Question: Most of the following selections were taken from letters-to-the-editors columns of newspapers and magazines. Identify any fallacies that may be committed, giving a brief explanation for your answer. Then, if a fallacy is identified, discuss the possible factors that led the arguer to commit the fallacy.

My gun has protected me, and my son's gun taught him safety and responsibility long before he got hold of a far more lethal weapon-the family car. Cigarettes kill many times more people yearly than guns and, unlike guns, have absolutely no redeeming qualities. If John Lennon had died a long, painful and expensive death from lung cancer, would you have devoted a page to a harangue against the product of some of your biggest advertisers-the cigarette companies?