate, particularly his arguments against restrictions on owning and carrying guns, the ensuing controversy surrounding the data and methodology used in his research, and his use of a sockpuppet identity to support his position on various websites in 2002 and 2003.[7][8][9]

[TheConcealer]

I about dropped a deuce when I read the first paragraph... from Cha town of all places!

Well go figure!

[PocketProtector]

Which is exactly why we know its not about crime or the chillren.
It's about Power. So much power that its a little scary what they have in mind for post disarmament.

[Sgt45]

Post disarmament would not be a good time to be a conservative, just prior to that might not be a good time to be a liberal.

[tokerblue]

I think everyone on this site would agree with the findings. The problem is that the antis would probably jump all over the fact that the study uses "cross-sectional time-series data for U.S. counties from 1977 to 1992".

[torgo1968]

There's also the issue that Lott has done a lot to hurt his own credibility. Look him up a bit and you'll find that he's been accused of funny business in his research, but even if he was innocent of that, there is his employment as a paid hack for Fox News. If an anti-gun researcher took a paid position with MSNBC, we would rightly point out that he was a political activist. That's what Lott has turned himself into.

This is why, if I have to cite a pro-gun researcher, I go with Gary Kleck. But now, I don't even do that. I use the antis' own work against them. David Hemenway, one of if not the most prominent anti-gun researchers in the country has granted that there are at least 100,000 defensive gun uses a year. Which outnumbers all gun deaths by three to one and gun murders more than ten to one.

[SpringerXD]

There's also the issue that Lott has done a lot to hurt his own credibility. Look him up a bit and you'll find that he's been accused of funny business in his research, but even if he was innocent of that, there is his employment as a paid hack for Fox News. If an anti-gun researcher took a paid position with MSNBC, we would rightly point out that he was a political activist. That's what Lott has turned himself into.

This is why, if I have to cite a pro-gun researcher, I go with Gary Kleck. But now, I don't even do that. I use the antis' own work against them. David Hemenway, one of if not the most prominent anti-gun researchers in the country has granted that there are at least 100,000 defensive gun uses a year. Which outnumbers all gun deaths by three to one and gun murders more than ten to one.

Agreed. It carries more weight when a rabid anti-gun person or group's own statistics work in our favor. If I remember correctly, Gary Kleck himself started out anti-gun until his research showed him otherwise.

[torgo1968]

Agreed. It carries more weight when a rabid anti-gun person or group's own statistics work in our favor. If I remember correctly, Gary Kleck himself started out anti-gun until his research showed him otherwise.

Yep, I believe he is also a card carrying member of the ACLU, Amnesty International, and a Democrat as well. Those don't exactly point to a pro-gun ideologue. If' I'm misremembering that I'd appreciate being corrected.

[dling]

Yep, I believe he is also a card carrying member of the ACLU, Amnesty International, and a Democrat as well. Those don't exactly point to a pro-gun ideologue. If' I'm misremembering that I'd appreciate being corrected.

Yep, he wrote that in the front of his book "Point Blank - Guns and Violence in America"

[Clodbert]

There are certainly holes in this paper (I wouldn't call it a study), but it's among the most compelling data I've seen on gun ownership and gun violence. There's no cause-and-effect but I don't think we'll ever determine with any certainty what causes or even directly contributes to gun violence. I'm glad to see that people are collecting data and being analytical about what they find because that's how you start to learn the right answers. Fortunately for us (at least I hope), we have the Second Amendment and no amount of associations, data points, or retrospective analyses should impede our rights.