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Comment by geaserg34234 | Hacker News Reader

I haven't seen any evidence that the NRA has fought research. They have taken a stand against the CDC advocating for gun-control policies, not performing gun-violence research. The CDC has simply refused to do this research since being banned from advocating for specific policy. The CDC is not banned from performing gun-violence research, and has even conducted such research at the specific behest of Obama. The conclusions of this research actually largely vindicated a lot of the points made by the pro-gun community.

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From the article:

>In 1996, Republican Rep. Jay Dickey removed $2.6 million from the CDC budget — the precise amount the CDC spent on gun research in 1995 — at a time when the center was conducting more studies into gun-related deaths as a "public health phenomenon," according to The New York Times. The NRA and some pro-gun Congressmen perceived this as more of an attack.

That funding cut of $2.6M was restored afterwards.

It is evidence that NRA has fought research which is what you asked. Thus you have now seen evidence even if you don't agree with the conclusion.

I don't agree. I see it as evidence that the NRA has fought against the CDC conducting policy advocacy. The CDC was advocating gun-control, so people got upset and cut their funding. Then a law was put on the books saying they weren't allowed to use funds for that sort of advocacy, and their funding was restored. I don't see any evidence that the research itself has ever been the target.

The CDC currently has both the funding and legal ability to perform gun violence research, but choose not to. In my mind, if you want more research on this topic, you should be pressuring the CDC to resume it.

Let me just say that I hate minutes-old HN accounts partaking in these discussions (which I believe to be off-topic for HN).

However, I think you make a good point that adds to the discussion; I just wish you'd use your normal account.

Understandable. Comment quality does tend to be pretty low for throw-away accounts. Unfortunately I don't maintain a regular account and (perhaps naively) hope that the quality of any comment I make will speak for itself and not be bolstered or disregarded simply because of who posted it.

I suppose these topics are inevitable when an article like this is posted, but I'll try to take your comment to heart and not jump down the political rabbit-hole so easily.

It's not so much who posted it as much as HN strives to be a community. There's a difference between anonymity and pseudonymity; the latter allows for community, and the former is a very different type of place.

Calling research advocacy does not prevent it from being research.

Yes, but if it really is advocacy there's no reason to fund it with tax money. I have no interest in having money taken from my paycheck to generate advocacy for political positions contrary to my own.

The CDC lost a lot of respect and public trust as a result of that gun "research". Respect and public trust it's going to need to carry out its actual mission, which is disease control.

No, the CDC mission is public health, which is why the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health for example is under it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Institute_for_Occupat...

And no, I don't agree that simply doing research is inherently advocacy. All you have shown is you suspect the truth disagrees with your beliefs which is something you should consider more deeply. Cognitive dissonance is a sign that something you believe is false and ignoring that is a bad idea.

PS: Thank you for acknowledging your above statement was wrong. I am going to assume it means you where not simply trolling.

No, research isn't inherently advocacy. But it can be advocacy depending on the way you do it - what you include in your studies and what you exclude. What you lump together when you roll up the numbers. And everybody knows this.

It's not that I suspect the truth disagrees with my beliefs - it's that I suspect my tax money is being used to propagandize my fellow citizens in an effort to erode my civil rights.

As to your p.s... 1) you are confused, and 2) people who assume other people are trolling when they meet disagreement aren't doing a good job of defending their own beliefs.

geaserg34234 is a very similar name and 18 hours old that started this thread which is where the trolling assumption came from.

1) you just acknowled NRA has fought against the CDC conducting and then acknowled CDC where conducting research. Which means you acknowledged the NRA was fighting research. You may feel it was biased or that the NRA was in the right or whatnot, but that's a completely separate point that I really don't care about. NRA's job is to support a viewpoint so that's what they are going to do.

>You may feel it was biased or that the NRA was in the right or whatnot, but that's a completely separate point that I really don't care about.

Um... okay. Whether or not the research is biased doesn't matter to you? That's an interesting position. Of what acutal value is biased research?

>NRA's job is to support a viewpoint so that's what they are going to do.

Yes, and the point was that's not the CDC's job. The day we start supporting the NRA with tax dollars is the day we can hold them up to the same scrutiny.

I really can't get worked up over 0.00006% of the federal budget. That's into fractions of a penny of my annual tax bill.

Anyway, the CDC's job is promote public health and they have an office of public policy so advocacy really does fall under their mandate as required by law. Ed: As does Saw Blade Guards oddly enough. Now, you can disagree with that mandate, but nobody was blowing public money on hookers and blow or something.

>NRA has fought against the CDC conducting policy advocacy. The CDC was advocating gun-control, so people got upset and cut their funding.

isn't it is normal duty of CDC to advocate for policies preventing epidemic deaths, like virus/bacterial control in hospitals? Guns kill people like a widespread virus (it doesn't really matter who carries the virus or a gun, be it human, bird, etc..) and such advocating does seems fitting for CDC.

The line between 'advocacy' and 'research' is not as clear as you suggest. There are plenty of people who will label any form of gun research by the CDC as advocacy:

"Timothy Wheeler, director of the group Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership, said Congress had good reason to stop the CDC’s firearm inquiries. "It was what we call advocacy research," Wheeler said. "It was research done with a preordained goal, and that goal was gun control." Wheeler, voicing an opinion shared by many in the gun-rights movement, said the CDC has been "irredeemably tainted" by past controversy. "I don't have faith in them anymore," Wheeler said. [1]

So it seems that CDC is avoiding gun research in order to reduce the risk of having their funding cut in other areas. From the Washington Post again:

The agency recently was asked by The Washington Post why it was still sitting on the sidelines of firearms studies. It declined to make an official available for an interview but responded with a statement noting it had commissioned an agenda of possible research goals but still lacked the dedicated funding to pursue it.

But Republicans aren't interested in providing funding for dedicated research:

Congress has continued to block dedicated funding. Obama requested $10 million for the CDC’s gun violence research in his last two budgets. Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) have introduced bills supporting the funding. Both times the Republican-controlled House of Representatives said no.

If Republicans consider the CDC to be tainted, why not establish a new, independent agency to conduct research into firearms?

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/storyline/wp/2015/01/14/...

Funding was cut for the CDC's gun-related activities at the same time as they were banned from advocating policy. Being "allowed" to research it but not having any money to do so is pointless.

IIRC the money was restored pretty quickly. If you read the CDC research it was pretty shoddy so I have a hard time being too angry about it.

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