Reply #8: Rifles aren't a serious crime problem in the U.S. and never have been...

[benEzra]

So you are saying your guns are more important than someone's life.

Rifles aren't a crime problem and never have been. To use Sen. Obama's state as an example, the FBI reports that there were 448 murders in Illinois in 2005. All rifles COMBINED accounted for only 4 of them.

In any given year, multiple states will report zero rifle homicides. Nationwide, the percentage of murders that involve rifles is less than 3%.

http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/05cius/data/table_20.html

IMHO, fighting to ban the most popular civilian rifles in America, when rifles are vastly underrepresented in violent crime, is not only counterproductive, it is political suicide in much of the United States.