Gun Control Linked to Milwaukee Crime Spike
A recent crime spike in the city of Milwaukee is an example of how gun-control laws can lead to more crime, according to a group that advocates for gun ownership.
Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, a member of New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s Mayors Against Illegal Guns coalition, and Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle – both Democrats – have opposed legislation that would allow Wisconsinites to carry concealed firearms.
Joe Waldron, executive director of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, said Tuesday that “instead of supporting legislation that would have allowed law-abiding citizens to fight crime by fighting back,” Barrett was “rubbing elbows with New York’s Michael Bloomberg, who won’t be happy until he has disarmed every average citizen in the country.”
Waldron said the anti-gun measures were disarming “the wrong people.”
“Instead of enabling citizens to defend themselves, he [Doyle] has perpetuated a low-risk working environment for predatory violent criminals and the Milwaukee murder rate proves it.”
Waldron was responding to a recent newsmagazine report showing that Milwaukee saw the largest jump in homicides from 2004 to 2005. The city reported 121 murders in 2005, up from 88 in 2004.
According to police statistics, as of Nov. 28 the city had seen 94 murders in 2006.
Waldron called it “ironic” that “anti-gun rights elitists beat the drums of hysteria about how there would be an increase in violence if law-abiding citizens were allowed to carry concealed handguns … and yet violent crime is rising.”
Eileen Force, a spokeswoman for Barrett, scoffed at the assertion that gun control laws keep guns in the hands of criminals and out of the hands of law-abiding citizens, calling Waldron’s group “kooky.”
“It’s Mayor Barrett’s position that we don’t need more guns on the streets,” she said. “We need less.”
Waldron said it was “difficult to measure” how much of an impact concealed carry laws would have in Wisconsin, but called the idea that fewer guns lead to fewer crimes “ludicrous.”
“Historically we can show that … where gun ownership is higher, crime is lower, and that’s true across the board everywhere in this country,”
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Wow, let’s label Waldron and those that support him as “kooky” and maybe we can dismiss them as nutjob gun lovers. Shame on Eileen Force. Why can’t gun ban supporters see that disarming the citizenry leads to an increase in violent crime? It happened in Canada, Australia, and don’t get me started on Washington D.C.!!
Good article, I hope that Tom Barrett wakes up and realizes his mistake.
I think a good comparison study between England (with strict gun laws (e.g. no handguns allowed)) and Switzerland (600,000 issued machine guns to civilians) is illustrative.
England has a lot of violent crime and Switzerland has nearly none at all.
I know there are other causes, but it’s not illogical to believe that the gun laws play at least a contributing role in this…
Taking things away so that we might not commit a crime with it is not a principle that we want to introduce into this country.
What is next. Cars? If we ban cars it will stop drunk driving. Eventually everybody’s hands will have to be chopped off so nobody can choke anybody to death. Baseball bats? Murders are committed with base ball bats.
If responsible licensed students had not been denied their constutional rights to bare arms, someone could have shot the va. nut before he killed so many people.
Gun control just got defenseless people killed
I don’t understand some people. Maybe since I live in Louisiana it can be said that I’m too stupid to have a opinion that makes a logical point. If a person is going to break the law why would they stop what they are doing and think “crap, it’s against the law to have a handgun so I’ll just report and turn it in before I break into this house and rob it”. I guess they know better, but can they beat an IQ of 152 in the 9th grade? doubt it, but money will prevail over intelligence.
I hate anti-gun laws!!!! I live in Milwakee, and the only people walking around the streets with guns are the criminals! I guarentee if everyone was carrying a gun, the criminals would think twice about using theirs!!!!!!