NRA “point man” recants

[G_j]

Source: Salon

Monday, Jul 30, 2012 11:20 AM EDT


NRA “point man” recants

The Republican lawmaker who killed gun safety research teams up with the scientist he targeted
By Alex Seitz-Wald

In 1996, Mark Rosenberg and Jay Dickey were arch-rivals in a key battle over guns. Rosenberg ran the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Dickey, a Republican member of Congress from Arkansas, was spearheading an effort to eliminate it. The issue was publicly-funded research conducted by the Center that exposed the public health dangers of gun ownership. The powerful National Rifle Association was not pleased, and Dickey took up the cause, first trying to kill the agency outright before successfully stripping funds for gun research and putting into law new prohibitions on this kind of inquiry. At a hearing in May of that year, he accused Rosenberg of secretly “working toward changing society’s attitudes so that it becomes socially unacceptable to own handguns.” Dickey’s amendment effectively stopped all government research into the hazards and potential solutions for a society with an estimated 270 million privately-owned guns.

But just over 15 years later, Dickey has had a change of heart and he and Rosenberg have come together together to publicly call for for restoring public funding for research into gun safety. In a joint op-ed in Washington Post Sunday, Dickey and Rosenberg write, “We were on opposite sides of the heated battle 16 years ago, but we are in strong agreement now that scientific research should be conducted into preventing firearm injuries and that ways to prevent firearm deaths can be found without encroaching on the rights of legitimate gun owners.”

“One of us served as the NRA’s point person in Congress,” the op-ed continues, noting that Dickey’s amendment “sent a chilling message” to gun researchers. “Since the legislation passed in 1996, the United States has spent about $240 million a year on traffic safety research, but there has been almost no publicly funded research on firearm injuries,” they note, even though firearms kill almost as many Americans every year (about 31,000) as motor vehicle crashes (about 33,000).

..more..

Read more: http://www.salon.com/2012/07/30/former_nra_point_man_recants/

[samsingh]

1. kick

[hack89]

2. Good - there is a need for some good science in this area. nt

[Zoeisright]

3. So what's he going to do about the 450,000 Americans

who were killed by guns in the last 15 years? Too little, too late Dickey.

[Doctor_J]

4. Which would be a better fate for him?

To get shot to death in a gun massacre, or to get colon cancer and have an allergy to pain medication?

Disgusting piece of protoplasm

[petronius]

7. What a truly truly disgusting thing to post..

[Turbineguy]

10. I think that's the way to frame it.

How many would not have been killed? Of course getting attitudes to change would impact gun sales.

Now I read on DU over the weekend that the direct cost of killing people comes out to about $30,000 each or about $1 billion per year. Wounding is about $300,000 each person.

Wouldn't it be cheaper to just give the NRA say $4 billion per year as tribute to let society live?

[nadinbrzezinski]

5. And this points to change in attitudes, and leading edges

Those who say nothing will change... lookie look, over here.

[krispos42]

6. This is good

Laws can't be made if the problems can't be identified.

Of course knowing the problems doesn't mean there's a solution, but studies must progress.

[DaveJ]

8. Nice to see a Republican grow up, for a change.

Th problem is that, too often, people acquire power, before first acquiring brains.

This is a rare case when the brain eventually caught up.

[tclambert]

9. Yeah, we need some statistics on this subject.

I hear people say they like to keep their guns loaded and easily available, "Because what good are they if you have to find them, unlock a box, and load them before you can defend yourself from a home invasion?" That sounds to me like an invitation for unintended users, including children, to find a gun and shoot someone. But that's all supposition, on both sides.

What are the real circumstances in gun deaths? Are lots of them accidental? Or are most gun homicides intentional? Drug related? Alcohol related? Age related? Does anybody ever shoot an actual criminal? Or do they mostly shoot close relatives? I would like some numbers. Maybe some easy modifications could save lives. An automatic safety where you have to press something for the trigger to work? (Nail guns have that.)

[ManiacJoe]

11. "recants" may not be all the accurate.

However, they are right about the topic needing some good science.

[BlueToTheBone]

12. How soon to the 100th Monkey?

It looks like we getting closer.

[CTyankee]

13. "even though firearms kill almost as many Americans every year (about 31,000)

as motor vehicle crashes (33,000)..." That's interesting.

To read pro-gun threads on DU, you would think that is not the case. I don't know how many times the charge is made that we have far more car fatalities than ones from guns, followed by "so why don't we ban cars?"

It's no wonder the public has been misled into believing NRA propaganda. It's stories like this one that show how insidious that group and its supporters are.

Nice to see them start to get exposed for the hideous people they are...

[CTyankee]

14. Wow, this is a silent place tonight! What happened?

No charts with flashing numbers, no "you were never safer" posts, no false data about gun safety...where are the usual suspects?

Goodness, I'm amazed! I would think the hordes would be out touting all those stats about gun safety and how well off we all are now because we can carry guns into public places...

Oh, dear...something happened...like the truth...funny about that, isn't it?