Lying for Gun Control

A recent Op-ed in the LA Times entitled California needs a Gun Violence Restraining Order makes some extraordinary and misleading claims.

Between 1999 and 2010, California reduced its gun death rate 56%, making the state a model for policymakers elsewhere seeking to reduce gun violence. California now has the ninth-lowest rate of gun death among the 50 states, but that isn't something to celebrate in the aftermath of the Isla Vista tragedy.

If California is really the "ninth-lowest" state for "gun death[s]" that statistic is not reflected in the overall murder rate for the state. According to the Uniform Crime Report statistics compiled at The Disaster Center , California has a murder rate of 5.0 per 100,000 population making it the the nineteenth worst state for murder (eighteenth if I exclude the District of Columbia with its 13.9/100K murder rate). The ten best states for murder rates are:

State	Murder Rate
NH	1.1
VT	1.3
IA	1.5
ID	1.8
MA	1.8
MN	1.8
UT	1.8
ME	1.9
HI	2.1
OR	2.4
WY	2.4

If Ms. Binder was interested in reducing murders and negligent homicides then she would logically be looking at those states with low rates. However, I suspect the author is not at all interested in reducing overall murder but only in the shibboleth of "gun violence". After all, seven or eight of the best states listed above have liberal gun laws meaning they will not fit into the boundaries of her superstitious nonsense.