THE SEAN HANNITY SHOW

Dividing America Senseless acts like what we've tragically witnessed this week in Charleston have unfortunately become touchstones to divide us, thanks to quick politicization of the issues. The names of the nine victims in this week's horrific shooting have been released. Unfortunately for their friends and family, much of America couldn't wait but a few hours before turning their tragic deaths into a political football.   The instantaneous politicization of tragic events has become par for the course.  One would hope that maybe our own president would be able to rise above the fray and unite America at a time of grieving.  But that was not the case, and we're no longer surprised. Obama addressed the shooting this week, drudging up the same old predictable arguments about gun control that we've heard time and time again.  He said, in part: "We don't have all the facts, but we do know that, once again, innocent people were killed in part because someone who wanted to inflict harm had no trouble getting their hands on a gun. At some point, we as a country will have to reckon with the fact that this type of mass violence does not happen in other advanced countries." But according to a study conducted by the Centers for Disease Control - at Obama's request! - the evidence is insufficient to determine whether gun control laws are effective in mitigating violence committed with a firearm: "Whether gun restrictions reduce firearm-related violence is an unresolved issue." Guns Can Be Important Here's another interesting fact to consider from the CDC report that Obama commissioned in 2013.  This is from the Las Vegas Guardian Express:   "The report tells us that 'the U.S. rate of firearm-related homicide is higher than that of any other industrialized country: 19.5 times higher than the rates in other high-income countries.' ... One interesting fact about this statistic, however, is that if one were to exclude figures for Illinois, California, New Jersey and Washington D.C., the homicide rate in the United States would be in line with any other country and - of course - the nation's capital, along with these three states, have some of the strictest gun laws in the country." And the report also touches on the important role guns play in self defense. For all the talk about guns, it is not at all clear that the policies Obama and other liberals are racing to propose on top of a tragedy would have stopped a mass killing.  It is an agenda that is disconnected from what actually happened. The victims and their families deserve time to grieve, before they become the latest pawns in the liberal attempt to divide Americans over our Constitutional rights.