U.S. gun violence in decline and the New York Times can't stand it

The Naples Daily News picks up on what studies and many recent articles have been saying for some time. More guns in public circulation have co-trended with a decline in gun violence. The Daily News article is specific to Florida:

As state and national legislators consider gun control laws in the wake of last month's Connecticut school shooting, Florida finds itself in a gun violence depression. The Firearm-involved violent crime rate has dropped 33 percent between 2007 and 2011, while the number of issued concealed weapons permits rose nearly 90 percent during that time, state records show.

You can almost hear heads exploding in the gun control camp.

Compare what was published in Naples to what got fit to print in today's New York Times: "More Guns = More Killing":

In Guatemala, riding a public bus is a risky business. More than 500 bus drivers have been killed in robberies since 2007, leading InSight Crime, which tracks organized crime in the Americas, to call it “the most dangerous profession on the planet.” And when bullets start flying, everyone is vulnerable: in 2010 the onboard tally included 155 drivers, 54 bus assistants, 71 passengers and 14 presumed criminals. Some were killed by the robbers’ bullets and some by gun-carrying passengers.

Leave it to the Times. Needing to bolster its narrative for U.S. gun control, it reaches to the distant south to a region plagued by political instability and narco-violence.

The Times neglects the mention Guatemala requires licensing for owners of  semi-automatic weapons and handguns. Guatemala already has gun control in excess of what's been publicly proposed by Barack Obama, Dianne Feinstein and the gun control Democrats in DC.

Here's one more factoid the New York Times missed:

"An investigation by Guatemala's El Periódico newspaper found that as many as 27,000 military weapons, including an unknown number of grenades, may have been illegally sold or stolen in recent years."

The above citation is from the Washington Post, July 17, 2010.

If criminals can't get guns by other means , they steal them. Often from police and military if there's no civilian supply of what they seek. It's long been the case world over.

Sorry New York Times, your reach to the south does nothing to bolster the case for more U.S. gun control. Whereas data crunched by the Naples Daily News seems pretty straightforward.


Related: A look at Guatemala firearms restrictions, Guatemala arms Mexican cartels