Brady Campaign misrepresents ATF data to promote 'more guns, more crime' message

[WhiteFeather]

More links off main link. You should all take some time to study this INFO in detail. If you want to keep your firearm rights for your children and grandchildren to enjoy as you have.

Do your part to protect our rights and speak up to counter these gun grabbers, learn their tactics and BS, sooner or later they will be coming to your town.

Its you're watch NOW, don't let them take your rights that Others in the past history of this country have paid the Very HIGH cost for you to have now.

In this one article there is lots of related research that is all in one spot for any of you to use in this battle for the Republic.

PLEASE read the PA Time To Crime rates for Firearms with a PA recovery.
Hint HINT for Lost & Stolen debates - the average time to crime for PA 10.09 years the average for nation wide is 10.39 years
http://www.atf.gov/firearms/trace_da...sylvania08.pdf

For everyone not in PA the same sort of data is available for your state as well to counter the gun grabbers twisting the info for their purposes and agenda. Its a war of information that is being waged against US, the anti-gunners have gotten so far by our apathy to do our part to protect our rights.

No one person or group can fight all the battles but together all of US as individuals can do our part win the war by educating people in the value of having ALL the Constitutional rights and Freedoms they protect intact..

http://www.examiner.com/x-2879-Austi...-crime-message

Brady Campaign misrepresents ATF data to promote 'more guns, more crime' message

The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, America’s preeminent gun control organization, recently issued a report suggesting that states with “weak gun laws” are the nation’s major sources of “crime guns.” But as with other Brady reports, a deeper examination is in order before accepting their conclusions.

Curious turnaround

Earlier this year, the Brady Campaign claimed that the Tiahrt Amendment restricted law enforcement from accessing ATF trace data:

The so-called Tiahrt Amendment (named after Congressman Todd Tiahrt of Kansas) includes several riders attached annually to Justice Department appropriations legislation since 2004 that make it harder for law enforcement to prevent gun violence. They should be repealed.

In this new press release, Brady uses “ATF crime gun trace data” as a reliable source upon which to base their conclusion that:

Gun dealers in states with weak gun laws supply guns to criminals in other states at a rate more than five times higher than dealers in states with stronger gun laws, according to a Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence analysis of newly released ATF crime gun trace data.

Apparently, the Brady Campaign has decided that law enforcement does have sufficient access to ATF trace data, and that this data helps Brady to “prevent gun violence” by citing it in their publications.

The ATF data indicates that there appears to be few, if any, restrictions on trace requests.

In 2008, there were 245,691 total traces from U.S. law enforcement agencies, a 6.2% increase over the 231,421 trace requests in 2007.

Law enforcement submitted requests for a variety of reasons. Weapons possession was the most frequent: 63,281 or 25.8% of the total. There were 7,957 homicide-related requests (3.2%), 26,841 were drug-related (10.9%), 6,955 requests were tied to aggravated assaults (2.8%), and 4,901 (2.0%) were related to robberies.*
But trace requests occurred for many reasons, including property crimes (3,309), health/safety (9,388), and many others.

ATF reality

After researching the ATF trace reports extensively, Brady claims the data “proves” that there is significant gun trafficking, as noted in the quote above claiming that “gun dealers in states with weak gun laws supply [most of the] guns to criminals.”

But their conclusion doesn’t concur with what the ATF says about their firearms trace reports. Curiously, Brady ignored page 2 of each state’s report, which notes:

• “Law enforcement agencies may request firearms traces for any reason, and those reasons are not necessarily reported to the Federal Government. Not all firearms used in crime are traced and not all firearms traced are used in crime.”
• “Firearms selected for tracing are not chosen for purposes of determining which types, makes or models of firearms are used for illicit purposes. The firearms selected do not constitute a random sample and should not be considered representative of the larger universe of all firearms used by criminals, or any subset of that universe.” [Emphasis added]

In other words, the ATF cautions that:

• There is no relationship between reported trace data and patterns of gun usage in crime.
• The trace data is not a scientific sample that can be extrapolated to prove anything about criminal usage of firearms.

Only 8 traces–0.004% of all requests listed by category–were specifically for weapons trafficking. It seems reasonable that since law enforcement has the freedom to request traces for any or NO reason, major concerns over firearms trafficking would have generated more of these requests.
Most importantly, there is no requirement to list a reason for the request: 10,137 trace requests provided no reason (4.9% of all listed by category). Nor is a crime necessarily linked to the request: 21,786 (10.5%) were for firearms “found” by police.

Bottom line:

• Police have broad freedom to request firearm traces.
• Trace requests are not necessarily linked to a crime.
• The ATF data provides no conclusive evidence that guns originating in one state are used in crime in any state.

Next, we will examine how Brady ignores bias in the trace data, and other hidden truths that render their conclusions dangerously unreliable, from the public policy perspective.

* These numbers are probably low. ATF reports only display the 9-12 most common request types for each state, combining the rest into the “other” category.

Next: Part 2

Previously, we examined how the Brady Campaign misused the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) data to manufacture conclusions that the ATF itself says are false. But Brady’s report contains additional errors and hides important truths. Let’s examine the following statement:

Georgia led the states with the highest total number of crime gun exports, not adjusted for population. Florida had the second highest total number of crime gun exports, followed by Virginia, Texas and Indiana. All five states have weak gun laws making it easy for criminals to get firearms, scoring fewer than 20 out of 100 on the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence 2008 state scorecard.

Brady’s definition of “crime gun exports” is the difference between the total traces requested by law enforcement in one state and the number of traces from other states where the gun was originally sold in that state. For example, there were 8,535 traces requested in 2008 for guns originally sold by a Georgia gun store. Georgia law enforcement requested 5,683 of these; other states requested 2,852. Thus, Brady claims that Georgia “led the states” with 2,852
“crime gun exports.”

There are two problems with Brady’s premise.

First, as noted in Part 1, not all traces were related to crime. Of all traces for which the category can be derived from the ATF reports (207,504), only 19,813 traces (9.5% of total) were linked to violent crime (aggravated assault, murder, robbery). However, law enforcement requested 21,786 traces (10.5%) for the category of “firearm found” and 10,137 (4.9%) for “none provided.”

Second, each state’s report includes “Time-to-Crime” data on page 7. On page 9, the ATF states: “Time-to-Crime was calculated for those traces in which the purchase date could be subtracted from the recovery date.”

(Note: “Time-to-Crime” is a misleading appellation, because the ATF also notes it “Includes same criteria as Total Number of Firearms Recovered and Traced.” This means that an unidentified number of traces in this category were for guns that were not used in crime. A better name would have been “Time-to-Trace.”)

The ATF notes that the national Time-to-Crime average is 10.39 years. Since it takes over 10 years for a gun bought in one state to end up being traced in another, there is no way to know why and how the gun traveled.

The Census Bureau noted in their Domestic Migration Flows report for 2005 that over 7 million people moved to different states in the previous year. This means that over a 10 year period, it is possible that over 50 million people–and their guns–moved to different states.

Instead of addressing these points, Brady assumes that guns always travel to other states for criminal reasons. But with over 10 years between initial sale and trace request, ATF trace data provides scant evidence of black market demands moving stolen guns across state lines.

‘Strong gun laws,’ more crime

As noted above, Brady believes that states with the most “crime gun exports” have “weak gun laws.”
The 2008 FBI crime data won’t be available until September 2009. But since only five states had slight changes (2 points) from their 2007 scores, we will use the 2007 data here.

According to Brady, states scoring less than 20 on their 100-point grading system have “weak gun laws.” After cross-referencing Brady scores with FBI crime data, it turns out these states also have less violent crime.
Table 1: Brady Score Versus Violent Crime

Category Brady Score Violent Crime Rate Murder Rate
Brady Score 20+ 46.1 511.4 6.7
Brady Score <20 8.9 395.6 4.8
Percent Difference -80.6 -22.6 -28.1


Separated out by Brady’s criteria, “weak gun law” states averaged 22.6% lower violent crime and 28.1% lower murder rates.

Brady claims: “weak gun laws [make] it easy for criminals to get firearms.” Then why aren’t these alleged criminals doing their “job”?

Brady alleges that “weak gun laws” place us at risk, but they:

• Misused ATF firearms trace data to “prove” that states with “weak gun laws” contribute to “gun trafficking.”
• Used their own scorecard criteria to show that these states are safer.

Once again, Brady proves that the most sensible gun law ever written was the Second Amendment.
Previous: Part 1


****************************************
For in-depth analysis of the issues discussed here, read Howard’s book Four Hundred Years of Gun Control: Why Isn’t It Working?, which deconstructs the gun control agenda and motivates more people to support our civil right of self-defense. Autographed copies are available from the author.

[ByAnyMeans]

Thank you for a very good post. It's a lot to read but well worth it. Not surprising that the Brayd Bunch would lie and misrepresent the stats but at least we can use this to show fence sitters why they crap spewed from an anti's mouth is just that... crap.

[Falcon118]

Rep owed WF. Thx

[stephpd]

Got to love the Brady Bunch score card. They talk about those states scoring lower then 20 out of 100. Well that's only 3/4 of all the states.Sorry but PA and DE scored higher then 20. Of course by their own score card some of the top 10 most restrictive states for gun laws are also the most violent.

Pa, you're #10 and need to try harder to piss theses folks off. DE is tied for #11 and we have work to do too.

http://www.stategunlaws.org/xshare/p...d_rankings.pdf

Every state should be working to get the lowest score. Find out where we're slipping and push that agenda.

We all really need to get to that bottom score of 2 out of 100.

[Warpt762x39]

The Brady Bunch has trouble with hearing and reading facts. The simple explanation for this problem is the fact that their heads are shoved so far up their own asses, they cannot hear or see the facts in front of them.

The only thing they can do? Make it up as they go along. Tossing in tidbits that they found in an ATF report.

[WhiteFeather]

To add more firepower to your educational arsenal compliments of from our friends in Ohio holding our western flank

http://www.buckeyefirearms.org/node/6829

ATF trace data proves gun control does not affect crime

One of the crown jewels of the gun control movement was the passage of the Brady Bill during the first term of Bill Clinton's administration. The bill created the five day waiting period for handgun purchases, and was hailed as the first step in halting handgun violence in America.

Of course, prior to the Brady Bill the anti-gun groups had claimed several other key gun control laws would end gun violence as we knew. Those failures did little to dim their unprecedented optimism over what the Brady Bill would mean to America.

As it turns out, all the Brady Bill did was over regulate the handgun buying process and create hurdles for honest people, since criminals rarely go into gun shops to buy a handgun. Don't be fooled by the anti-gun rhetoric about keeping guns out of the hands of criminals, they want to keep honest people from owning guns as well.

Recent ATF gun trace data shows that the Brady Bill had little effect on gun crime, and that the holy grails of the anti-gun movement are meaningless when it comes to crime fighting.

According to the ATF, the average time a gun is in circulation before being used in a crime is ten years.

Regardless of whether a state had a "one-gun-per-month" law, and despite any other active gun control laws, the 10 year period remained pretty consistent from state to state. Guns bought in-state were also most likely to be traced in that state.

So, when New York City Mayor Micheal Bloomberg carries on about how New York's so-called gun problem is caused by out of state purchases he is blowing smoke.

Such a statistical breakdown, from a credible source, does damage to the anti-gun movement's claims that straw purchases are putting guns in the hands of criminals in large numbers. It also destroys their claim that guns are bought in the heat of the movement and then immediately used in crimes.

The argument that the mere possession of a gun turns honest people from law-abiding citizens to someone that is heartbeat away from being a criminal is shredded as well. If the possession of a gun was enough to overcome people's law-abiding nature, guns would be used in crimes much faster than the national average of 10 years.

Arguing that waiting periods and background checks have deterred criminals was always laughable, since criminals will always find a gun when they need it. This ATF gun trace data is further proof that Brady waiting periods, and one-gun-a-month limits, are feel-good laws that do more to discourage honest people from buying a gun than deterring criminals.

According to the ATF, in Ohio it takes an average of 10.16 years before a gun is used in a crime, and the national average is 10.33 years. That stands in direct contrast to the anti-gunner's claims that people walk into gun shops to buy guns with the express purpose of using them in a crime. It also disproves their argument that guns are bought in bulk in one state and shipped to another specifically for nefarious purposes. If that was the case, guns used in crimes on average would pop up much sooner.

For the record, it has to be noted that other studies have shown that less than 1% of firearms ever produced are ultimately used in a crime.

We, once again, have statistics from an impartial source that disprove a key component of the anti-gun platform. Therefore, the big question isn't that the anti-gun leadership continues to exist in America today. They will continue chasing windmills despite the failure of gun control - but why anyone pays attention to them.

They have cried wolf for nearly 50 years. Yet, people keep running each time they shriek about the evils of gun ownership.

Over the years they claimed concealed carry laws would lead to blood running in the streets and were proven wrong. They claimed so-called "assault weapons" were to blame for criminal activity and that was also shown to be incorrect. Now, we have further proof that the Brady Bill is largely useless.

As it stands, every argument made by the anti-gun community in America has proved to be seriously flawed. Only when they create their own statistics using misleading guidelines and falsified results can their side stay in the debate.

It's clear, as time goes on, that the American people see through the anti-gun arguments since they have lost every meaningful political challenge over the last twenty-five years.

At the national level, even what they claim as a victory is based on a staggering loss. The recent vote in the United States Senate over National Reciprocity was hailed by the anti-gun movement as a victory. But, they still were outvoted on the issue 58-39. That is an overwhelming level of support in favor of national concealed carry reciprocity, and only a filibuster by the Democrats keep it from becoming the law of the land.

When a self-proclaimed great victory is achieved through administrative trickery, it ceases to be a great victory. Still, that won't stop the anti-gun movement from claiming the tide is turning on the gun debate.

Basking in what we've gained over the years, however, is still a luxury pro-gun advocates can't afford. Now that we have yet another case that disproves the false hope of gun-control, it is vital that the message is trumpeted far and wide.

Otherwise, the spin and deception used by the anti-gun leadership to ply their message can regain a foothold for their side.

It's our job to see that it doesn't.

Gerard Valentino is the Buckeye Firearms Foundation Treasurer and writes for the ValentinoChronicle.com.

[Vig]

I'm not surprised. The Brady Campaign is only partly to blame, however. They're feeding off the media's misrepresentation of crime to make their flubbed stats more believable. The problem, in my opinion, lies chiefly with the ASC (American Society of Criminology) for not taking a public stance on the misrepresentation of crime in popular media. Any time the AMA (American Medical Association) decides that one part of the egg is bad for us, we hear about it right away, not so with the ASC, however.

The ASC is the group with the academic clout, power, and (IMHO) moral obligation to set the record straight on the misrepresentation of the frequency of criminality. The Brady Campaign is only successful because they are able to prey on the fear that crime rates are at an all time high when in reality the rates are no higher today than in the 1970s.

[donm]

You have to realize that the Brady Campaign is more a religion than an objective, rational program. Their objective is simply to take as many guns off the street as possible, by whatever means is necessary. Classic application of "the end justifies the means."

I've always found it odd that they demand that we leave our self protection up to the police, while the tragic shooting of Jim Brady and President Reagan took place under the active protection of the "best and brightest" in the personal protection business.

[stephpd]

I'm not surprised. The Brady Campaign is only partly to blame, however. They're feeding off the media's misrepresentation of crime to make their flubbed stats more believable. The problem, in my opinion, lies chiefly with the ASC (American Society of Criminology) for not taking a public stance on the misrepresentation of crime in popular media. Any time the AMA (American Medical Association) decides that one part of the egg is bad for us, we hear about it right away, not so with the ASC, however.

The ASC is the group with the academic clout, power, and (IMHO) moral obligation to set the record straight on the misrepresentation of the frequency of criminality. The Brady Campaign is only successful because they are able to prey on the fear that crime rates are at an all time high when in reality the rates are no higher today than in the 1970s.

I see it differently. Most everything we use to debunk the Brady Bunch and media are these reliable sources. But look at the sources that the media uses. All to often it's the Brady Bunch, occasionally the NRA but they seldom do there homework for rebuttal. You'll almost never see the ATF, FBI orASC giving the straight poop. You also have a two one one situation when these debates go on since the media will frequently side with the Brady's and try to keep the gun person off kilter.

So I see, mostly, a biased news person, unwilling to do their homework and do anything close to fact checking. They'll side with the 'common sense' and fear mongering, more for ratings, instead of being an informed moderator.

It's hard for the gun groups to get a fair shake with the MSM. And some of them, like Alan Gottleib (SAF), seem to do more harm then good.

[Seventy4Blazer]

fact:
more guns HAVE been sold in the past year than in recent history.

Fact:
Crimes involving firearms HAVE increased in the past 6 months.

FACT: its because of the person the amss of the USA voted for to be president and the scare of our firearms being taken away

FACT: the poor economy has allowed the minds of people to change to a point that some will do almost anything to survie, others have cracked and lost some marbles that were already short changed, and all around things are just BAD.

FACT: brady campaign has used this situation to skew the numbers, and people are going to take it hook line and sinker... sadly