Chicago’s Real Problem – Gangs, Not Guns
The Chicago Tribune reported this week that members of the notorious gang “Almighty Gaylords” have been arrested for “selling an AK-47 assault rifle,” as well as being charged with “state drug and gang crimes.”
Chicago has extremely strict gun laws, and yet this street gang has retained power for decades, with its origin dating back to the 1970s. So is this really a gun problem in the Windy City or a gang problem?
More Misuse of “High-Powered”
We continue to note that the media likes to label practically all firearms as “high-powered,” and the term has become a generic adjective to the point that it is almost meaningless.
This weekend The Monitor ran a story titled, “Mexican national jailed for allegedly smuggling ammunition,” and it included this passage:
“Authorities report that Martinez-Bernache was arrested Wednesday at the Gateway International Bridge in Brownsville after he attempted to smuggle 4,000 cartridges of .223 caliber ammunition and 1,000 cartridges of 7.62 caliber ammunition without a license.
“This type of ammunition is commonly used in high-powered assault rifles, authorities said.”
If authorities said that this was “used in high-powered assault rifles,” than those authorities prove they aren’t much of a gun authority.
Here is the problem. The .223 caliber ammunition is for the AR-15 or M-16, and it was actually designed to be a lower-powered bullet than the .30 caliber that was used in the M1 or M14. Those could be considered “high-powered,” but the .223 is generally considered an intermediate cartridge and thus not technically “high-powered.”
The other problem is that the 7.62 caliber ammunition comes in 7.62x54mmR, which is the old Russian standard for the WWI era bolt action rifles, as well as World War II Soviet era semi-automatic rifles. But the Soviets were among the first to see that this high-powered round was over-powered for combat needs, and created the 7.62x39mm round for the SKS. This was later used in the AK-47, which is considered an assault weapon, while the semi-automatic versions could be deemed assault weapon styled.
The point is that the 7.62x39mm is also an intermediate round, so this story is just another example of media misinformation.
Miami Herald Points Fingers at US Gun Shop for Mexico’s Woes
Have the editors at The Miami Herald not been following the news? That is the only excuse that comes to mind when the paper offers an editorial titled, “Stop the gun flow.” It offers two interesting thoughts:
“Ever since it became clear that U.S. gun shops are major suppliers of weapons used by drug traffickers in Mexico, this country has had an obligation to help stop the slaughter south of the border.”
And:
“Now the AFT has come up with a better idea — to require gun dealers in four border states to notify federal authorities about individuals making frequent purchases of high-powered weapons.”
OK, first we’ll point out (again) that most of the guns in question are not HIGH-POWERED! Those are intermediate cartridge firearms such as AK-47s. But once again, the use of the adjective “high-powered” makes the guns seem even more ominous and insidious.
But let’s take this a step further. Again, there is no proof that “U.S. gun shops are the major suppliers of weapons” used by the drug gangs or anyone in Mexico. This statement disregards that the drug gangs have fully automatic weapons, grenades and grenade launchers. None of these are readily available at gun shops.
But taking it further, why should those border states suffer new gun control regulations. We would ask where is the obligation that the editors speak of, when Mexico has long had an obligation to stop the flow of drugs and illegal aliens and has done nothing to stop either!
BuffaloNews.com Story Offers Sinister Gun Description
Even when the media doesn’t try to be anti-gun biased, it remains very much so. Case in point this week, a story in BuffaloNews.com had the headline, “Machine gun and drugs seized in arrests of two.”
That sounds like a good thing; criminals with a machine gun and drugs deserve to be arrested. But the problem is that the story doesn’t actually say what type of machine gun OR if there was in fact a machine gun. What is noted is that there were “two high-powered assault rifles, including a defaced AK-47.”
So the media misinformation continues. As we regularly note, assault-rifles are NOT high-powered. But this makes for good copy and sounds more sinister, thus another example of the media being very anti-gun biased without even trying too hard.
AP Story Mislabels Assault Rifles
We will continue to call out errors by the media, and this includes the use of “high-powered” to describe assault rifles. The latest example this week was the Associated Press, via News1130.com, which included this passage:
“ATF agents said they were ordered repeatedly to step aside as gun buyers in Arizona walked away with AK-47 assault rifles and other high-powered weaponry headed for Mexican drug gangs.”
This continued use of high-powered to describe the guns remains the key media bias and is factually incorrect. As we’ve long stated, this is just sloppy reporting, plain and simple.
USA Today Suggests Most Semi-Auto Rifles “High Powered”
Time and time again the mainstream media uses the adjectives “high-powered” to describe pretty much every firearm out there. This week in a story titled, “Feds target frequent sales of semi-auto rifles on Mexico border,” USA Today noted:
“Hoping to reduce the flow of high-powered weapons into Mexico, the Justice Department today said it would require gun shops in four border states to provide data on frequent buyers of certain semi-automatic rifles.”
This is really not about “high-powered weapons” exactly, and includes long guns larger than .22 caliber, which isn’t even close to high-powered. In fact, this is really about semi-automatic military style firearms such as AK-47s and AR-15s, two weapons that are all too often erroneously called “high-powered” when in fact they are not.
Kenneth Melson Tries to Hang On
The Los Angeles Times reported on Friday that Kenneth Melson, acting head of the ATF did not be “the fall guy” for the Fast and Furious debacle.
We must note that the LA Times report was guilty of the usual media misinformation:
“Melson does not want to be “the fall guy” for the program, under which ATF agents allowed straw purchasers to acquire more than 1,700 AK-47s and other high-powered rifles from Arizona gun dealers.”
We must ask again, why does the mainstream media insist on calling AK-47s high-powered? These are not high-powered and the mainstream media, along with anti-gun zealots seems incapable of getting the message! Of course, it could be that this is the very message they intend to send out – by implying that the AK-47 is high-powered makes it all the most ominous and dangerous.
CSM Worried Fast and Furious May Undermine Efforts to Stop Flow of Guns South
It is clear that The Christian Science Monitor has an anti-gun agenda. With a piece titled, “How much damage did ATF’s ill-gated gun-running sting to war on drugs?” we assumed the article would note the debacle of ATF, but then the deck – the second headline – offered this thought, “Fast and Furious, the Mexico gun-running sting gone bad, may cost ATF’s acting chief his job. A larger concern is that it may undermine efforts to stop the flow of US guns south.”
Read that very last section again, “may undermine efforts to stop the flow of US guns south.” In other words, the biggest concern for the editors at CSM is that gun control efforts could be derailed!
The article adds these bullet points:
• The role US borderland gun shops play in feeding the region’s drug-related violence.
• How Mexico’s ruthless crime gangs use the weakly regulated US market to arm themselves.
• How the American gun lobby’s opposition to regulation has stifled government efforts to plug the flow of arms into Mexico.
But it gets worse. The CSM story offers this passage:
“According to the report, released last week by Sens. Dianne Feinstein of California, Charles Schumer of New York, and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, an ATF study of 2009 and 2010 crimes in Mexico involving firearms found that 70 percent of the traced weapons have a US source.”
How can we believe this number given that ATF has allowed guns to walk into Mexico? Worse, this story fails to note that this 70 percent number is just the guns that were believed to possibly be from the United States, and thus not all guns are sent for tracing.
The story also shows that CSM is confused on some issues. Consider this passage:
“More than 2,500 high-powered weapons were let loose through the program, but the agency lost track of hundreds of AK-47s and other arms that filtered across the border in Mexico – and into the hands of Mexico’s violent drug gangs, according even to some ATF officials.”
This implies that the AK-47s are “high-powered,” a point we bring up again and again. The AK-47 fires a 7.62x39mm cartridge, one widely accepted as intermediate. High-powered only works to serve as an adjective to imply that these are truly dangerous guns and somehow “more powerful” than a hunting rifle – which is incorrect.
All taken together CSM continues its clear anti-gun bias and pointing the fingers squarely at American gun shops for Mexico’s woes.
LA Times Misspeaks on “High-Powered” Rifles
This week The Los Angeles Times noted that many of the guns bought illegally, and let to “walk” to Mexico as part of the Fast and Furious debacle actually stayed in the United States. That is no surprise, nor is it a surprise that the reporting from the Times is full of the normal misinformation.
Case in point:
“Even as high-powered weapons flowed toward Mexican drug cartels in a controversial U.S. surveillance program, hundreds more guns probably escaped into the hands of criminals inside the U.S., federal agents told Congress on Wednesday.”
Followed by:
“The ATF agents said they were ordered to watch as more than 1,700 guns, including AK-47 variants and other high-powered rifles, were sold to ‘straw purchasers’ in Arizona and then transferred to suspected agents of Mexico’s violent drug trafficking organizations.”
These paragraphs taken together might imply to a reader that the AK-47 is a “high-powered” rifle. It is not. We’ve noted this many times, and while the rest of the story suggests a real issue, it is hard to accept the credibility of the media when this misinformation is stated over and over again.
Herarst Survey Tries to Pin Mexican Violence on American Guns, As Well as AK-47
The Hearst Newspapers tried to lay much of the blame on Mexico’s gun violence on America, ironically in a piece titled, “AK-47 favorite gun of cartels.”
The AK-47 for the record was designed in the Soviet Union shortly after World War II. Even the guns used by Mexican cartels are imported from Romania. This is a fact that is largely ignored, but the Hearst story tries to blame America again, noting:
“The No. 1 gun in the Hearst survey was the AK-47 imported from Romania by Century International Arms of Delray Beach, Fla. Century Arms, as it’s commonly known, legally circumvents a federal law stipulating that imported rifles must be suitable for ‘sporting purposes.’ Once inside the U.S., Century Arms converts the rifles into military-style AK-47s capable of holding 30-round magazines.”
This is flat out misinformation. These firearms not “converted” or modified. Merely they ship without magazines, and once in America are provided with the same exact magazines that have been used with the AK-47 for decades.
To claim that Century Arms converts these implies that something mechanical is being done to the firearms and this isn’t the case.
This article also tries to suggest that American firearms are fueling the cartel wars in Mexico, noting:
“Top ATF officials have said in congressional testimony that 90 percent of the guns submitted for tracing by Mexican authorities are from the United States. Gun-rights advocates doubt the accuracy of that claim.”
Here again an outright law. It isn’t just gun-rights advocates but even the ATF has acknowledged that the 90 percent number is inaccurate and has been thoroughly debunked. To imply otherwise is not only sloppy journalist but is fact twisting the facts to fit with the anti-biased tone of the article.
