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On that gun database we don’t have *wink wink*

In comments here, Curtis highlights this:

…she [Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano – ed.] will give Mexican authorities access to a government database to trace the U.S. origin of seized weapons.

And he responds with:

Is that the database that they weren’t legally supposed to build/maintain? Populated with data from 4473s and/or NICS checks – which data was legally only to be kept for a short period of time (30-60days?)?

Now, my understanding is that there is not to be a database of gun owners. A database of guns is fine and dandy so that police can do traces on firearms, which is pretty much a de facto list of gun owners. Now, if our .gov will hand it over to Mexico, does anyone really believe that the Tiahrt Amendment will restrict law enforcement access to trace data? In other news, I guess cities that want to get the info that Tiahrt says they can’t have, they could just ask Mexico for it.

25 Responses to “On that gun database we don’t have *wink wink*”

  1. Ron W Says:

    Another example of NO CHANGE…treason at the highest levels evidenced by a continuing deference to Mexico and appeasement of illegal aliens over American citizens. But we voted for the continuation of Jorge Bush and the same as if we’d gotten Juan McCain.

  2. JKB Says:

    So why do the Mexicans need access to the database? Are they going allow the Federales to conduct investigations and raids in US territory? Seems to me if the Mexicans provided the info about the weapons to the US and they were found to be of US origin, then any number of US agencies should be looking into it, FBI, ATF, DDTC, BIS, Customs, just to name a few.

    Are we outsourcing our federal law enforcement now?

  3. Sebastian-PGP Says:

    So let me get this straight…it’s our fault their drug dealers have guns and we need to change the way we do business here.

    Why aren’t they taking responsibility for the metric tons of blow that are coming north?

  4. Tam Says:

    I’d assume that they’re talking about being able to run BATFE traces, which have nothing to do with NICS and have been around since ’68, 25 years before the Brady Bill.

  5. Joe Mama Says:

    I wonder if the search warrents will be in Spanish now…

  6. _Jon Says:

    As predicted….

  7. Tam Says:

    Why do we assume that elected officials don’t know a barrel shroud from a “shoulder thing that goes up”, but they’re absolute fucking geniuses on the regulations that surround the sale of firearms and the record keeping involved?

    Hell, your average gun shoppe commando or intarw3bz gun forum dweller thinks that the Feds get to keep all 4473’s and that you have to give the BATF blueprints of your house and the right to search it whenever they want when you get a “Class Three” license to buy a machine gun or “silencer”.

  8. Tam Says:

    Hell, Janet doesn’t know the BATFEIEIO from the Bat Phone…

  9. Dock Says:

    “not to be” and “is” are two different things.

    http://www.njdems.org/press_print.php?ID=169

    E-trace is a nationwide database maintained by the ATF that lists a firearm’s first purchaser, date of purchase and the retailer from which it was purchased. The information is compiled from police records of gun purchases provided by local departments, but until today was only accessible by the ATF and the police department that provided it.

    “Firearms tracing identifies the illegal source of firearms and provides law enforcement invaluable leads to target firearms traffickers,” said Special Agent Potter. “The New Jersey State Police and ATF have partnered in this country’s first of a kind state clearing house for gun tracing. The importance of this project cannot be minimized:
    comprehensive firearms tracing saves lives.”

    Supposedly some manufacturers are automagically handing over their data on every new purchase straight to this program. I can’t find the list though.

    Hey, Germany can get this info too, since 2007!

    http://www.eagleworldnews.com/2007/02/11/germany-to-use-atfs-etrace-system/

    What could possibly go wrong.

  10. HTownTejas Says:

    The recent escalation of violence in Mexico is because of their newly invigorated War on Drugs. Same reason our murder and corruption rates are so high. But instead of fixing the problem by ending the war, we’ll go after one of the many inanimate objects utilized by the black market profiteers we’re enabling, guns.

    From the New York Times:

    Since coming to office in December 2006, Mr. Calderón has sought to revamp and professionalize the federal police force, using it, with the army, to mount huge interventions in cities and states once controlled by drug traffickers.

    The result has been mayhem: a street war in which no target has been too big, no attack too brazen for the gangs…

    The violence between drug cartels that Mr. Calderón has sought to end has only worsened over the past year and a half. The death toll has jumped 47 percent to 1,378 this year, prosecutors say. All told, 4,125 people have been killed in drug violence since Mr. Calderón took office.

    As Radly Balko notes at the end of this piece:

    None of this is surprising. You create black markets, you get crime. Step up enforcement and knock off a couple of big-time dealers, and their rivals are going to fight over the portion of the market that you’ve just opened up. When the liquor store down the street goes out of buisness, the other neighborhood liquor stores compete for its customers with ads, and maybe some sales or specials. When the main drug supplier in town goes out of business, competing suppliers compete for his customers by killing one other, and anyone who happens to get caught in the crossfire.

    Instead of fixing the source of Mexico’s or America’s problem, let further crack down on peaceful citizen’s who are not involved.

  11. Gunstar1 Says:

    About E-trace:

    Yes it does have all the purchaser information in it IF the state/local government makes you register your firearms.

    Key quote

    The information is compiled from police records of gun purchases provided by local departments, but until today was only accessible by the ATF and the police department that provided it.

    If you really don’t want the feds to know, don’t live in a state that requires that you register your firearms.

    As for manufacturers that are handing over data… the only data they have is if you have sent it in for repair or filled out a warranty card.

  12. Adam Says:

    Napolitano also said “A growing wave of criminal violence in Mexico’s border communities and in the interior of the country, fueled by the availability of guns and currency smuggled south from the U.S., poses a serious threat to Mexico’s security.” I guess we better stop the flow of currency south of the border too since it is a serious threat to their security. No more US aid money or manufacturing jobs for Mexico.

  13. Paladin Says:

    Hey folks hate to blow your baloon but the Courts do NOT require Law Enforcement to obtain search warrants anymore. All the cops have to say is they “suspected” they were in danger from someone or something inside. I’ve witnessed this violation of the Constitution myself in a 4th Judicial District Courtroom. All the cops have to do is indicate they were concerned with “officer safety” or some other bullshit and the search warrant requirement is waived. The SCOTUS just ruled days ago that Now cops can require PASSENGERS in vehicles stopped for things as small as ALLEGED Traffic violations to get out of car and be searched even if there is no visible indication of anything wrong or suspicious – the officer ONLY needs to be concerned with their safety. My question is WHAT ABOUT THE CITIZEN’S SAFETY AND RIGHTS????? That’s what the scumbags are suppose to be looking out for.

  14. Tam Says:

    Dock,

    You quoted from a New Jersey news source:

    E-trace is a nationwide database maintained by the ATF that lists a firearm’s first purchaser, date of purchase and the retailer from which it was purchased. The information is compiled from police records of gun purchases provided by local departments, but until today was only accessible by the ATF and the police department that provided it.

    Well, I guess that would work fine in a state like New Jersey, where the police have a record of gun purchases. Not so much in most states, though…

  15. Sebastian Says:

    My understanding is that E-trace basically is an electronic version of the A&D records of manufactures and distributors. It basically quickly gets you to the dealer than sold the firearm, but someone still has to call up the dealer and tell him to pull the 4473 to get the customer who purchased it. I suppose it’s possible the ATF could be adding purchaser information from 4473s recovered from defunct licensees and from New Jersey police departments, but my understanding of federal law is that this would be illegal.

    I suspect in the article above, the reporter probably has no idea what he/she is talking about, or really understands the capabilities and limitations of the system.

  16. straightarrow Says:

    I have no doubt that Mexico’s drug cartels are the beneficiaries of American weapons smugglers. There can be no legitimate argument to the contrary. I do think those Americans aiding in the smuggling of arms to the drug cartels should be convicted, imprisoned and executed.

    Let’s start at the source of the weapons pipeline. Washington D.C.

    Here’s how it works, our government, in the form of aid, sends money and arms to the Mexican authorities in the name of Good Neighborliness and the War on Drugs. The Mexican authorities from civilian to military then, for a price, distribute these weapons to the drug cartels. They keep the money themselves and the cartels use the money the American weapons help them make to go off continent to buy more weapons of foreign manufacture. For example, AK 47’s. The cartels own more of these firearms than there are in the U.S. or than there have been in the U.S. They could not have bought them here through straw man purchases because they are not here nor have they been available in anything like the numbers in the hands of the drug cartels.

    Everybody wins. The Mexican authorities keep the American money, keep the money from selling the arms our Washington thugs send them and blame us for their problems.

    The drug cartels have a reliable supply of weapons and keep all the money they get from their illegal activities.

    Our Washington thugs get to browbeat the American citizen into surrendering more liberty, thus enhancing their own power, while blaming everybody but themselves, the Mexicans, and the drug cartels.

    Everybody wins, except of course, for the innocent citizens on either side of the border.

    These smugglers of American origin need to be held to account, instead they get reelected.

  17. emdfl Says:

    And I suspect that the batfags have been illegally compiling lists of who owns what for as long as they have been able to figure out how to do it. From the time that agents were caught copying 4473’s during annual shop inspections until now with the NEW! IMPROVED! COMPUTERIZED! forms, a bureaucracy will do whatever it can get away with.

  18. Tam Says:

    From the time that agents were caught copying 4473’s

    Every time I hear that tale circulating on the intarw3bz, I have to wonder about its origins.

    You do know that they’ll sometimes photocopy a small number of 4473’s and grade off the copies, rather than the originals, so that you don’t have to deal with piles and piles of 4473’s sitting out on tables during the whole inspection. (They don’t grade all your 4473’s for the past year, only a percentage; I want to say it’s like 50 forms plus some fraction of a percent, but it’s been a while since my last compliance inspection. I’ve been through four or five myself, and been present at friend’s shops for a couple more and never have I seen the bulk copying I read about on gun forums.)

  19. workinwifdakids Says:

    In a small government office in Mexico, a secretary works for a meager salary. Someone will contact her, and give her a choice. She can either hand over the names of Americans with certain types of guns, or she can watch her children die. If she chooses to hand over the list, they’ll give her $20,000 in cash.

    That’s the way business works in Mexico, and that’s why we shouldn’t be sharing our toys with them.

  20. chris Says:

    All these reports of grenades, RPGs, machine guns and such getting captured by the cops in Mexico… Christ almighty, I could only wish that those items were available for easy purchase here in the US… If they were, I suspect that there would be a significant decrease in political corruption.

    But I know for a fact that these guns are not coming from American shops… I suppose it is possible that some might be coming from American importers but I suspect that the vast majority are coming from some of the other borders in Mexico.

  21. Tam Says:

    Anybody here think Pugsley wouldn’t like to see a leftist coup in Mexico? Anybody? Bueller?

  22. emdfl Says:

    Tam –
    The last time I read something about that I believe it was in an article regarding the way the Chicago police were utilizing mandatory registration forms cross-indexed with 4473s via the Tiehart(sp?) trace regulations.
    I have no major beef with the rank and file batfe, but having worked in a bureaucracy I KNOW that scum rises to the top. And I do also remember reading about the testimony given by some upper level BATFE bureaucrat to the effect that the bureau was in fact “holding” NICS requests for over 60 days.

  23. Standard Mischief Says:

    There probably isn’t a nationwide federal database of gun owners. Instead, during the NICS window (that they disregard the letter of the law) or using some means at the state level, the record-keeping likely gets passed over to some sleazy corporation like Choicepoint, who the federal overlords just buy the data from as-needed with your tax dollars.

  24. NZoli Says:

    I don’t know why are you so upset by the cops knowing you have a gun(I am not american so I don’t care about your amendaments) because every civilized country beside US (all EU for certain+China+your bellowed arabs) require to submit all your data when you purchase a gun. It is nothing wrong with that unless you indent to do something illegal with the gun and you don’t want to get caught. Hack, in the majority of EU you can’t own a gun stronger than airguns. Guess why we don’t have your gun-related problems

  25. SayUncle Says:

    Of course you don’t. You’re a subject.

Remember, I do this to entertain me, not you.

Uncle Pays the Bills

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