More Guns Equals More Gun Deaths. What A Surprise.

From a report published yesterday by the non-profit gun research group Violence Policy Center:

"Our studies consistently show that states with strong gun violence prevention laws and low rates of gun ownership have the lowest gun-death rates in the nation.  The highest gun-death rates are in states with weak laws and easy access to guns."

The top three states for highest gun-death rates are Alaska, Louisiana, and Alabama.  The three lowest rates are in the states of Hawaii, Massachusetts, and New York.  Ohio ranks 30th.

The NRA promotes the unregulated proliferation of guns and ammo, and is always loudly claiming that increased numbers of armed citizens result in a safer society.  The NRA is full of shit.  More guns equals more gun deaths.  Period.

Another favorite logic twist for the NRA is to cite all the non-gun items and circumstances that also kill people -- knives, ball bats, poisons, Colonel Mustard with the candlestick in the study -- and isn't it then so horribly unfair to demonize guns when more people die every year in traffic accidents than by gunshots?

Well, check this out.  This year, for the first time, gun deaths may exceed vehicular deaths.

And yet one political party, deeply beholden to the gun lobby and its money, is committed to the deadly status quo and to doing absolutely nothing to address this public health and safety issue.  Even the slaughter of a school-full of little children could not move them to any sort of action.

There are no perfect, 100% guaranteed solutions to this problem, but isn't it shameful to keep doing nothing?  Couldn't we try to do something?  Shouldn't we?