NSSF: Aiming for Accuracy

Majority of Americans Against Gun Control

New Rasmussen and Gallup reports reveal that more Americans oppose stricter gun control laws.

"Just 39 percent of Americans now say the United States needs stricter gun control," according to Rasmussen Reports, which released its poll results last Monday. Rasmussen reported that "50 percent are opposed to stricter gun control laws, and 11% are not sure."

Last March, 43 percent favored stricter gun control laws, according to Rasmussen.

The report comes in advance of the Supreme Court agreeing to hear the McDonald v. Chicago case that will determine if the Second Amendment trumps state and local anti-gun laws. The case is sponsored by the Second Amendment Foundation and the Illinois State Rifle Association on behalf of several Chicago residents.

According to Rasmussen, "Only 20% of adults believe city governments have the right to prevent citizens from owning handguns.

Sixty-nine percent (69%) disagree and say city governments do not have that right. Eleven percent (11%) are undecided.

Eighty-seven percent (87%) of Republicans, 52% of Democrats and 72% of unaffiliateds say cities do not have the right to ban handgun ownership."

The Gallup poll, released today, confirms the trend, finding "a new low of 44 percent of Americans saying the laws covering firearm sales should be made more strict. That is down 5 points in the last year and 34 points from the high of 78 percent recorded the first time the question was asked, in 1990."

Firearms Accidents Not a Major Factor in Health Care Costs

With some media stories about health care making reference to guns as a reason for rising costs, the National Shooting Sports Foundation reminds reporters and editors that fatal firearms accidents are at all-time lows and now represent less than 1 percent (actually 0.7 percent) of all accidental fatalities in the country.

Declines in accidents involving children have been steep. Between 1996 and 2006, accidental fatalities for children 14 years of age and under decreased by 61 percent, and by 77 percent going back to 1986, according to the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control.

In a side-by-side comparison with other forms of unintentional fatalities, firearms rank far down on the list, well below motor vehicles, poisoning, falls, choking, drowning and fires.

These successes have come about through the promotion of the safe use and storage of firearms through voluntary measures, including programs such as Project ChildSafe and the practice of including appropriate gun-locking devices and safety literature with new firearms. These voluntary, firearms industry programs, along with ongoing firearms and hunter safety education efforts, are helping to continue the trend toward increased firearms safety and decreased firearms accidents.

Hunting with ARs--The New Paradigm

Ed Rasimus on his Thunder Tales blog draws attention to the rising popularly of hunting with AR-15-platform rifles. He calls it "The New Paradigm."

We agree. See NSSF's recently launched educational campaign on Modern Sporting Rifles, and pass on the fact card and the video on the campaign's Web site. A four-page insert runs in major sporting magazines such as Field and Stream, Outdoor Life and Petersen's Hunting this month and next.

Thanks to Say Uncle for the reference to Ed's blog post.

What Happened Yesterday in U.S. v. Stevens

For a good overview of the U.S. Supreme Court justices' comments yesterday in the United States v. Stevens case, read Jim Shepherd's account in today's Outdoor Wire. Justice Scalia made a number of informed references to hunting. Also, see the SCOTUS blog. For background, read NSSF's news release and the amicus brief that NSSF submitted to the court.

 

 

New NSSF Long-form AR-15 Educational Video

The National Shooting Sports Foundation's educational campaign on modern sporting rifles has added a new long-form video (long for the Web anyway, five minutes) to accompany its 30- and 60-second messages. The campaign is designed to reach a wide audience in the hunting and target shooting community, with emphasis placed on educating sportsmen whose preference for traditional-looking firearms can lead them to misunderstand AR-15-platform rifles and to even describe them as "assault weapons," which inadvertently lends support to elected officials and organizations who want to ban these rifles.

Some hunters or target shooters may not care to use AR-15-platform rifles. That's OK; we all have our preferences for certain firearms and the right to own the guns we choose. What's damaging to all gun owners, however, is when sportsmen label ARs as "evil" or "bad" guns because they look different from traditional rifles. In doing so they assist gun-ban initiatives that could affect the rights of others to own the type of firearm they prefer--AR-platform rifles--which are favored by younger hunters and shooters, precisely the group on which the future of those activities rests. Traditionalists should be aware that legislation that could ban AR-15-type rifles could sweep up traditional-looking semi-automatic rifles and shotguns (and even handguns) in its net.  

The campaign's four-page educational insert on the modern sporting rifle, which tracks how military rifles of a certain era became popular civilian sporting rifles, will hit in sporting magazines ranging from Field & Stream and Outdoor Life to Petersen's Hunting and Gun Dog, among others. The point is that today's modern sporting rifle is just another step in the long history of the military-to-civilian sporting rifle evolution.

For this campaign to have a widespread effect on changing attitudes toward AR-15-platform rifles and to clear up misunderstanding about them (for example, their operation is semi-automatic, not full automatic, with only one round fired with each pull of the trigger), the campaign needs advocates who are willing to correct individuals—your friends, reporters, elected officials—who are misinformed about these rifles. A helpful pocket fact card available at www.nssf.org/msr can assist that effort. Consider sending the fact card to your local, state and Congressional representatives. 

As NSSF President Steve Sanetti has said, "We ask everyone who values their gun ownership rights to correct misunderstandings about the use and operation of these modern sporting rifles. If we let misinformation go unchecked, we only assist those who would ban ownership of these and other types of semi-automatic firearms, like your duck-hunting shotgun. We can't let that happen."

The Necessity and Pleasure of Owning Firearms

Two major newspapers this week have published stories that accurately capture the varied reasons why people choose to own firearms.

In The Washington Post yesterday, reporter Christian Davenport does a good job of showing how difficult it is to purchase a handgun in Washington, D.C., even after the U.S. Supreme Court, in District of Columbia v. Heller, struck down the city's longstanding ban against handgun ownership. It took Davenport four trips to the police department, two background checks, being fingerprinted, taking a five-hour class and passing a 20-question test--a total of nearly 16 hours--to purchase his handgun. Certainly, no one can claim that it's "too easy to buy a gun" in this city. About 550 D.C. residents so far have endured this purposely prohibitive process to become handgun owners, with many more, no doubt, unwilling to put in the time to overcome such a significant barrier to ownership. In the process of exercising his Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms, the reporter overcomes his apprehension about handling a firearm, discovers the enjoyment of shooting and wrestles with his feelings about whether to keep his newly acquired handgun in the home to protect himself and his family. Read "Get a Gun in D.C.--Do You Feel Lucky? and watch the video that features a segment filmed at Maryland Small Arms Range, Inc.

Today in The New York Times, Caitlin Kelly, author of the book "Blown Away: American Women and Guns," leads off her story, "For the Stressed Business Owner, a Range of Pursuits to Revive the Spirit," with a woman contractor who finds that shooting trap is a way to renew her energy in these challenging economic times for small business owners. “You’re not thinking about anything else, and when I come out of there I feel refreshed,” said Diane Slovak of Connecticut. NSSF assisted the author in finding her subject. Read the story and see the author's blog.

Educating Reporters Two at a Time about AR-15 Rifles

Dear Amanda Lee Myers and Terry Tang,

As Associated Press reporters, I know you want to "get it right."

However, it's utterly incorrect to say an AR-15 rifle is an "assault weapon," as is done several times in your story yesterday headlined, "Man carrying assault weapon attends Obama protest."

An AR-15-style rifle is not an assault weapon.

An assault weapon is a fully automatic firearm--a machine gun that, as long as the trigger is depressed, will continuously fire until the magazine is empty. Fully automatic firearms have been severely limited from civilian ownership since 1934.

An AR-15-style rifle, on the other hand, functions as a semi-automatic. It fires only one round with each pull of the trigger--just like countless other semi-automatic firearms that millions of Americans own legally for hunting, target shooting and self-defense. AR-15s are among the most popular firearms selling today and can rightfully be called today's modern sporting rifle.

Granted, AR-15-style rifles look like military rifles, such as the M-16, but as good reporters it's important that you not confuse the way AR-15s and military weapons function. Unless you deliberately want your readers to be confused about this issue, which is exactly what groups wanting to ban these types of firearms are after--confusion--you should not promote misinformation by using in accurate terms.

Versions of modern sporting rifles are legal to own in all 50 states, provided the purchaser passes the mandatory FBI background check required for all retail firearm purchasers.

If you would like an introduction to learning more about AR-15-style rifles at a target shooting range with a certified instructor, the National Shooting Sports Foundation would be pleased to arrange such a seminar, as we've done for hundreds of other journalists who now understand that AR-15s are not assault weapons.

Thanks for listening.

Tracing the Truth Instead of Guns

The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg (where have we heard that name before?) School of Public Health has just released another report calling for increased regulation of licensed firearms retailers.

Its analysis of the recently released 2008 Bureau of Alchohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives' study of firearms traces "found that the states with strong regulations and oversight of gun dealers, as well as regulation of private sellers, have far less gun trafficking than do states that lack these measures."

Really?

Then how do they explain the fact that in California, the state that perhaps most embodies all the sales regulations that anti-gunners dream of, 73 percent of the firearms traced in 2008 came from . . . California, dwarfing the next highest source state (Arizona) with a paltry 5 percent of guns traced in California orginating from The Grand Canyon State?

In fact, if you study other states that similarly place additional controls on retail sales and firearms dealers such as New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland and Massachusetts, you will find that ALL of those states are themselves the top sources of firearms traced in their states.

Not Surprisingly, The Brady Center Has It Backwards

In a classic case of inconsistency, the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, commenting on the newly released ATF firearms trace data, implies that if only all states had highly restrictive gun laws like those in effect in big cities, urban criminals would be prevented from obtaining firearms.

In other words, the “same shoe” theory fits this argument, but it doesn’t fit the Brady Center’s opposition to nationwide concealed carry by law-abiding citizens on “Federalism grounds,” when they say that each state should determine for itself the kinds of gun laws it should have based on local attitudes about guns, rural/urban cultural differences and law enforcement input.

They have it exactly backwards. Why does a city have any right to tell a more rural state located thousands of miles away that the state needs to severely restrict its citizens’ constitutional rights by exacting draconian gun-control laws to suit the city’s urbanized views?

Since the U.S. Supreme Court has stated that firearms ownership is an individual right of all citizens, isn’t the better argument that all states should permit law-abiding citizens to exercise this right equally, no matter where they are located?

Young Hunters: Safe and Supervised

The following comment from NSSF has been posted to an MSNBC.com story about a youth hunting accident whose content misleads readers about Families Afield, an initiative supported jointly by NSSF, the U.S. Sportsmen's Alliance and the National Wild Turkey Federation. The comment was posted by NSSF senior vice president Chris Dolnack.

To the Editor:

There is nothing wrong with a family member taking a youngster hunting under supervised conditions in order to pass along the many wholesome traditions that responsible hunting teaches.

By sensationalizing a youth hunting accident, however, your story paints an inaccurate image of young hunters as being unsafe and undermines the successful work of Families Afield, an initiative that seeks to remove restrictive age barriers so that youth can experience hunting with an adult mentor.

Research shows that supervised youth hunting is a safe activity. That's one reason why over the last five years 28 states have changed their hunting laws and regulations to create opportunities for youth to hunt under the supervision of an adult, resulting in 283,000 new and safe hunters. This is good news for hunting, a tradition that faces considerable challenges from urbanization, access and a changing culture.

An introduction to hunting at a young age goes hand in hand with nationwide movement to encourage children to spend more time outdoors being active, enjoying nature and gaining an appreciation for wildlife and habitat. Having tried hunting with a parent or guardian, a child can move on to take a hunter education course, which is required in all 50 states in order to purchase an adult hunting license.