(January 21, 2001) THERE ARE LIES, DAMNED LIES, STATISTICS … AND NOW POLLS.

Maryland citizens want handguns banned. Or so some people want you to believe. The latest attempt to lead you (or rather, to lead politicians) to this conclusion comes from a poll recently pumped up by local media. Polls are so very scientific, so this news must be true … err … right?

No. This is a classic example of why left wingers promote self esteem over critical thinking in our schools. You might not conclude gun bans are so popular if you pause to check out what you're being told in the press.

The poll was commissioned in part by the Gazette Newspapers. The Gazette's track record on gun control is one of making news, not reporting it. Gazette staff created the big Montgomery county 'crisis' a few years ago, by discovering that a gun shop there was close to a county park. Having created a false sense of danger to children they hammered legislators until they enacted a new 'gun free zone' law. (There are still no regs to implement it, as we have reported. Obviously what's important is the symbolism, not enforcement.) Likewise, it was the Gazette that whipped up a sense of crisis over gun shows held at the county fairground, leading to the push to ban them.

One of the more recent anti-gun victories for the Gazette came from their whipping up a sense of crisis around a gun safety group holding its banquet in a county fire hall. You read that right: Gazette staff wanted Montgomery county police standing by to arrest organizers of a "Friends of the NRA" dinner if they dared distribute material like Eddie Eagle brochures in a designated 'gun free zone.' The law cited by the Gazette was neither applicable nor for that matter enforceable (the county has never implemented regulations.) But the Gazette's tactics worked. The Bethesda-Chevy Chase Fire Rescue squad, that rented the hall, rudely gave the boot to the gun safety group.

Now this same Gazette wants you to believe Marylanders want handguns banned. Inquiring minds may wonder whether this is just more of the same, creating "news" out of whole cloth in order to sell papers and advertising.

Is it? Apparently so. The poll was conducted by none other than the Democratic polling machine, Potomac Survey Research, run by the former head of the state party. They publish "findings" that are just what the Machine needs, when the Machine needs it. Potomac only reports what leadership wants people to think, not what is. If the party thinks we citizens ought to paint our butts green and set our hair on fire, then doggoned if it wouldn't be long before Potomac would appear out of the blue with numbers showing how we're stocking up paint and matches. At that point, the sheeple get on board so as to not be left behind.

All we can conclude from the recent spate of articles is that leadership wants the public to believe handguns ought to be banned. And that certainly is not news at all.