Gun-control debate is an urban vs. rural one

Pediatrician Christine Fox prepares
to shoot at a West Virginia range.
(USA Today photo by Denny Gainer)

America's debate over guns is in many ways a rural-urban debate, writes Chuck Raasch of USA Today, who cut his journalistic teeth as a rural reporter in his native South Dakota.

"The gun debate rages in two Americas," Raasch writes. "One of the biggest factors in where you stand on gun ownership and gun violence depends, literally, on where you lay your head at night.
A compilation of December Gallup polls showed that rural Americans — roughly one-sixth of the population — are more than twice as likely to have a gun in the home than those living in large cities. Perhaps unsurprisingly, they are six times more likely to hunt. Rural residents are also most likely to say the best way to reduce gun violence is to better enforce current gun laws rather than pass new ones, an argument echoed by the National Rifle Association and other gun-rights groups."

Raasch, who is based in Washington, went to West Virginia to talk to gun owners. His story seems designed for urbanites, but it's still a good read, here.