Fatal Cop Shooting Suspect Killed In Standoff

[Atypical Liberal]

36. You really need to do some research.

I still maintain that the main contributing factors to the reduction in violent crime rates are gun control, better policing, and just for fun let's throw in better medical treatment.

You are completely wrong.

You really, really, need to go spend a couple of hours Googling "Violent Crime in the United States".

Violent crime in the US is now at it's lowest point in decades. Yet we currently have record numbers of firearms in circulation. The election of President Obama in 2008 sparked a massive spike in firearm and ammunition sales yet violent crime rates have continued to decline since then, as they were well before his election.

Since 1986 we have gone from virtually no states allowing concealed carry to now every state except one allowing it. We are also seeing more and more states passing "castle doctrine" style laws that remove the duty to retreat from victims of crime.

Now I will NOT make the case that the reason we are having reduced crime rates is because of more firearms. We can't make that case. But we can certainly make the case that more guns do not result in increased crime rates.

There have been many reasons proposed for the decreased crime rate. One of them is that the price of cocaine crashed from its high in the 1990s. Another is that the drug trade has more or less stabilized and matured, with less internal struggles in the distribution chains. Another is that, for good or ill, the United States has incarcerated huge swaths of the population in the age, sex, and race range most likely to be involved in violent crime (young black males). And because of this, that same swath of the population has been unable to procreate.