I was absolutely aghast when I read the Deseret News editorial headed on Nov. 11.
Never before have I read an article even on the editorial pages in which facts were so blatantly twisted and logic so faulty that even had I not had any prior knowledge of the topic, I still would have taken issue with nearly every stated assertion.The article sought to discredit Utah's concealed weapon permit law by comparing it to the similar 8-year-old law in Florida. It first states that contrary to claims of proponents, it failed to keep criminals from applying. Having a convict apply for a permit in no way endangers anyone. That proponents made such a ridiculous claim, I doubt, but whether true or not, can only serve to impugn them, not determine whether the law is bad. The stated figure of 691 convicts that were prevented from receiving permits because of application restrictions and checks is obvious proof that those restrictions are successful in keeping guns from the wrong hands.
The article then stated that in 549 cases, licenses were revoked and that of those, 167 were found to have criminal histories that should have prevented them from receiving the permit, and later, that 200,241 people were granted permits over nine years. Those figures indicate a fractional 27 hundredths of 1 percent of issued permits having been revoked, and an insignificant 8 hundredths of 1 percent of all permit holders being known convicts who "sneaked by" background checks over nearly a decade; or 99.9% of applicants having lawfully obtained permits. These numbers at very least support the effectiveness of safety features in the law.
The fact that a small number of Floridians have committed crimes after receiving permits may point out a fallacy in stated proponents claims, as the article suggests, but has no direct relevance to the law itself. Given that the article itself admitted that those crimes weren't necessarily gun related according to their sources, no cause and effect relationship can be assumed between the obtaining of the permits and the commission of those crimes.
As it wound down, the article further claimed that it would be difficult to show that "the increase in hidden weapons has reduced crime or made people feel safer" and "no one has noticed a dip in crime rates' since Utah's law went into effect. Again, no relevance. A permit to carry a concealed weapon isn't important as a crime reducing measure, it concerns an individual's 2nd amendment rights, and more importantly, ability to protect himself or herself from a violent assailant.
Moreover, it seems obvious that those 200,000 plus Floridians allowed to carry a concealed weapon, as well as thousands in Utah, did feel safer with a weapon, or they would not have obtained the permit in the first place.
This piece of gobbledygook claimed that a study of eight years under a similar law in Florida yields results that "paint a startling picture." What's startling to me is how far some will distort the picture to make it resemble the image they hold.
Scott Shipley
Salt Lake City