Too many people were dying from automobile crashes on highways. But people considered these crashes to be “accidents,” or acts of fate for which we could not know the cause. They argued that if we could not know the cause, we could not prevent them. People were not thinking of cause and effect.

Gun violence takes an extraordinary toll on individuals, families, and communities in the United States. But the NRA has been successful in working through Congress to make sure that much of the critical data for assessing the problem, and finding interventions that work, is not collected, maintained, or made available.