President Obama and his Mexican counterpart, Felipe Calderón, outlined a common approach Thursday to combating drug violence, climate change and trade disputes but
appeared to part ways over the urgency of reinstating a U.S. ban on assault weapons.
On his first presidential visit to Mexico, Obama praised Calderón for taking on the drug cartels, whose arsenals and economic power are threatening the integrity of the Mexican state. Obama said he will push the U.S. Senate to ratify an inter-American weapons-trafficking treaty designed to curb the flow of guns and ammunition to cartels and other armed groups in the hemisphere.
But he indicated that while he favors reinstating the U.S. ban on assault weapons, which Congress allowed to expire five years ago,
the move would face too much political opposition to happen soon. He said better enforcing existing laws and increasing U.S. vigilance on the border to prevent weapons smuggling, as his administration has begun to do, would have a more immediate effect on stopping U.S.-made weapons from reaching Mexico's cartels.
"I believe we can respect the Second Amendment of the Constitution ... and curb the flow of assault weapons to Mexico," Obama said at a news conference with Calderón at Los Pinos, the presidential compound. "None of us are under the illusion this would be easy."
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2009073300_mex17.html
