A reader retorts…That America is not solely responsible for the problems the Mexicans are having with the drug gangs. He cites the growers, official corruption and the Mexicans who smuggle the stuff into the States as bad guys. Fair enough.

     According to him, I am saying in my previous blog, “America is bad. American drug users are bad. American government (war on drugs) is bad. The poor Mexicans are just somehow unwitting pawns being manipulated by Bob the crack addict in Philly...” Then he asks, philosophically, “Which came first: the crack addict or the Mexican coca grower?”

     Well, the addict came first. He discovered how to abuse the drugs and created a market for them. Until then, hemp was only good for making rope, poppies were decorative flowers, and coca was a leaf Indians chewed in the South American rain forest. …And no one would even think of ingesting a product made from Drano and Sudafed.

     Don’t get me wrong. The drug gangs in Mexico and Central America are really dangerous, really evil characters who deserve whatever punishment the Mexican government can apply to them. At the same time, it’s a shame we have to bankroll them and thus financially support the narco-terrorism and murder along Mexico’s border with the United States.

Another reader remarks… “Speaking as someone who has been deep in Mexico many times, I think the crack addict came first. However, Mexico has been abysmally poor for my whole life, and all of that is the result of the population of Mexico making one dumb decision after another, starting about 1910. Their top down Marxist economy set them up for takeover by the drug lords. and when we put the heat on Colombia, Drug Central moved north. I no longer plan to retire there. Too bad.”

     I have to agree that Mexico has been a poor steward of its own national fortunes for the past 100 years. The end of the Diaz regime marked the beginning of a succession of revolutionary governments each of which did its bit in ruining the economy, allowing lawlessness and betraying the hopes of the very people who put them in power. This the Mexicans were able to do very much on their own, with minimal interference from the United States.

     Now Mexico is entering an era in which organized crime, in the form of the drug gangs, is threatening to take over effective control of the country. President Calderón is showing considerable moral and physical courage in taking on the narco trafficantes. Now if there was only some way we could reduce the “demand” side of the economic equation, to give our friends in Mexico the edge…

     We managed to export a big part of our drug problem to Mexico in the past few years when we made it much harder to acquire ephedrine and pseudophedrine cold medicines like Sudafed. You need a considerable amount to cook up a batch of crystal meth. But federal law has put these OTC medications behind the pharmacy counter. To buy them, you need to flash an ID and sign a log book --something would-be drug dealers feel shy about doing.

     The result has been a drastic reduction in the “mom and pop” meth labs here in the States, and the creation of “super labs” turning out "ice meth" on an industrial scale in Mexico. The ephedrine and pseudoephedrine is imported from India and China (or made domestically) and cooked in Mexican labs. The resulting “ice” is very pure, very potent, and highly in demand.

     Huge amounts of money are involved in the trade. A 2007 federal raid on one lab in the Chapultepec district of Mexico City –an upscale neighborhood at that—yielded $205,000,000 in United States currency. That was just one drug operation. The Mexican government is trying to restrict precursor chemical production, but that raid demonstrates that the drug gangs have all the capital they need to keep the trade up and running with only sporadic shortages due to law enforcement

According to the National Drug Intelligence Center, in their drug threat assessment for 2008, the problem with Mexican drug trafficking organizations is not staying south of the border: “Mexican methamphetamine distribution networks are expanding in many U.S. drug markets and have supplanted many local midlevel and retail dealers in areas of the Great Lakes, Pacific, Southeast, Southwest, and West Central Regions. Mexican DTOs have expanded their methamphetamine distribution networks, particularly in methamphetamine markets previously supplied by local distributors.

     “Law enforcement authorities in cities, including Akron (OH), Hannibal (MO), Dallas and Houston (TX), Mobile (AL), Nashville (TN), Oklahoma City (OK), Orlando and Tampa (FL), Pueblo (CO), and Richmond and Shenandoah (VA), report the growing prevalence of Mexican DTOs at all levels of methamphetamine distribution in their areas and a concurrent increase in the availability of ice methamphetamine. Furthermore, law enforcement reporting indicates that in some cities--including Los Angeles, Chicago, Dallas and Fort Worth (TX), Memphis and Nashville (TN), and Oklahoma City--Mexican DTOs are exploiting their relationships with Hispanic and African American gangs as a means of controlling methamphetamine distribution at the midlevel and retail level."

      Your friendly, neighborhood dope dealer is being replaced by a different kind of businessman. If you welched on a $50 debt you were cut off. If you don't pay the Mexican trafficker his $50, you'll be cut up.

     Looks like a whole new front has opened in the War on Drugs.

   

The drug war in Mexico… is not going very well. If you saw this item: (http://www.townhall.com/news/world/2008/07/25/mexican_military_losing_drug_war_support) in TownHall you must be as concerned as I am. President Felipe Calderón sent 20,000 Mexican Army troops to cities on the U.S. border where the civil authority had broken down and the territory was under the effective control of the narco trafficante gangs.   The dismal news is that the soldiers have gotten bored, frustrated and unhappy with their duty. They are breaking into private homes and conducting warrantless searches. Suspects are being beaten and tortured. All you have to do to get even with that neighbor who plays loud music after 10 is to send in an anonymous “tip” that the guy next door is holding meth. The Army will break down his door, toss his house thoroughly and, if you’re lucky, put a bag over his head, beat him senseless and crush his testicles with pliers.

    All this puts the United States in a sticky position... We are the root of the problem, with our insatiable appetite for drugs. We are the source of the money that gives the narco trafficantes their power. If not for the millions we send down south for drugs, Calderón would not have to fight it out with the narcotics lords for civil control of the border cities.
    Congress has approved $400 million for Mexico’s drug war. It’s the least we can do. At the same time the thought of the Mexican Army imposing a brutal martial law on the border is disquieting, to say the least. One hopes that the Mexican Army will be disciplined enough in the future not to abuse the civilian population.
    It may be a vain hope: For as long as the army is at the border there exists the possibility that the drug gangs can subvert individual soldiers (through bribes and extortion) and even whole units.
    Where are the narco trafficantes getting the military weapons and sometimes military uniforms that have been spotted on our side of the border? A recent shootout in Phoenix, Arizona, between narco gangsters and police is said to have involved at least one Mexican soldier.
    As Americans our souls should be troubled by all this. Because of our demand for illicit drugs, Mexico may lose control of her border states. Right now, and for quite some time in the past, Mexico has been losing the lives of its citizens in this war.
     Every death of an innocent civilian, every honest cop slain, every woman abducted, raped and slain in Juarez; every child caught in the crossfire, was victimized directly by our selfish demand for drugs.
     We have given our wealth to the enemies and assassins of the Mexican people. Our drug habit has brought misery, violence and death to a people already struggling against poverty.
    So much for narcotics abuse being a victimless crime. Who was it who said, “I shudder for my country when I recall that God is just.”

“Compassion” Exterminates a Family…More than a little sympathy should be felt for the majority of illegal immigrants who have come to the United States to escape the crushing poverty of their home countries (not just Mexico, but several Central American nations). The recent extermination of a San Francisco family, however, makes the case very plainly for tighter control of our sovereign borders.
    It began with gridlock in a San Francisco intersection. One of the drivers, Edwin Ramos, got sick of waiting for the intersection to clear. He got out of his car, aimed his AK-47 Russian assault rifle at the car and driver he thought responsible for the gridlock and fired. He killed Anthony Bologna, 49, and his son, Michael, 20. The younger Bologna son, Matthew, 16, died from his wounds later.
    Important points to consider: One--Ramos is in the United States illegally. He is a native of El Salvador. He has no documents to indicate he entered this county legally.
    Two—He is a member of the Mara Salvatrucha gang, known as “MS-13,” arguably the largest and most violent criminal organization in the hemisphere. Even if Ramos had tried to enter the country legally, his membership in MS-13 would have disqualified him. Widespread in the U.S. and Central America, the ultra-violent MS-13’s criminal activities in the United States include drug smuggling and dealing, gun running, people smuggling, murder for hire, theft and arson.   
    Three—Ramos was convicted twice before in felony cases (2003 and 2004) but his file was never turned over to ICE because San Francisco considers itself a “Sanctuary City.”
    That means that city police and other officials will not turn over information on an individual’s status as an illegal alien to federal authorities. He was arrested earlier this year when a gun used in a double homicide was discovered in a car Ramos was driving. The D.A. decided not to file charges against Ramos and ICE was not notified.
    Ramos is going to face murder charges for killing the Bologna family, though it is unlikely that his wanton crime will earn him the death penalty; the District Attorney, Kamala Harris, personally opposes capital punishment.
    The crime could have been prevented on three separate occasions: if Ramos had been deported for his 2003 and 2004 felonies, or if he had been reported to ICE after the gun incident this year. Instead three lives were sacrificed so that the “Sanctuary City” could carry on hiding lawbreakers from federal authorities.
    Ramos’s story is no isolated case, but the vast, vast majority of undocumented residents in this country are hard-working people who stay out of trouble. We will have to find some sort of solution for them which will be characterized by our traditional values and our love of liberty and fair play.
    We must seal our borders against illegal entry and deport any undocumented individual, without exception, who is a member of a criminal gang or who has committed a crime. …And we must impose sanctions, including cutoffs of federal money, to the so-called “Sanctuary Cities,” which fail to report violations of federal law.

You and what Army?…To secure our borders will require a vastly expanded Border Patrol and military backup. An area command of the Army should be created with bases along our southern border. The battalions assigned to this command should be selected from the state National Guards and also be rotated in from the regular Army. They should establish strong points and patrols along the known and suspected routes of entry into the country, with larger bases for reserve troops, light armor and tactical helicopter support further back from the border area.
    Congress should empower the soldiers in the “Border Command” area to detain suspects to be turned over to civilian law enforcement, and to respond with force when force is applied against our Border Patrol or troops on our own soil.
    There have already been gunfights on our side of the border. Smugglers bringing in drugs and illegal immigrants have included men who at least wore the uniform of the Mexican Army and who carried military weapons.
    Meanwhile, on the Mexican side of the border, courageous President Felipe Calderón is directing his army in a desperate war against the powerful and violent narcotics gangs. It is an uphill battle. Nuevo Laredo is in the hands of the narco trafficantes. The Mexican government and the narco terrorists are fighting for control of Ciudad Juarez, where more than 400 persons have been murdered this year. Tijuana is also at risk.
     If Calderón fails to regain control of the border cities, we better be ready for the violence to spill over onto our side of the border.