Last month, Mexico's courageous and beleaguered president, Felipe Calderon, began deploying military units to fight well-armed narco-terrorists in northern Mexico. On the U.S. side of the border, DEA, ATF, FBI, Customs and Border Protection, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, along with state and local law enforcement officers, commenced a coordinated, multi-state crackdown on drug gangs. According to the Department of Justice, the operation netted 755 drug dealers, money launderers and smugglers.
In addition to committing additional law enforcement assets to the border, the U.S. also is providing Mexican authorities with intelligence, high-tech detection gear, sophisticated sensors and night-vision equipment for combating cartel "foot soldiers" armed with automatic weapons, hand grenades, heavy machine guns and Soviet-era rocket-propelled grenade launchers. This help certainly is warranted. It is in our national interest that the Calderon campaign against the cartels succeed.
Unfortunately, the O-Team and its "progressive" allies in Congress aren't satisfied with the progress that is being made thus far. They apparently intend to use the cartel crisis, as Emanuel has advocated, "to do things that" they thought they "could not do before."
On Feb. 25, Attorney General Eric Holder urged the U.S. "to reinstitute the ban on the sale of assault weapons." He said, "I think that will have a positive impact in Mexico, at a minimum." The following day, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., said, "I am prepared to wage the assault weapons battle again and intend to do so." And March 17, during a Senate Judiciary Crime and Drugs Subcommittee hearing, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., claimed that an "iron river of guns from the United States arms Mexican drug cartels to the teeth."
Reality check: Resurrecting the so-called "assault weapons ban" that expired in 2004 isn't going to do anything to help the Mexican government deal with drug cartels -- or any other criminal organizations. Nor was the O-Team's decision to stop the Defense Logistics Agency from allowing surplus military brass cartridges to be reloaded going to stop a single bullet from reaching criminals. Thankfully, that inane rule has been reversed, saving law-abiding gun owners -- and our heavily indebted government -- money.
The Mexican drug cartels aren't being armed by law-abiding Americans. Rather than trying to re-enact meaningless legislation based on the appearance of a firearm or the shape of a magazine, the O-Team and its congressional allies need to focus on securing our borders and providing the resources to enforce the laws we already have on the books. Infringing on the Second Amendment rights of U.S. citizens won't make Mexicans -- or any of us -- any safer or more secure, no matter how severe the crisis.