Monday, August 18, 2008

A "South Of The Border" Shoot 'Em Up

This other New York Times story from yesterday tells us…

LOS ANGELES — The rising tide of guns flowing into Mexico from the United States, which is fueling some of the worst drug violence in Mexico in years, can be stopped only by cracking down on smugglers the way federal authorities hobbled the Mafia, the secretary of homeland security, Michael Chertoff, said Thursday.
I should note, by the way, that Mike (“City of Louisiana”) Chertoff was featured in the prior post also about Putin trying to capture more Arctic oil; never a good sign when Chertoff is your “strategy” guy on a vital issue. And I also don’t understand the Times’ choice of a photo for this story – I’m hard pressed to find any source of amusement here.

Also, you could also make the case that the “mafia” that we have come to know through The Godfather and The Sopranos is in descent, but other international groups, notably from Mexico and Russia, are filling that void.

Continuing…

The Mexican governors sought to emphasize the United States’ place as the chief recipient of drugs and exporter of weapons. United States officials have estimated that 90 percent to 95 percent of the weapons used in Mexico’s drug violence come from the United States.



The governors on Friday pledged more cooperation among state law enforcement agencies to curb gun trafficking. For example, Arizona and the Mexican state of Sonora across its border, which has experienced heavy fighting among drug gangs, recently signed agreements to share intelligence and use databases to track stolen weapons.



In the interview, he said the United States and Mexico were working on penetrating the smuggling organizations, an effort he called vital to dismantling them. Getting inside, Mr. Chertoff said, is particularly important because many of the weapons are bought by middlemen at gun shows and shops and then resold or delivered to the cartels, making them difficult to trace.
In that event, then, I would just call for more restrictions on sales of guns to try and prevent “straw” purchases, such as the type the story describes. Also, I would use this as an opportunity to plug the bill by Dem Rep. Carolyn Maloney McCarthy of New York, which would reauthorize the assault weapons ban (surely assault weapons figure into this deadly mix).

Finally, though the Tiahrt Amendment noted here restricts the ability of cities to use trace data from the ATF when investigating crimes in U.S. cities, I think this is an opportunity to finally push for repeal of this and the odious rider attached by Richard Shelby in the Senate that mandated jail time for law enforcement officials using trace data outside the narrow bounds of what Tiahrt prescribes. I say this because we should share trace data with Mexican authorities also, and it would be silly to do that but restrict that use in this country.

But then again, I’m just a filthy, unkempt liberal blogger, so what do I know?

The governors, pushed by the conference host, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California, highlighted the effort to improve the environment and strengthen economic ties. They floated, among other proposals, the idea of an express toll lane at border crossings to ease congestion into the United States and pay for road and other improvements.

“Some people still think of the border only in negative terms,” Mr. Schwarzenegger said at the opening ceremony at a theater near Universal Studios Hollywood. He added: “Every time we turn on the TV or pick up the newspaper we are hit by stories about illegal immigrants and the problems they create. We see that all the time. But I also want people to know about the positive stories.”
I suppose the idea of an express toll late could make sense, but I would really want to know more about what would be required for someone to enter this country in that manner before I approved it. The problem is that we can’t make up our minds on who we should include or exclude, to say nothing of the question of citizenship for illegals or whether or not they should receive driver’s licenses. I would say we should work out all of that stuff first before we think about the equivalent of EZPass for them.

And by the way (speaking of trying to restrict guns), here’s some good news on that front from the Brady Campaign (and by the way, Dems, you are STILL supposed to be the party of gun control; trying to run and hide from that will only make you look more foolish).

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm confused about a couple of things.

If it's the US' fault that there is a market here for illegal drugs, why isn't it Mexico's fault that there is a market there for illegal guns?

Seems to me like the US is being held responsible for both problems. Isn't that a double standard?

It seems to me that if Mexico would solve their problems as a supplier of drugs (which would require them to solve the problems of corrupt government and corrupt police as well as actually police the border...figure the odds) then their illegal gun problem would solve itself.

If the Tiahrt amendment prevents law enforcement agencies from getting the ATF trace data when investigating crimes, how do they always seem to know where the guns came from after crimes?

It seems to me that all those reports that "the perpetrator got his gun from a pawn shop" or "bought the gun from xxx gun shop" would say "We don't know where he got his guns because the ATF won't share their trace data with us."

doomsy said...

As nearly as I’ve been able to determine based on what I’ve read, the Tiahrt amendments (really, they started in 2003 and have grown more restrictive) are aimed at preventing lawsuits against the NRA by state and local governments. I’m not aware of any difficulty faced by law enforcement in the matter of sharing trace data as a result. It just makes me wonder, though, when I read in this story that information is being shared with the Mexican governors; I’m not opposed to that if we’re sharing the same type of information in this country.

Also, though drug use is hardly an activity I condone, I think it’s pretty plain that our “drug wars” have been unsuccessful since we have to relaunch them with every new administration, or so it seems. We need to focus more on prevention and getting the word out as early as possible just how bad they are (I don’t have any current information on that as to how successful we are now as opposed to years past).

Simply put, I think it’s silly to blame this country for drug usage since, unfortunately, it seems that will be a “constant” that we have to manage as best as we can, especially with the economy of the last eight years as opposed to the nineties shedding more jobs than it’s creating. Beside, even if we weren’t consuming the drugs from Mexico, the guns would still be entering the country to the point where the criminals would enforce the trade somewhere else in the world – I don’t see a connection to the point where reducing one also reduces the impact of the other.

Anonymous said...

Beside, even if we weren’t consuming the drugs from Mexico, the guns would still be entering the country to the point where the criminals would enforce the trade somewhere else in the world

That's a good point, and it's hard to predict the future. I would think, though, that if the Mexican government were able to stop (or at least slow down) the drug smuggling, there'd be less incentive for the cartels to engage in the violence. Part of the reason they work so hard to protect their "turf" is the huge profit potential. Cut off the profit potential and the incentive to violently protect the turf goes away too.

And I strongly disagree with the implication that the liberty of US citizens should be infringed in an effort to alleviate problems in another country...especially whan that country refuses to address a large part of the problem: i.e., the porous borders that enable the gun running in the first place and the rampant corruption of the government, Police and military.

Crack down on the smugglers? Absolutely, unequivocally. Arrest them, lock them up and throw away the key.

Limit the choices of all Americans...even the law abiding ones...in an effort to impact another country's criminal element? Not a chance.

I do, however, agree with you on the "war on drugs". Take the money ineffectually thrown away in enforcement and incarceration related to the WoD, invest it in prevention and treatment programs and I'd be willing to bet we'd make MUCH more headway in reducing the problem than the current model.

doomsy said...

Fair enough - thanks for the comments.

Anonymous said...

No; thank YOU.

It's so refreshing to have an intelligent, civil conversation on the Internet without one side or the other immediately flinging ad-hominems as soon as their viewpoint is questioned.

Kudos. Keep up the good work.