“It’s that kind of resolve that inspired one of the architects of the New York grant program, Thomas Abt, to want to teach more cities how to start using—and how to stick with—the best violence-reduction strategies. His thinking breaks from political orthodoxy on both the left and the right: The main reason violence is so persistent in the United States, he believes, isn’t that gun laws are too weak (a common argument among liberals) or that police critics have hamstrung tough street-clearing tactics (an often-stated conservative belief). It’s that not enough cities, whatever their political leanings, are properly using basic strategies that are known to persuade would-be shooters not to acquire guns, and not to use them on one another, in the first place.“

The Atlantic

September 11, 2019