Blog#4-Mexican Army Cracks Down on Drug-related Violence

The war on drugs is an international and domestic social problem. According to the Ed Crane with the CATO Institute, these drug wars have global impacts on our culture with enormous civil liberties abuse in all countries, police corruption, and it has created a criminal subculture that lures young people into the opportunity to make quick cash (“Ending the”).

In the Reuters.com article, “Mexico deploys troops to outskirts of Mexico City”: Drug-related violence has worked its way to the capital of Mexico. This has caused the deploy of 1000 soldiers, federal police, and local police to patrol the streets of Nezhaualcoyotl where two rival drug cartels are disputing. The Zetas and La Familia cartels are fighting for control of a growing market for narcotics and illegal goods according to a security expert at consultancy Risk Evaluation (“Mexico deploys”).

Mexico City has been affected the least by the drug gang’s bloody wars and clashes with security forces. These wars have contributed to about 60,000 deaths over the last six years (“Mexico deploys”). According to Reforma data, by the middle of September 550 deaths have occurred in Mexico City and the State of Mexico due to the drug war.  They have also seen an increase in the number of kidnappings in 2012. The attempts by the Mexican troops  to win this drug war is slim because of not having the fire power in a population of 1 million people.

In an interview with the former President of Mexico, Vicente Fox he stated that President Bush and Obama’s wage on the drugs war has not given sufficient attention.  A Gallup poll revealed that 50% of people in public opinion would be in favor of de-criminalization or legalizing marijuana consumption.  Sernau, in our Global Problems textbook indicated that various states have explored decriminalizing marijuana: where it could would not be allowed to be sold commercially and would not be allowed to be advertised, and possession of it would not be a crime (“Global, p.135) Fox stated that the U.S. government needs to be aware of this trend and not live in the past when prohibition were imposed over free citizens like alcohol, abortion, and cigarettes (“Ending the”). He suggests two policies for the U.S. if it is illegal then enforce the law or changing the law where it is not illegal or is not penalized. He claims that in Mexico, they do not produce drugs. The drugs are coming from Venuazalia, Bolivia, Columbia, and Equador. He says that Mexico’s policy should consider the 50,000 kids that have been killed in the last 5 years, ages 15-25 years old, the 50,000 that killed them, and the fifty thousand working with the cartels. Resulting in losing 150,000 kids that were not born criminals. These are kids that didn’t have opportunities for a different life and Mexico needs to make sure that these kids have a better offer that the offers they get from the cartels. He believes that you need to take the army off the streets because violence is not a response to violence (“Ending the”). There are  numerous violations of human rights and legal due process is not being upheld.  Fox believes that enforcing laws through a revamp police system and by electing the sheriff and police chief by the citizens with no relation to the election. This would avoid partisanship in order to end the police corruption. If a kid is earning a $1000 a month from criminals, then we must meet match offer ,offer a nice job, or provide scholarships to go to the best Universities (“Ending the”). He shared a concept that I thought was quite interesting, “We must match revolutionary ideas with criminal ideas.” This war on drugs is costing the U.S. $50 billion dollars (“Ending the”). Fox states that the U.S. must decide whether to legalize drugs or enforce the law and control cargos from crossing the border.

Gram, Dave. "Mexico deploys troops to outskirts of Mexico City." news.yahoo.com. Ed. Vicki Allen. N.p., 20 Sept. 2012. Web. 20 Sept. 2012. <http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/20/us-mexico-drugs-idUSBRE88J10O20120920>.

Fox, Vicente. “Ending the Drug War.” N.d., 20 Sept. 2012. Web. 

Sernau, Scott. Globl Problems. 3rd ed. New Jersey: Pearson Education, 2012. 135. Print.

Ending the War on Drugs. CATO Institute, 15 Nov. 2011. Web. 20 Sept. 2012. <http://www.cato.org/drugconference/program.html>.