Op-Ed: Gun Control - Brady Campaign and the New Math

January 17, 2007

By Howard Nemerov

When I served as Mayor during the 1990’s, the Administration and Congress helped local communities fight crime by providing funds to hire more police, and making it harder for criminals to get guns. As a result, crime decreased. Over the past few years, however, the approach seems to have been switched. Now cities are often seeing less police but more guns on their streets. These new crime statistics indicate that we’re doing things backwards. – Paul Helmke, President of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence

Brady Campaign’s new spokesman seems full of high-sounding verbiage these days, but the Clinton administration’s crime policies–contrary to Helmke’s claims–fell short on crime fighting...

...Helmke claims that the Clinton administration “helped local communities fight crime,” implying he supported these efforts as mayor (from 1988-2000) of Fort Wayne, Indiana. During his last five years as mayor, the national violent crime rate fell at a 7.0% faster rate, murder fell 12.6% more nationally, and rape fell 12.1% faster, while the aggravated assault rate in Fort Wayne actually rose 15.9%, trailing the national index by 38.4%. In the five years since Helmke was voted out, Fort Wayne has beaten the national violent crime index by 11.2%. This begs the questions: Paul, why did you fail so miserably on your watch; don’t you think you should accept personal responsibility instead of blaming law-abiding citizens you never met?

Click here to read the entire article from Howard Nemerov, an accomplished writer and good friend to Buckeye Firearms Association.