The Left often claims that America is far ahead of the rest of the world in mass shootings, citing a paper by one Adam Lankford saying America has 31% of total mass shooters worldwide.  Since Lankford hasn't made all his data available to be checked by other researchers, it isn't likely his "study" is legit.  Others have gone over the paper and find that, far from leading the world in mass shootings, America is #56 at worst.

This has all the earmarks of another Michael Bellesiles case.  Bellesiles in 2000 published a book purporting to show that colonial America had far fewer guns than usually believed.  The book won the prestigious Bancroft Prize.  Its author was feted on TV, talk shows, and the gun control party circuit.  Then others looked into his claims.  Many of his claims were doubtful.  He didn't make his data available for others to check.  The evidence was so overwhelming against Bellesiles that for the first time ever, the Bancroft Prize was withdrawn.

The conclusion was inescapable: to any honest person, Michael Bellesiles was a fraud.

Lankford's work also smacks of Michael E. Mann, a leading voice of the climate change crowd who invented a data spread that had the form of a hockey stick and omitted or significantly changed a number of pertinent values.  The hockey stick became a standard reference among the high priests of climate change.  But Mann refuses to share his data so that other researchers can verify it, as is standard in academe and vital to ensure good science.  More than anything else, this dodge reticence gave away the game: to any honest person, Michael Mann is a fraud.

Bellesiles and Mann are but two of the many academics who sold their souls to the Left in abandoning the exacting standards that historically characterized academic research, in pursuit of a reputation the easy way.  Adam Lankford has entered his name in those lists.

Let there be no mistake: to any honest person, it appears that Adam Lankford is a fraud.