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More thoughts on guns and Mexico and cartels
As noted earlier, everyone from President Obama to the Mexican ambassador is claiming that 90%, or even 95% of criminal guns recovered in Mexico come from the US. The fact that 90% of guns submitted to ATF for tracing trace to the US, but the Mexican government only submits guns that it thinks came from the US; a while back FoxNews ran the numbers and concluded that only 17% of guns recovered in Mexico came from the US. Now Factcheck.org reruns the numbers and concludes it's more like 34%, still a minority.
One mystery remains: the difference between the two sets of numbers is explained as the smaller one reflect guns that could be traced to a particular State, the larger one includes those that couldn't be. A successful ATF trace at the very minimum tracks it to retail dealer, thus you know the State. If they couldn't report the State, it probably means an unsuccessful trace -- we know that Colt made it in the US, but can't trace it to the dealer. Unsuccessful traces are disproportionately traces of sales long ago -- those made before the 1968 GCA are about hopeless, and even subsequent to that, the farther back in time, the more likely records have been misplaced.
Which would suggest, at least, that about half of the traces relate to very old gun transfers. Say a gun was sold at retail in 1960, has gone thru 2-3 legit owners since then, a burglar steals it and fences it across the border -- that'd go down as a gun "traced to an American source," and be portrayed as if it was a straw man sale or crooked dealer.
The other possibility is that guns not traced to sale in a particular State include guns not sold in the US at all, but exported. In 2007, American manufacturers exported 10,530 handguns and rifles to the Mexican Ministry of Defense. Think the cartels have enough money to get their hands on as many as they want?
· non-US
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And on the waterfront: The U.S. Coast Guard Merchant Marine Personnel Advisory Committee (MERPAC) held their public meeting April 16-17, 2009 at the Mass. Maritime Academy (MMA) at Buzzards Bay, MA. I attended that two-day meeting.
Capt. Joe Murphy (teacher of maritime security management at MMA; and father of Chief Mate Shane Murphy, of the recently hijacked MAERSK ALABAMA), called MMA Police on me on the allegation that I might have a gun in my possession because I talked about Second Amendment rights and duties of seamen because the Secretary of Homeland Security has general superintendence over the U.S. merchant marine and its personnel. The MERPAC meeting was supposed to be open to the public. I was a member of the public, but a particular "nobody" portion of the public, just an ordinary citizen, a seaman from the rank and file of the Seafarers International Union. More on this at my blog: http://americancommondefencereview.wordpress.com/
Every time I talk about Second Amendment rights of seaman with anyone associated with the U.S. Coast Guard I end up with federal or local law enforcement in my face!
So, you faithful readers of David T. Hardy's blog who are pissed off at me and hate the sight of my name, "Don Hamrick," don't feel too bad. I piss off the U.S. Government too! It seems, real talk about rights and duties under the Bill of Rights pisses off a lot of people everywhere!
More on this at my blog!
They always leave out the 7773 forms don't they?
Playing to ignorants.
What's very interesting to me is that we still continue to play the Gun Banners game. They set the rules, and we respond defensively.
The Mexican government has huge stability and corruption issues, even more so than our country. We are allowing the freedom haters in our country to deflect the real issue at hand, Mexican crime. The notion that USA liberty should be curtailed because of illegal activity in a different country is disgusting.
Let's not even add that the war on drugs is a complete failure and money-pit, not unlike alcohol prohibition. Legalize drugs in the United States -- give us more freedom, not take it away, and guess what? This problem disappears, and we save billions of dollars.
Freedom lovers in the United States need to start putting those that would enslave us on the defensive. They need to start playing by our rules, not vice-versa.
My impression is that the Mexican Government is very careful to not mention or trace guns they know or suspect were sold to their Army and then later ended up in criminal hands.
Looks bad, you know.
Perhaps this questions already been addressed.
What is the number of traces for the 10,530 weapons shipped to the Mexican military? Surely,
the BATFE, DOD, and the manufacturers can cooperate to trace any of these guns that turn up?
It is disturbing that these wepaons may have found their way into the cartels' hands, but we have no info about them.