Pirate's Cove

You’ve heard about the last violence fest in uber-liberal Chicago, right?

(CBS News) At least 14 people were killed and 58 others were wounded in shootings across Chicago over the long holiday weekend, from Thursday evening through early Monday morning.

There were also six police-involved shootings, two of them involving teens who were killed.

Some, like MSDNC and ABC, report that there were 82 shootings. Chicago’s top cop, Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy, blames this on lax federal and state gun laws

“The illogical nature of what’s happening here — that government can intercede and prevent this from happening is overwhelming. And I refuse to think otherwise in a great country like America that we can continue to allow this to happen — not just on a state, but on a federal level.”

McCarthy, reciting the criminal histories of several of the suspects in this weekend’s violence, noted gang members face tougher consequences for losing their guns from their gangs than from authorities.

Uh huh. Because we all know that gang members really care heavily about federal and state laws in general, much less gun laws. And Chicago already has some of the nations most draconian gun laws already, laws that pretty much affect law abiding citizens. But, hey, McCarthy is wrong, according to Warmists

Hot summers make for a bloody Chicago

(skip a few paragraphs)

In a city so infamously beset by violence that it’s earned the nickname Chiraq, the general trend has been that murders become more frequent in warmer weather. In 2012, there were 500 murders in Chicago, and many attributed the jaw-dropping figure — the highest in the country — to an unseasonably warm spring and unbearably hot summer. It wasn’t hyperbole: I was there, and I didn’t fully comprehend the meaning of “stifling heat” until July 2012.

When I read about the tragic events of this weekend, I started thinking about a great piece that my colleague Brentin Mock wrote for Grist last week:

When we think of heat-related deaths, we envision elderly people with heart problems who can’t manage under extreme temperatures. But Lee’s film also shows how heat exacerbates underlying tensions and anxieties in our communities, especially those where racial, cultural, and class differences are apparent … Do the Right Thing’s suspense builds as the temperature rises. The destruction at the movie’s conclusion is an apt metaphor for what will happen as the Earth’s temperature rises under climate change, enflaming communities’ socioeconomic problems in the process.

Got that? Warming is making this Bad. And, yes, small scale violence occurs when it is warmer. Studies bear this out. (interestingly, studies also bear out that war and general strife are more prevalent during cool periods). Yet, there have been more than enough murders, acts of violence, and gun violence which occurred during the winter in places like Chicago. The city has reached 200 homicides this year. There were 25 in March, 21 in February, and 23 in January. Certainly less than the 43 in May and 36 in June. And there have been 21 in July already. But, what about the 40 in December, 2013? Not exactly warm. Quite a few of them seem to be in the same areas of Chicago. Quite a few seem to involve gang members.

Instead of worrying about “climate change”, and, of course, they are trying to blame the fictional man-caused climate change, there should be a focus on the types of people involved in the majority of violence. You can’t stop it all, but blaming “climate change” is simply idiotic beyond belief. Furthermore, gun laws focus on law abiding citizens, quite a few who want guns to protect themselves from the criminals that gun laws ignore.

Read: All That Murderous Violence In Chicago? Yeah, “Climate Change” »