Last week, the FBI released its national crime report for 2012. By a slight margin, the nation's violent crime rate decreased in 2012--relative to 2011--making it the lowest it has been since 1970. Compared to 1991, when it hit an all-time high, violent crime is down by 49 percent. The nation's murder rate was unchanged in 2012; still lower than any time since 1963 and at nearly an all-time low.
Between 2011 and 2012, 24 states and the District of Columbia experienced decreases in their murder rates. There was no correlation of these trends with the severity of the states' or the District's gun control laws. Troubled Detroit, under Michigan's law requiring a permit to purchase a handgun, had the highest murder rate among large cities, followed by Baltimore, under Maryland's law imposing a seven-day waiting period on handgun purchases. But there was no relationship between other large cities' murder rates and their gun control laws.
President Obama had nothing to do with the decrease in crime, of course. But you would think he'd be happy to take credit for it. It's not like he has much else to show for himself lately. However, as the Washington Times' Emily Miller pointed out on Wednesday, Obama hasn't said a word about it.
"Not once has the president remarked on these numbers. Neither has [anti-gun] New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg," Miller wrote. "The liberal media pretend the statistics are written in invisible ink. Why the blackout? Because all violent crime--including gun homicide--has gone down over the last 20 years. The gun murder rate has gone from 6.62 per 100,000 inhabitants in 1993 to 3.27 in 2012, a decline of more than 50 percent."
Instead, on Sunday, during what for everyone else present was a memorial service for the Americans who were murdered by a lunatic in the Washington Navy Yard on September 16th, Obama took to the podium to speak less about the victims of the crime, and more about his two favorite subjects--himself and what he and his adoring followers believe is the comparative inferiority of the United States to just about every other country on Earth.
"What's different in America is it's easy to get your hands on gun . . . . Well, I cannot accept that," he said. Ignoring the FBI's report, showing gun crimes at a fraction of the level they were 20 years ago, he railed against a fictional "epidemic of gun violence [that] tears apart communities across America."
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