How Bloomberg and ‘Moms Demand Action’ Mislead on Guns bit.ly/2Ej1vFg
"Before she blocked me on Twitter, I frequently read the posts of Shannon Watts, the founder of @MomsDemand , as well as tweets from Michael Bloomberg and his @Everytown for Gun Safety, which is the chief financial backer of Watts’ organization."
It’s alarming how frequently @ShannonRWatts manipulates data to craft a narrative that America is held hostage to a violent gun culture, and how often she and Mom's Demand regurgitate the usual debunked Dem Media Industrial Complex myths, lies, half-truths & conspiracy theories.
Anti-gun propaganda is powerful, and Watts’ skills are finely honed. Her LinkedIn profile shows she held director and vice president positions with global reach in public relations at such prominent firms as Monsanto and General Electric Healthcare.
On November 26, as President Trump visited Mississippi ahead of the U.S. Senate runoff election, Watts posted the following:
"Mississippi has the second highest rate of gun deaths in the nation – nearly 18 deaths per 100,000 residents."
"Mississippi has the second highest rate of gun deaths in the nation – nearly 18 deaths per 100,000 residents."
I’m not certain where Watts gets her information for that tweet, since my research showed that MI has the 4th-highest rate. But that’s not the point. The concern is with how she always withholds the specifics.
Based on the most recent Centers for Disease Control and Prevention figures, Mississippi had a total of 587 firearm deaths in 2016: 268 were suicides, and 282 were homicides.
This is clever anti-gun methodology; two out of three of the annual total of 37,353 gun deaths nationwide are from suicide, totaling 22,938. Per the CDC, firearm suicide rates are 7.1 per 100,000; suffocation and poisoning rates, combined, are 5.7 per 100,000.
Imagine a world in which there were no guns at all. If those who are suicidal couldn’t access firearms, it is likely that some—perhaps the majority—would suffocate or poison themselves.
In what unquestionably is a major public health crisis in America, suicide rates have been rising the last two decades. A gun, however, is still an inanimate object in a suicidal American’s hands, just as plastic bags, vodka, and sleeping pills are.
Increasing suicide rates are wholly unrelated to discussions about legal and responsible gun ownership.
There is a mechanism already in place with the National Instant Criminal Background Check System for the mentally ill seeking to buy firearms. Is this background check system perfect? Of course not, just as no alleged “solution” pitched by Watts and Bloomberg is “perfect.”
The idea of due process for would-be gun owners with mental illness is, I’m certain, constitutionally inconvenient to the anti-gun cult.
When gun crime data in Democrat-controlled cities and suicide data are removed from national figures, gun crime rates are astoundingly low, considering the approximately 350 million legally owned firearms, and nearly 2 trillion rounds of legally owned ammunition.
Do Watts and Bloomberg know even a scintilla of this information? I suspect they do, just as they know that “assault weapon” has no actual mechanical or technical meaning, regardless how much their DMIC and politician sycophants parrot the lie.
One can’t really fault them for being so out of touch with what’s happening in long-time Democrat ghettos and inner cities. Bloomberg’s net worth is $46B, making him the 11th-wealthiest man in the world. Watts’ home is worth more than $1.2M, with a nearly $1M mortgage open on it.
It’s not coincidental that affluent, privileged, white Democrats are some of the most ardent anti-gun Americans.
As a postscript, the NRA wields far less influence than the organization proclaims.
As a postscript, the NRA wields far less influence than the organization proclaims.
Yes, the group has some influence, and, yes, it’s politically active. But what the NRA has spent in the last two decades on all political activity is a pittance compared to what other organizations in unrelated industries spent in 2016 alone.
Around 20% of the NRA’s total spending has occurred just in the last 3 years, although anti-gun groups spent $37M on this year’s state and federal midterms, compared to the NRA’s $20M.
