Rarely in life is there such a beautiful and distinctive correlation between two things.

One hopes that they and others find this a good example of why one should not
accept arguments from authority...

It's in their nature to believe anything bad about firearms.

Was I right about the study blurring the distinction between homicide and murder?

http://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/columbiatribune.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/24/1248fd0a-a108-11e3-beea-001a4bcf6878/531179a2f22e9.pdf.pdf

Without knowing what numbers they're using and why they used those numbers as opposed to the ones you present, there's not much to say other than as you present it, it doesn't seem to add up.

It will open as a PDF:

http://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/columbiatribune.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/24/1248fd0a-a108-11e3-beea-001a4bcf6878/531179a2f22e9.pdf.pdf

Having scanned it myself, I'd say that it is another "correlation without causation" sort of relationship, and done with an agenda in mind.

The introduction reeks of bias, and it's easy to select the "best" information to make your point, if you're conducting a study with an agenda.

But see for yourself.

Trouble is, the murder rate in Missouri actually decreased during that period
from 7.7/100,000 persons in 2008 to 6.5/100,000 persons in 2012.

Since the prohibitionists like to claim that part of that decrease is due to better survivability
rates among gunshot wound victims, note also that the aggravated assault rate also
dropped during that same period, from 344.4/100K to 323.4/100K

the paper does provide a place to download the actual study.

Reading through it now, and the 'Data and Measures' section seems to be where they split from you on what numbers to use.

Notably, under the results section, the homocide rates they provide are actually both below the numbers you provide, perhaps because whatever stats you're using do not disaggregate as finely as the data they're using.

They list 4.66/100k as the number around which things hang between 1999-2007, 6.23/100k in 2008, and a mean of 5.82 for 2008 to 2010.

So it looks like wherever you got your numbers is including other deaths that don't meet the study criteria.

All murders are homicides, but not all homicides are murders

Also, the rate of people being nonfatally shot (or stabbed, or beaten, etc.) also
dropped per the FBI, so it's not just an improvement in emergency medicine

Intent? Or does 'protecting oneself' not count?

We've seen how even the claim of 'self-defense' has allowed some very dubious killings to occur without legal punishment in SYG states, lately.

But whatever their criteria, they must actually be more stringent than yours, if they're getting lower numbers than you do, no?

I can't see how they can both be including things in their study that you wouldn't consider murder, and still have fewer reported than you do, unless the numbers you retrieved are fuzzy in some other way that's pumping them up as well.

Murder is defined as malice aforethought with the degree contingent upon whether outright killing was the original intent or only physical harm was intended though it resulted in death.

I've found it better to simply ask for definitions when debates are starting to step over into parsing wording to decide whether something is 'right' or 'wrong'.

One key to a debate is to ask for a definition and if the other party is unwilling to supply it I have learned it is because they favor the complaint more than the remedy. It's a power-over-others thing.

justifiable homicide (self defense or defense of another) are not crimes, nor should they be.

that is because self defense is not a crime. Can you give an example of dubious killings that were allowed? Claiming self defense is one thing, the State not being able to disprove it is something else. Most of the time, obvious self defense cases, regardless of SYG or DTR, don't go to trial. Out of the three in Florida that made the news, one was a hung jury only because John Guy can't cross examine to save his life. The trial of one hasn't started yet AFAIK, the other was proven to be self defense beyond any doubt to anyone actually paying attention and half way intellectually honest. We have one that is going to jail, one probably (assuming the media accounts are half way correct) is going to jail, and one that shouldn't have gone to trial.
http://www.talkleft.com/story/2013/7/14/145748/759/Colo_News/The-Legacy-of-the-George-Zimmerman-Trial
SYG doesn't change the standard for self defense from DTR, The only difference is the duty to retreat if one can. Under DTR, one only has to if, and only if, one can or can do so safely. Either way, it falls under the same principles that basically apply anywhere.
http://lawofselfdefense.com/the-five-principles-of-the-law-of-self-defense-in-a-nutshell/

he other was proven to be self defense beyond any doubt to anyone actually paying attention and half way intellectually honest.

If it's the case I think it is, we're far enough apart in what we believe to be intellectually honest that we're both simply wasting our time interacting.

until I watched the entire trial for myself. I was not very astounded by the MSM's incompetence, but was very disgusted by the bullshit from pundits.
Every practicing lawyer, right and left, who followed it came to the same conclusion that the jury did.
To me, intellectual honesty is seeing the facts and reality of the situation through dogma.

I'm a bit of a prig when it comes to certain things. I don't like Larry O'Donnall's and Thom Hartman's (I actually used to like Thom's show, but the white horse prophecy rant made me lose a lot of respect for him) anti Mormon bigotry anymore than I like Glen Beck's anti Islam bigotry. I don't like Rush's sexism, and I don't like Bill Mahars. just like I don't like it when Fox lies, and I don't like it when MSNBC lies. I detest them equally. If that makes us too far apart, then so be it.

then I've got to say that although he might have been able to legally pull it off, I don't agree with it on common sense.

He got into a fight with a younger man he stalked. If, and this is a big if, we even grant that he actually believed his life was in danger, it was because he must have been losing a fight he picked in the first place. And he 'won', simply because he had a gun and was definitely willing to kill, something we'll never know about the young man he killed, since the only testimony we have along those lines came through Zimmerman.

Is it really 'self-defense' when you stalk someone when even the police have asked you not to? To me, 'self-defense' would have meant listening to the police and sitting tight. Not following Martin. He created the situation that then 'required' him to defend himself, if indeed he did. In my mind, there's nothing intellectually honest in saying he didn't deserve jail time for creating the situation that led to him shooting an unarmed man to death.

or did not follow the trial closely.

No law was broken by Zimmerman OR Martin right up to the point that Martin struck Zimmerman, knocked him down and started striking Zimmerman's head against the pavement. There is no physical evidence that contradicts this. The physical evidence and the testimony of the witnesses without a personal relationship with either Zimmerman or Martin overwhelming favored Zimmerman.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_of_Florida_v._George_Zimmerman

Actually, I kinda said that in my post. Zimmerman set himself up for an encounter by stalking Martin. And while Martin might have reacted poorly to being followed around by some creepy stalker type when he was on a skittles run, it's completely to be expected that he might try to fight someone who was stalking him at night.

Was a 'law broken' by Zimmerman up to that point? No. But he set the whole sequence in motion, by stalking some poor kid who was merely returning to his house at the time after buying candy and pop. His actions caused the fight, his actions caused the death.

no one is justified in striking someone, knocking them down and beating their head against the pavement just because they think a person is "creepy". As a reminder, Martin was 5'11" and 158 pounds, hardly the child he was portrayed as in the media.

There is no evidence that Martin tried to call the police or run and he should have been easily able to outrun the shorter, heavier Zimmerman (5'8", 206 pounds).

If, indeed, Martin struck Zimmerman first (as no witnesses other than Zimmerman testified, because there were no witnesses until the end of the fight), then that would be simply the 'proximate' cause. Zimmerman's desire to play vigilante defender of his neighbourhood, while armed, started the dominoes falling.

someone he had no legal right to strike and the compounded the initial assault by beating Zimmerman's head against the pavement.

There were no witnesses to the start of the fight other than Zimmerman and Martin. Only to the end, and only one guy who 'thinks' Zimmerman was on the bottom at that point.

What if Zimmerman lied, and He was the one who touched, hit, whatever Martin? No living witnesses means his is the only evidence that exists as to who started the fight. Maybe Martin only fought back against a man who outweighed him, was armed, and had even had MMA training, and just happened to start winning the fight.

But we'll never know for sure, because Zimmerman made sure his was the only testimony available as to 'who started' the fight.

Actually, John Good got a good look and knew it was Zimmerman on bottom.

The person who Trayvon was talking on the phone with said she thinks Trayvon started it. The evidence is this:
Trayvon ran when he saw Zimmerman, before Zimmerman got out of the car. George made it only as far as the "T" when he was told "we don't need you to do that." There is no evidence that Zimmerman gained sight of him again until the attack. Meanwhile, Martin told the the person he was on the phone with that he made it to his dad's girl friend's house (about 70-100 yards south of the "T&quot , then said he could see Zimmerman a few minutes later. The attack was at the "T", so, that implies that Martin doubled back, hid in bushes to attack. This person also said she thought Martin started the fight.

Zimmerman's "MMA training" wasn't. It was more like boxing aerobics, according to the instructor. He also sucked at it. Martin on the other hand, was very fond of MMA and street fighting who recently learned the "ground and pound". In a text to a friend, he said we was looking forward to beating the shit out of someone who ratted him out for pot because he "didn't bleed enough" the first time.

How do we know Zimmerman wasn't lying? He passed a polygraph, and convinced investigators that he was telling the truth, including a "challenge interview" where the cop lies about a witness or a camera who saw everything. That didn't change Zimmerman's story.

What evidence do you have that he could have of other than speculation and propaganda from the likes of Crump's PR firm and Al Sharpton? Do you think he could be lying because the liars and fools at TYT etc said he was? Please. Cenk and his crew make Palin look like a MENSA member. MSNBC isn't better than Fox. Once I learned how wrong they were about the basic facts, I discounted everything. Either way, under Florida law, if an initial aggressor starts to back off, the defender must also back off. Counter attacks are not allowed. Assuming Zimmerman started it, and there is no evidence other than lies and speculation that says he did, once he started to struggle to get away and screamed for help, that ended the threat and any further beating would not be justified.

The testimony by the owner of the kick boxing gym stated that Zimmerman was "'grossly obese,' and not athletic at all. Pollock also testified that 'He was an overweight, large man when he came to us, a very pleasant, very nice man, but physically soft and predominantly fat, not a lot of muscle, not a lot of strength.' He also testified that Zimmerman came to the gym to lose weight and get in shape"

The prosecution itself pretty much acknowledged that Martin struck Zimmerman first.

Like most who did not follow the actual case itself, but relied on the news, you have an inaccurate view of the actual facts of the case and additionally refuse to even consider the possibility that Martin may have indeed been the initial aggressor, which is something supported by the physical evidence.

and taking some lying pundit's word for it.

If you actually knew the facts, and not what the pundits claimed while showing a picture of a 12 year old kid you would see the same thing. I agree with Albert Einstein when he said that common sense is simply a collection of prejudices you acquire during your childhood.

First, there was no "stalking". That has a specific meaning, and it wouldn't apply here. The only reason pundits used it was to inflame. In this case, he got out of the car to answer the NENO's question, "which direction is he running". That is not stalking. There is no evidence he picked a fight. All of the evidence showed that Martin doubled back and attacked. There is no evidence Zimmerman left the T, and wasn't walking back to his car as claimed. BTW, in this case, being older is a disadvantage. 17 year old football player and street fighter has a large advantage over a 28 year old insurance salesman.

Not true either. There is no evidence that Zimmerman wanted to kill anyone (there is no evidence that he is a racist either, given that he is mixed race). There was no "stalking". We actually do know a lot, there was an evidence hearing that included Trayvon's phone. He wasn't a nice kid, and had some violence issues. Anything we would have learned about either one, true or not, would have no relevance in the trial and not allowed anyway.

That isn't what happened. Martin was out of his sight before he got out of the car. Zimmerman was running when the NENO said "we don't need you to that" then he stopped running. The non emergency number operator is not the police, and does not have any authority to tell anyone to do anything. You can tell by the background noise. There was no stalking, and the police said nothing like I said above. It is self defense when someone who is stronger and more athletic than you punch you to the ground, straddle you and start pounding your head in the sidewalk. This went on for at least 40 seconds while Zimmerman yelled for help. How do we know this? Physical evidence for one. There were also two eye witnesses who called 911. You can hear Zimmerman screaming for help in the background of the witnesses' 911 calls. (How do we know it was Zimmerman? Tracy Martin said it wasn't Trayvon.)

Other than the fact that wherever you got your information either lied to you or didn't watch the trial? Unarmed is a misnomer. If someone is capable of inflicting death or grave bodily injury with their bare hands, then they are not unarmed.
I do know two things for certain: 1) Under no law anywhere does getting out of a car in their neighborhood, or even following someone, give anyone the right to beat their head in the sidewalk. 2) If it were my head getting beat in the sidewalk, I would do whatever I had to to survive, and have every moral and legal right to do so.
One of the best legal blogs that reported on it was Talk Left. Check out the links, they say it better than I would:

The legacy of this case will be that the media never gets it right, and worse, that a group of lawyers, with the aid of a public relations team, who had a financial stake in the outcome of pending and anticipated civil litigation, were allowed to commandeer control of Florida's criminal justice system, in pursuit of a divisive, personal agenda.

Their transformation of a tragic but spontaneous shooting into the crime of the century, and their relentless demonization of the person they deemed responsible, not for a tragic killing, but for "cold-blooded murder," has called into question the political motives and ethics of the officials serving in the Executive branch of Florida's government, ruined the career of other public officials, turned the lives of the Zimmerman family, who are as innocent as their grieving clients, into a nightmare, and along the way, set back any chance of a rational discussion of the very cause they were promoting, probably for years.

IOW, some ambulance chaser named Benjamin Crump falsely accused a moderate Democrat of being a murderer and being a racist just to get a trial and get a wrongful death lawsuit. Nothing they said was true.
http://www.talkleft.com/story/2013/7/14/145748/759/Colo_News/The-Legacy-of-the-George-Zimmerman-Trial
http://www.talkleft.com/story/2013/7/11/22341/3139/crimenews/Benjamin-Crump-Who-Screamed-Doesn-t-Matter
You Tube has a complete archive of the trial from start to finish, and even stuff the jury didn't see. Check it out.

At least compare before to after.

The question is, why didn't their numbers match the FBIs for the same period?

Not just 2008-2012.

You can find the numbers for the earlier years in the beginning of the 'results' section.

http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/1998/98sec2.pdf

(page 78)

If you think the paper should have included prior years, you need to discuss that with the authors.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/12626127#post2

33 to 2 and RD has self banned all together on DU

Like limp vultures, hyenas, circling prey, poking, insulting, calling names.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/12626127#post19

Now they can attack him without him being able to respond. I am so glad this group is better than that. They only have like two people who post on that group, very big tent they have. Glad they can support each other.

Just the same few people patting themselves on the back at how enlightened they are, calling us "Bubbas", and insisting that a broad swath of gun control measures will be adopted in the near future.

Any day now.

Really!

I'm not going to give them a chance to put another notch on their gun butts.

IMHO they don't want actual passage of effective firearms laws or any actual reduction in violence, with or without firearms, as they are so attached to their culture war on gun owners.

It's raher childish, really.

themselves to major, venerable universities, perhaps to glom onto the glory of those schools. The National Institute for Drug Abuse (NIDA) attached itself ramora-like to Columbia University (NY) and released its "latest findings" like a fig-drunk bluejay, teetering on a limb over a top-down T-Bird. Academia has been slothful lately, and seems unlikely to do anything about it.

...the method used to commit murder matters not a whit to the victim or their family:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/12626127#post34

friendly icon: Anyone care to discuss the terms "pious fraud" and/or "faith-promoting rumor" ?

Sure. Neither apply. Altho fraud applies to you, friendly icon.

Study ties law’s repeal to more gun homicides in Missouri
March 1, 2014 A study that will be published in the April issue of the Journal of Urban Health links the 2007 repeal of Missouri's permit-to-purchase handgun law to an increase in firearm homicides in the state.
The study, conducted by researchers at Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, finds that the law's repeal is associated with an additional 55 to 63 murders per year between 2008 and 2012... --->>> I presume they mean firearms
Using FBI UCR data through 2012, the study said Webster and his colleagues found there was an increase in the annual murder rate in the state of 0.93 per 100,000, or 16 percent.

Friendly Icon's fraud is explained here. In his OP, he provided true overall homicide stats for missouri, seemingly showing a decline from 7.7 murders in 2008 (overall, not just firearms) to 6.5 in 2012. When comparing gun homicide rates with overall homicide rates, the devil dances in the details, as he's doing in this series of reports.
The flaws: first, 2008 counts as the first year after the repeal. The second flaw is that friendly icon ignores the 3 years in between, namely 09, 10, 11. Can't do dat here.

friendly icon's stats: ...2008 Murder and nonnegligent homicide 7.7/100,000 ....
...2012 Murder and nonnegligent homicide 6.5/100,000

Actual stats: 2007 - 6.5 --- total homicide 385
2008 - 7.7 ------------------ total homicide 456
2009 - 6.5 -------------------total homicide 387
2010 - 7.0 -------------------total homicide 420
2011 - 6.1 -------------------total homicide 366
2012 - 6.5 -------------------total homicide 389
http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/mocrimn.htm

.. the average for the 5 year aggregate, 2008 - 2012 inclusive, shows 6.76 overall homicides on average per year, which is indeed higher than 6.5 posted in 2007 (note 6.3 in 2006), but the figure is just an approximation since actual yearly numbers are not known, so in my rough comparison using averages only ~5% increase occurs.
So, the overall homicide rate appears to have increased over the 5 year period as compared to 2007.
Also, the firearm homicide rate increased I suspect, according to what the authors contended.

Adding yearly homicides from 2008 - 2012: 456 + 387 + 420 + 366 + 389 = 2018.
2018/5 = 403.6, but this is only a 4.6% increase using the averages, over 385 in 2007.
Using the high year 2008, increase of 71 over 2007's 385, gives an 18% increase for the one year, now that would be misleading for the report. (disaster center's figures have increase of 71 while report mentions just high increase of 63, tho maybe just firearms).

And no mention that it was a two-year spike, followed by a steady decline

Not gun murder rate, all murder. The claim is false as published, and no backing and filling
can make it true. Note the lack of qualifiers.

There's also this, from the second page of the study:

Also no qualifications, and no mention that the MO murder rate in 2011
dropped below that of 2007 -and stayed down.

As to any distinction between methods of murder, I can only repeat what I said in post #45

"...the method used to commit murder matters not a whit to the victim or their family

I take it to mean that, based on their model, the rate increased 16% above what it would have been had the intervention (change in laws) not occurred - it's not saying that the rate went up an absolute 16%.

Of course, it's a poorly written paper and they really didn't make clear what they meant. I'm guessing that what we're looking at is actually a draft* (given that the title page only mentions a date of submission and nothing about acceptance or forthcoming); hopefully it will be/was cleaned up before final publication.


* And not really ready for submission in my opinion, given the lack of clarity you've identified, typos, and what look to be some screwed-up citations.