Glad to see John Sigler in the area saying what needs to be said:
“Philadelphia doesn’t need any new anti-gun laws to combat the lawless,” said John C. Sigler, a Delaware lawyer who was appointed president of the firearm-advocacy organization this year. “They simply need to enforce the laws they already have.”
Speaking to students at the Widener University School of Law, Sigler, a former Dover police captain and Navy submarine veteran, delivered a hard-line argument: He said gun-control laws don’t work and are not the solution to violent crime.
“If Philadelphia wants to stop the killing, they’ve got to make criminals pay the penalty,” he said.
Even from my point of view, the NRA has not been very visible in Pennsylvania.  I hope this is a sign that’s about to change. The Philadelphia politicians have, for too long, pushed the easy solution:
“They need to step up to the plate and say enough is enough, my constituents are dying and we need to stop that. And to stop that, you need to take the bad guys, put them in jail and you leave them there. If they come back out, and do it again, you put them back in again for twice as long,” he said.
He said the public must accept the cost of fighting crime.
“If it means building more prisons, then build more prisons,” Sigler said.
Gun control is easy.  It’s a way for cowardly politicians to pretend like they are doing something. It’s a lot harder to actually fight crime. The politicians must be held to account, and not permitted to take the easy road.
I think the judiciary are playing a large part in why the criminals are running rampant in Philly:
http://daysofourtrailers.blogspot.com/2007/10/theft-of-services.html
I agree with the jist of his argument. Over 70% of the murder victims in Philadelphia this year have criminal records themselves. It’s clearly a case, more often than not, of criminals killing criminals. I do, however, take issue with the statement If it means building more prisons, then build more prisons.
We’re already imprisoning 2.2 million people nationally. We’re going to toss even more people in there? The prison population has quadrupled since 1980. We really need to re-think what gets someone tossed in jail, and we really need to re-think what we’re supposed to do with them once they’re in there and after they’ve done their time. “Fuck ’em” doesn’t cut it!
None of the political leaders have the balls to admit that the War on Drugs is primarily responsible for both cities’ crime problems and for the explosion in US prison population.
Sebastian, we noticed something this morning about the same topic that was maybe worth mention but kindofan aside to what you pointed out. The Delaware News Urinal article on the Sigler speech had this, which I found interesting:
http://www.delawareonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071018/NEWS/710180375/1006/NEWS
Student David Anthony said he’s an NRA member and a resident of Philadelphia, where top officials concede that gun violence is completely out of control.
He asked why the NRA routinely opposes measures that he thinks are reasonable, such as limiting gun purchases to one a month, especially in light of all the straw purchases that criminals’ girlfriends make there.
/ quote
I can’t imagine that an NRA member in good standing (not to mention someone with knowledge of the law) would make such a ridiculous statement. Criminals’ girlfriends are committing criminal acts, therefore law-abiding citizens must yield more rights? Sounds like double secret reverse astroturfing!
Yes, the real problem is that too many criminals do the crime but don’t do the time. If you let a criminal back out on the streets after just a few years in the slammer he or she will get a gun on the black market if they want one even though it is already illegal for them to touch it. Another gun control law will not force them to be defenseless, although taking guns from law abiding citizens does make the profit to risk ratio for crime look much better to thugs on the streets. After all, surveys of criminals show that most of them are much more worried about running into an armed “victim” who is therefor able to defend him or herself than they are of running into the police.
. If you let a criminal back out on the streets after just a few years in the slammer he or she will get a gun on the black market if they want one even though it is already illegal for them to touch it. Another gun control law will not force them to be defenseless, although taking guns from law abiding citizens does make the profit to risk ratio for crime look much better to thugs on the streets.
You’re arguing a straw-man here. I never said that having another gun law was a way of reducing cities’ violent crime rate. What I did say is that simply tossing criminals in jail doesn’t solve anything either. We’re already close to being maxed out of capacity, and prisons cost money to build and maintain. Also, unless we’re going to impression every felon for life, they’re going to eventually get out, and prisons have a bad track record of preparing released felons for a life outside of crime.