Debunking Robert Reich’s Lies Promoting Gun Control

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Robert Reich is no stranger to controversy. He has a habit, it would seem, of saying things that, frankly, just aren’t true. Maybe it’s a hold-over from his time as Secretary of Labor under the Clinton Administration.

Recently, Reich released a video that covers five points that, he says, can be used to counter the NRA. For many anti-gunners, the NRA is who they imagine is the focal-point of all support for gun rights in the U.S., so that’s who they aim for. Frankly, we’d love to have a good discussion about this with Mr. Reich, but, first, he needs to tell the truth.

Reich’s first point is that gun laws save lives. Reich argues that “gun massacres” fell by 37% under the Federal assault weapons ban and more than doubled when the ban lapsed. The problem with this point according to Chris Knox and Jeff Knox, is “Reich doesn’t cite a source for his claims because there is no credible source drawing that conclusion.” Why should we believe his assertions about this?

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Reich’s second point is that the “Second Amendment was never intended to permit mass slaughter.” Here’s the thing: gun ownership doesn’t equal mass slaughter, and legal gun owners are the ones who prevent mass slaughter. Need proof? Check out the statistics in our article here.

Gun ownership isn’t about mass slaughter. Guns aren’t even the point. People with murderous intent cause mass slaughter, and, if it isn’t guns, it will be something else like fertilizer (remember Timothy McVeigh?). But guns are used defensively much more often than offensively and numerous would-be mass shootings are stopped by a legal gun owner on site with a firearm. Reich assumes that gun owners want to use guns for “mass slaughter” when the fact is that guns prevent mass slaughter much more often than causing it.

Reich’s third point is that more guns won’t make us safer. Our article noted above debunks this lie, but Knox and Knox have this to say about this one:

Once again, Mr. Reich throws around “studies” but fails to mention which ones.  We can easily present more than 30 studies that show that gun control laws don’t reduce risks of violence.  In fact, in the late 1970s Wright and Rossi produced a study funded by the Carter Justice Department, with the objective of determining which “gun control” programs were most effective.  They found none. In the mid-2000s, both the Centers for Disease Control and the National Science Foundation did independent reviews with the same objective. Both reviews reached the same conclusion as Wright and Rossi: that there is no clear evidence that any gun control laws have effectively reduced crime.

Tired of the lies, yet? Well, apparently, Reich wasn’t because his fourth point is that the “vast majority of Americans want stronger gun safety laws.” The first problem with this point is that, the majority’s opinion isn’t relevant to the legality of a situation. It might be argued that the majority of Americans supported slavery in 1800, but that support didn’t make slavery right.

Secondly, the point of a law being in place is to prevent a mob majority from trampling the rights of a minority, so, even if pro-gun people are in the minority (which my experience does not lead me to believe), it doesn’t matter if the majority want to make the entire nation defenseless. Anti-gunners do not have a “right” to prevent pro-gun people from being able to defend themselves.

And, thirdly, Knox and Knox point out that polls are often skewed by how the questions are asked and answers interpreted. In other words, polls can be rigged.

Reich’s fifth point is that the NRA is a “special interest group with a stranglehold on the Republican Party.” My first response to Mr. Reich about this point is that Planned Parenthood is a special interest group with a stranglehold on the Democratic Party, but he seems okay with that. I don’t appreciate his double-standard and hypocrisy. Other groups can be accused of having a similar “strangle hold” on the Democratic Party. In fact, why should it matter if the NRA is a special interest group and if they support a particular party who tends to vote the way that the NRA supports on gun rights? Until Reich argues that all special interest groups should be taken out of politics, this is just a smoke-screen and hypocrisy.

All-in-all, Reich has some pretty pathetic and misleading talking points to give anti-gunners. What we need to do is to keep giving anti-gunners the facts.

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28 COMMENTS

  1. Robert Reich now convinces me that he is also an INTELLECTUAL MIDGET, too. What a maroon! He sucked as a Secretary of Labor, too. (for those in the P C crowd, if you’re offended, tough noogies!. My rights do not end where your feelings begin.)

  2. Robert Reichs is a lot like his mentor Bill Clinton. He tells lies and when he doesn’t lie outright then he makes up fictitious polls and studies so by the time anyone fact checks the guy no one is interested that he made it all up. That has been the MO for practically all Democrats lately. They would not know the truth if it bit them in the ass.

  3. When the Robert Reichs of this country confiscate the guns, only the criminals and crazies will have guns! The decent, honest citizens will be defenseless!

      • I’ve been involved in Second Amendment issues for many years. Too many gun owners talk big but it’s just talk. They don’t belong to any Second Amendment organizations. They just talk. Many of them don’t vote because they “Don’t want their name on any list.” It’s just talk, talk, talk! That’s why our enemies win!

  4. We just had a murder where the attacker used a hatchet. Do we want to ban all hatchets? London is about ready to ban knives since guns are banned. Even the police do not carry guns. But there is a quick fix that can stop kids from getting guns. It simply means legislation that parents of students who take a gun from home are to be charged and tried along with the student shooter for failure to keep their weapons secured. That would shut down school shootings by students. But, of course, with 300 million people in the nation, killings with something are going to happen because of the odds. Doesn’t anyone ever pay attention to that issue? The odds of 1 in 300 million could be 300 killings every year. Until we have a lot more data on the mental illnesses we are not going to cure any of the present people who are potential killers anytime soon. Also, no one makes an issue of vehicular accidents. We can do a lot more to reduce vehicular accidents by paying attention to the causes of accidents. I do that and submit the results to the legislature.

  5. Same old anti gun song and dance. The moon is made of green cheese because I say it is. “Studies” corroborate my claims, though I either cannot or will not specify which studies, nor by whom these “studies” were made, oh yes, there is also the question of who funded the referenced studies. All sorts of questions go unanswered, why the lack of answers looming large.

  6. Robert Reich is a midget, both physically and mentally. Being a bit short on mental ability is a bad enough problem which is made worse by his willingness to lie. I guess he is a typical Democrat, if his mouth is moving he is lying. There are, of course, many reports written by researchers who studied data and wrote about the connection between guns and violent crime. We read those reports and cite them when we say guns reduce crime rates. People like Obama (and Reich, I suppose) read the same reports and see them as flawed. So, Obama had the CDC do a study on the same subject and lo and behold, got the same answers. His response was to bury the report-liberals know the facts, but are irritated by the answer. The solution is simple, ignore the reports and the answers and make up your own data (right out of your empty little heads).

  7. It’s not about the guns, it’s about the control. Large “D” Democrats want control of every aspect of our lives and with the 2nd Amendment in place, they cannot get control. The writer, above mentions Planned Parenthood. Tens of thousands of human beings are slaughtered every year in the womb, and YOUR tax dollars pay for this infanticide. Where’s the outrage? None from the Libtards on the left. And all for convenience. Because those having abortions, in the majority, are “inconvenienced” by bringing those children into the world. I guess it was too “inconvenient” to consider that a child might result from their lying on their backs and spreading their legs for a good time. Tens of thousands are killed asa result of drunk driving, but where is a call for the confiscation of motor vehicles or another prohibition of alcohol? The 2nd Amendment was put in place just for the very reason that we seeing from the Left; that a small minority would try to exercise control over the majority, because they think they know how everyone should live their lives. How does Putin, Castro and Rocket Boy keep control of their countries? Is not by popular election; it’s because they don’t have the means to resist. And that’s what keeps the rest of the potential despots in this country in check.

  8. Reich must know that any effort to confiscate firearms in the US will either fail outright or fail because of active armed resistance. If anyone is stupid enough to fall for his smoke and mirrors bullshit, they are too stupid to actually vote because they are mentally defective. Study after study by reputable researchers show he is completely a liar of the worst kind. I am getting very tired of these liars and hypocrites calling themselves liberals. They absolutely are not. If the Antifa crowd wants to target real fascists they just need to look at these so-called liberals. Of course the Antifas are themselves fascists, so there would be no humans involved in a fight of that nature, only animals.

  9. Robert Reich Clinton’s Authority on Labor from 93 to 97 worked in both the Ford and Carter Administration’s. I think I see a Pattern here. Another Academic who should stay out of Politic’s He’s neither good at it and has no real idea about how the real world works. Idea’s like his is how the world got this way in the first place!

  10. Reich was just another lying pandering tramp of the Clintons, truth never mattered to them.

  11. Riech is no more impressive nor honest than any lefty of the likes of Schumer, Perlousy, Waters, Jackson Lee, Durbin, or RINOs fo the ilk of Flake, Corker, Graham, Ryan, or McConnell, so his phony “opinions” mean nothing, period.

  12. Reich is a slippery, dissembling small reptile in league with The Evil Pirate Queen and her Dikhead mate, Slick Willy. Other BeeEss and turd flingers Reich uncleanly conspires with are the big fat lumpy pile of slippery jive and lies, Loretta The Hutt Lynch and the beast’s predecessor Eric “Afro Commie” Holder…charter members of Poofy Prince Obongo’s Mulatto Mafia. The arrogant Cleanhead Jeh Johnson gets special mention…and a 20 foot sack to stuff cotton bolls within, on the business end of a whip.
    All the above overdue for nooses.

  13. Never confuse a Liberal Democrat with the facts, they know what they know, even if totally wrong!

  14. The left rely’s on deceit and lies to push there ANTI GUN AND POLITICAL agenda>>WHAT IS GUN CONTROL SIMPLY PUT GUN CONTROL IS PEOPLE CONTROL.FIRE ARMS A MEANS OF PROTECTING ONE’S SELF AND ASSURING ONES AUTTONMY ARE REMOVED FROM CITIZENS,MAKING THEM VULNERABLE TO CONTROL TO WHICH THEY ARE UNABLE TO REJECT .EXAMPLES JO STALIN,MAO TSE TUNG,POL POT,IDI AMIN DA DA ADOLPH HITLER.IF YOU WISH TO LIVE OR DIE UNDER THOSE CONDITIONS THEN GO RIGHT AHEAD AND VOTE FOR A GUN CONTROL POLITICIAN.
    THE DUMOCRATS ARE EVEN PUSHING VOTING BY ILLEGAL ALIENS YOU KNOW THE ONES THEY SAID HAVE BEEN IMMIGRATING INTO THIS COUNTRY,ACTUALLY ITS MORE LIKE AN INVASION.tHEY ARE DRAINING ALL OF THE BENEFITS THAT ARE SUPPOSED TO BE FOR AMERICAN CITIZENS AND DEPLETING ALL BENEFITS FUNDS SORRY IT’S NICE TO BE GENEROUS BUT WE MUST PROTECT AMERICAN’S CITIZENS BENEFITS

  15. This idiot learned from the best of them, Hilliary, Billy Boy Clinton. If their nose’s grew like Pinocchio’s did. They wouldn’t be able to get in a car without having their nose cut off first.

  16. Robert Reich is a Bill of Rights trashing freedom hater! He wants decent, honest citizens to be defenseless while the crooks and the crazies will still have their guns. Robert Reich is in the same category as Michael Bloomberg who runs around trying to take guns away from citizens while Bloomberg has seventeen armed bodyguards! They both have the sincerity of a prostitute’s kiss!

  17. Our country will never be the way it use to be. The liberals do not believe in the law, workers, decent wages, mother, father, family, debates, Constitution, Bill of Rights, lower taxes, etc.
    They want to control us and all we do. They are poor losers. They are greedy and think they are smarter than us. God help us.

  18. No one advocates confiscation some sensible people advocate registration and requirement for training and proof of responsibility. Your points refuting Reich are not valid and they are in fact lies. You list no verifiable figures on violence prevented by firearms and in fact it makes no sense. The best source of statistics is international availability of firearms in developed countries

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