Deadly milestone

The gun-control crowd is being predicably opportunistic in seizing on the news that Indiana is now one of 10 states in which gun deaths outpace motor vehicle deaths -- 735 vs. 715, in 2009, the most recent year for which state-by-state information is available. Not that I blame them -- milestones are great pegs on which to hang your messages.

While motor vehicle-related deaths are on a steady decline as the result of a successful decades-long public health-based injury prevention strategy, gun deaths continue unabated -- the direct result of the failure of policymakers to acknowledge and act on this ubiquitous and too often ignored public health problem.

There could be a much different spin put on this emphasizing the good news for traffic safety instead of the bad news for gun safety. And the stories I read (didn't quite get to all of them) didn't break those gun deaths down. There aren't identical public policy approaches for suicides, armed robberies, accidents, etc. etc.

But I take the point that stressing safety has made a difference in vehicular deaths and could in gun deaths as well. You can easily get a gun permit in Indiana without demonstrating that you even know which end does what. It wouldn't be a violation of the Second Amendment to require gun carriers to take a little training and get certified beore getting a permit. They even do that in Texas, for goodness sake.