In downtown El Cajon, not far from where my in-laws lived quite a few years ago, there was a store that had a prominent sign that really caught the imagination: “Guns—Liquor”. That’s as good a summary as any of the last year.
Last year was the best ever in the U. S. for firearms sales:
and it was the best year ever for liquor sales:
The monthly statistics on firearms sales makes it even clearer. I am given to understand there was a spike in marijuana usage last year as well.
There are lots of reasons for these developments: fear, anxiety, boredom. The timing of some of these developments makes it hard not to suspect that the federal handout were not used, at least in part, for buying guns, liquor, and other recreational drugs.
In nearly all major cities there was also a spike in homicides. It’s hard not to suspect that this was related, too.
Stay tuned. If the availability of money was a factor, the COVID-19 relief bill might insure that 2021 is even better for guns and liquor than 2020 was.
The alcohol sales are a public health problem, but the gun sales are not any kind of problem. Virtually every person buying a gun is White, and many are women. These people are the least likely to engage in any sort of gun violence or of any kind of violence. They are buying guns in a rational, fearful response to the very real violence, actual insurrections (Portland, Minneapolis), of BLM and Antifa. Violence which is very obviously encouraged and even organized by local and state authorities, and which is obviously directed against White people. Furthermore every single sale, including those at gun shows, entails a background check. No criminals, mentally ill people, drug users, wife beaters, or dishonorably discharged persons can or do buy the guns tallied by Brookings. Moreover, many of the guns sold are long guns, rifles and shotguns, which are almost never used to kill people.
We do not have a gun problem; we have a Negro problem. At least 55% of all murders in the US are committed by young Negro males, and 75% of all serial killings are committed by them. Virtually all of those killings are committed using 9 mm automatic pistols purchased on the street.
The Brookings report is a non-story, intended to scare, agitate, and incite Progressives. The real story in the graph, never alluded to, is the collapse in White confidence in the American government and institutions. Whites rightly fear their government, its courts, its schools. They are learning to fear the police and the military, as they should.
The graph itself is evidence of the fundamental dishonesty of the people running our institutions.
The pandemic was good for not only liquor and gun sales, but also for increased populace surveillance, decrease in civil rights, more money in the pockets of tech and multinational billionaires (except for the ex president who lost $700 million in wealth), and the crushing of the middle class, small business owners, and the upending of progress being made in low income working segments of society.
The poster above is right that gun sales grew with soccer mom types, whites and minorities fearful for the safety of their businesses and families, as the Dems and media continue to dismiss the 500 plus riots dominating the nation last year, 25 people killed, and over 700 law enforcement officers injured at the hands of mostly BLM and Antifa dissenters. Of course some here deny the existence of Antifa, and seem to forgive any destruction incurred by BLM rampages. And, most of the people responsible for billions of dollars worth of property damage, lives lost or injured were in and out of jail in a jiffy – some even bailed out by the Biden campaign. Meanwhile, some 300 Capitol protesters have been prosecuted – some left lingering in jail for an indeterminate amount of time – while all 56 FBI field offices, except for one, are hot on the pursuit of tracking down and arresting all others identified as wondering around the Capitol building that fateful day. Convoys of law enforcement, FBI, military are descending on households around the country, ransacking homes and taking breadwinners away. Is this the new America under a Democrat regime?
That is untrue. Gun purchases among blacks are just about proportional with their percentage of the population.
Also, I’m not sure that we have a problem with blacks. I think that blacks have a problem with blacks.
“Guns- Liquor “
I’d like to have met the owner.
Probably an interesting guy.
“If the availability of money was a factor, the COVID-19 relief bill might insure that 2021 is even better for guns and liquor than 2020 was.”
Heh. Especially if blue state pensioners and other pet “covid relief” bill recipients drink.
“I think that blacks have a problem with blacks.”
I’d prefer to think of it as lawless thugs have a problem with other lawless thugs.
I agree that the perpetrators are, by and large, “lawless thugs”. But the victims are both “lawless thugs” and ordinary, honest people trying to go about their daily lives as the bullets whiz past their heads. By far the greatest number of both are black.
Well, clearly your whiteness does not allow you to see the racial bias and insensitivity in your remarks. Re-education camp for you!
I thought about Bob’s comment and next wondered what should we do, as a society about that.
But he’s a smart guy and I didn’t want to ask a dumb question with an obvious answer so I thought about that and realized we’re already taking action.
We passively isolate violent Blacks in their own neighborhoods while putting a happy face on that by over representing them in advertising and media.
See, we made up for segregation, flip on the TV.
Liquor makes sense if people were staying at home with nothing to do. Guns? If you actually look at gun sales (using background checks as a proxy) you saw 3 waves. The first was in March coincident with the pandemic. The next with the Floyd murder. The last with the election. Anytime there is fear a Dem might win a lot of people to go buy guns. Fear that they will be taken away, though that never happens.
Jan cites 25 killed which comes from study by ACLED. Details at link. 11 were involved directly in the demonstrations. At least 4 of those killed by clearly right wing shooters and several of those were also demonstrators run over by cars going through the crowds. No doubt they were Antifa. Several were protesters shot by police or security guards.
So the killings were awful. SO were the injuries and lets hope they jail those guilty of crime, but portraying this as all Antifa and Black people is wrong and just a fear tactic. One of the times I have been most disappointed in Dave was his claim that we had more killings in the BLM riots/demostrations than we had back in the 60s. Turns out it is not even close. We should learn to not respond to fear and hyperbole. BTW, over 130 police were injured at the DC insurrection. So in one singly riot/demonstration we had 1/6 of the number of police injured as we did with all of the BLM events. Note I am using jan’s numbers here and I think it safe to safe she is not a liberal shill. Still, we continue to see efforts to minimize what happened that day.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/31/americans-killed-protests-political-unrest-acled
Steve
The Omaha bar owner who shot and killed Skurlok, when indicted , shot and killed himself.
Case closed.
Ammunition is just about impossible to get anymore. I’m not buying any (have plenty I inherited from my Dad), but my friends who go to the range have difficulty even finding 22 rimfire.
Steve, most of last year’s uprisings, street protests, vandalism, looting and so on were precipitated by anarchistic groups, many, if not most, self identifying with BLM and/or Antifa affiliations. Were there right wing participants? Probably, but their participation was on the coattails of those who initially organized these chaotic events.
As for the Capitol protests, and the damage and harm done on that day…a fuller context is appropriate here, including questioning why intel, predicting groups were aligning to make trouble on that day, was not acted upon? Why was the head of Capitol Police requests (6 in total) for backup denied, as was the President’s call, ahead of January 6, for 10,000 National Guard rejected? How different would that day have played out if these requests had been granted and preventive tactics deployed instead of ignored. Or, was this a way to allow a violent distraction to occur, putting a stop for any of the procedural events to take place, in which compelling evidence would be shown questioning the legitimacy of the election in key swing states. Also, doing the math, like you are keen to do…out of the approximate million people attending the rally – mostly at the Ellipse – 800 is the number being sought out by the FBI as being suspects for prosecution – a minuscule fraction, many who were simply caught up in the flow of human traffic streaming, unopposed, onto the Capitol grounds. And, yet all the people protesting the election in DC that day are defamed as “domestic terrorists.â€
The issue jan was killings and police injured. I pointed out that on that one day there were about 1/6 the deaths and police injuries you had with all of the BLM events combined. You are the one trying to minimize it.
Steve