Posted on 12/01/2008 7:34:21 AM PST by SwinneySwitch
Over 40 Murders Reported this Week
CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico - New details on a deadly discovery across the border from El Paso. This morning police in Ciudad Juarez say at least 12 masked gun men opened fire inside an upscale seafood restaurant and killed at least eight people. The attack comes a day after seven men were found executed in a school soccer field in an upper class neighborhood in Juarez.
In all, 40 murders were reported over the holiday week along the border near El Paso. Police say the men were armed with AK-47 and fired off more than 100 rounds.
Our Mexicana flight to Ixtapa was late leaving Mexico City just before Christmas some years ago. The pilot apologized in Spanish and in English and then added to make amends, he would conduct us to a special tour of the smoky volcano just outside the capitol. He took the big 727 jet almost sideways into the cone...we could smell the sulfur coming up. Then he kicked the jets open and we shot up and out of MC airspace. I thought my wife was going to scream. Our son, aged about 12 at the time, loved it.
The Mexican government seems to be so hopelessly corrupt that the only way out of this is the legalization of drugs. This would take a severe toll on their society, but at this point, it would be better than the status quo.
Yep. As with all, things and places change and not always for the better. Keep the memories...
Re#45 There were a number of commuters like that as I recall when I was down there about the same time. Today, I wouldn’t cross the border for any reason.
Not to worry, after the 20th of next month when the borders are thrown wide open as payback for all those political donations, we'll be trying to ignore all the carnage going on right here.
I don't think that's necessary. The ONDCP recently put out some estimates on how much Mexican Drug Trafficking Organizations are making selling drugs to Americans. They estimate total revenues are $13.8 billion. They estimate that about $8.6 billion of that, close to 62%, is coming from marijuana alone. They say about $3.9 billion comes from cocaine, about $1 billion from meth, and less than $400 million comes from heroin sales. These are total revenues, not net profits. Marijuana is the biggest money maker for Mexican drug trafficking organizations. They bring in less than half as much from cocaine, and they're just the middlemen for cocaine. They produce the marijuana they sell. They have to buy the cocaine and import it so they don't make all the profits like they do on marijuana. If marijuana sales represent 62% of their revenues from providing drugs to Americans, then marijuana sales should account for a good bit more than 62% of their actual net profits because they make all the money from marijuana since they produce it and are not just the middlemen like they are with cocaine. If we just legalized marijuana, we'd deprive them of most of their income.
Not only would legalizing marijuana kill Mexican drug trafficking organizations cash cow, but it would make it harder for them to move their cocaine and meth and heroin too. Americans consume more marijuana than all other illegal drugs combined. The existing distribution networks for marijuana are massive and reach every corner of America. These existing distribution networks make perfect conduits through which to move other drugs, and that's exactly what Mexican drug trafficking organizations do. They use the same people to smuggle it in. They use the same people to transport it around the country. They try to move as much of their cocaine and other drugs as they can through the same people buying up their marijuana, and so often this is how their cocaine and meth and whatnot makes it to the street level dealer who is selling marijuana. If we legalized marijuana, those existing black market pipelines for marijuana distribution would disappear, and it would make it a lot harder for Mexican drug trafficking organizations to move their cocaine, meth, and heroin. In fact, the Colombians might just stop letting the Mexican control cocaine distribution in the U.S. because without the huge existing distribution networks for Mexican marijuana the Mexicans won't be in much of a better position to move Colombian cocaine than the Colombians themselves. Then the Mexican drug trafficking revenue would drop from $13.8 billion to less than $1.5 billion.
We don't need to legalize all drugs. Legalizing marijuana alone would reduce Mexican drug trafficking organizations to a shell of what they are today. They'd be deprived of the lion's share of their profits and their main pipelines for moving the hard stuff would fall apart.
Like $100 million to buy off environmental groups to support growing marijuana in our national parks?
There was thread on it on FR a week or two ago.
I could go along with legalizing marijuana.
I will guarantee you that if you don't flash money or expensive items around, don't try to score any dope, and show the same kind of good common sense you would use in the USA about neighborhoods, being aware of surroundings, etc, that Mexico as a whole is as safe or safer than the USA. The border is crazy b/c of the smuggling gangs. Be careful and aware of your surroundings and you will have no greater problems than most other places. I stayed in my friend's house in Mitla, Oaxaca. We didn't even lock the doors. It was like life in the USA in the 60s when I was growing up.
Oh, yeah, we already have that!
Was it a Longjohn Silver or Red Lobster?
Also MS13 and others from south of the border have associations with Muslim terrorists, including smuggling them into this country.
Lived in California for thirty years, off and on.
I've yet to cross the southern border.
Until we play by the same rules as the drug cartels,
they have the advantage in this war.
(Or, we could repeal prohibition and enjoy the peace).
It's not the Mexicans who are the end users of the product.
It's the US drug use that is the problem.
You won’t find me arguing with you.
During one of our coffee shop discussions we talked about how the feds have involved themselves in the banking industries and money transfers because of drugs. They have a great power in that sector alone; they will not want to lose it for any reason.
The issue is not just drugs, it’s about power over the people.
President Bush, just what is your excuse for not sending down an executive order to seal our borders after the 9-11 attacks? Screw waiting for Congress to do something, they never would, never will. The President could have closed that border with a wartime executive order. He did not want to because he is so cozy with the Mexicans. He was so chummy with Vincente Fox it was sickening. The new Mexican leader is getting the same coddling from Bush. If President Bush were really serious about protecting the country from terrorists, he would have secured our borders. He likes all the cheap labor streaming across the border, and if Mexican thugs cross over and kill Americans I guess that doesn’t bother him. Another Bush disappointment.
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