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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jacques Chitte who wrote (36645)	5/2/1999 7:44:00 PM
From: The Philosopher	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

The CDC wants to label gun ownership a Health Crisis. I wonder whether they are so eager to label bomb ownership a Health Crisis for the people of Yugoslavia? Sort of depends on whose ox is getting gored.

To: Jacques Chitte who wrote (36645)	5/2/1999 7:48:00 PM
From: jbe	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

Lather, I would agree that labelling gun ownership a Health Crisis is a bit much -- if true. But that wasn't my point. The CDC (about which I know very little) is a government agency, and as such will continue to exist and perhaps even prosper whatever action, if any, is taken with regard to gun ownership. Hence the comparison between the CDC and the Tobacco Institute, which has a material interest in the actions taken with regard to the tobacco industry, is an apples & oranges type of comparison. That's all. And on another point: the CDC's objectivity. True, the CDC has adopted a position of advocacy. Does that mean, in your opinion, that it is providing us with doctored statistics? In other words, do you have any reason to believe that their statistics are inaccurate, and can you prove it? And, final question: could they not have reached the conclusion that guns should be banned on the basis of the statistics they collected, rather than the other way around? Joan P.S. Sorry I could not take you up on your breakfast offer. I had a houseful -- oops, I mean treeful -- of exhausted satyrs to take care of.

To: Jacques Chitte who wrote (36645)	5/2/1999 8:09:00 PM
From: Grainne	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

<<The CDC wants to label gun ownership a Health Crisis. You'd'a thought they would restrict themselves to firearm injuries or deaths. To me, this seriously impugns the CDC's objectivity in the matter.>> How can you say this? If you study the comparative statistics of gun deaths in the 26 industrialized nations, for example, it is hard for me to believe that anyone who was truly objective could come to any conclusion other than that the proliferation of guns in America is indeed a health crisis. This is all really hard for me to understand. There is a very common perception abroad that America is a very violent nation awash in guns, and gone nuts with killing people. Inner city children have been dying here for at least a decade in gun violence, and now it has reached the upper middle class suburbs where all of us begin to take notice. It would seem very normal to me that everyone would suddenly realize that Americans possessing all these guns was absolutely nuts, and really hurting our society, and yet it is almost politically incorrect to even say anything about it. And yet that is the OBJECTIVE reality.