Two thumbs up.

The Center for American Progress has released a “50-State Analysis of Gun Violence and Its Link to Weak State Gun Laws.” See also Interactive: Measuring Gun Violence Across the 50 States. The report states,

Despite this complex web of factors that influence the rate of gun violence, this report finds a clear link between high levels of gun violence and weak state gun laws. Across the key indicators of gun violence that we analyzed, the 10 states with the weakest gun laws collectively have an aggregate level of gun violence that is more than twice as high–104 percent higher, in fact—-than the 10 states with the strongest gun laws.

The report measured these ten indicators of gun violence:

1. Overall firearm deaths in 2010
2. Overall firearm deaths from 2001 through 2010
3. Firearm homicides in 2010
4. Firearm suicides in 2010
5. Firearm homicides among women from 2001 through 2010
6. Firearm deaths among children ages 0 to 17, from 2001 through 2010
7. Law-enforcement agents feloniously killed with a firearm from 2002 through 2011
8. Aggravated assaults with a firearm in 2011
9. Crime-gun export rates in 2009
10. Percentage of crime guns with a short “time to crime” in 2009

Gun laws are not the only factor impacting gun violence, the press release says. I would add that there are outliers that don’t fit any correlation. New Hampshire, for example, has permissive gun laws but ranks low in gun violence. I suspect the correlation between rates of gun ownership and gun fatalities is stronger. Nevertheless, the data do seem to show a tendency toward more gun violence in states with loose gun laws.

Some on the Right still complains about including suicides as part of “gun violence.” I’ve already explained why it’s perfectly legitimate to include suicides, since the presence of guns is known to increase suicide rates. The Harvard School of Public Health considers access to firearms to be a major risk factor in suicides.