Video: Ohio Fox affiliate rips apart Piers Morgan’s homicide statistics
posted at 6:29 pm on January 10, 2013 by Erika Johnsen
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Wow…..actual journalism and reporting still exists?!
topdawg on January 10, 2013 at 6:31 PM
This same guy gave Obama a real tough interview during the election.
rndmusrnm on January 10, 2013 at 6:36 PM
Awesome.
Ben Swann is a better journalist than everyone at CNN, CBS, ABC, NBC, PBS and the AP – combined.
Aizen on January 10, 2013 at 6:36 PM
He did great with the numbers, Erika. Thanks for that.
His conclusion, or moral of his story, is a little off, though, because it’s not clear what he means by “the heart” and whether he truly believes “the heart” is the only factor.
Dusty on January 10, 2013 at 6:47 PM
So disarming citizens leaves them open to open violent criminals. Colour me shocked.
NotCoach on January 10, 2013 at 7:04 PM
Holy geez.
nicktjacob on January 10, 2013 at 7:08 PM
Thought it was pretty clear that he meant the conscience of the individual.
tdpwells on January 10, 2013 at 7:12 PM
I see what you did there.
Odysseus on January 10, 2013 at 7:26 PM
the argument that i have heard is about the murder rate.
very well, BG can have more violent crime, but how much of it is deadly? meaning, how many homicides(total homicides, not just gun homicides) there is per 100000 ppl in GB and the US?
nathor on January 10, 2013 at 7:48 PM
Shame there aren’t more honest stories citing actual statistics given the heightened leftist rhetoric.
Tim_CA on January 10, 2013 at 7:50 PM
lets take that argument as true, why would you would need more than handguns to defend itself?
nathor on January 10, 2013 at 7:51 PM
the point is, there are many factors that contribute for crime rates either guns are present or not, but the lethality of the crime increases if guns are present.
nathor on January 10, 2013 at 7:53 PM
The second amendment argument is not one of self defense any more than it is one of hunting, but to play along:
Why do the security forces which defend our public servants choose to use submachine guns? Why do police carry AR-15′s in their cruisers? If these are the tools of choice for those individuals when they need to confront bad guys, why would a citizen be denied use of the same to defend life and limb?
At the minimum, I may feel I’m better able to produce controlled fire with a carbine than I am with a handgun. Doesn’t that benefit everyone involved?
TexasDan on January 10, 2013 at 8:02 PM
the point is, the more lethal power each individual has, the highest the probability of some individual will achieve a higher body count if he goes berserk.
imagine everyone could buy grenades?
so it seems obvious the need of a balance between lethality of the weapons available and the need of self defense.
nathor on January 10, 2013 at 8:10 PM
Piers Morgan cherry-picked the gun-related murder rate as his comparison in order to make the U.S. look as bad as possible. Taht doesn’t make it the best point of comparison.
Which is the better comparison: based on the gun-related murder rate, or based on the murder rate overall? Obviously, dead is dead. But Morgan was only interested in comparing the statistics that looked best for him.
And which is the more relevant to us, anyway: the rate of people who are atually killed, or the rate of people who suffer any violent crime.
Why accept Piers Morgan at face value? It’s not just that his stats are wrong. His selection of stats is also wrong.
tom on January 10, 2013 at 8:13 PM
The 2nd Amendment isn’t about “balance”. It’s about the right of the people to defend themselves from a tyrannical government. As such I should be able to legally posses anything I can bear, just as the 2nd Amendment says. But your point is invalid from the word go because the vast majority of mass shootings occur in so called gun free zones. The power of a weapon is irrelevant when it comes to self defense. When would be criminals know their intended victims are armed and prepared to defend themselves they look for softer targets. It is no accident that home invasions are uncommon in the United States. Criminals do not want to be shot even if they are packing an RPG.
NotCoach on January 10, 2013 at 8:21 PM
so why having any limit at all on the weapons an individual might possess?lets buy rpg’s, grenades, anti-air should missiles, whatever you need to defeat a “tyranical goverment”!
anti-air shoulder missiles?
all kinds of anti personal bombs?
for dissuasion, handguns should be enough.
nathor on January 10, 2013 at 8:27 PM
I agree.
Yes. Anything I can bear.
It is not enough to stop a tyrannical government.
Let’s cut through the crap. Point to single instance in our history when these so called “common sense” guns laws have done anything to reduce violence.
NotCoach on January 10, 2013 at 8:31 PM
sure, but neither the fox show shown this murder rate comparison!!! and its really what matters. if GB with a higher violent crime rate manages to have a lower crime mortality rate, then guns might contribute to the overall higher murder rate…
you tell me? i would say actually killed ppl is more important no?
only if the murder rate is higher in the UK. if not, he has some point. but truth be told, there are other factors to look at because there are many countries out there with guns that have lower crime and murder rates….
nathor on January 10, 2013 at 8:34 PM
that is insane!!! just imagine muslim immigrants buying those? too much lethal power on the hands of independent individuals without the kind of control an army provides, its flirting with anarchy…
not reduce violence but reduce mortality…
I am not sure… would need to research… this is not a pet issue for me…
nathor on January 10, 2013 at 8:43 PM
Is that like an unbreakable rule or something?
xblade on January 10, 2013 at 9:06 PM
And yet, we let Muslim immigrants buy plane tickets. Go figure.
xblade on January 10, 2013 at 9:08 PM
no, just my opinion that handguns are the perfect dissuasion weapon for the common day to day life. but of course, you are free to disagree and as someone that does not won guns, I wont take my opinion too strongly…
nathor on January 10, 2013 at 9:10 PM
because we cannot discriminate on bases of religion… duh! anyway, do you agree we could by ANY weapon? imagine a simple passion crime where the husband shoots down an commercial airplane just to kill the wife and lover… you dont have to mix muslims in the scenario to understand that allowing too much lethal power on the hands of every individual is just flirting with disaster.
nathor on January 10, 2013 at 9:15 PM
Very powerful indeed… So in conclusion Great Britain that disarmed its citizens is much more violent place than the US…
mnjg on January 10, 2013 at 9:42 PM
This is where statists get confused. It’s not this government’s job to “allow” power (in) the hands of it’s citizens; it’s this government’s job to protect the G*d given rights of it’s citizens, one of which is quite clearly enumerated in this country’s constitution.
Will people like you ever realize the difference between law abiding citizens defending themselves vs criminals?
As to why hand guns might not be enough, how about the quite recent case of a Georgia wife defending herself and her children as the man who broke into her home found where they were hiding (thereby suggesting he was after victims, as opposed to mere burglary)She shot him 5 times–and he’s in the hospital, not the morgue. If he’d been on PCP, or some similar substance, would she and/or her kids still be alive?
Auralae on January 10, 2013 at 9:46 PM
No, that is most certainly not the point. But even if it was, you’d be wrong.
The funny thing about the magazine size argument is that in actuality, it doesn’t matter to the criminal and it does matter for the victim.
Criminals are going to pick gun free zones and can reload at their leisure as a result. The victim who is using a gun in self defense may well be under fire. Yes, you can reload quickly with practice, but who would want to be put to the test with their life, or loved one’s lives, on the line? Do you know what the average hit percentage is for police? 10 rounds doesn’t give you very good odds when it matters most. You’ll note the police carry quite a few.
Just in case you’re unaware, Korean store owners used AR’s to defend life and property during the LA riots. Handguns would have been less than ideal in those circumstances.
Finally, you seem content to allow your government to place a higher value on the lives of our public servants than upon yours as a citizen. If the most effective tool to defend life is a full auto submachine gun or AR 15, as evidenced by the selection of those tools by the secret service and PD’s, but those tools are not an option for you and me, then we’re being placed at an intentional disadvantage by our government.
Again, 2nd A is not about self defense, but even on those terms you’d be wrong to ban long guns.
TexasDan on January 10, 2013 at 10:02 PM
So sayeth the troll who knows diddley about guns and squat on why a 12 gage pump loaded with 00 is one of the great dissuaders of all time.
Remind me again why you folks are not troll-cotting this individual?
PolAgnostic on January 10, 2013 at 11:40 PM
Ben Shapiro of Breitbart ripped apart Piers Morgan’s homicide statistics to his face.
aquaviva on January 11, 2013 at 1:57 AM
I’ve been waiting for Breitbart to put up the full transcript of Piers Morgan and Ben Shapiro. They have yet to do it, but NewsBusters has the opening exchange.
Breitbart would cheer. Ben lets him have it from the get-go, rips off his pseudo-moral mask and tells Morgan exactly what he and the Left have been doing.
INC on January 11, 2013 at 2:06 AM
The murder rate is higher in the US, but by less than the gun homicide rate.
However, across catagories of crime where there isn;t a body involved, the UK is far worse than the uS, especially concerning rape.
As a bunch of limeys and Aussies I used to barhop with put it: You feel way safer going out at night in the US to a bar. you are far less likely to find yourself in a bar fight. It’s just that if you do, you know you are far more likely to end up dead here than in London. Which is, in and of itself, a discouragement to getting into a bar fight…
JohnGalt23 on January 11, 2013 at 2:42 AM
because we cannot discriminate on bases of religion… duh! anyway, do you agree we could by ANY weapon? imagine a simple passion crime where the husband shoots down an commercial airplane just to kill the wife and lover… you dont have to mix muslims in the scenario to understand that allowing too much lethal power on the hands of every individual is just flirting with disaster.
nathor on January 10, 2013 at 9:15 PM
Your premise is insulting. You believe that all Americans are stupid and that if allowed to have too much “lethal power” as you call it, then we will all of a sudden lose our minds and start murdering at will. And you definitely don’t get sarcasm.
GeorgiaBuckeye on January 11, 2013 at 7:17 AM
Nice try. This journalist’s presentation speaks for itself. You’re a freaking moby here. You’re trying to pass yourself off as someone who isn’t liberal but just so concerned about the direction of conservatism. Scrape these folks off your shoes people. Arguing with them just makes you more stupid.
smoothsailing on January 11, 2013 at 7:50 AM
I don’t care what any statistics say.
The 2nd Amendment shall not be infringed.
So it doesn’t matter what anyone ‘believes’.
Badger40 on January 11, 2013 at 7:59 AM
And fox
MoreLiberty on January 11, 2013 at 8:00 AM
Reverse that: the more lethal power each law-abiding individual has, the higher the probability that when some individual goes berserk that he will taken care of swiftly and with extreme prejudice; hence, reducing the likelihood that someone will choose that path to make a name for themselves.
I will actually agree. [Handguns are more portable, more concealable, 'easier' to shoot in many ways, generally have less over-penetration than rifles, etc.] However, that’s not for the government to decide, but the individual. And, it’s not – by any stretch of the imagination – the only valid reason to own firearms.
Exactly right. The statist premise is that people are inherently stupid and allowing them to have a lot of rights is dangerous because they might hurt themselves or others. Of course, the statist is so much more enlightened than us poor rubes……
GWB on January 11, 2013 at 10:45 AM
Sounds familiar…. Like “an armed society is a polite society”, maybe?
GWB on January 11, 2013 at 10:47 AM
From the article
– Jim DeMint
I love Jim DeMint, I am not sure I completely agree, it is not the political parties, Republican, that had it wrong. I watched almost every major campaign stop for Ryan-Romney on the internet, and watched Red Rock twice. The party had the right message. That too many republicans may have sat on their hands and expected the Romney campaign to “entertain them” is sad. But Romney won all the red states, and beat McCain’s record doing it. *see footnote, final vote count.
But the Medium is the message, and the overwhelming media captioned the Romney campaign as Beleaguered, Fumbled, Jumping the Gun, Not ready for Prime time. I think we need to buy one of the networks, and put our own former White House aids there. Buy AP? Buy Reuters? the medium told them to text their favorite Idol to win on Nov 6th.
I would have got on a bus to go live in Mitt Romney’s America, that I saw and heard about from him and Paul Ryan; that American that I saw and heard at Red Rock. Too bad the rest of America was censored from hearing about it.
To those in the 30 Rep. Governed states, using Heritage models to put intellectual value back in the schools would be a great stride toward sanity…don’t you think?
I am looking forward to see De Mint generate new ideas, but he needs two tracks. One to shore up the red states, that need to make true American examples of themselves, and the other for the uninitiated in the blue and purple states…who have no idea what he is talking about thanks to the MSM.
*Footnote, the American Spectator Magazine online.
http://spectator.org/archives/2012/12/03/romney-beats-mccain
Fleuries on January 11, 2013 at 11:23 AM