On Friday's CBS Evening News, travel editor Peter Greenberg filed a report in which, without challenge, he passed on Mexican President Felipe Calderon's charge that America is "the key part of the problem" of drug cartels in his country. And, even though the overwhelming majority of guns seized from Mexican drug cartels are known to originate from countries outside the U.S., Greenberg seemed to claim that all were bought in the U.S. Greenberg:
He (Calderon) claims American drug use is financing the cartels, and smuggled American guns are arming them. This is an example of the more than 90,000 weapons the Calderon government has confiscated in the last four years - almost all of them high-powered, and all of them bought in the United States.
But, as previously documented by NewsBusters, in April 2009 Fox News reported [1] that 83 percent of guns recovered in Mexico originated outside the United States.
Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of the Friday, November 12, CBS Evening News:
PETER GREENBERG: Remarkably, despite U.S. State Department travel warnings, tourism is up 20 percent in Mexico, including five million Americans. And it is America, claims Calderon, that's the key part of the problem. He says the $40 billion drug trade exists to feed an insatiable American appetite.
FELIPE CALDERON, PRESIDENT OF MEXICO: We have a neighbor which is the largest consumer of drugs in the world, and the problem is, everyone want to sell him drugs through my window or through my door. So United States needs to reduce consumption of drugs one way or another.
GREENBERG: He claims American drug use is financing the cartels, and smuggled American guns are arming them. This is an example of the more than 90,000 weapons the Calderon government has confiscated in the last four years - almost all of them high-powered, and all of them bought in the United States.
CALDERON: And I'm talking like 50,000 assault weapons, machine guns, more than 8,000 grenades, almost 10 billions of bullets, which is amazing figures.
- Brad Wilmouth is a news analyst at the Media Research Center