This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
If a U.S. citizen dies this year, it is more than 1,000 times more likely he or she will die from an automobile accident, and 334 times more likely from a gunshot wound, than they would from any type of terrorism — Islam-related or other.
While we accept the first two risks because automobiles and guns, each in very different ways, have improved life, we obsess about the threat of terrorism.
However, unlike the risks we are willing to accept in exchange for the convenience and enjoyment of automobiles and guns, we are unwilling to accept the risk of allowing the entry of a small number of carefully vetted refugees in exchange for upholding the moral and social imperatives on which the country is based.
John Brandt
South Jordan