Thursday, January 28, 2010

posts

what are we going to comment this week?
Posted by at

1 comment:

Jesus Basurto said...

Bill Boyne: Drug trafficking continues to expand at Mexican border

The bloody and destructive war waged by drug traffickers continues to expand in Mexico and border areas of the United States.

In their battle over millions of dollars in illicit profits, ruthless leaders of the drug cartels have made life dangerous on both sides of the border.

Victims of the war include not only police but prosecutors and even members of the victims' families. In one case, drug dealers killed a Mexican sailor who was on enforcement duty and then broke into the sailor's home and killed his mother and three other relatives.

In response to those killings, Mexican President Felipe Calderon said, "These contemptible events are proof of how unscrupulously organized crime operates, attacking innocent lives, and they can only strengthen us in our determination to banish this singular cancer."

The United States government has reported that enormous sums are funneled to drug traffickers in Mexico each year. The New York Times reported recently that "Although the United States authorities seized $138 million last year, that amount pales in comparison to the $39 billion a year the Drug Enforcement Agency estimates is smuggled to Mexico every year."

People in the United States have been outraged by the ruthless expansion of the drug wars. However, there has been little attention paid to one aspect of the conflict: It is the fact that most of the money that fuels the conflict comes from American drug users, addicts and dealers.

Mexican addicts buy drugs, too, but their expenditures are only a small fraction of the huge sums which the traffickers are fighting for. That raises the question: Does the United States have a moral obligation to undertake a long-term program of education, enforcement and counseling to reduce the consumption of illegal drugs?

That obviously would require an expensive, ongoing campaign of police work as well as education in trying to reduce the number of men and women using illegal drugs. Such a program would have two advantages: It would not only increase the pressure on current addicts but, if handled skillfully, would discourage young people from becoming users. That result would have many far-reaching benefits.

The program could start in middle school and high school with experts giving realistic advice on how lives can be ruined by using addictive drugs. Similar programs could be conducted outside the school system so that the message is heard by everyone.

After all, similar efforts have resulted in a substantial reduction in the number of people who smoke cigarettes. That has caused a major improvement in public health. In the same way. efforts to reduce drunken driving have proved to be effective.

It would be easy to adopt a cynical attitude and say, "That would never work in real life." But is is clear that Americans are being hypocritical in expressing outrage at the drug cartels and at the same time ignoring the fact that American dollars are, in fact, the main cause of the drug wars.

Our present policies are not working and it is time to take a more comprehensive view of the issue.

February 3, 2010 at 7:19 PM

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)