Republican Lands ‘Four Pinocchio’ Rating For Talk On AUS Gun Policy

While Jeb (!) Bush struggles with the realisation his surname doesn’t make the Presidency of the United States of America his birthright, and Marco Rubio cops flak for wearing some admittedly flash footwear, Texan Senator Ted Cruz has emerged as Trump’s strongest competitor. Cruz is sticking pretty close to the Republican playbook too, focusing on religion, immigration, and guns. Aaalways the guns. 

Coming to Iowa TVs this weekend: #TedCruz dons face paint in appeal to hunters, gun owners https://t.co/er3fzZ4OuI pic.twitter.com/3JKIIlqC5C

— newsobserver.com (@newsobserver) January 20, 2016

In one of his latest appearances on a right-wing radio talk show, Cruz saw it fit to bring our auspicious nation into his campaign platform, claiming that Australia’s strict gun policy, specifically the national buyback scheme of 1996, has directly lead to a dramatic increase in rapes and sexual assaults on women. 

He claimed that spike is directly attributable to the victims not being able to protect themselves, ’cause they just couldn’t pack heat any more.

The Washington Post did some digging. Their findings can be summed up thusly:

The crux of the counter-argument, of course, is that Australia and America had such vastly different gun cultures – and still do – that drawing parallels between the two is nigh on impossible, and it’s faulty logic to assume the ramifications of our buybacks would be mirrored in the US. The Fact Checker did find that sexual assaults rose in number between ’96 and ’08, but have been dropping since. Stats show we’re sitting at 1996 levels right now, too.

The Post also highlighted the U.S’ concealed carry provisions, which allow citizens to walk around willy-nilly with a handgun on their person. That’s never been a thing Down Under, excluding very limited professions, meaning Cruz’ assertion sounds as if we had a comparative gun ownership culture before the buybacks. Not so. 

Closing up, the piece suggests “there is evidence that the gun reforms helped reduce gun deaths, but it’s not a sole cause-and-effect relationship.”

They concluded “the rates didn’t go up ‘significantly’ after the buyback and there’s no evidence changes to gun laws in Australia affected sexual assault rates or jeopardised the ability of women to protect themselves.”

That makes sense. It might not win conservative votes, though. 

For his efforts, Cruz was awarded “four Pinocchios” out of a possible five. Good one, bud. 

Source: The Washington Post / Fairfax. 
Photo: Joe Raedle / Getty.