Mexican Drug Cartel Violence - Getting Worse and Closer Every Day

While the nation's War On Drugs strategy has not changed over the past four decades, despite its general overall ineffectiveness, the world of illegal drugs has been changing, radically and violently, all around us. Consider the following sample of news stories from just the past few months:

• A Washington Post article on May 9, 2010 reported that drug cartel gunmen were probably behind the assassination of the country's national police chief, hitting him with nine bullets outside of his home in Mexico City. The article also reported that this is just one of 6,000 drug cartel killings over the past two and a half years which also includes the assassination of the Federal police agency's organized crime leader. Two and half years, 6,000 deaths or about 200 people a month are dying as a result of the drug cartels.
• An August 20, 2010 Associated Press article reported that six town police officers were recently arrested in connection with the assassination of a town mayor in northern Mexico. Included in the six was a police officer whose job responsibility included guarding the mayor. The six are alleged to be employed by the local drug cartel.
• An Associated Press report on August 245, 2010 reported on fired bullets that had hit El Paso's city hall at the end of a work day, bullets that likely originated from the Mexican side of the border. The AP article also reported that bullets hit a university building, resulting in the closing of a major highway. It is believed that the bullets were a result of the drug wars and gangs battling along the U.S./Mexican border. El Paso police reported that they cannot do much of anything since the gunfire originated in a foreign country. The police reported that some of the bullets were apparently from guns capable of sending a round over a mile in distance, certainly a high powered weapon of choice of the drug gangs.
• On a more grisly note, the AP reported on August 26, 2010 that a Mexican drug gang was likely behind the massacre of 72 Central and South American migrants on a ranch just south of the United States border. Apparently, besides dealing with the trafficking of illegal drugs, the drug cartels also traffic in illegal aliens, often holding them for ransom from their families. They sometimes also force their kidnapped victims to become so-called foot soldiers in carrying drugs north into the United States. A few days later, two car bombs exploded near to the prosecutor's office responsible for looking into the massacre.
• An MSNBC story from August 30, 2010 reported that Mexico's Federal police agency had to fire nearly 10% of its force this year for failing to pass tests designed to check for corruption and association with drug cartels.

Massacres, stray bullets coming over our border into our cities from high caliber weapons, car bombings, slain elected officials and law enforcement officials, and government and police corruption, not a pretty picture. The situation is moving very quickly and in the wrong direction when it comes to the whole illegal drug problem, causing one Mexican government official to state his worry that the country was becoming ungovernable as a result of the drug problem and the related gangs and violence that it causes.

Unfortunately, our political class is not moving quickly at all in this matter. We are still mired in the Nixon era "War On Drugs" that has done nothing to stop the flow of drugs, has increased the violence in both our country and Mexico in drug related affairs and has wasted untold billion of dollars in the process. I am not a drug culture expert, a drug user, or a drug dealer. However, I am smart enough to see a large problem getting even larger that will eventually spill over into our country as the drug gangs get more powerful, richer, better armed, and more brazen.

That is why Step 26 in "Love My Country, Loathe My Government" is so important. Step 26 would impanel a panel of expert Americans from a wide range of disciplines to examine where we are now relative to the drug problem, look at the economics of the whole situation, weigh arresting vs. treatment options, examine successful approaches to the problem from other countries including legalization and decriminalization, and come up with a coherent set of alternatives that the American public can debate and vote on.

Waiting for the political class to to the same is not going to happen. It has not happened since Nixon, there is no reason to think it will happen soon. This set of politicians are too worried about their next election and not taking the strong and courageous steps of actually recommending new approaches to this problem, lest they alienate some voters. As a result, the world moves quickly and in this case violently forward, while we sit and wait. Step 26 would eliminate that wait.

Our new book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at www.loathemygovernment.com. It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Also visit the following sites for freedom:

http://www.cato.org/
http://www.reason.com/
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://www.realpolichick.blogspot.com/
http://www.flipcongress2010.com/