(AP Photo/Ricardo Arduengo)
"Guns from America fuel Jamaica's gang wars," declares the AP headline.
Eighty percent of the weapons seized in the Caribbean island are traced back to the United States.
That's what the caption under the lead slide show photo says. But then there's this:
[O]f those whose origin can be traced, 80 percent come from the U.S...
Oh, that's a bit different. Gee, where have we seen this type of manipulation before?
Attempts to blame the U.S. for Jamaican crime are not new. Noises were being made about this years ago. And not just for U.S. guns being responsible for "gun deaths" in Jamaica, but also for U.S. guns being responsible for "gun deaths" in Canada.
Then again, we see the same tactic exploited domestically, with invented terms like "the Iron Pipeline" being used to decry states with "lax gun laws." Mind you, this presumes you need to agree with The New York Times on the meaning of "lax."
Left unsaid in the hysteria is the observation that somehow, those places enjoying such laxity also enjoy much more peaceful conditions, unlike the locales that employ near total "gun control"--like Chicago or...Jamaica.
And President Obama's assertion that "what works in Chicago may not work in Cheyenne" notwithstanding, it appears that every one of the "solutions" being promulgated at the national level are "one size fits all".
Maybe, just maybe, it's not the guns?
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Welcome back, Kurt!
St. Louis Gun Rights Examiner Kurt Hofmann has been on a computer-imposed sabbatical lately.
He's back. Go read.
Check out other Gun Rights Examiners:
- Atlanta: Armed customer stops robbery
- Austin: Brady Campaign: More government, more crime
- Boston: Do Massachusetts Gun Laws apply to all? (Part I)
- Charlotte: Dangers of gun registration: 'The Belgian Corporal'
- Cleveland:
The next generation of gun rights activists
- DC: Under Obamacare, where will Canadians go for medical services?
- Denver: What happens to you when you buy a gun?
- Los Angeles: SoCal Churches go concealed carry.
- Minneapolis: Dirty Deeds in Virginia
- Seattle: GAO report being deliberately misinterpreted for sensationalism
- St. Louis: Gun rights advocacy not responsible for killings
- Wisconsin: Gun rights advocates make progress
Comments
Will they blame the counrties of the far East for 'lax' machete laws?
Most of the murders in the Carib. aren't gun related.
Check out the stats on Haiti.
You know, gun smoke has also been implicated in global warming, or cooling, or whatever the big boogeyman is now. So practice often to tighten your groups and reduce your carbon bootprint.
Ditto to that, Jerry.
The thing about the Jamaican situation is that it illustrates so well the complete failure of gun control. Jamaican has some of the most draconian gun laws in the world, and it's all for naught. The only segment of society that they've managed to disarm is the law abiding citizen. I lived in Jamaica back in 80 and 81, and I've spent the last 29 years traveling there with my Jamaican wife. And nothing has changed in all that time. Today you are just as likely to get your ass shot off in Kingston as you were back then!
Unlike in Mexico, the vast majority of Jamaican guns seized are submitted for tracing. Jamaica and the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives find most of the seized weapons come from three Florida counties — Orange, Dade and Broward — all with large Jamaican populations, according to Shields.
Jerry - they are hard at work attempting to crack down on knives already. (shrug) Molon labe.
I'm beginning to think that U.S. guns may be responsible for the star clustering effect in the center of the Carina Dwarf Galaxy. Someone should look into this.
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