Just think how much lower the death rate would be with "sensible" gun laws in place.  Then we could all just get along and live as one big happy family--it would be, like, utopia, you know?  AAAAARRGGHHHHHH!!!!  We locked up most of the scum, shot a few through CCW (not in my state! Sigh!), and generally put the fear of God in enough of the rest to lower crime rates.  Still they yammer for gun bans.  The only one I approve of is the one gun a month law, except I'm not sure I can afford to buy them at that rate if it is mandated.  LOL

Just to play devil's advocate here...



You KNOW the reason?  I doubt it.  You may think you know the reason, just as anti's think they know the reason - and would say that this is the effect of stricter gun laws both at a federal level ('89 and '94) as well as many local levels.

The problem is that it is actually impossible to establish causality in things like this.  It is not possible to determine what causes trends like this - and the most likely explanations involve multiple factors.  One of the most likely is in fact the healthy economy in this period.  Totally irrespective of gun laws, prison sentences, etc - the fact is that crime is inversely correlated with the economy.  Good economy = less crime.



Problem is that crime levels (and gun deaths] have also fallen in states that DIDN'T enact CCW, so again, it becomes impossible to make a causal attribution.  It is not even valid to statistically look at the differences between states that did and did not, and establish an aggregate, because there are too many confounding factors and state differences.



Problem is many criminals (like crackheads carjacking someone) don't even think ONCE.  

I'm NOT disagreeing with you, just trying to put it in perspective.  Statistics like this don't necessarily help because both sides can find ways to make it consistent with their argument, and the kind of analyses that MIGHT shed a little more light on the issue are too compelex for the average person to be interested in.


BTW - Welcome to the board.  Hope you stick around.  [:)]