Immediate Steps to Reduce Our Nation's Gun Violence

In the wake of the Sandy Hook school shooting in Newton, CT the President has asked what steps we can take in the short term to possibly prevent such events from happening in the future.  Naturally, anti-gun forces are seizing on the opportunity to bring up ideas that they have been trying to implement for decades: banning cosmetic features of rifles, banning certain classes of weapons or calibers of ammunition, instating new waiting periods, banning large capacity magazines  etc.  The problem with these proposals is simple: they aren't likely to save lives or stop incidents like Newton from happening again.  If another incident occurs with something that is still legal, there will be steps to ban whatever tools were used.  Prohibition by 1000 cuts.  The people pushing control in the wake of Newtown are prohibitionists, they don't want so-called "common sense" laws.  Their end game is total (or near-total) prohibition of civilian firearms.  This is why pro-gun forces stand so firmly on the issues - give your opponents an inch and you could easily end up disarmed.  

So, from a pro-gun point of view, what can be done? What steps can we take that reach across the isle?  What do we think can preserver our rights while potentially stopping violence in the future?  The NRA is not against working with their political enemies for meaningful legislation - the National Instant Check system is a prime example.  So, what else can be done?  In the spirit of the President's request for immediate action, here are some humble suggestions.  I don't believe them to be the complete answer, but I think they are a good starting point and an honest attempt from someone who cherishes his firearms freedoms:

• Get the NRA, NSSF, Brady Campaign, VPC, and the Ad Council to come together to create an ad campaign (TV, radio, web, print, bus shelters) that can blanket the nation with safe-storage information.  Remind people that when not in immediate use, firearms should be secured, trigger locked, and/or in a gun safe.  Encourage families with members that have serious mental health issues to keep firearms locked away at ALL times, and to possibly consider storing non-essential firearms with a responsible family member or neighbor. 
• Give high publicity to mental health options that are currently available in the United States.  Let people know what actions they can take if they have a family member with mental illness.
• Work with manufacturers of safes and firearms to provide free trigger locks and discounted gun safes.  These locks and safes should come with materials from the above mentioned campaign. Consider funding for vouchers to be made available to those with less means so that they can afford quality safes.
• While tragedies like Newtown get the focus of the people and the media, they are truly rare (and by many accounts, on the decline).  The real problems with gun violence lies in 3 areas: gang violence, drug violence, and domestic violence (I am not counting suicide in the numbers, since availability of guns affects only method and not rates).  We should have a national conversation about domestic violence - we should look at other countries that have seen sharp drops in numbers and implement those changes.
• Mass killings are not what inflates our homicide numbers, single acts are - we should get tough on criminals with firearms who perpetrate these crimes with a firearm, ideally before it escalates to homicide.  The justice dept should put together guidelines for local, state, and federal prosecutors to STOP cutting plea deals with suspects committing crimes with guns.  Examine initiatives like "project exile" and the like that remove gun criminals from their jurisdiction (prison swap) - this was a seen as a successful deterrent in the past.
• Implement NRA Eddie Eagle childhood gun safety programs in every school ("Stop, Don't touch, Leave the Area, Tell an Adult") - services should donated by the NRA.  I would like to add that this program is agnostic about adults owning guns and the children are never exposed to the fact that it is run by the NRA.  The sole goal is to keep children away from firearms without proper adult supervision and to prevent accidental deaths (which are continuing to trend to all-time lows despite more guns being available in the US.)
• Real compromise means both sides are unhappy.  If one side wants a magazine or class of firearm ban or safe storage laws, what are they willing to conceded to gun-rights advocates? I suggest we look at concealed-carry laws.  Despite the wailing and gnashing of teeth, these laws have not increased violence, as the anti-gun crown predicted.  In most cases, homicide is at all-time lows.  So, would either side take a compromise such as this this:
  "The pro-gun forces agree to a 10-round magazine limit and reinstatement of 1994-style "assault weapons" ban; and the anti-gun forces agree to concealed-carry reciprocity across all states (with an optional federal-issued 50 state carry permit that has classroom and practical requirements)"? 

I know these are ideas will not be enough for people who truly have an aversion to guns, and to long time political foes of gun rights.  That being said, I think our country could make meaningful progress by examining these ideas and I believe they are truly in the spirit of coming together to look for immediate solutions that the President has put forward.

Update: I was disappointed to see that President Obama appointed Vice President Biden to head up his committee on gun violence.  Biden has been as vocal an anti-gun politician as one can get.  He has supported just about every initiative to cripple gun rights, including promoting law suits to sue gun manufacturers in attempt to put them out of business.  With this appointment I don't believe that Obama is looking for bi-partisan compromise, which is how this "national conversation" is supposed to be framed.  I would have much preferred a democratic Senator from a pro-gun jurisdiction, or a Republican governor from a more liberal state. 

VPC Leaves out Facts in Gun vs Car Deaths

Josh Sugarman of the Violence Policy Center (VPC) has been touting a new study about gun deaths around the internet, including on the Huffington Post.  The synopsis is that, despite our frequent interactions with cars and our rare interactions with firearms, there are now 10 states which have higher gun death rates than auto death rates.

What Sugarman conveniently leaves out is that this is an anomaly caused by two very good things - both auto death rates and firearm death rates are down overall.  He is correct that in some states, the auto death rate has fallen below the firearms death rate.  Naturally, he calls for more regulation.

My home state, Washington, is among those those 10 states.  While he does note this in a bullet list, he fails to go into any details on these rates.

The WA Department of Health has a PDF detailing firearms death in Washington.  It clearly shows a line graph indicating that, despite the increase in firearms ownership and public carry, the death rate by firearms has been declining for two decades.  FBI data shows that overall, violent crime and gun death has been on a steady decline for two decades.  The murder rate in America peaked in 1991, a time that was much less gun-friendly than today.  Since then, the US population has risen by approx 56 million people, yet homicides have decreased by 10,000 (or 41%).
If you dig deeper into these statistics, you will see that the demographic in WA that has the highest gun deaths is actually men 75 years of age and over.  This is attributed to people who are choosing suicide as their end of life option.  It has been documented over and over (including on this blog) that access to firearms does not increase the suicide rate - it only changes the preferred method (The U.S. is way down there at #41 for suicide rates.)  Guns, while messy, are seen by many as the quickest, most painless, guaranteed method of suicide.  Also interesting will be observing if this rate changes as Washington State's assisted suicide law becomes more prevalent and accepted socially.  So he is including statistics - and justifiable homicide.  Also, I'm not sure how it factors in, but Washington is well below the national average on auto deaths AND gun deaths.  This all sounds like good news to me.

In addition, due to economic downturn, the US saw miles driven fall by 3.6% in 2008.

So, back to the good news - gun deaths are down.  Automobile deaths are down.  Only the Violence Policy Center could spin this as an anti-gun story.

update: Since the article was posted the NRA has responded.