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I'm looking forward to seeing the movie, so I can't comment on the movie yet. Moore definately has an agenda, and I tend to agree with a number of his views. (I also think he's very witty and a fine film maker)
However, the FBI just released the crime statistics for 2001. While violent crime is up 2.5 percent, there were several years of decline prior to 2000. Unless, I misread the report, there were 8,719 murders with firearms (out of a total 15,980). Seems to me the 11,000 figure is incorrect? There are also statistics Moore isn't going to bring up, like how many times a firearm is used by a law abiding citizen to prevent a violent crime (I've seen numbers ranging from 800,000 to 2.5 million).
Let me share two stories and save further comments until I've seen the film. Story number one: At a mall in the nice part of town, a woman collapsed upon entering the mall. Immediately (and I do mean immediately...people called 911 as soon as she fell) no less than 3 folks called 911 on their cell phones. It was 5 minutes until the EMTs arrived (and I thought that was a very good response time). However, 5 minutes is a very long time if someone's trying to hurt you. (You can enter a judo shiai to get an idea)
Story number two: A 31 year old man was beaten to death by a group of boys raging in age from 17 to 10. The man fled from the group and entered a home, but the group dragged him out of the home. No firearms involved. No weapons other than what the group grabbed while chasing the man.
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