Fleeing drug wars, Mexicans flood into U.S.

[Ritterin Sophia]

I will here repeat what I have said elsewhere: our continued efforts to intervene in the affairs of a foreign nation has the end result of destabilizing that nation, rendering it incapable of responding to our requests. If we are going to cut of the only hope these people have of making a new life for themselves, then we ought to do our part in ending a major component of what drives them in that quest.

Understanding that you're libertarian, you wouldn't happen to be an isolationist would you?

[Punarbhava]

LSD is no joke, sure, you won't die from it, but the effects are unpredictable and the psychological problems from it can be severe. Some people who take that trip just don't come back, I think that makes it more dangerous than pot, booze, or tobacco.

Is this based on any real medical evidence or science, or is it just an urban myth?

I've heard all of that myself, of course, but I haven't reviewed any of the literature on LSD and its actual effects, so I'm curious as to how true this is.

People who have a family history of mental illness or may be prone to it for other reasons may have severe problems using LSD. That's true for any other drug as well though. If you have a mental illness or for whatever reason are prone to it, the sensible solution is to not use any illicit drug (nor some legal ones).

On topic, when the drug cartels have the balls to stand up to the Mexican Army and entire towns on the northern border are run entirely by the drug cartels, it's no wonder citizens are trying to flee to the US. Our war on drugs is decimating this country.

[Einzige]

I will here repeat what I have said elsewhere: our continued efforts to intervene in the affairs of a foreign nation has the end result of destabilizing that nation, rendering it incapable of responding to our requests. If we are going to cut of the only hope these people have of making a new life for themselves, then we ought to do our part in ending a major component of what drives them in that quest.

Understanding that you're libertarian, you wouldn't happen to be an isolationist would you?

Militarily, yes. I am however in favor of free-trade and liberal immigration.

[Akkleptos]

Hell, one of the reasons why they're having the violence now is because Vicente Fox (the previous President of Mexico) refused to make the pay-offs to the gangs that prior Presidents had made for decades, and his successor, Felipe Calderon, has been actively going after them in major trafficking routes (like Ciudad Juarez).

Actually, it's more like El Señor Presidente used to be -as long as the PRI ruled (about 70 years)- some sort of Capo di tutti gli cappi, and it was he who determined which gang or cartel controlled which territory, and rather than making pay-offs to the cartels, it was actually the other way around! (AFAIK. References would be hard to find, as this kind of deals are rarely officially put down on paper...)

Fox, a newcomer to even his own party -morally conservative, economically liberal, Catholic, and eminently entreprenurial PAN- used to be a high executive for the Mexican branch of Coca-Cola, a businessman and boot-and-hat-wearing rancher, who had all the best intentions but was sorely lacking the political expertise necessary to deal with the very complex reality in Mexico. So, when he became president, he decided to stop all Government-Cartels agreements cold, which resulted in a wave of violence (drug gang wars, cartel struggles over the control of different territories, fragmentation and alliances within the cartels, whatnot....) of which we suffer the consequences even today.

I take a rather liberal view on this issue. I support the legalisation of marijuana but not the hard drugs such as cocaine, heroin, LSD, methamphatamines, and so on. At the same time I think America needs to take concerted military and police action in Mexico to eradicate the drug lords which Mexico seems to be incapable of including but not limited to assassinating or kidnapping drug lords, (with Mexican approval) helping patrol the streets of border cities like Ciudad Juarez or Tijuana, and increased efforts at curbing the Mexican drug cartel branches in America.

That's going to prove fairly difficult. As a Mexican, I think it would be a good idea, but Mexicans at large and especially the government have long toted this loud anti-interventionist anti-US paranoid prejudice against any kind of meddling of other countries in the nation's affairs. The government is pretty adamant about this. So, while US advisors and DEA agents are allowed to operate in Mexico, they cannot even legally carry firearms, and their freedom to operate is largely courtailed.

I can understand how this could easily be construed as corruption and protectionism towards the cartels -which, to a limited extent, would be possible- but the anti-interventionist paranoia has been part of the political culture of Mexico since the Mexican-American War (1847), the French Intervention (1860's) and others.

So, yeah, we have some actual historical reasons to look at any kind of foreign interference in internal national affairs with a lot of suspicion.

Why my dear Simon, then its time for War Plan Green

Well, while quite feasible, I wonder if the remedy wouldn't be worse than the illness, due to political and financial costs, as pointed out by others boefore me. Besides, it bears pointing out that Mexico (well, Pancho Villa's troops) has been the only country that actually invaded a part of the continental US and actually got away with it

EDIT: had forgot to type in "with a lot of suspicion". Added some references.

[Guardsman Bass]

Actually, it's more like El Señor Presidente used to be -as long as the PRI ruled (about 70 years)- some sort of Capo di tutti gli cappi, and it was he who determined which gang or cartel controlled which territory, and rather than making pay-offs to the cartels, it was actually the other way around! (AFAIK. References would be hard to find, as this kind of deals are rarely officially put down on paper...)

I didn't realize that the PRI Presidents were that directly involved in the gang business. I suppose it's not really surprising, seeing as how they sat at the top of a vast network of patronage and corruption (of which the gangs were part).

[Ritterin Sophia]

I will here repeat what I have said elsewhere: our continued efforts to intervene in the affairs of a foreign nation has the end result of destabilizing that nation, rendering it incapable of responding to our requests. If we are going to cut of the only hope these people have of making a new life for themselves, then we ought to do our part in ending a major component of what drives them in that quest.

Understanding that you're libertarian, you wouldn't happen to be an isolationist would you?

Militarily, yes. I am however in favor of free-trade and liberal immigration.

Then I feel you need to read this essay by Stuart to really understand how US Policy has worked. We blew our chance at a non-interventionist military fifty years ago.

[General Mung Beans]

Do you have any ideas for how we can do this or is it just more of the usual "tough on crime" talk that gets trotted out all the time?

To give an example making drug dealing in hard drugs (not users) punishable by life in prison without parole.

[General Mung Beans]

That's going to prove fairly difficult. As a Mexican, I think it would be a good idea, but Mexicans at large and especially the government have long toted this loud anti-interventionist anti-US paranoid prejudice against any kind of meddling of other countries in the nation's affairs. The government is pretty adamant about this. So, while US advisors and DEA agents are allowed to operate in Mexico, they cannot even legally carry firearms, and their freedom to operate is largely courtailed.

I can understand how this could easily be construed as corruption and protectionism towards the cartels -which, to a limited extent, would be possible- but the anti-interventionist paranoia has been part of the political culture of Mexico since the Mexican-American War (1847), the French Intervention (1860's) and others.

So, yeah, we have some actual historical reasons to look at any kind of foreign interference in internal national affairs with a lot of suspicion.

I understand, after all, correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the party currently in power the more pro-American one (relatively)? Also is there any talk of restoring the death penalty because of the crime wave and vigilante groups springing up?

Why my dear Simon, then its time for War Plan Green

Well, while quite feasible, I wonder if the remedy wouldn't be worse than the illness, due to political and financial costs, as pointed out by others boefore me. Besides, it bears pointing out that Mexico (well, Pancho Villa's troops) has been the only country that actually invaded a part of the continental US and actually got away with it

EDIT: had forgot to type in "with a lot of suspicion". Added some references.[/quote]

[Akkleptos]

I understand, after all, correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the party currently in power the more pro-American one (relatively)?

Sort of. Heavy on the "relatively".

Also is there any talk of restoring the death penalty because of the crime wave and vigilante groups springing up?

Lots, actually. But sadly, it's the inefficient and nearly useless judicial system and corrupt, incompetent and underpaid police forces that need to be changed first. Otherwise, we'd be liable to end up having innocent people executed who just were in the wrong place at the wrong time; while the criminals would just become more vicious and prone to kill victims, fearing identification.

[Illuminatus Primus]

this essay by Stuart to really understand how US Policy has worked. We blew our chance at a non-interventionist military fifty years ago.

That's completely laughable in any circumstance when you consider anything outside racist criteria and especially in particular light of Mexican issues. The U.S. conquered half of Mexico in a "supreme international crime" a century and a half ago, it intervened in the civil war between the Republicans and Second Empire after our Civil War, and it intervened long before 50 years ago both against Pancho Villa in the Punitive Expedition and the previous Veracruz Expedition. President Wilson famously claimed that he'd teach the Mexicans to elect better men (while intervening against the leader of an army coup in large part sponsored by the previous Administration's diplomat in D.F.). The U.S. articulated broad interventionist foriegn policy statements long before the end of World War II, encompassing the entirety of the Americas.

In any case, that screed Stuart produced is a piece of apologetic for the George W. Bush Administration and early 2000 American foriegn policy and is hardly a serious or uncontroversial academically authoritative treatment on U.S. foriegn policy, before or after fifty years ago. Incidentally, the U.S. never seriously considered isolationism prior to, during, or after World War II, and articulated very ambitious and expansive global political and economic foriegn policy proposals during that time, coming out of both Council on Foreign Relations and State Department planning groups.

Lastly - and this is in response to the thread in general -, I find it extremely chauvinistic and symptomatic of endemic U.S. nationalist fanaticism that open imperialism with the laughable premise, stated or unstated, that it would be for the general interest of the U.S. public, much less the Mexican, is considered not only tolerable, by laudable. As pointed out, the U.S. has meddled in the affairs of Mexico throughout the modern period. The economic liberalization was undertaken under pressure from U.S. business interests and economic institutions and enacted in an atypically corrupt election, even by Mexican standards. The public did not favor the liberalization, it was devastating to the poor and rural communities, and even precipitated the quasi-Maoist (at least initially) Zapatista revolt in Chiapas. The U.S. has greatly contributed to the instability of Mexico both through direct policies financial and economic which are largely to the benefit of U.S. interests, and indirectly through policies that do nothing but permit the drug trade to continue (state sectors even implicitly aided and participated in some of the drug trade during the 1980s). The U.S. and Americans would do well to respect the Mexican people's right to self-determination and to realize armed force would likely be just as destabilizing and costly in human terms as it has been in the Middle East.

[Einzige]

Then I feel you need to read this essay by Stuart to really understand how US Policy has worked. We blew our chance at a non-interventionist military fifty years ago.

And? You're not telling me anything that I don't already know: that American power and 'prestige' is nothing more than a pack of lies enforced at gun-point. I might take that essay to heart if my chief concern were with the maintenance of an American Empire. It is not.

[Ritterin Sophia]

Then I feel you need to read this essay by Stuart to really understand how US Policy has worked. We blew our chance at a non-interventionist military fifty years ago.

And? You're not telling me anything that I don't already know: that American power and 'prestige' is nothing more than a pack of lies enforced at gun-point. I might take that essay to heart if my chief concern were with the maintenance of an American Empire. It is not.

Then you ignore that the reason America has become as successful as we can is we can trade safely without disruption due to an interventionist military that brings the hammer down when someone starts to destabilize an area. Do I wish we could maintain stability without an interventionist military? Yes I do, but is it possible? If you have a time machine that allows people to go back to the 1950's then yes.

[Ritterin Sophia]

-snip-

PM me when you make a response in regards to what I posted rather than what you think I meant by it.

[K. A. Pital]

IP's points about Mexico do stand here. Shatten, I can understand when you're talking about interventionism outside of the Mexican context; etc. In the Mexican context, the US interventionism was less than benigh, and a large factor in the corruption. In general, U.S. influence in the Third World has often produced enormous corruption.

Apparently your position is that other nations are too stupid, too inferior or something to manage their affairs and trade without the USA. This position is oft heard, not just here, but everywhere on the net whenever the subject of American interventionism is discussed.

I fail to see how your point though, or Stuart's essay on the geopolitical goals of the USA as he sees them is in any way relevant to this discussion of the Mexican issue.

Are you proposing an invasion of Mexico or something, Shatten? Please, explain your position clearly.

[Ritterin Sophia]

IP's points about Mexico do stand here. Shatten, I can understand when you're talking about interventionism outside of the Mexican context; etc. In the Mexican context, the US interventionism was less than benigh, and a large factor in the corruption. In general, U.S. influence in the Third World has often produced enormous corruption.

I'm sorry but it seems to me like both of you would like to ignore that during that period of time Mexican bandits routinely crossed the border to commit crime. Indeed some border towns had to be secured at a later date because the Mexican government was incapable of stopping them from falling to anarchy

Apparently your position is that other nations are too stupid, too inferior or something to manage their affairs and trade without the USA. This position is oft heard, not just here, but everywhere on the net whenever the subject of American interventionism is discussed.

Again, I did not say that, if international politics is a zero sum game then someone must take the power America gives up when it stops it's interventionism, power someone else will use or they will lose to someone willing to do so. This means instability as other nations start testing the water to see where their new boundaries are.

I fail to see how your point though, or Stuart's essay on the geopolitical goals of the USA as he sees them is in any way relevant to this discussion of the Mexican issue.

It means that if America is unwilling or incapable of dealing with problem's in it's own backyard it will in turn not do so on the global scale.

Are you proposing an invasion of Mexico or something, Shatten? Please, explain your position clearly.

I'm saying I strongly support an offer of moving troops into Mexico in support of the Mexican government in order and that I oppose any measure that would hinder America's ability to influence global politics to it's liking.

[Illuminatus Primus]

-snip-

PM me when you make a response in regards to what I posted rather than what you think I meant by it.

It is not my fault you think rants about how he and only he understands Bush's widely despised and criticized "With us or against us" speech by a naval architect on an internet board somehow represents a substantive and authoritative treatment of U.S. foriegn policy.

Then I feel you need to read this essay by Stuart to really understand how US Policy has worked. We blew our chance at a non-interventionist military fifty years ago.

And? You're not telling me anything that I don't already know: that American power and 'prestige' is nothing more than a pack of lies enforced at gun-point. I might take that essay to heart if my chief concern were with the maintenance of an American Empire. It is not.

Then you ignore that the reason America has become as successful as we can is we can trade safely without disruption due to an interventionist military that brings the hammer down when someone starts to destabilize an area. Do I wish we could maintain stability without an interventionist military? Yes I do, but is it possible? If you have a time machine that allows people to go back to the 1950's then yes.

Ahhh stability. The great weasel word. Makes it sound like all would be a happy town market of fair trading and nice salesmen if it weren't for those evil people who just want to disrupt Grandpa America and his town market. It sounds much better than using the stick to keep markets open to our preferences and against those of the foreigners. The U.S.'s interventionist policies are aimed at a single goal: to keep an international economic order favorable to U.S. elite interests, and to enforce that against any democratic deviation by the denizens of the Third World.

IP's points about Mexico do stand here. Shatten, I can understand when you're talking about interventionism outside of the Mexican context; etc. In the Mexican context, the US interventionism was less than benigh, and a large factor in the corruption. In general, U.S. influence in the Third World has often produced enormous corruption.

I'm sorry but it seems to me like both of you would like to ignore that during that period of time Mexican bandits routinely crossed the border to commit crime. Indeed some border towns had to be secured at a later date because the Mexican government was incapable of stopping them from falling to anarchy

Excuse me? Protect against 'crime'? The U.S. intervened in Mexico PRIOR to the Villa raids in Veracruz, and of course, assisted in overthrowing the Francisco I. Madero revolutionary government, by agitating for a coup with Madero's army commander, Victoriano Huerta. Why don't you learn even an ounce of fucking history on this topic before wasting my goddamn time. Forgive me if I fail to feel bad for the U.S. in this case, similarly to how I would not feel too bad for the Soviet Union if after toppling revolutions in its client states, some banditry in the post-coup chaos spilled over the border.

Oh and of course, aggressive war is the supreme international crime, according to the Nuremberg Tribunal, hardly a bastion of anti-American thought.

Apparently your position is that other nations are too stupid, too inferior or something to manage their affairs and trade without the USA. This position is oft heard, not just here, but everywhere on the net whenever the subject of American interventionism is discussed.

Again, I did not say that, if international politics is a zero sum game then someone must take the power America gives up when it stops it's interventionism, power someone else will use or they will lose to someone willing to do so. This means instability as other nations start testing the water to see where their new boundaries are.

Realism is not an empirical school of thought in international relations. In fact, its effortless to show that foriegn policy in the last 200 years has been a net-positive game, given that even technological or economic advantage can rapidly close and reverse disparities in power in a time of geometric growth in societal sophistication. "BLAH REALISM" does not make an argument. In fact, your points are exactly what people who believe that foreigners have human rights like us criticize about realism, because it seems like such a shallow and superficial defense for raw imperialism.

In any case, what horrible foriegn power or dastardly plot will hatch in Mexico without the American boot? Hmmm? Rather than treating us to vague supposition, since you imply you know that there would be a negative outcome to a decrease in American power in this context, tell us the future, my friend.

I fail to see how your point though, or Stuart's essay on the geopolitical goals of the USA as he sees them is in any way relevant to this discussion of the Mexican issue.

It means that if America is unwilling or incapable of dealing with problem's in it's own backyard it will in turn not do so on the global scale.

Ahh, the old imperialist lie. So in order to maintain "credibility" (read: dick-waving street rep), the U.S. must capriciously intervene in the affairs of Mexico and exacerbate its domestic problems in order to maintain elite economic advantage, or everyone will gang up on us? In any case, its still not Mexico's fault, even if realism is a legitimate excuse, for its situation. If they labor under a noxious burden of U.S. power, how can they be fully sovereign and functionally responsible for domestic outcomes?

Are you proposing an invasion of Mexico or something, Shatten? Please, explain your position clearly.

I'm saying I strongly support an offer of moving troops into Mexico in support of the Mexican government in order and that I oppose any measure that would hinder America's ability to influence global politics to it's liking.

You sound exactly like a Soviet commissar in 1956 explaining how badly those Hungarians need a boot in their ass. We just need to replace the liberal rhetoric with Leninist. So much for the U.S.'s belief in human rights or democracy. I really don't know how some of our foriegn friends on this board breathe through the smog of smug American exceptionalism, so deeply rooted even in the liberal that almost no Americans can see the double-standards and special exceptions always reserved for the U.S. No American would ever use these arguments to justify the boot of other oppressive powers throughout history.

[Ritterin Sophia]

-snip-

Thanks for illuminating why N&P has become the joke it is. Again, when you're ready to have a conversation I'll be here, I have no interest in a shouting match where neither of us is going to budge because the other is being an ass and the most verbose one wins.

[Illuminatus Primus]

-snip-

Thanks for illuminating why N&P has become the joke it is. Again, when you're ready to have a conversation I'll be here, I have no interest in a shouting match where neither of us is going to budge because the other is being an ass and the most verbose one wins.

Oh whatever, holier-than-thou back-seat mod. I'm sorry you made a one-post clinging to Stuart and thought that sufficed as an argument. You made several factual claims about U.S. imperialism and the last fifty years. All of them were historically without basis. If you don't mean to make authoritative claims and actually mean to make nuanced "I thought that", "isn't it true that", etc. claims, than maybe you should have. But quite frankly if I were a native Mexican I'd be offended by the blase attitude toward U.S. intervention that y'know, kills people, in my country and others.

[Ritterin Sophia]

-snip-

Thanks for illuminating why N&P has become the joke it is. Again, when you're ready to have a conversation I'll be here, I have no interest in a shouting match where neither of us is going to budge because the other is being an ass and the most verbose one wins.

Oh whatever, holier-than-thou back-seat mod. I'm sorry you made a one-post clinging to Stuart and thought that sufficed as an argument. You made several factual claims about U.S. imperialism and the last fifty years. All of them were historically without basis. If you don't mean to make authoritative claims and actually mean to make nuanced "I thought that", "isn't it true that", etc. claims, than maybe you should have. But quite frankly if I were a native Mexican I'd be offended by the blase attitude toward U.S. intervention that y'know, kills people, in my country and others.

Again, I'm more than willing to have a conversation, but not if you're going to assign motives to myself and other people that simply don't exist in a futile argument where we just yell past each other, just tell me when.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Fine.

this essay by Stuart to really understand how US Policy has worked. We blew our chance at a non-interventionist military fifty years ago.

Defend this statement.

Defend the unsupported assumption, fairly challenged, that international relations really is a zero-sum game, that Mexican banditry provided cause for us to invade Mexico, that we should invade Mexico to "secure" it in what would almost certainly be against the democratic will of the Mexican people, and in opposition to the Mexican state.

And I am sorry, but I do believe the beliefs you seem to hold and express, whether intentionally or not, are just propaganda which is saturated into the minds of Americans by our media, culture, and education, and is just a thinly-spread veneer over naked imperialism.

[Ritterin Sophia]

I'll get back to you, I'm going to be busy until tomorrow.

[Ritterin Sophia]

My cousin had to cancel so:

Defend this statement.

It's quite simple, that's how American policy is decided and we lost our chance at nonintervisionism when things like the antiballistic missile treaty and cancellation of expanding America's strategic bomber force.

Defend the unsupported assumption, fairly challenged, that international relations really is a zero-sum game,

You have a political agreement that doesn't favor one side to the detriment of the other? I'll be happy to concede if you do.

that Mexican banditry provided cause for us to invade Mexico,

Go to 1873-96.

that we should invade Mexico to "secure" it in what would almost certainly be against the democratic will of the Mexican people, and in opposition to the Mexican state.

Then you apparently didn't read what I typed.

And I am sorry, but I do believe the beliefs you seem to hold and express, whether intentionally or not, are just propaganda which is saturated into the minds of Americans by our media, culture, and education, and is just a thinly-spread veneer over naked imperialism.

Thin veneer? I'm afraid not, it's blatant and apparent to anyone who cares to look at the situation. The fact of the matter is that if we don't, someone else will. Be it China, Russia, or even the EU.

[loomer]

LSD is no joke, sure, you won't die from it, but the effects are unpredictable and the psychological problems from it can be severe. Some people who take that trip just don't come back, I think that makes it more dangerous than pot, booze, or tobacco.

Is this based on any real medical evidence or science, or is it just an urban myth?

I've heard all of that myself, of course, but I haven't reviewed any of the literature on LSD and its actual effects, so I'm curious as to how true this is.

People who have a family history of mental illness or may be prone to it for other reasons may have severe problems using LSD. That's true for any other drug as well though. If you have a mental illness or for whatever reason are prone to it, the sensible solution is to not use any illicit drug (nor some legal ones).

This is correct. LSD can be more psychologically damaging for 'normal' people than other drugs because it happens to be very good at simply bringing formerly dealt-with or suppressed conditions to the front, or magnifying something that wasn't quite there yet. Ego death can also change a person - normally though this is considered a positive experience.

Basically if you just made it so you had to take your first acid drop in a psychiatrist's office because he'll know where you're at and have thorazine on hand if you can't handle it (and remember - a lot of psychiatrists are looking back into the illicit drugs used by their predecessors and finding genuine, legitimate therapeutic lessons. I believe Salvia was recently found to be a potent anti-depressant because of the viewpoint shift it can produce.), then these risks are greatly nullified while still allowing the populace to use a largely harmless substance in a positive exploratory manner.

Just don't let another Timothy Leary anywhere the equation.

[K. A. Pital]

The fact of the matter is that if we don't, someone else will. Be it China, Russia, or even the EU.

Russia, China or the EU would use military force in Mexico? Are you nuts? It's an ocean away and no one here in China, or back there in Russia or the EU cares about Mexico enough to actually use military force there.

So what exactly do you mean?

You have a political agreement that doesn't favor one side to the detriment of the other? I'll be happy to concede if you do.

A border agreement or a trade agreement can favour both sides, and can be more or less fair. You're saying that nations only make agreements that "detriment" someone? I don't think all agreements are like that, no?

[Ritterin Sophia]

The fact of the matter is that if we don't, someone else will. Be it China, Russia, or even the EU.

Russia, China or the EU would use military force in Mexico? Are you nuts? It's an ocean away and no one here in China, or back there in Russia or the EU cares about Mexico enough to actually use military force there.

Are you even reading what I'm typing? That's clearly in regards to global influence.

So what exactly do you mean?

That politics is a zero-sum game and if the US doesn't use it's influence to it's advantage then someone else will use it to our detriment.

A border agreement or a trade agreement can favour both sides, and can be more or less fair. You're saying that nations only make agreements that "detriment" someone? I don't think all agreements are like that, no?

A trade agreement is an economic agreement, clearly a difference between a political agreement like a mutual defense pact or anti-proliferation agreement.