Dept. of I don't know whether to Laugh or Cry

This article on a U.S. "kidnapping expert" being seized by kidnappers in Mexico where he had gone to assist local authorities was my favorite in a sea of despair-inducing items today.  

I don't mean to belittle this gentleman's plight and hope that he is released unharmed, but it does make me wonder if hubris is not our most abundant national resource.

The article actually highlights the deeply disturbing goings on in Mexico where kidnapping and assassinations by drug cartels are striking at the heart of civil society. You would think that the American media might consider this to be a story of more cosmic significance than Governor Bagsofhair, but I see little real coverage of it on cable news.  I wonder, too, the degree to which these problems are exacerbated by the unrelenting failure that is the "war on drugs."   

The unraveling of our neighbor to the south strikes me as a story to which serious attention is owed.      

Comments

[low-tech cyclist]

Indeed. It IS a major story, even if nobody in our media is telling it.

When our domestic drug policies threaten to destabilize a country like Mexico - not just destabilize the government, but destabilize the whole damn country - it's time to junk those policies.

It's not like the War On Drugs is having much success domestically either. We manage to incarcerate a number of the players, but that only means that the same illicit and violent businesses on the same street corners are manned by a new set of players, and the carnage continues.

[Lisa Simeone]

Again, legalize, legalize, legalize.

[Lisa Simeone]

By the way, of all the groups out there fighting for legalization, I think LEAP is one of the better ones. You can read more about it at www.leap.com .

[Sir Charles]

During a recent trip to Key West on business the guy sitting next to me asked if I was in town for the NORML convention! True story. (He must have seen my Rasta lawyer business card.)

[Lisa Simeone]

Apropos of this discussion, here's something from Small Wars Journal, by John Sullivan and Adam Elkus:

So far, the conflict has killed over 1,400 Mexicans, 500 of them law enforcement officers. No longer fearing retaliation, cartel gunmen assault soldier and high-ranking federale alike. The criminal threat is not only a threat to public order but to the state....

As the intensity of the violence grows, so does the possibility that Tijuana and Juarez’s high-intensity street warfare will migrate north. Recent cartel warfare in Arizona indicates that America has become a battleground for drug cartels clashing over territory, putting American citizens and law enforcement at risk.... Command of the shadow economy guarantees riches and political influence....

“Black globalization” also creates a neo-feudal power structure in which power flows to non-state forces controlling large slums. These fortresses of criminal influence are no-go areas for law enforcement and act as channeling points for the global illicit economy. Using temporary autonomous zones in urban and rural centers, criminals can tap into a $2.5 trillion global illicit economy growing at 7 times the rate of growth in the legal economy....

Mexico stands at a crossroads. A possibility exists that Mexico could very well become a criminal-state, with centralized criminal activity dominating the Mexican polity. Cartel power could become so deeply rooted within the Mexican state that uprooting it would mean civil war. Such an outcome would prove disastrous for American interests.

[Lisa Simeone]

Ha, ha, Sir C! Our comments crossed in the ether. Gee, I never figured you look that much like a pothead . . . . Could it be your Blago-hair?

Perhaps I should post on this someday instead of putting it into the Comments, but I've always found it highly interesting, if not hypocritical, that many people on the left who are careful to hold to correct political views -- who buy only union stuff, or organic or shade-tree-grown this and that, who don't want dangerous levels of pesticides flying about, etc. etc. etc. -- think nothing of buying, for instance, cocaine. There's a long line of blood extending all the way around the world from that nice white pile of powder on the mirror. It's naive at best and vicious at worst to ignore it.