There’s no denying that America has a gun violence epidemic, with gun death rates higher in this country than almost anywhere else. Opinions can differ as to whether this is how we want our society to live. What is truly indefensible, however, is banning research on guns. And yet, after a horrifically violent 2015, Congress has continued to do just that.
Even the Republican congressman who initially introduced the amendment nearly two decades ago, former Rep. Jay Dickey (R-Ark.), has come around to opposing it.
“Back in 1998, I took part in cutting off gun violence research dollars at the federal level because of what was considered a misapplication of the dollars by the CDC. I have recently expressed my regrets that we didn’t continue that research with the provision that nothing shall be done in this project to infringe the rights of gun ownership as guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution in the Second Amendment,” Dickey wrote in a recent letter to Thompson.
If you’re so scared of what research might show that you stop it from being performed at all, what does that say about you?
