Fresh on the heels of the tragedy at Martin Place, libertarian Senator Leyonhjelm has jumped on the bandwagon with his ideas about gun control. He’s a politician and so, like Tony Abbott, can’t resist the opportunity to get some media attention for some of his half-baked views.
Libertarian Senator Leyonhjelm
On the surface, he looks like a social progressive supporting gay marriage, decriminalisation of marijuana and assisted suicide. He and his party are also opposed to foreign aid and gun control.
What lies at the heart of this is a philosophy that believes in limiting the role of government in regulating the lives of individuals. It’s about being pro-choice. It’s not about being socially progressive.
In the wake of the tragedy of Martin Place, he has trotted out old the mantra of the National Rifle Association “The only way to stop the bad guy with a gun, is a good guy with a gun.”
This is absolute nonsense on a number of counts.
There is no evidence whatsoever to suggest that the good guys with guns have done anything to stop the bad guys with guns in America where death rates from firearm homicides are amongst the highest in the world.
He ignores the difficulties in working out who the good guys are when you start handing out gun licences. Of course, we could get everyone who applies for a gun licence to tick a box:
That should do the trick.
Leyonhjelm argues that if someone in the Lindt Cafe had a gun, they would have been able to shoot gunman Man Haron Monis. In Leyonhjelm’s brave new world, everybody would carry a gun to protect themselves. So here’s how the Lindt Cafe scenario would have played out.
A gunmen (a bad guy) walks into the cafe, which is full of good guys with guns. He produces a gun and points it at a group of customers. One of the customers (a good guy) then pulls out his gun and fires at the gunmen. Unfortunately, he miss and hits one of the customers who are sitting behind the gunmen and who cannot see that gunman (the bad guy) is carrying a gun.
What they can see is the customer who has fired at the gunmen and hit one of the other customers (also a good guy). The partner of the wounded customer pulls out a gun and returns fire. Within seconds, all the good guys are firing at each other and the cafe is ablaze with gunfire.
Lindt Cafe light up with gunfire as police storm in
Tim Haslett's Blog 
Well, I’m not sure where you are getting your facts but let’s address some of the ones that are wrong.
America where death rates from firearm homicides are amongst the highest in the world.
Sorry but that is demonstratively wrong. And look at some of the countries that have much higher rates than America — How about Honduras — over 22 times higher rate than America. How about Mexico where the gun control laws are so strict there is literally only 1 gun store for civilians in the entire country !! And their homicide rate is 3 times our.
Country Homicides (rate per 100,000 people)
Honduras 64.8 (2010)
El Salvador 39.90 (2008)
Jamaica 39.40 (2009)
Venezuela 39.00 (2000)
Swaziland 37.16 (2004)
Guatemala 34.8 (2010)
Colombia 27.1 (2010)
Brazil 18.1 (2008)
South Africa 17.00 (2007)
Panama 16.10 (2010)
Mexico 10.00 (2010)
Paraguay 7.30 (2009)
Nicaragua 5.90 (2008)
Costa Rica 4.6 (2006)
Uruguay 3.43 (2009)
Philippines 3.24 (2002)
Argentina 3.0 (2008)
Barbados 3.0 (2000)
United States 2.83 (2012)
Peru 2.60 (2009)
There is no evidence whatsoever to suggest that the good guys with guns have done anything to stop the bad guys with guns in
We’ll back up and address this part.
http://www.buzzfeed.com/ryanhatesthis/10-potential-mass-shootings-that-were-stopped-by-someone-wit#.waRZypeJr
9 different potential mass murders stopped by someone with a gun — a good guy with a gun. Next we can look at a survey done by Kleck and Gertz where they found up to 2,500,000 Defensive Gun Uses (DGUs) each year. A DGU is where the presence or threat of a firearm stopped/prevented a crime. This study is backed up by 16 different surveys that found similar amounts. Heck even the media can not hide all the times people defend themselves with a firearm
How about this story reported by Huffington Post
The family members of a robbery suspect that held a store employee at gunpoint in Alabama are lashing out at the Good Samaritan who shot him and stopped the robbery.
Adric White, 18, was shot five times after he allegedly tried to hold up a Family Dollar store in Mobile on Nov. 12.
FOX10 spoke exclusively to both the unnamed Good Samaritan and the family members of White. They’re livid that their son was shot while pointing a gun in someone’s face.
“If [the customer’s] life was not in danger, if no one had a gun up to him, if no one pointed a gun at him – what gives him the right to think that it’s okay to just shoot someone?” a relative, who wished to remain anonymous, told FOX10. “You should have just left the store and went wherever you had to go in your car or whatever.”
But when the suspect pulled out a gun at about 5:30 p.m., the Good Samaritan did too.
“He had the gun to his head. He had him on his knees,” said the Good Samaritan, who wished to remain anonymous. “I drew my gun on him and I said ‘Hey don’t move.’ At that point he swung around and before he had a chance to aim the gun at me I fired. I didn’t want to shoot him.”
The man shot White five times. He was taken to USA Medical Center, where he remains in police custody.
And don’t you love the family’s reaction?
He ignores the difficulties in working out who the good guys are when you start handing out gun licences.
yes that is a problem. Just like we can’t tell who are the good guys when we elect them to Congress or hire them to serve on the police force, right?
But the evidence is out there that the people with the licenses are fairly law abiding — in fact far and away more so then the average population. Many states, like Texas, track the number of people with Concealed Handgun Licenses who are convicted of crimes. Not once in the history of the license program has the conviction of CHL holders been above 0.50% of all the convictions that year. The current rate is 0.20% . Isn’t that pretty convincing?
Many states report the same type of numbers.
And your imagination is running wild with how the scenario would play out
In all likelihood the situation would have played out more like that video. The idea that gun owners, especially those who choose to carry in public, can’t exercise common sense and judgment is just not borne out by the facts.
Bob S.
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