Saturday, December 22, 2012

NRA Solution to Traffic Fatalities


Obvious logic. Cars don't kill people. People kill people. So, what we need to reduce traffic fatalities on our roads is a lot more good people who truly love their cars constantly driving around ready at a moment's notice to ram their car into someone who is about to crash, thus reducing deaths caused by bad people in cars. Sure, that ought to do it.

And we all know cars kill more people than guns. Well, maybe not in a few states. Data from 2009 (most recent statistics available):


  • Alaska: 104 gun deaths, 84 motor vehicle deaths
  • Arizona: 856 gun deaths, 809 motor vehicle deaths
  • Colorado: 583 gun deaths, 565 motor vehicle deaths
  • Indiana: 735 gun deaths, 715 motor vehicle deaths
  • Michigan: 1,095 gun deaths, 977 motor vehicle deaths
  • Nevada: 406 gun deaths, 255 motor vehicle deaths
  • Oregon: 417 gun deaths, 394 motor vehicle deaths
  • Utah: 260 gun deaths, 256 motor vehicle deaths
  • Virginia: 836 gun deaths, 827 motor vehicle deaths
  • Washington: 623 gun deaths, 580 motor vehicle deaths


    • Source, Josh Sugarmann with data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) - h/t Ardis.

    OK, so you could say that cars are not protected under the US Constitution like guns are. Clearly the Founders couldn't even conceive of the idea of modern transportation - but of course they fully envisioned the evolution and development of "arms" including large magazines for automatic and semi-automatic weapons? Original intent? Strict construction? Anyone?

    And there is that pesky Ninth Amendment that would seem to preserve the freedom of movement long recognized by our inherited British Common Law which I suppose could be applied to cars. But only if you stretch things again beyond original intent when the Founders were clearly talking about feet, horses, coaches and ships.

    The NRA is disgusting. I went out to the garage yesterday to remove the NRA Sharpshooter badge I won at Scout Camp from my old backpack. The badge wasn't there. I then seemed to recall that I had removed it some time ago as my disgust for the NRA didn't start just yesterday.
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    7 comments:

    1. Papa DDecember 22, 2012 at 1:03 PM

      Yeah, this "solution" was perhaps the NRA's lowest moment - and that's saying something.

      ReplyDelete
    2. Papa DDecember 22, 2012 at 10:32 PM

      and by "this solution" I was referring to the solution proposed to deal with school shootings. If that wasn't the focus of this post . . .

      ReplyDelete
      Replies
      1. GrantDecember 22, 2012 at 10:49 PM

        I gotcha, Papa D. This post was an attempt at parody at that most bizarre press conference of the NRA.

        The funny thing is how people divide mentally. Some like you and me hear that proposal and think it's the craziest thing we've ever heard. I have friends and relatives who think I'm crazy not to go along with the NRA's proposal. It's like alternate universes.

        Delete
    3. Sagacious PerspicacityJanuary 30, 2013 at 12:09 PM

      You are being quite dishonest here. If you wanted to make an honest application of the NRA's recommendation to cars, you would say that if you see someone purposefully killing pedestrians with their car, you should use your own car to stop them now instead of waiting for the police to stop them 10 minutes from now. The NRA has never, ever said that an accidental shooting should be prevented by shooting the other person first.

      The logic in the NRA's statement is simple and straightforward. If a person who is already on the scene when the shooting starts can stop it, you save lots of lives compared to giving the shooter 10 or 20 uninterrupted minutes before the police arrive to conduct his shooting spree. Time and time again, experience proves that to be the case. When interrupted by someone already on the scene, an average of 1.4 people die if the resister is armed and 2.6 people die if the resister is unarmed. By comparison, over 14 people die on average if no one resists and the victims wait for the police to stop it. What is crazy about that?

      ReplyDelete
      Replies
      1. GrantJanuary 30, 2013 at 5:16 PM

        Silly, perhaps - "dishonest," a bit harsh. It would be nice if you would provide a source for your statistics. Otherwise, we can only assume they are propaganda from the NRA. I will leave you're posting here for people to judge on their own, but reliable sources would help your case.

        Delete
    4. UnknownJanuary 31, 2013 at 8:50 PM

      As a conservative mormon, I wouldn't consider you to be conservative.

      ReplyDelete

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