
I have watched a few episodes of CBS’s Elementary. I love crime stories and I have long been a fan of anything even vaguely related to Sherlock Holmes. But for someone reportedly as insightful as the main character, this resurrection
by John Lott28 Oct 2013, 3:03 PM PST0

The media calls started coming in within hours of the Newtown Massacre on December 14th. Demands were already being made for more gun control laws, and the media wanted responses. The next week was a blur, with four appearances on CNN, the
by John Lott24 Jan 2013, 8:57 AM PST0
Blame Bush. It has been almost three years since President Obama took office, yet he still blames Bush for the bad economy. Now the Obama administration is following the same strategy to get out of the “Fast and Furious” mess.
by John Lott9 Nov 2011, 4:28 AM PST0
Murder and violent crime rates were supposed to soar after the Supreme Court struck down Chicago’s and Washington, D.C.’s gun control laws. Politicians predicted disaster. “More handguns in the District of Columbia will only lead to more handgun violence,” Washington’s
by John Lott4 Oct 2011, 4:34 PM PST0
Academic debates occasionally get pretty ugly, and that is just the way it is. Sometimes they get really very ugly. There is one case that has bothered me for several years. James Q. Wilson is now 80 years old, and
by John Lott12 Aug 2011, 2:51 PM PST0
If Congress and the president don’t raise the debt ceiling, the consequences will be disastrous, politicians and pundits tell us, — the equivalent of an economic Armageddon. And President Obama warns that the consequences are so dire that he cannot
by John Lott15 Jul 2011, 8:55 PM PST0
The police described it as an armed robbery and a hostage situation. Before dawn on Sunday, May, 8th, two robbers stormed into a Walgreens store wearing masks and gloves and carrying guns. Video cameras in the store on Napier Avenue
by John Lott25 May 2011, 4:03 PM PST0
Carrying a gun protects people from criminals, but carrying an audio recorder can also pretty important. The Phildelphia Daily News yesterday showed just how valuable a tape recorder can be. Some police in Philadelphia apparently didn’t know what Pennsylvania and
by John Lott17 May 2011, 2:25 PM PST0
Is President Obama really the Deficit-Cutter-in-Chief? After racking up massive deficits through his various Stimulus programs and facing continued losses from Obamacare, the White House is now trying to portray Obama as taking a leading role in solving the problem.
by John Lott13 Apr 2011, 4:58 AM PST0
Everyone wants to keep guns away from criminals, but gun control advocates, such as Media Matters, don’t want to acknowledge that there are costs to disarming law-abiding citizens. Lately Media Matters has particularly been incensed that anyone would point out
by John Lott5 Apr 2011, 1:38 PM PST0
Everyone wants to keep guns away from criminals, but gun control advocates, such as Media Matters, don’t want to acknowledge that there are costs to disarming law-abiding citizens. Lately Media Matters has particularly been incensed that anyone would point out
by John Lott5 Apr 2011, 10:01 AM PST0
The Washington Post’s E.J. Dionne seems to actually believe the Obama administration’s claim that he has helped gun rights (see here). Yet, it almost seems as if many on the left attack Obama simply to make him appear more moderate
by John Lott18 Mar 2011, 11:47 AM PST0
Tom Brokaw said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on January 13: “Gun control is too simple a phrase to define all the complications and nuances of it, frankly. In Arizona they have a wide open system. I would be nervous about
by John Lott16 Jan 2011, 6:16 AM PST0
Only someone at the New York Times would claim that their paper was not “anywhere close” to Fox News on bias. What was surprising was the source of this trashing. Clark Hoyt, the just retired ombudsman of the New York
by John Lott2 Aug 2010, 9:02 AM PST0
People walking the streets armed with guns must be dangerous, right? The Brady Campaign and the Violence Policy Center keep claiming that even those individuals who have legally obtained permits to carry concealed handguns are extremely dangerous. With millions of
by John Lott25 Jul 2010, 5:38 AM PST0
Despite all our experience with permitted concealed handguns, the debate continues. There are always fears about what might happen. A New York Times article on Monday repeated some of those concerns in an article on Utah’s permit system: Peter Hamm,
by John Lott7 Jul 2010, 5:38 AM PST0
President Obama surely didn’t intend it, but he deserves some credit for last year’s 7.4 percent drop in murder rates. His election caused gun sales to soar, and crime rates to plummet. While gun sales started notably rising in October
by John Lott8 Jun 2010, 7:29 AM PST0
Gun owners might not feel besieged right now, but they should be very concerned. Last week the Obama administration announced its support for the UN Small Arms Treaty. This treaty poses real risks for freedom and safety in the United
by John Lott3 Jun 2010, 12:31 PM PST0
“Human Target” is a fun show to watch. Christopher Chance (Mark Valley) is an expert at self-defense and his job is to protect people from life-threatening situations. This episode is about the case that moved Chance from being an assassin
by John Lott21 Apr 2010, 11:08 AM PST0
Has “Burn Notice” gotten new writers? They used to have some very insightful comments about guns and crime (e.g., see the episode in season 2 entitled “Lesser Evil”). Yet, now one needs a scorecard to keep tracks of all the
by John Lott10 Mar 2010, 5:37 PM PST0
The District of Columbia’s murder rate plummeted by an astounding 25 percent last year, much faster than for the US as a whole or for similarly sized cities. If you had asked Chicago’s Mayor Daley, that wasn’t supposed to happen.
by John Lott1 Mar 2010, 8:53 AM PST0
The global warming scandal keeps getting worse. Revelations over the last few weeks show that many important assertions in the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change were based on misquotes and false claims from environmental groups, not on published academic
by John Lott11 Feb 2010, 8:39 AM PST0
Trillions of dollars are at stake in the man-made global warming debate. The Climategate scandal – where leaked emails and computer programs involve dozens of prominent scientists worldwide – has almost everything one would want in a good scandal: conspiracies,
by John Lott8 Jan 2010, 5:22 AM PST0
USA’s new series “Royal Pains” is about Dr. Hank Lawson (Mark Feuerstein), who serves as a “concierge doctor” to the rich and semi-famous residents of the Hamptons. In the course of the show, there are some unfortunate public policy claims
by John Lott16 Jun 2009, 6:44 AM PST0
When script writers run out of something else to say (e.g., there are only so many times they can say everyone is uninsured and miserable about it), guns and gun makers are easily available to demonize. “Life” and “House” have
by John Lott13 Apr 2009, 7:25 AM PST0