Hey there.
I thought I would take a moment to discuss a hugely important aspect of the "war on drugs" that doesn't get any airplay in the "US Mainstream Media" - you know: the "proper media" where if something is mentioned, it's real (like WMD's being in Iraq, for example) and if it's NOT mentioned, it's not real, sort of like with the medical potential of the cannabis plant. Never hear about that reality, do you?
Today we'll talk, briefly, about another downplayed aspect of the "war on drugs": The War on Drugs is one of the Primal Forces of Corruption.
On the flip is a discussion of the dynamics of how the war on drugs corrupts law enforcement officers and nurtures the worst people humanity has to offer.
And yeah, to the extent that you want to say or suggest any of the following nonsense, you are helping feed this beast.:
- It's just not important.
- Now just isn't the time.
- There are more important things to deal with.
- It's divisive.
- We'll look weak on crime
It's not so much a "with us or against us" mentality, which some of those whining in protest will suggest. It's more of a either you are smart and aware enough to get this or you aren't. If you aren't able to "get it" it's not because you are intellectually "inferior": it's that you are still buying the crap the government sells - drug war propaganda takes up all the space where real, verifiable information should be.
The next stage of prohibition dynamics is well underway in Mexico.
Criminal gangs have been nurtured by the vast profits that come from TRAFFICKING drugs: marijuana and real drugs, to be specific.
Let us also make this clear before proceeding: drug dealing and trafficking is entirely about money, not about making drugs convenient for people to get or use, as many folks seem to think. It's about cash, pure and simple. The more the better,
Killings in Mexico border city increase fivefold in 2008
Drug cartels, including the powerful Juarez and Sinaloa gangs, are fighting for control of key trafficking routes into the United States across Mexico, particularly in border areas where violence has spiraled.
More than 5,300 died countrywide last year in drug-related attacks, including beheadings and massacres, -- over double the figure for 2007 -- according to the country's top prosecutor
The direction of the flow of this is centered on trafficking routes INTO the USA, where people have money for drugs. The process of taking drugs from Mexico and smuggling them into America is called "smuggling" and the purpose is to move illegal drugs from there to here where they gain hundreds of percents in value. It's easier to move real drugs (cocaine and heroin) than to move the amounts of cash they are worth. Cannabis is less lucrative and thus requires massive quantities to be grown and shipped to make any money.
Some Mexican Gangs have set up shop in US National Forests and grow the herb here and sell domestically, allowing for more profit since there is no border crossing to be made with the large bundles necessitated by cannabis's bulky nature. Much more profitable. [Note the propaganda memes in that CBS article, read through and see how they blame pot smokers for the actions of criminal gangs. It's something you as an intelligent person wants to know correctly.]
The ONLY reason these people are thriving is because drugs are prohibited, plain and simple.
I think people get tired of the comparison, and that's too bad, because it is the very model I am talking about: Alcohol prohibition is uniformly viewed as a stunning failure, a situation that made alcohol MORE detrimental to society than when it was tolerated. The enforcement of alcohol prohibition allowed criminal gangs to flourish and make staggering amounts of money while fueling all manner of crimes peripheral to the Black Market (invariably created by a prohibition".
The same dynamic applies to cannabis prohibition and to the illegality of hard drugs. The more the prohibition is enforced, the more lucrative trafficking becomes. Those who produce the raw drug and those who sell it on the street here aren't the ones making the big bucks: it is the criminal organizations - the Cartels - that make the real money. They have so much money they are as powerful as the Mexican government, for all intents and purposes.
Ciudad Juarez, across the border from the US city of El Paso, Texas, has seen an eruption of crime, including extortion and kidnappings and attacks to finish targets off in hospitals, that has caused hundreds to flee.
The 2008 deaths included 75 police, and 46 bodies found in two hidden graves last February.
The Cartels operate hyper-violently and with complete impunity.
This is simply a natural stage in the progressive reaction to progressively more intense efforts to maintain prohibition. Prohibition is far more than just a failure: it is a disastrous policy that encourages the very thing it is supposed to eliminate or at least "keep in check". It directly feeds the criminal organizations, it corrputs the police force and any public officials in the loop.
Now, I know a lot of Americans don't give a flip about people in other countries, but some of you here do, I know for sure. So we have to try and get these blindered folks to understand that it's spilling over into the USA.
You'd think this would be a wake up call for people; however this is America we're talking about and the right NOT to connect the simplest of dots is an honorable tradition, particularly amongst Republicans and other not-so-bright people who value their heads being stuck deeply in the sand.
The Committee on Border Relations, which consists of lawyers, professors and border advocates, wants to help out. It is set to present a resolution that might change the approach of how government officials in El Paso and the U.S. help their counterparts in Juarez combat crime and curb the violence.
It is proposing more funding to help law enforcement agencies in the U.S. combat the illegal trafficking of arms into Mexico, to increase advocacy programs that help families that have fallen prey to drug-related crime and more education on drug abuse and demand on the American side of the border.
In other words, let's just escalate more of the same policy that has never worked, that is never going to work, and that is directly traceable to all those dead people about which they fiegn concern.
They propose MORE funding for the police. It's NO WONDER that cops LOVE the drug war - it has been a fabulous thing for increasing their funding and their unconstitutional police powers. (We don't care about the constitution anymore, so I am not talking about constitutional damages today).
But there is also money for MORE PROPAGANDA. What they call "education" is just propaganda: false and misleading disinformation that casts aspersions on "drug users" and encourages those doofuses who buy this crap to feel superior to "druggies" and massages an artificial prejudice that is a central part of why many people here engage in that list of whiny attitudes I included at the beginning of this post. (You are free to believe whatever you want, but if you believe what the government tells you about this issue your elevator just ain't reaching the top floor.
So, there you have it. Again. The precious US war on drugs, too unimportant to do anything about, is killing thousands and thousands of people (more than illegal drugs themselves, but not as many as legal Big Pharma drugs) and it is a real pity that so many otherwise literate people - people who have been to school and work math far better than I do - cannot grasp the simple reality of this situation.
The war on drugs is a fraud, a counter-productive, $50 billion a year waste of time, squandering monies we don't have, corrupting our law enforcement, and exacerbating all the drug problems it is supposed to be eliminating.
IF you cannot wrap your head around something as anti-intellectual and stupid as Creationism, you should be able to see the war on drugs for the scam that it is.
Essential Reading: How the Narks Created Crack