Weapons Ban

[JohnMOhio]

President of Mexico is asking that the Assault Weapons Ban be reinstated. MSNBC is stating 90% of weapons taken from cartel traced back to USA. Also that of 35,000 taken, half of them are "high powered weapons." Heard one of the gal reporters said that they included Armour Piercing hand guns. Interesting choice of words don't you think.

Sounds to me like they have all the answers to the Mexican problem and it the fault of the US. Not their corrupt system.

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[1903 Mike]

Ever since the start of the mexican drug war my local gun shop has been out of RPGs and hand grenades. There isn't a full automatic assault weapon in sight either. So sad.

Anyone who thinks or allows themselves to be misled into thinking that these firearms are coming from the US has an agenda that isn't friendly to the Constitution of the USA. Even if these firearms were coming from the USA a simple sealing of the border would fix the problem.

[Jim K]

That 90% figure is a lie. The Mexicans first ran a check on confiscated guns to see where they came from. Most were from the Mexican Army, a fact they quickly covered up. Then they set aside those guns they suspected came from the U.S. (about 15%). They asked U.S. authorities to trace those guns and, sure enough, 90% came from the U.S.

So the 90% does not mean 90% of the guns used by the Mexican drug cartels. It does not mean 90% of the guns confiscated from the cartels.

It means 90% of the guns the Mexicans said came from the U.S. actually did so.

So the Mexicans lie, Obama lies, Napolitano lies, Pelosi lies, the Brady Campaign lies. What else is new?

Jim

[JohnMOhio]

Jim K, now that is a believable statistic. The problem again is getting the truth out there and not the big lie. If I did my math correctly, that means about 13% of the total amount of the guns come from the US. I would suspect then that some were stolen and some purchased legally. Wonder what the numbers were on that.

[RayP.]

That 90% figure is a lie. The Mexicans first ran a check on confiscated guns to see where they came from. Most were from the Mexican Army, a fact they quickly covered up. Then they set aside those guns they suspected came from the U.S. (about 15%). They asked U.S. authorities to trace those guns and, sure enough, 90% came from the U.S.

So the 90% does not mean 90% of the guns used by the Mexican drug cartels. It does not mean 90% of the guns confiscated from the cartels.

It means 90% of the guns the Mexicans said came from the U.S. actually did so.

So the Mexicans lie, Obama lies, Napolitano lies, Pelosi lies, the Brady Campaign lies. What else is new?

Jim

I believe that 90% of ALL the guns were made in U.S.,they just didn't get to Mexico directly unless it was via U.S. Govt. directly to Mexican Authority/Military,the rest probably traveled to secondary countries as Aid/like lend lease or plain sales,and some in those countries started a little gun theft from their Govt. and turned to gun smuggling business for cash/drugs.
(a little side note,rifle grenades are in short supply in my area also,been on back order for quite awhile,I think those Samoli pirates made a run on them to get ahead of any bans.)

RayP.

[cary m2a]

Heck, I was thinking of sending some of my old junker guns down there to help the little war along and end it sooner.

Cary

[Pete]

President Obama Backs Inter-American Arms Treaty

By Scott Wilson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, April 16, 2009 6:41 PM

MEXICO CITY, April 16 -- President Obama announced in a visit here today that he will push the U.S. Senate to ratify an inter-American arms trafficking treaty designed to curb the flow of guns and ammunition to drug cartels and other armed groups in the hemisphere.

Obama made the announcement after meeting with Mexican President Felipe Calderón this afternoon. The meeting is the centerpiece of Obama's first visit to Mexico, whose government is engaged in a broad war against heavily armed drug cartels threatening the integrity of the state.

"The Obama administration's commitment to seek ratification [of the treaty] is important because stemming the number of illegal firearms which flow into Latin America and the Caribbean is a high priority for the region and addresses a key hemispheric concern relating to people's personal security and well-being," a senior Obama administration official said before the announcement.

Obama's visit here, the first by a U.S. president to the capital in 13 years, represents a show of support for Calderón, who two years ago became the first Mexican president to so fully deploy the army against drug cartels supplying a enormously lucrative American market.

Since then, more than 10,000 people have died in drug-related violence that is most intense along the U.S.-Mexican border. The Bush administration won approval for a three-year, $1.4 billion counter-narcotics package for Mexico and some Central American countries in June 2008, but the military hardware has been slow in arriving.

Many of the guns used by the drug cartels travel south from the United States. Some assault rifles recovered by Mexican authorities have been traced back to U.S. military bases.

In the days leading up to the president's visit here, senior Obama administration officials said the government was focused on enforcing existing U.S. laws to stop arms smuggling, although Mexican officials have called for more help.

Obama's announcement on the treaty -- formally known as the Inter-American Convention Against the Illicit Manufacturing of and Trafficking in Firearms, Ammunition, Explosives and other Related Materials -- marked an additional step.

The Clinton administration signed the treaty, better known by its Spanish acronym CIFTA, after the Organization of American States adopted it in 1997. In all, 33 countries in the hemisphere have signed the treaty. The United States is one of four nations that have yet to ratify the convention, although Obama administration officials say the U.S. government has sought to abide by the spirit of the treaty for years.

The treaty requires countries to take a number of steps to reduce the illegal manufacture and trade in guns, ammunition and explosives.

In addition to making illegal the unauthorized manufacture and exporting of firearms, the treaty calls for countries to adopt strict licensing requirements, mark firearms when they are made and imported to make them easier to trace, and establish a cooperative process for sharing information between national law-enforcement agencies investigating arms smuggling.

Advocates for the treaty have argued that the United States, even if it is trying to follow many of the convention's requirements, is undermining its credibility by failing to ratify it. The treaty was sent to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 1998, but no action has been taken since then.

U.S. gun-rights groups participated as observers in drafting the treaty, which experts say includes language stating that it does not impinge on the U.S. Constitution's Second Amendment. But U.S. advocates of the treaty say its passage was bogged down in the waning days of the Clinton administration, and never emerged as a priority for the Bush administration.

Jorge Chabat, a professor of international studies at the Center for Research and Teaching in Economics in Mexico City, said Obama's advocacy for the treaty marks "an important step toward ending the permissiveness in the United States" toward arms trafficking on its border.

"Obviously there is a part of this that is symbolic," Chabat said. "But President Obama has moved to do more against this arms trafficking from the U.S., and this is part of that. There is a great deal of fear behind this that the border violence will enter the United States."

Johanna Mendelson Forman, senior associate of the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said that "this goes beyond symbolism."

"It sends not only a positive message to Mexico, but also to the region that the United States wants to be a reliable partner in improving security," she said.

*****

The text of the treaty can be found on the link below by clicking on Inter-American Convention:

http://disarmament.un.org/treatystatus.nsf

[Louis of PA]

Ever since the start of the mexican drug war my local gun shop has been out of RPGs and hand grenades. There isn't a full automatic assault weapon in sight either. So sad.

[quote=1903 Mike;39140]
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Like you, I've experienced delays in obtaining ammo for my recoilless rifle, while a buddy has the same problem in getting 88MM for his multi-purpose cannon, a war bring- back. And prices for mortar rounds continue to climb; my lady friend up north is now limiting her jaunts to the range to 5 rounds per day.

I won’t even mention what the Bren gun shooter is paying for his ammo. He picked this number up at our local thrift shop; it was the last one they had in stock and they don't know when they'll receive more.

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[R.L.E.]

Get Ready, Their Comming! Will The Last True American Please Grab The Flag!

[duggaboy]

I know we all know what is going down, so pack in the brass, and the primers now and get the powder cause this is getting close to being here.