John Lott hits a home run

Real Clear Policy has an article by John Lott dated May 3, 2017 in which Mr. Lott makes the case that murder isn't a nationwide problem  Instead, it tends to be concentrated in a few very urban, and very dangerous places in the United States.  You can read Mr. Lott's article here.

The point of the article, and the point of John Lott's body of work has been that the problem is not guns, but rather the bad intents of some people.  The existence of guns does not in any way change people with bad intentions.  They would just as easily use knives, fire place pokers, crow bars, or indeed any tool they could to inflict harm on their fellow human beings and attempt to intimidate and humiliate them for power and profit.  Guns just make the task easier.  But guns also make the task of self defense easier for the citizen that would otherwise be preyed upon.

Tellingly, the national press, who advocate for gun control tend to live in these large urban areas, and tend to see the rest of the country as being like the areas in which they live.  Thus, while thinking of themselves as open minded citizens of the world, they are in fact more parochial that the people living in the much denigrated fly over country.