Political Analysis Blog

I chose to critique an article from The New York Times titled "The Gun Challenge: What We Don't Know is Killing Us"  The first thing that caught my attention about this article was the title. With all the killings that have taken place over the past few months like the shootings at Taft High School in California and Sandy Hook elementary in Connecticut, the debate over gun control is even stronger then ever. This article focuses on how the gun lobby has a strong hold on congress when it comes to regulating gun control and putting money forth to to places like the Centers for Disease Control and other agencies to research gun violence and what we can do to make it better. It has many valid and interesting points. For example the article sates that "gun lobby has effectively shut down research on gun violence for the past seventeen years". I find this extremely interesting because although it is our right to bear arms, it is also our responsibility to make sure those fire arms are being operated safely and being used in a legal and proper manner. President Obama has asked congress to aid in his research by donating millions of dollars to research involving deaths by guns and gun control and violence in general. These are clearly things that need to be investigated. With so many violent acts committed with fire arms it would almost seem silly not to put time and effort into finding the most effective way to regulate fire arms. Of course supportrs of the NRA and of guns themselves are going to strongly oppose this research and try to do whatever they can to voice their opinion on the opposite of the issue. This article is clearly aimed at supporters of stronger gun regulation and to maybe sway the opinion's of those not. In this article it discusses how research of prevention of gun violence were stopped as soon as they were making strides that were not in favor of the NRA. This article all around has very good information, obviously with a certain purpose. Stronger gun regulations. It discusses all the aspects that need to be looked into as far as guns are concerned including gun violence at home, background checks, distribution of guns and the trafficking of guns. It also imposes that we ask more questions when it comes to guns such as is this person stable enough to own a gun? How did this person acquire a fire arm? Of course the NRA are going to dispute it. Although the author does make a good point in the article when he states that "In 1996, Congress took $2.6 million intended for gun research and redirected it to traumatic brain injury. It prohibited the use of C.D.C. money to "advocate or promote gun control". The gun control debate is very increasingly becoming more heated and important in national politics as well as among the American people. I agree with the majority of information in this article. Although it is one sided, I feel Congress should do all they can to make sure that guns don't end up in the hands of the wrong people. I agree with prohibiting the sale of certain fire arms such as bazookas and high capacity magazines. There is no reason anyone should own one of those, not even for hunting purposes. Some might say that the issue of gun violence and gun control right now are detracting from real problems our nation is facing such as economic ones, but I feel it is equally important that the safety of our citizens is at the front table of Congress. I feel this author did a great job at stating his/her facts and making some valuable information known. It gave me lots of insight on the topic and helped me understand how deep of an issue this really is in America and has been for a very long time. There was plenty of evidence to support the claims and ideas in this article. The most interesting I thought came at the end when it stated that "more than 100 researchers in public health and related fields pointed out that mortality rates from almost every major cause of death have declined drastically...but the homicide rate in the United States, driven by guns, is almost exactly the same as it was in 1950". Now that is something tto think about.