<p>There's also a correlation between ice cream sales and drownings-- it doesn't make them necessarily directly related. The point is that you can't just say, "Aha! They're correlated!" and rest on your laurels. I also don't believe that gun legislation reduces crime, either. What I do believe, however, is that the "ZOMG, gun control heavy cities have crime = gun control is bad" argument is logically fallacious at best. It ignores the causative factor for the gun control in the first place (high rates of gun crimes), and instead goes for the more easy correlation.</p>
<p>I prefer the much less definite answer of "it's very complicated, let's look at it from all angles." Unfortunately, that doesn't give talking heads/pundits/political zealots much to rant about, so I'm usually left being called either a raving liberal or a baby-eating conservative depending on who I talk to...</p>
<p>And yes, my less-than-concrete opinion has led to me being called both.</p>