Daily Archives: 27 August 2009

Gun Town U.S.A. peaceful, prosperous, and murder free

“In March 1982, 25 years ago, the small town of Kennesaw – responding to a handgun ban in Morton Grove, Ill. – unanimously passed an ordinance requiring each head of household to own and maintain a gun. Since then, despite dire predictions of ‘Wild West’ showdowns and increased violence and accidents, not a single resident has been involved in a fatal shooting – as a victim, attacker or defender.

The crime rate initially plummeted for several years after the passage of the ordinance, with the 2005 per capita crime rate actually significantly lower than it was in 1981, the year before passage of the law.

Prior to enactment of the law, Kennesaw had a population of just 5,242 but a crime rate significantly higher (4,332 per 100,000) than the national average (3,899 per 100,000). The latest statistics available – for the year 2005 – show the rate at 2,027 per 100,000. Meanwhile, the population has skyrocketed to 28,189.

By comparison, the population of Morton Grove, the first city in Illinois to adopt a gun ban for anyone other than police officers, has actually dropped slightly and stands at 22,202, according to 2005 statistics. More significantly, perhaps, the city’s crime rate increased by 15.7 percent immediately after the gun ban, even though the overall crime rate in Cook County rose only 3 percent. Today, by comparison, the township’s crime rate stands at 2,268 per 100,000.

This was not what some predicted.

In a column titled ‘Gun Town USA,’ Art Buchwald suggested Kennesaw would soon become a place where routine disagreements between neighbors would be settled in shootouts. The Washington Post mocked Kennesaw as ‘the brave little city … soon to be pistol-packing capital of the world.'” (Read more from wnd.com)

Afghan opium profits going mostly to U.S. allies

“One of the most revealing things we learned this week about the war in Afghanistan came in a Los Angeles Times report headlined ‘Taliban Drug Proceeds Lower Than Thought.’

We’ve been told again and again for years on end that the Taliban were running their operations off the opium trade, clearing as much as $400 million per year. Now, a Senate Foreign Relations Committee investigation says the proceeds are closer to $70 million.

But that’s not the real news. The real news is what’s missing: If our enemies aren’t taking as much money as we thought to provide protection to the source of raw material for 90% of the world’s heroin, then who is providing that protection?

Apparently, the answer is: our friends.

The Times goes on to say:

In one of its most disconcerting conclusions, the Senate report says the United States inadvertently contributed to the resurgent drug trade … by backing warlords who derived income from the flow of illegal drugs. … These warlords later traded on their stature as U.S. allies to take senior positions in the new Afghan government, laying the groundwork for the corrupt nexus between drugs and authority that pervades the power structure today.

The cost of this may well go beyond the effect on the heroin shipments.

When we sat down this week with Amin Tarzi, director of Middle East Studies at the Marine Corps University and a native Afghan, he said that the United States has lost credibility with the Afghan populace by allying itself with warlords who have been known across Afghanistan for many years as criminals.” (Read more from npr.org)