Daily Briefing For Wednesday, December 5, 2012

The Coffin As Soap Box

I hadn't planned on weighing in on the recent controversy surrounding Bob Costas' comments on gun control.  But after seeing a number of posts on Facebook about this, I felt compelled to address a few issues.

1. Calling for Costas' removal from the air isn't censorship.  Censorship is when the government restricts the content of public discourse.  If market pressures and public opinion are brought to bear to remove a commentator from the airwaves, that's a voluntary decision of the commentator's employer.  Just ask Don Imus.
2. Guns aren't the problem.  Karl Rehn at KR Training provided this catalog of stories from a variety of news sources, evidencing a clear case that in the face of more people owning firearms than ever, crime rates are actually down.  To wit:
   
   Self Reported Gun Ownership At Highest Level Since 1993
   
   Forbes: What The Left Won't Tell You About U.S. Gun Sales
   
   NPR: Violent Crime Down Five Straight Years
   
   NBC News: FBI Reports Violent Crimes Now At Historic Lows
3. Costas' comments were a diversion from a different and much more likely problem.  The NFL Players Association has filed a class action lawsuit against the NFL regarding the failure to warn over the concussion risks players face.  The Suburban Dad Survivalist brought this to your attention eight months ago.  The NFL is facing problems with off the field behavior of a number of its players, including acts of domestic violence, substance abuse and suicides.  By blaming guns, the NFL and its proxies (that would be Bob Costas) divert attention away from the real problems facing players and onto an instrumentality that's been a part of American culture and history far longer than football.

I'm not calling for Costas to be fired or punished.  I've never been a big fan of his, perceiving him to be only a sligtly more cerebral version of Brent Musburger.  He is certainly entitled to his own opinion on guns and anything else.  I'd prefer he not share those opinions - even if his opinions were congruent with mine - on a sports show.  Stick to football.  If you want to be a political commentator, go on Meet the Press.

This event serves as a great reminder that we still have a lot of work to do to educate the public on the benefits of self sufficiency in the self defense realm.  Use the data above to bolster your arguments.

Detroit In Free Fall

Back in the late 1930s and early 1940s, a number of people from rural areas moved from their farms and into urban areas for work.  My grandparents on my father's side did just that, relocating from their rural Tennessee home to move to Detroit to find work.  Dad was even born there.

Once known as a working shrine to modern industrialism, Detroit is now in free fall.  Today, a Detroit city councilwoman called on President Obama to bail out Detroit, since Detroit residents voted for him in the recent election. 

The answer to what ails our cities isn't in Washington.  It's in our own cities, with our own people.  That's the crux of what I've been trying to convey for years now.  The Suburban Dad Survivalist nation needs to be prepared to be leaders in our various communities to find solutions amongst ourselves, rather than looking to another governmental agency for a bailout.