Community Corner

Letter to the Editor: Bad Things Can Happen to Good People

The number of violent crimes has decreased in the US, while the number of gun carrying residents has increased.

Bad things can happen to good people … anywhere, anytime and that has driven up the number of gun sales owned by good people. Violent crime has gone down in the United States for the last several decades, while the number of guns in civilian hands has gone up. With more citizens carrying guns for protection, criminals cannot know who is armed and who is not. A number of citizens choose to arm themselves with a handgun for the same reason police do: to protect themselves and others from violent danger. The statistics for last year available from the FBI are: 14,748 murders, 84,767 rapes, 367,832 robberies, and 797,500 kidnappings.

Many liberal-minded thinkers simply want to ban gun ownership while criminals are still purchasing their weapons illegally from a straw dealer, out of the back of a car. Chicago has banned gun ownership, yet the city has one of the highest gun crime rates in the nation, so taking guns out of the hands of law abiding owners is not the solution. The city violent crime rate for Chicago in 2010 was higher than the national violent crime rate average by 148.31% and the city property crime rate in Chicago was higher than the national property crime rate average by 44%. (Citirating.com) The solution must also address a combined effort to correct the mental health issue, banning military-style assault weapons with clips of 100 rounds and banning “X” rated video games to minors.

The Supreme Court has now definitively held that the Second Amendment protects an individual's right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that weapon for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home. As law abiding Americans, we must protect our constitutional right to bear arms.

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Shirley White 
Blue Bell 


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