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August 12, 2009

Anti-gun Propaganda from Time Magazine

Lance Fairchok
In a Time Magazine article entitled "Obama's Mexico Mission: Keep Guns in El Norte" Journalist Ioan Grillo conjures up images of back alley gun deals where Americans sell sniper rifles, machine guns and other "heavy weapons" to Mexican drug lords who load them in unmarked panel trucks and smuggle them south. With all the melodrama and sensationalism of a dime store detective novel, Grillo tells us that "vast arsenals" flow south from the United States.

"But seven months into Obama's administration the guns keep flowing south and show no sign of abating. Mexican government raids continue to turn up vast arsenals of brand new firearms that can be traced to shops north of the Rio Grande."   IOAN GRILLO, Time Magazine

It would be despicably evil stuff, selling "vast arsenals" to brutal murderers who use them against innocent civilians and police. Luckily it's not true.  Virtually nothing in Grillo's article is supportable by real evidence. In fact his article reads like a progressive left talking paper on how to build support for gun restrictions in the US, "to help Mexico" against the drug cartels.  Strangely, it is published as President Obama visits that corrupt and blighted country.  If you think that's a coincidence I have a bridge in Juarez to sell you.

The truth is not hard to find, unless of course you are unconcerned with truth and care more for your ideology.  Let's look at some facts that the legacy press will not tell you, omitting them from your view as they program the American public with the anti-gun perspective they support.  

FOX news reported in April 09 that:

"In 2007-2008, according to ATF Special Agent William Newell, Mexico submitted 11,000 guns to the ATF for tracing. Close to 6,000 were successfully traced -- and of those, 90 percent -- 5,114 to be exact, according to testimony in Congress by William Hoover -- were found to have come from the U.S.

"But in those same two years, according to the Mexican government, 29,000 guns were recovered at crime scenes.

"In other words, 68 percent of the guns that were recovered were never submitted for tracing. And when you weed out the roughly 6,000 guns that could not be traced from the remaining 32 percent, it means 83 percent of the guns found at crime scenes in Mexico could not be traced to the U.S."

Only 17 percent, not exactly what we heard from Grillo and his pals in the nation's newsrooms was it?  FOX did not make these numbers up; they got them from the ATF.  So where do all the guns come from?  Mostly through Central and South America, Mexico is a smugglers paradise, where bribes, kickbacks and payoffs are a way of life.  Every imaginable weapon can be found in the Mexican black market, including Korean grenades, Belgian rifles, and Spanish rocket propelled grenades, Chinese explosives and fully automatic Russian assault rifles that cannot be purchased in the US. 

Many of the weapons come from the Mexican Army, mostly M-16s that deserting soldiers took with them when they left for the high pay the drug cartels provide (150,000 over the last six years according to FOX).  Hugo Chavez has been active also, facilitating drug and gun smuggling through terrorist groups like Columbia's FARC. Ecuador, Bolivia, Cuba and Nicaragua and the rest of the Bolivarian Alliance also have their hands in the drug smuggling business. 

In May 2008 the Washington Post reported that one cartel went so far as to hang a banner recruiting soldiers across one of the busiest roads in Nuevo Laredo saying: "We're offering you a good salary, food and medical care for your families."  Los Zetas, a hit squad formed former Special Forces soldiers were behind the recruitment campaign. Mexico has deep seated cultural and political problems that go far beyond anything the US can do by restricting our citizen's freedoms.    

The reason for Gallo's article becomes apparent quickly. It originates from the usual suspects and is part of an agenda we have anticipated since Election Day. It is the typical straw man set up, following the Alinsky model. "You do what you can with what you have and clothe it with moral arguments."  Alinsky instructed in his book Rules for Radicals.  It is eminently moral to help a neighbor in need the Democrats will argue.  What compassionate American would not support a ban on terrible weapons that kill innocents in Mexico? 

"Obama concedes that one major problem in stopping the traffic is the strength of U.S. gun laws - and the gun lobby supporting them. Mexican officials have pushed for the United States to reinstate a Clinton-era ban on assault rifles. Such weapons - especially Kalashnikovs and AR15s - are behind the vast majority of Mexican gang killings. Both types of guns have been sold widely in Arizona and Texas since the U.S. ban on sale of assault weapons was repealed in 2004."

Who is it in the Obama administration that sends out memos on appropriate topics for "progressive" journalists to write to compliment the Presidents agenda? You can anticipate heart-rending investigative reports exposing American complicity in the Mexican violence.  After all, for the left, every bad thing in the world is our fault.  Along with the press propaganda we will see legislation from Democrats to restrict, register and criminalize a wide variety of popular rifles and pistols; first will be the "assault rifles" with high capacity magazines.  Next will be anything that looks "military" regardless of function or capacity.  Next will be anything semi-automatic.  If that does not work they will try to restrict ammo, then private reloading, then gun shows, then concealed carry permits, and any number of concocted back door assaults on second amendment freedoms.  Grillo writing is a triumph of anti-gun exaggeration.

"The camcorder shakes as it films the thud of thick .50 caliber bullets ripping through a steel plate target in the heat of the Arizona desert. Panning across the jagged rocks and cacti, the camera then focuses on the shooter: a smiling Mexican sitting down on the dust as he uses both hands to fire the huge state-of-the-art weapon that can tear through tank armor. He was the happy customer, having bought the killing machine from an Arizona gun shop for about $21,000."

He got ripped off.  A .50 caliber rifle only costs about three or four grand, or maybe Grillo made up the dollar amount to be more sensational.  It would be in keeping with the rest of his fallacious article.  Grillo is not a very good journalist.  He does very poor research. The rifle won't pierce tank armor, and it's not particularly state of the art. We used them in WW2.  Grillo should try fiction writing as he has already proven he has some skill at it.

Grillo is an advocacy journalist, which is to say he is a propagandist, part of a disinformation campaign whose tempo is picking up to follow Obama's radical socialist vision.  A free people with guns will not be content to be ruled by elites, so the left is congenitally driven to control them. To achieve this they use the press as a weapon. What do we call it when the press conspires with government to mislead and deceive the American public?  We call it tyranny.  What do we do about it?  Show up to vote those responsible out in 2010.  As for Time Magazine and its lack of "ethics", don't buy it and don't read it. Hit them in their pocket book.  There are still a few "free market" solutions left.

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