A strict ban on military calibers and military style guns. Only one gun store in the entire nation. Onerous licensing requirements for legal gun owners. Long prison terms for illegal possession of even a single round of illicit ammo. That sounds like utopia to America’s gun control advocates, right? Yet this describes the state of civilian gun ownership in Mexico.

Unfortunately all of that gun control means that only criminals, drug cartels (but I repeat myself) and corrupt government officials have guns. Most of the rest of Mexicans cower in fear.

And they have good reason to do so. After all, murder in Mexico has almost become a national sport of sorts. Last year, the nation had a record 33,341 homicides. That number reflects a steep increase over the (record) 29,168 murders in 2017.

What’s worse, this year, Mexico’s bad boys have worked hard to kill even more people. In fact, murders are up 3.3% from last year. Bloomberg has the news via Yahoo:

Mexico’s homicides in August show the nation remains on pace to break last year’s record, while a national poll showed President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s approval falling as the economy teeters on the brink of a technical recession. Murders rose 3.3% in the first eight months of the year to 23,063 from 22,316 last year, according to government data released Friday. The August toll rose to 2,966 from 2,954 in the same month a year ago.

Clearly — as we’ve said here hundreds of times — gun control doesn’t stop criminal violence.

For an up-close and personal look at some recent cartel violence in Mexico, click here for this story from Noreste (NSFW, extremely graphic violence).

Strict, Betoista–style gun control makes resistance to tyranny — or just protecting your own family, much more difficult.