Last month, Donald Trump became the first president in more than 30 years to speak at the annual National Rifle Association convention. He thanked his buddies in the NRA for voting for him and warned us of the dangerous world in which we live.
Unfortunately for all of us, he got the dangers all mixed up. In fact, he and the NRA are hiding the real dangers we face by creating imaginary ones.
We're told that the threat comes from outsiders who hate Americans and want to come here to do us harm. No one wants that to happen, but can you guess how many Americans were killed by foreign terrorists on American soil in the past decade? Fewer than 30.
Over the same 10 years, more than 110,000 U.S. citizens were murdered by other Americans wielding firearms.
To put this in perspective, every 10 years, we kill as many of our own citizens with firearms as were killed in the Vietnam, Korean, Gulf and Iraq wars and the 9/11 attacks combined.
We don't need outsiders to slaughter us — we do it ourselves with a gusto not shown by any other developed nation.
Fight back with your voice and your vote.
Charles A. Ettensohn
Swissvale
