Posted on 10/19/2012 6:00:23 AM PDT by marktwain
The Honduran government is reportedly set to conduct a review of its gun laws in an apparent effort to combat rising violence levels, though equal emphasis will need to be made on addressing endemic corruption and weak institutions to solidify any gains.
Matias Funes, a representative from the independent Commission on Public Security Reform (CRSP), said on Oct. 16 that Honduras’ gun laws are in need of urgent revision if efforts are to be made to combat the country’s endemically high level of violence, reported La Tribuna.
Security Minister Pompeyo Bonilla said the government agreed a review of the law should be undertaken and that President Porfirio Lobo had asked that he begin conducting one.
Under the existing law, citizens are allowed to own as many as five personal firearms. According to statistics released last month by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Honduras’ homicide rate for 2011 was 92 per 100,000, up from 82 the previous year.
(Excerpt) Read more at csmonitor.com ...
What Honduras needs is an expectation of the rule of law and of property rights. Now it has neither.
Typical reaction. More restrictions that the bad guys don’t give a hoot about. I believe Mexico has some pretty strict gun controls in place (except for the F&F guns) and it sure doesn’t seem to bother the cartels in any way shape or form. Not to worry though, the “un” has a solution for that too. Oh, wait, the bad guys don’t care what the un says either? Shocking I know.
Helping keep mankind warm for 65 years.
As a homeowner in Honduras (La Ceiba, Caribbean coast), I can confirm that you are absolutely right. The government of Honduras allows stealing to be the national pass time — in exchange for doing little or nothing to help create an opportunity society.
The Honduran people would love to work. Unfortunately, their government is run by the rich who could care less what the people want or don’t want — as long as they don’t want the rich people’s money.
The rich power brokers in Honduras could turn the economy around in a heartbeat — if they would undertake a genuine initiative to attract foreign investment. But, why bother, when they already have the wealth and power?
Having a flourishing middle-class would lessen the power of the elites, and also reduce their effective wealth.
The elites want servants and concubines, not competitors.
You nailed it. Knowing as many of the rich and powerful as I do in Honduras, this has been a hard pill for me to swallow. But, truth will out. The elite is very fortunate — because by nature the Honduran people are fairly passive and unassuming.
Thats actually the model the worlds elite are trying to spread. The rich and powerful have everything and the individuals have no rights and no power.
I ran into the same attitude in Panama, but tempered a bit by the U.S. presence there.
I had a conversation with one of the elite, and said that the Panamanian economy could be easily improved with some free market medicine, that in their position, they had unique power to demand free trade with the United States.
She said, “Then where would we get our maids?”
As Panama has been on the cusp of a free trade agreement with the U.S. for years (blocked by the Democrats) it seems that wiser heads have prevailed there.
Before anyone thinks that we are ragging no capitalism, please allow me to gainsay that notion.
The fact is, in Honduras, pure capitalism would would be the magic elixir for solving the economic woes. The government should needs to lift restrictions on foreign investment and create programs like Costa Rica and Panama used to have for attracting a plethora of expats. Plus, the government needs to stop playing footsies with the rich and powerful.
Let me give you an example of the final point.
The Honduras government has conspired with the car dealers to make it virtually impossible for the average citizen to buy an old used car to drive around. They don’t do it by inspections — they do it by severely restricting the number of used cars that can be brought down from the US and by imposing huge taxes on even the most dilapidated use cars (taxes only the wealthy can afford).
The result: a used car that would cost about $250 to $500 in the US costs about $3000 in Honduras. And keep in mind, this is a country where the average annual income is $2500.
So, only the wealthy have cars — keeping the common folks on the plantation. And the car dealers can jack up the price on junkers to the point where an average Honduran has to hock his life to buy one.
The rich get richer, the powerful get stronger — and the poor ride bicycles to the plantation.
That’s not capitalism. Capitalism would allow the car market to seek its own level — without government interference. That alone would spur private industry in Honduras.
So... there is a rising crime rate and their solution is to make sure ONLY the criminals have guns?
Liberalism is a mental desease.
It will be okay, average citizens will not suddenly be armed. You see, Obama will make sure that only the cartels get good high quality weapons from the USA.
It would be far more effective for Honduras to instead create the idea of the “citizen as enforcer of the law”.
This is based on the idea that just having an armed citizenry isn’t enough. The citizenry must take an active role in enforcing the law.
That there is a public expectation that if someone is armed, and they witness a crime, they call the police if possible, but *then* they do something about it.
This form of public resistance to crime makes committing crimes much more difficult. It is not just “cleaning up” after a crime has been committed, but actively interfering with it.
For Honduras to do this would likely just take a few minor changes in their laws. Most of it would be in changing the attitude of the public.
Corruption also plays a part in maintaining the status quo for the elites.
A regular person wanting to start or run a business has to deal with an endless series of inspectors and regulators, each of whom needs to be paid off or he shuts your business down. From the bureaucrat's viewpoint, the purpose of business is to provide an income stream to the bureaucrats.
Meanwhile, a member of the Elite can operate a business, and God help the bureaucrat stupid enough to try to shake down a bribe from somebody who is a cousin to El Presidente.
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