Yoko Ono Calls for Gun Control on Anniversary of John Lennon’s Death

December 8, 2016 marks the 36th anniversary of the murder of John Lennon, and his widow Yoko Ono is using the day to push more gun control for Americans.

“Dear Friends,” the 83-year-old singer began a Facebook post Thursday. “Every day, 91 Americans are killed with guns. We are turning this beautiful country into a War Zone. Together, let’s bring back America, the green land of Peace. The death of a loved one is a hollowing experience.”

“After 36 years, our son Sean and I still miss him,” Ono concluded.

Lennon was killed in New York City by Mark David Chapman on December 8, 1980. Chapman stood outside Lennon’s apartment building, waited for the opportunity to get close to him, then killed him with a .38 revolver. Ono is pushing gun control 30 years after the fact without understanding that 1980 and 2016 are worlds apart.

For example, there were no background checks in 1980. But Democrats, under the leadership of President Bill Clinton, secured background checks in 1998 under the guise of making Americans safer. However, the implementation of background checks has actually had the opposite effect: it has proven background checks do not stop determined attackers and would not have stopped Chapman, who “had a permit and no police record,” according to the Daily Mail.

Nevertheless, Ono is pushing the same, tired mantra that so many contemporary gun controllers propound in their efforts to secure more background checks. Chiefly, that “91 Americans are killed with guns…every day.”

Similar claims regarding the number of Americans killed each day were made by actors Alec Baldwin and Michael Douglas prior to the 2016 presidential election. Baldwin and Douglas tried to justify their claims by suggesting 33,000 Americans die in gun violence each year, but this is false. In reality, the number of homicides annually hovers around 10,000 to 11,000 a year. Gun control groups, Baldwin, Douglas, and Ono are able to suggest a higher number by combining homicides with accidental gun deaths and suicides. The number of accidental deaths averages around 500 annually and he number of firearm-related suicides averages 21,000 to 22,000.

So…. background checks do not stop determined high profile attackers and the number of Americans actually killed by gun violence is 66 percent lower than the number quoted by Ono (and Baldwin and Douglas and Hillary Clinton and countless others). Moreover, Lennon’s attacker would have no problem passing a criminal background check today with the background he had when he bought his .38 revolver.

As usual, gun control is not the solution.

AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of “Bullets with AWR Hawkins,” a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.