UN Calls for Gun Makers to Fund Victims Compensation
Another reason to hate the proposed United Nations Arms Control Treaty, and another reason why it is imperative that the United States never sign this treaty. Dallas Blog is one of the few outlets that have noted that this treaty would call for all nations to track and monitor gun exports and sales.
The problem is that this would create a new bureaucracy, and worse would leave gun manufacturers open to lawsuits if their products were somehow used by illicit parties – even if the guns potentially ended up in the wrong hands through illicit means.
In other words, U.S. gun makers could face having to pay compensation should the Mexican Cartels use weapons that were exported and legally sold to the Mexican Army. But if the guns somehow made it to the cartels, which is absolutely happening as corrupt officials are illegally selling the guns, the manufacturers could be called to compensate victims!
And finally, we have to ask, what about the millions (or more) of AK-47s that flooded the world’s markets during the days of the Soviet Union. Who, if anyone, would be responsible for that compensation?
NRA: Mexico Considering Suing USA Gun Manufacturers & Distributors
From our friends at the NRA:
In another chapter in the ongoing attempt to blame the American gun community for Mexico’s internal strife, CBS News reports that the Mexican government has retained the New York City-based law firm of Reid Collins & Tsai to examine its options for suing U.S. gun manufacturers and distributors.
This report describes Mexico’s actions as a “novel approach,” in reality, such lawsuits have been used for decades as a tactic by anti-gun groups and governments in their attempts to bankrupt gun manufacturers and circumvent the political process.
That’s why Congress passed the “Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act” in 2005. This act protects firearms manufacturers, distributors, dealers and importers from suits brought about as a result of “the harm solely caused by the criminal or unlawful misuse of firearm products or ammunition products by others when the product functioned as designed and intended.”
The outlook for a Mexican government suit looks dim; since the PLCAA was signed into law by President George W. Bush on Oct. 26, 2005, no federal court has allowed such a suit by a government plaintiff to go forward against a U.S. firearms manufacturer.
The Mexican government’s plans for a lawsuit extend at least back to November 2, 2010, when a contract with the law firm was signed. Unfortunately for the Mexican government, the possible lawsuit has come to light at the same time as diplomatic cables newly made available by Wikileaks, which have shown that drug cartels obtain much of their weaponry from Central American arsenals.
One such cable, recently publicized by Mexico City newspaper La Jornada, addresses a frequently heard claim about the origin of guns used in Mexico’s crime wave.
The cable’s author writes, “Claims by Mexican and U.S. officials that upwards of 90 percent of illegal recovered weapons can be traced back to the U.S. is based on an incomplete survey of confiscated weapons. In point of fact, without wider access to the weapons seized in Mexico, we really have no way of verifying these numbers.”
This information comes to light only weeks after another cable publicized by La Jornada revealed that 90 percent of the drug cartels’ “heavy armament,” such as grenades and rocket launchers, originates in Central America and enters Mexico through its Southern border with Guatemala. Bolstering these claims, IHS Global Insights reported on April 6 that the head of U.S. Southern Command, General Douglas Fraser, testified before the Senate that over 50 percent of the military grade weapons in the region originated from Central America. Read more
BBC Blames US Guns
Even the British mainstream media seems hell bound on blaming the United States for the woes in Mexico. In a story this week for its Website, the BBC noted a few interesting points including this kicker:
“Nearly 35,000 people have died in drug-related violence in Mexico since December 2006, and many of the killings have been carried out with guns smuggled in from the US.”
What makes this story interesting is that the accompanying photo shows a variety of military style rifles – so called assault weapons. It is impossible to tell from the photos whether these are true military guns or commercial versions. In addition to several AR-15/M-16 style guns there are also a Steyr Aug, two FN P90s, as well as an AK-47 clone in the photo. Those guns aren’t even made in the United States – but in fairness they are sold in commercial models. It is just interesting that the media shows the international nature of the guns, yet America gets all the finger pointing.
Almost Laughable Headline – But it Isn’t Really Funny
The San Diego City College’s “award-winning, student-run newspaper,” City Times offered this headline: “Gun control could have prevented some of history’s worst crimes.”
The editorial offers a few choice passages:
“The United States has seen many such massacres, including the Columbine shootings, the Virginia Tech shootings and countless more gun-related mass killings, most of which could have been prevented by stricter gun laws.”
Could stricter gun laws have made the difference? The editorial even questions itself noting that both New York City and Washington, D.C. have strict gun laws – but as the writer notes, have seen “very different results.”
The editorial unfairly notes that New York is one of the safest large cities in the country because of the gun laws. This isn’t quite the case. There is still gun crime in NYC, and yet the gun laws are strict. Meanwhile D.C. has crime, which the editorial blames on close proximity to Virginia and Maryland.
Missing from the equation is Chicago. That city has seen a lot of crime, despite the laws in Illinois and Chicago. So why not cite that one? The answer is that it doesn’t fit with the editorial. Read more
The Moderate Voice Offers Liberal View of Guns in Mexico
In a piece titled, “Mexican Drugs, U.S. Guns,” the writer at The Moderate Voice pin the blame on the violence south of the border fully on the latter. The author writes:
“While many citizens on the U. S. side of our southern border complain bitterly about the influx of illegal drugs through the Mexican corridor, most show little more than complacency when confronted with the arms trafficking in the opposite direction. The blood on the streets of Mexican cities is brought about almost entirely with the use of weapons from the United States.”
The story goes on to note that Mexico has some of the toughest gun control laws in the world, and then again lays the blame at America. The article adds:
“It is the smuggling of semi-automatic rifles and shotguns that accounts for much of death and violence on the Mexican side of the border.”
The point of this story was to spur a debate, but we must argue that no fair debate can come from the information provided. The simple fact is that it has never been proven that the “almost entirely” all the guns are from “weapons from the United States.” This fact has been disputed and even debunked in the past year and a half. Yet it is cited in the mainstream media time and time again.
The other problem with this argument is that it fails to note that the guns – whether they are coming from the United States, China or being sold by corrupt military personnel in the Mexican Army – are being paid for by drug money. Stop the flow of drugs, you’ll stop the flow of money and with it the violence.
NPR Offers Excerpt of New Book on the AK-47
WaPo Letter to the Editor is as Uninformed as Usual Editorials
Typically we don’t report on “letters to the editor,” but the recent letter from Eliot L. Engel to the editors of The Washington Post is no ordinary letter. Rep. Engel (D-N.Y.) is chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcomittee on the Western Hemisphere, so it is essential that readers – and more importantly all voters – know his stance. Read more
Sovereign Society Offers Insight on International Gun Laws
While the purpose of a post from Mark Nestmann for the Sovereign Society was to explain importation laws, and he noted that the Second Amendment of the Constitution of the United States does not apply to other nations, the piece is worth reading as he notes some interesting insight about gun laws in other nations. Read more
WaPo Cites 80 Percent Figure Long After it Was Debunked
Do the editors at The Washington Post actually believe what they write or will they use false numbers just to prove a point? We know the paper is vehemently anti-gun, but is it creditable to quote a figure that most of the mainstream media has acknowledge is a made up number? In an editorial titled “U.S. falls short in helping Mexico end its drug war,” deputy editorial page editor Jackson Diehl quotes the “old 80 percent of guns come from the United States.” Hasn’t this number been debunked enough for Mr. Diehl? Apparently not. Read more
Fourth of July Editorial From Brady Center Misses the Mark
If you believe the word from The Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, the United States leads the world in gun related homicides. In a misplace Fourth of July editorial, which appeared on the Tauton Daily Gazette website, the Brady Bunch offered this thought:
“On this Independence Day weekend, as Americans reflect on the history of the nation’s founding and contemplate its future, the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence has released the latest edition of its God Bless America poster, documenting that, in one year, guns murdered 17 people in Finland, 35 in Australia, 39 in England and Wales, 60 in Spain, 194 in Germany, 200 in Canada, and 9,484 in the United States.”
Where is Afghanistan or Iraq on this list? While maybe a very different picture of “gun homicides,” we question why these nations weren’t included? What about other wartorn nations in Africa and Asia? Why aren’t those nations included? Many experience violence every day? This is because those nations lack the freedom of the United States?
Where does China rank on the list? In China it is a capital offense to even be caught with a gun, yet gun violence happens. In Mexico it is hard to legally obtain a gun, yet here too we see regular violence that is all too common.
No, the picture that the Brady Center offered is not a good one of the United States, but it isn’t a fair one either. Are those deaths really because we have guns however, or because we have a criminal element? That’s the question that isn’t being asked enough.
