Open thread for night owls: Obama unchains public safety research into gun violence'perhaps

One of the more meaningful of Obama's executive orders today may be the one directing the Centers for Disease Control to "research the causes and prevention of gun violence." One would think that the federal government would, if nothing else, have at least taken upon itself the rather benign chore of determining whether there was anything that could be done to reduce the modern epidemic of gun violence'but you'd be wrong, because guns have become so fetishized, in America, that Congress has repeatedly blocked federal scientists from even looking into that:

From the mid- 1980s to the mid-1990s, the CDC conducted original, peer-reviewed research into gun violence, including questions such as whether people who had guns in their homes gained protection from the weapons. (The answer, researchers found, was no. Homes with guns had a nearly three times greater risk of homicide and a nearly five times greater risk of suicide than those without, according to a 1993 study in the New England Journal of Medicine.)

But in 1996, the NRA, with the help of Congressional leaders, moved to suppress such information and to block future federal research into gun violence, Rosenberg said.

An amendment to an appropriations bill cut $2.6 million from the CDC's budget, exactly the amount the agency's injury prevention center had previously spent on gun research. The money was returned to the agency later, but targeted for brain injury trauma research instead.

In addition, the statute that governs CDC funding stipulated that none of the funds made available to the agency can be used in whole or in part 'to advocate or promote gun control.'

The results have been a near-full stop on research into effective gun safety policies, including ways to reduce accidental gun deaths, domestic violence involving guns, and other basic policy questions.

'When I first started, there were 50,000 people a year dying on the highways. Now it's 32,000 and that's because there's been superb scientific research,' Teret said. 'We need to be able to address gun-related injuries in the same scientific manner as highway injuries.'

One would think. But while Obama may be able to lend his weight to efforts to restore basic federal research aimed at reducing America's 30,000 gun related deaths per year, it will be up to Congress to fund individual research initiatives'research that NRA-beholden members have effectively blocked for nearly two decades. And the National Rifle Association remains insistent'even more so than during the 1990's'that no further research into reducing America's gun violence be allowed to go forward.

So now we wait. Is announcing to federally funded researchers that they are, in fact, allowed to tackle the issue of gun violence and gun safety an impeachable offense? We shall see. If nothing else, we certainly should look forward to hearing from the first imbecile that tries.

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