Guns, shooting, and hunting

Ever since I was a little kid (That was a long time ago), I have enjoyed shooting and hunting. In fact, when I was eight years old, my mother enrolled me in an NRA shooting course. We're talking 1950. The target shooting that we did was in the basement of the Canfield Corner Pharmacy in Woodbury. Can you believe that! (I still have a group picture to prove it). Since I am a Life Member of the National Rifle Association, and belong to "Gun Owners Of America" and "The Second Amendment Foundation", and am a NRA Certified Hand Gun Instructor, I am amazed at where the Left Wing media and politicians have taken us with their demonizing of guns, shooting, and hunting. When I was in High School, it was common for kids to bring their guns to school in their cars if they were going hunting with friends after school, and nobody thought a thing about it. Today, if a kid brings in a G.I. Joe, with his "weapon", he will be suspended, if not expelled. Ridiculous!!!

I have included the picture on the left that was taken from the inside cover of the 1959 "Wide Awake", the Woodbury High School yearbook. That's the Superintendent of Schools holding the double barreled shotgun on the Senior Class. Anybody want to guess how many pictures like that appear in any school publications today? Not one single thing has changed, except the attitude toward guns.


Periodically, I will be posting some of the more common myths about "guns" and the real facts you don't get in the media today, because of their blatant bias.

Today's myth:

Myth: Concealed carry laws increase crime

Fact: Forty states, comprising the majority of the American population, are "right-to-carry"
states. Statistics show that in these states the crime rate fell (or did not rise) after the right-to carry law became active (as of July, 2006). Nine states deny or restrict the right to carry.

Fact: Crime rates involving gun owners with carry permits have consistently been about 0.02%
of all carry permit holders since Florida’s right-to-carry law started in 1988.

Fact: After passing their concealed carry law, Florida's homicide rate fell from 36% above the
national average to 4% below, and remains below the national average (as of the last reporting
period, 2005).

Fact: In Texas, murder rates fell 50% faster than the national average in the year after their
concealed carry law passed. Rape rates fell 93% faster in the first year after enactment, and 500% faster in the second. Assaults fell 250% faster in the second year.

Fact: More to the point, crime is significantly higher in states without right-to-carry laws.

Fact: States that disallow concealed carry have violent crime rates 11% higher than national
averages.

Fact: Deaths and injuries from mass public shootings fall dramatically after right-to-carry concealed handgun laws are enacted. Between 1977 and 1995, the average death rate from mass shootings plummeted by up to 91% after such laws went into effect, and injuries
dropped by over 80%.

Some criminologist believe measuring first year change is shortsighted as it takes more than a year for permits to be issued, reach critical quantities, and for the criminally minded to recognize the new situation and avoid violent confrontations.