Life, Liberty, Politics and Policy in the Land of Enchantment!
Our War In Mexico
Over 800 people have been killed in the state of Chihuahua so far this year as a war rages between rival Mexican drug factions. Some towns have been completely taken over by drug lord militias. In one town, police who didn't go to work for the drug lords were beheaded. This week 11 people have been killed in Juarez, including a national sports figure.
Mexican police and civil authorities are seeking asylum in the United States. They don't trust their own government, even their national government and its military, to protect them.
But this isn't just the Mexicans' war. It is our war, spurred on by the nation's hunger for cocaine, heroin, meth, and marijuana. We have bred these violent, paramilitary, quasi-governmental drug cartels with our futile War on Drugs. We have created billionaires out of low level smugglers.
The cartels' power doesn't end at the Mexican border. They have been compromising our Border Patrol and police for years. They bring their violence north with them. How long before we see the open warfare in Juarez spill into the streets of El Paso, and from there to Las Cruces and northward?
We cannot win the War on Drugs. We never will. We only continue to create a platform for drug lords to reap the benefits of their deadly business.
Before we start sending troops into Mexico to help that government regain control of its northern territory, we need to address the root causes of this mess. Some brave public official will have to bring the option of decriminalization to the table. By decriminalizing, we take the criminals out of the drug trade. We cut their profits. Instead of spending billions on fighting a losing War on Drugs, we can provide more treatment and education, while also reducing our prison population. It's not as though our criminalization of drugs has stopped their use. We have only made a bad situation much, much worse. It is past time for a different, smarter approach.
Who will start that debate?
I sure wish Gary Johnson was still talking out on this issue.
Mexican police and civil authorities are seeking asylum in the United States. They don't trust their own government, even their national government and its military, to protect them.
But this isn't just the Mexicans' war. It is our war, spurred on by the nation's hunger for cocaine, heroin, meth, and marijuana. We have bred these violent, paramilitary, quasi-governmental drug cartels with our futile War on Drugs. We have created billionaires out of low level smugglers.
The cartels' power doesn't end at the Mexican border. They have been compromising our Border Patrol and police for years. They bring their violence north with them. How long before we see the open warfare in Juarez spill into the streets of El Paso, and from there to Las Cruces and northward?
We cannot win the War on Drugs. We never will. We only continue to create a platform for drug lords to reap the benefits of their deadly business.
Before we start sending troops into Mexico to help that government regain control of its northern territory, we need to address the root causes of this mess. Some brave public official will have to bring the option of decriminalization to the table. By decriminalizing, we take the criminals out of the drug trade. We cut their profits. Instead of spending billions on fighting a losing War on Drugs, we can provide more treatment and education, while also reducing our prison population. It's not as though our criminalization of drugs has stopped their use. We have only made a bad situation much, much worse. It is past time for a different, smarter approach.
Who will start that debate?
I sure wish Gary Johnson was still talking out on this issue.
Tags: decrimininalization, drugs
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by KCUF Media on -
Some brave public official will have to bring the option of decriminalization to the table. By decriminalizing, we take the criminals out of the drug trade. We cut their profits. Instead of spending billions on fighting a losing War on Drugs, we can provide more treatment and education, while also reducing our prison population.
By re-legalizing various drugs [1], we can cut federal, state and local spending -- no more need for law enforcement, prisons, border and entry-point searches, etc., in terms of drugs. Treatment and education are best done by parents and doctors, and there's Constitutional authorization for federal spending for these.
I sure wish Gary Johnson was still talking out on this issue.
Gary Johnson got stabbed in the back by party hacks over the issue when he brought it up in 1998. One of those hacks was then-DPS Secretary Darren White -- the same Darren White who is running to replace Heather Wilson.
Since I can't in good conscience support either Heinrich or White, I'll be casting a blank in that race come November.
[1] Heroin was legal before 1890. Cocaine was legal before 1914. Marijuana was legal before 1937.
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Permalink Reply by KCUF Media on
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Speaking of war in Mexico, I remember reading that Army Special Forces had been deployed there back in the 1990's to help squash Subcomandante Marcos and the EZLN. Don't see why not -- SF were deployed to El Salvador during the late Carter years as "advisors," but ending up getting combat pay, CIBs, etc., out of it at the end. And who knows what sort of black ops the Reagan Administration was running there, in Honduras and Nicarauga during the Iran-Contra fling.
These people really do love starting wars, don't they? Too bad they don't have to go and fight themselves.
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