Got this in an email this morning. maybe someone could fact check it It didnt make the news here:
"Finally Some Truth Leaks Out
Yesterday, I was pleased to notice that "mainstream" media had begun to question the absurd statements being made by US officials concerning the "iron river" of firearms flowing from the United States into Mexico .
For the past weeks, we've heard politicians, bureaucrats and supposedly informed law enforcement officials blame the flow of US firearms into Mexico for that country's reversion back into its old, violent, ways.
Today, the other side of our long, common border with the United States looks like some backwater dictatorship. Violence is no longer the exception-- it's the rule, with drug cartels fighting it out with each other -and occasionally a corrupt Mexican police force.
Infuriatingly, high-ranking US officials, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, have continued to spout inaccurate statistics that blame
the US firearms industry and our retail system for the Mexican violence. They say ninety percent of all the illegal guns in Mexico come from the
United States , purchased in legal or illegal transactions, then smuggled into Mexico to arm the cartels.
That is not a statistical fib, it is an absolute bald-faced lie. To repeat something you know isn't true makes whomever repeats it a bald-faced liar as well.
Unfortunately, it demonstrates this new administration's complete and utter disdain for the rest of us. They believe we're as incapable of
questioning them as we are of deciding our own futures. Fortunately, not everyone is buying into the lie. With Mexican cartel battles involving
full-auto rifles, grenades and other military-style weaponry, even the most naive reporter should eventually question officials saying they're being
procured in the United States . A reader's note the other day asked "can you get me an address on those Texas gun stores where I can get the
machine guns and rocket launchers that are being smuggled into Mexico ? I'd like to have some of that for myself. " Finally, some hard questions
are being asked. In San Diego , KGTV television's investigative unit used a forensic firearms consultant to inspect a Mexican army cache of
seized weapons. Based on those findings, it was obvious to consultant Marc Halcon that what was being stated by government officials as fact
and parroted by reporters was not accurate. In fact, he reported that while US gun shops were getting the blame for supplying the cartels with
weapons, the real fact was that many of the high-powered weapons the criminals were using come from the U. S. government. They had been
given to the Mexican military to fight the cartels. Instead, it appears they were taken to the cartels by the more than 1,200 soldiers per month
who go AWOL from the Mexican army -- apparently taking their firearms with them. Since 2000, an average of 16,000 soldiers have deserted.
You do the math on the number of military firearms that could put into circulation.
On Thursday, Fox News reported the government statistics, were simply wrong. More disturbingly, they reported, ATF officials didn't seem to
be interested in doing anything to correct the inaccuracy.
Truth be told, only a small percentage of the tens of thousands of illegal weapons seized in Mexico each year come from the United States .
The statistic being quoted doesn't refer to the total number of weapons seized, only the ones with marking that allow them to be traced. Tens of
thousands of illegal military weapons aren't traced, they're warehoused.
As the old expression goes, there are three kinds of lies: plain old lies, damned lies and statistics. Personally, I'm just about tired of getting wet
feet under blue skies while my own government continues to tell me it's raining. The firearms industry, meanwhile, does seem to be the one
growth sector in our economy -- at least in the near-term. The industry may be quietly concerned about the end of 2009, but consumers continue
to drive sales up --despite the fact most of the rest of the economy is suffering.
President Obama, in fact, is on track to be the first repeat winner of our Firearms Salesman of the Year honors. Despite his underlings saying the
administration's for firearms and the Second Amendment, the consumersaren't buying it. Instead, they're buying guns and ammunition.
The FBI's National Instant Criminal Background Check (NICS) shows a 23. 3 percent increase in background checks for February 2009 as
compared to February 2008. January had a 28 percent increase, December 24 percent and November showed a 42 percent jump when
more than 1. 5 million background checks were performed. That huge jump followed the November elections, but I'm certainly not going to try
and read any significance into that. It's obviously a coincidence. Besides, NSSF President Steve Sanetti already tied the two together when
he noted that "Since November, sales of firearms in particular handguns and semi-automatic hunting and target rifles -- are fast outpacing
inventory. Americans are clearly concerned about their ability to be able to purchase these products in an uncertain future. "
Finally, in what is probably a prime example of a "buried lead" in reporting, I have it on good authority that federal officials are telling
international competitors they can't bring semi-automatic shotguns into the United States for a major international competition. Match officials
and competitors have been told the US only wants to allow "break action shotguns" into the country these days. The last time I looked, there
didn't seem to be any law to that effect on the books.
But - it seems "off-book" is where some elements of our government prefer to operate these days.
Believe me, we'll keep you posted on this one.
--Jim Shepherd"
Attention: TDR Forum Junkies 
. GregH
