A Quadruple Dog Dare

[fasteddie]

From Today's Rochester D&C Newspaper

Andreatta takes quadruple dog dare from gun nut

I never turned down a quadruple dog dare in middle school, and I’m not about to start now.

So, I’ve accepted one from an angry reader to print what he purported in an anonymous letter to be “truthful statistics” about guns.

“Thought you would like to see some truthful statistics in regard to guns,” he wrote in a letter postmarked March 6 with no return address or signature. “I quadruple dog dare you to print this in your column — I’m certain you WILL NOT!!”

Well, I’m showing him, aren’t I? I can hear him now: “I know you are, but what am I?”

I’m publishing his rant not because of its truthfulness, but to illustrate the tortured, dog-whistle politics- laced logic that’s informing the gun debate for a sizable voting bloc. Logic like his is partly why nothing gets done.

Mr. Dog Dare’s letter is mostly a cut-and-paste job of a viral June 2017 Facebook post by gun-worshipping rocker Ted Nugent. That post has been shared 119,000 times, suggesting it has infiltrated the news feeds and minds of untold millions of Facebook users.

Refuting Nugent’s most outrageous claims would require more space than I’m inclined to devote to a quadruple dog dare. I’m thinking readers will spot the holes in his arguments on their own anyway.

Suffice to say, though, that Nugent crafts fallacy after fallacy from sometimes questionable data to make a case for maintaining the status quo.

Consider his non sequitur that “65 percent (of gun deaths) are by suicide which would never be prevented by gun laws.” While it’s true that upward of 6 in 10 gun deaths are suicides, it doesn’t follow that those suicides were inevitable.

Then there’s his appeal to authority that “15 percent (of gun deaths) are by law enforcement in the line of duty and justified.” Justified? All of them? Tell that to the family of Walter Scott, the South Carolina man whose killer cop was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Don’t even get me started on his false equivalency likening the lethal power of guns to double cheeseburgers.

I’ve condensed Mr. Dog Dare’s letter here to the “truthful statistics” for brevity. Readers can find the full text of it on my Facebook page.

Mr. Andreatta — Thought you would like to see some truthful statistics in regard to guns. I quadruple dog dare you to print this in your column — I’m certain you WILL NOT!! I refer you to the last line of this message — “control” — NOT “gun.” One more thought — NOT ONE of these incidents was perpetuated by an

NRA member — NOT ONE! What does that say about its members?!? Just thought you ought to see some REAL facts and figures. NO ONE will ever get my guns. My family and my possessions are protected by my friends — Mr. Smith and Mr. Wesson and Mr. Winchester.

There are 30,000 gun related deaths per year by firearms, and this number is not disputed. U.S. population 324,059,091 as of Wednesday, June 22, 2016. Do the math: 0.000000925% of the population dies from gun related actions each year. Statistically speaking, this is insignificant! What is never told, however, is a breakdown of those 30,000 deaths, to put them in perspective as compared to other causes of death:

❚ 65% of those deaths are by suicide which would never be prevented by gun laws ❚15% are by law enforcement in the line of duty and justified ❚ 17% are through criminal activity, gang and drug related or mentally ill persons — gun violence ❚ 3% are accidental discharge deaths So technically, “gun violence” is not 30,000 annually, but drops to 5,100. Still too many? Well, first, how are those deaths spanned across the nation?

❚ 480 homicides (9.4%) were in Chicago ❚344 homicides (6.7%) were in Baltimore ❚333 homicides (6.5%) were in Detroit ❚ 119 homicides (2.3%) were in Washington D.C. (a 54% increase over prior years) So basically, 25% of all gun crime happens in just 4 cities. All 4 of those cities have strict gun laws, so it is not the lack of law that is the root cause.

This basically leaves 3,825 for the entire rest of the nation, or about 75 deaths per state. That is an average because some States have much higher rates than others. For example, California had 1,169 and Alabama had 1.

Are 5,100 deaths per year horrific? How about in

See ANDREATTA, Page 15A

 

ontinued from Page 2A

comparison to other deaths? All death is sad and especially so when it is in the commission of a crime but that is the nature of crime. Robbery, death, rape, assault all is done by criminals and thinking that criminals will obey laws is ludicrous. That’s why they are criminals.

But what about other deaths each year? ❚

40,000+ die from a drug overdose — THERE IS NO EXCUSE FOR THAT! ❚

36,000 people die per year from the flu, far exceeding the criminal gun deaths ❚34,000 people die per year in traffic fatalities (exceeding gun deaths even if you include suicide) Now it gets good: ❚

200,000+ people die each year (and growing) from preventable medical errors. You are safer in Chicago than when you are in a hospital!

❚ 710,000 people die per year from heart disease. It’s time to stop the double cheeseburgers! So what is the point? If Obama and the anti-gun movement focused their attention on heart disease,even a 10% decrease in cardiac deaths would save twice the number of livesannually of all gunrelated

deaths (including suicide, law enforcement, etc.). A 10% reduction in medical errors would be 66% of the total gun deaths or 4 times the number of criminal homicides.

So you have to ask yourself, in the grand scheme of things, why the focus on guns? It’s pretty simple: Taking away guns gives control to governments.

Thus, the second amendment was proudly and boldly included in the U.S. Constitution. It must be preserved at all costs.

Remember, when it comes to “gun control,” the important word is “control,” not “gun.”

This is the mindset that supporters of progressive gun reforms are up against. I quintuple dog dare them to keep up the fight.

David Andreatta is a

Democrat and Chronicle

columnist. He can be reached at DANDREATTA@Gannett .com.

An excerpt of a letter quadruple dog-daring D& C columnist David Andreatta to print 'truthful statistics' about guns.DAVID ANDREATTA

[Hunter007]

3 hours ago, fasteddie said:

From Today's Rochester D&C Newspaper

Andreatta takes quadruple dog dare from gun nut

I never turned down a quadruple dog dare in middle school, and I’m not about to start now.

So, I’ve accepted one from an angry reader to print what he purported in an anonymous letter to be “truthful statistics” about guns.

“Thought you would like to see some truthful statistics in regard to guns,” he wrote in a letter postmarked March 6 with no return address or signature. “I quadruple dog dare you to print this in your column — I’m certain you WILL NOT!!”

Well, I’m showing him, aren’t I? I can hear him now: “I know you are, but what am I?”

I’m publishing his rant not because of its truthfulness, but to illustrate the tortured, dog-whistle politics- laced logic that’s informing the gun debate for a sizable voting bloc. Logic like his is partly why nothing gets done.

Mr. Dog Dare’s letter is mostly a cut-and-paste job of a viral June 2017 Facebook post by gun-worshipping rocker Ted Nugent. That post has been shared 119,000 times, suggesting it has infiltrated the news feeds and minds of untold millions of Facebook users.

Refuting Nugent’s most outrageous claims would require more space than I’m inclined to devote to a quadruple dog dare. I’m thinking readers will spot the holes in his arguments on their own anyway.

Suffice to say, though, that Nugent crafts fallacy after fallacy from sometimes questionable data to make a case for maintaining the status quo.

Consider his non sequitur that “65 percent (of gun deaths) are by suicide which would never be prevented by gun laws.” While it’s true that upward of 6 in 10 gun deaths are suicides, it doesn’t follow that those suicides were inevitable.

Then there’s his appeal to authority that “15 percent (of gun deaths) are by law enforcement in the line of duty and justified.” Justified? All of them? Tell that to the family of Walter Scott, the South Carolina man whose killer cop was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Don’t even get me started on his false equivalency likening the lethal power of guns to double cheeseburgers.

I’ve condensed Mr. Dog Dare’s letter here to the “truthful statistics” for brevity. Readers can find the full text of it on my Facebook page.

Mr. Andreatta — Thought you would like to see some truthful statistics in regard to guns. I quadruple dog dare you to print this in your column — I’m certain you WILL NOT!! I refer you to the last line of this message — “control” — NOT “gun.” One more thought — NOT ONE of these incidents was perpetuated by an

NRA member — NOT ONE! What does that say about its members?!? Just thought you ought to see some REAL facts and figures. NO ONE will ever get my guns. My family and my possessions are protected by my friends — Mr. Smith and Mr. Wesson and Mr. Winchester.

There are 30,000 gun related deaths per year by firearms, and this number is not disputed. U.S. population 324,059,091 as of Wednesday, June 22, 2016. Do the math: 0.000000925% of the population dies from gun related actions each year. Statistically speaking, this is insignificant! What is never told, however, is a breakdown of those 30,000 deaths, to put them in perspective as compared to other causes of death:

❚ 65% of those deaths are by suicide which would never be prevented by gun laws ❚15% are by law enforcement in the line of duty and justified ❚ 17% are through criminal activity, gang and drug related or mentally ill persons — gun violence ❚ 3% are accidental discharge deaths So technically, “gun violence” is not 30,000 annually, but drops to 5,100. Still too many? Well, first, how are those deaths spanned across the nation?

❚ 480 homicides (9.4%) were in Chicago ❚344 homicides (6.7%) were in Baltimore ❚333 homicides (6.5%) were in Detroit ❚ 119 homicides (2.3%) were in Washington D.C. (a 54% increase over prior years) So basically, 25% of all gun crime happens in just 4 cities. All 4 of those cities have strict gun laws, so it is not the lack of law that is the root cause.

This basically leaves 3,825 for the entire rest of the nation, or about 75 deaths per state. That is an average because some States have much higher rates than others. For example, California had 1,169 and Alabama had 1.

Are 5,100 deaths per year horrific? How about in

See ANDREATTA, Page 15A

 

ontinued from Page 2A

comparison to other deaths? All death is sad and especially so when it is in the commission of a crime but that is the nature of crime. Robbery, death, rape, assault all is done by criminals and thinking that criminals will obey laws is ludicrous. That’s why they are criminals.

But what about other deaths each year? ❚

40,000+ die from a drug overdose — THERE IS NO EXCUSE FOR THAT! ❚

36,000 people die per year from the flu, far exceeding the criminal gun deaths ❚34,000 people die per year in traffic fatalities (exceeding gun deaths even if you include suicide) Now it gets good: ❚

200,000+ people die each year (and growing) from preventable medical errors. You are safer in Chicago than when you are in a hospital!

❚ 710,000 people die per year from heart disease. It’s time to stop the double cheeseburgers! So what is the point? If Obama and the anti-gun movement focused their attention on heart disease,even a 10% decrease in cardiac deaths would save twice the number of livesannually of all gunrelated

deaths (including suicide, law enforcement, etc.). A 10% reduction in medical errors would be 66% of the total gun deaths or 4 times the number of criminal homicides.

So you have to ask yourself, in the grand scheme of things, why the focus on guns? It’s pretty simple: Taking away guns gives control to governments.

Thus, the second amendment was proudly and boldly included in the U.S. Constitution. It must be preserved at all costs.

Remember, when it comes to “gun control,” the important word is “control,” not “gun.”

This is the mindset that supporters of progressive gun reforms are up against. I quintuple dog dare them to keep up the fight.

David Andreatta is a

Democrat and Chronicle

columnist. He can be reached at DANDREATTA@Gannett .com.

An excerpt of a letter quadruple dog-daring D& C columnist David Andreatta to print 'truthful statistics' about guns.DAVID ANDREATTA

Well said (

the second amendment was proudly and boldly included in the U.S. Constitution.[[[[ It must be preserved at all costs.]]]]

Remember, when it comes to “gun control,” the important word is “control,” not “gun.”)

[chas0218]

The columnist is an idiot. He obviously didn't actually read letter but skimmed it discounting the facts that are provided via the FBI! Best example of Sheeple.