"Chicago"

Shortly after the Democratic Party in 1984 held its nominating convention in San Francisco, Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatric peppered her convention speech at the Republican National Convention with references to "San Francisco Democrats." Those were the good old days when San Francisco was known most of all for homosexuals (not yet universally "gay") and gay was not good.

On January 12, 2016- approximately 5,237 days or 452 months too late- Ted Cruz stated "I think he may shift in his new rallies to playing ‘New York, New York’ because Donald comes from New York and he embodies New York values."  And throughout the years, Republicans have attacked "Hollywood liberals."

Move over, San Francisco, Manhattan, and la-la-land, and make room for Chicago.

The latest comes from Repub governor Matt Bevin, interviewed Monday evening by CNN's Erin Burnett.   When Burnett noted of mentally ill individuals, "if they do not have a gun, they cannot kill a lot of people," Bevin responded "But again, here's it's important (to) understand. Where in America do we have the greatest amount of gun control laws on the books? Name a major city. Chicago might come to mind. Look at the high --"

Of course, coming to mind is Chicago, the previous home of Barack Obama, the current home of Barack Obama, and the home of the upcoming Obama museum.  After Burnett countered with "or New York" (where the crime rate has dropped even more precipitously than elsewhere), Bevin contended

Or New York. Look at some of the -- of the murder rates. Again, every city is different, but I would say this -- we have more rules and more regulation and more restrictions on the purchase and ownership of guns than we ever did historically, and that in many instances is good and appropriate. I'm not taking a beef with that whatsoever...





The FBI Uniform Crime Report of 2015 revealed Chicago as having the 25th highest murder rate in the country. Municipal borders, obviously (except to gun control opponents), are porous and firearms flow in from outside of a city- including Chicago- into a city.  State borders are porous, also, but less so- and as Fact Check found in October, 2015

The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, both groups that advocate for strong gun laws, published a scorecard on state gun laws in 2013, giving higher letter grades to states with stronger gun laws. Nine of the 10 states with the highest firearm death rates, according to the CDC, got an “F” for their gun laws, and one of them got a “D-.” (Note that most states — 26 of them — received an “F.”) Seven of the states with the lowest firearm death rates got a “B” or higher; two received a “C” or “C-“; and one — New Hampshire — got a “D-.”

Three of the ten states with (by one measure) the most lenient gun laws are among the six states with the highest age-adjusted firearm rates. As FactCheck pointed out, correlation isn't causation, But "Chicago."

Share |