They're Everywhere!

(Cartoon by Jim Morin, published 7/1/14 in the Miami Herald and featured at McClatchy DC.  Click on image to enlarge and then please return.)
President Obama has caved in once again.  Rather than lean on Congress to get a reasonable and humane immigration bill passed, he's decided to increase the budget for detention centers.  Wouldn't want those pesky aliens mixing in with the real people, eh?

From McClatchy DC:

President Barack Obama asked Congress on Tuesday for $3.7 billion to help cope with the influx of unaccompanied children illegally crossing the southern border.

The money will pay for additional border patrol agents, more beds at detention centers, an increase in prosecution of smuggling networks and a media campaign to discourage parents from sending their children on what the White House calls a “dangerous journey.”

The administration described its approach as an aggressive and cost effective response across the federal government that will allow the United States to try to prevent and more quickly process the

 cases.  [Emphasis added] 

Now, I can sort of (kind of) understand the concern being expressed by President Obama with this latest influx of "border runners."  They are mostly young kids, being shipped by their parents, often without any family members to accompany them, only hopes and prayers for their children's future.  I share the concern, as I'm certain most people do, that this is no way to provide for those kids' future. 

And , as one of my fellow residents here at the Cuckoo's Nest pointed out, there is more going on here than those kids' future.  He thinks that it's a diversionary move by the drug cartels in Central America and Mexico.  While the US Border Patrol is busy dealing with these bus loads of children, they aren't paying attention to the smugglers both above and below ground. He may be right.

Even so, surely there is a better way to handle the issue.  For one thing, the US government could put some pressure on Mexican and Central American governments to do their parts in clamping down on the drug cartels and their growers. 

Another thing the US government could do is change our ridiculous drug laws, the way many states are beginning to do.  Legalize marijuana and tax it the way alcohol and tobacco are taxed. That would be a good start and might ease not only smuggling problems but also our prison crowding.  As to other drugs, well, I haven't completely made up my mind, but it seems to me that adults should be allowed to pick their poison.

At any rate, I would love to see a more sensible border policy.  Maybe even during my life time.  Know what I mean?

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2014/07/08/232634/obama-requests-37b-for-additional.html#storylink=cpy 

Puff Puff Puff

(Click on image to enlarge.)

Ted Rall's cartoon and column in the Los Angeles Times really caused me to laugh loudly, which is pretty damned hard for me to do these days.  Here's a taste:

In musings that might surprise those who remember his "Moonbeam" period (but not those who have noticed there's no squarer square than an old hippie), Gov. Jerry Brown took to Sunday morning TV to worry aloud that emulating Colorado could leave the state defenseless against (a) foreign business competition and (b) terrorism.

"How many people can get stoned and still have a great state or a great nation?" Brown mused. "The world's pretty dangerous, very competitive. I think we need to stay alert, if not 24 hours a day, more than some of the potheads might be able to put together." ...

I'm always interested in policy appeals motivated by fear. Politicians have unleashed an awful lot of threats -- a few real but mostly imagined -- during the last decade and a half. And they haven't exactly made us a better, stronger or more economically successful nation. Brown's thoughts are nowhere close to the depraved paranoia of Dick Cheney; the idea that California will be morally and economically weakened, its security undermined, because a tiny minority of the state's residents regularly indulge in the evil weed seems about as serious and substantial as a puff of smoke.  [Emphasis added]

Now that's some masterful snark.  but I would expect no less from Mr. Rall.

Will California pass a recreational marijuana law if it makes the ballot in November?  Probably not.  It took a while to get a medical marijuana law passed, and after it did, state and local governments fussed around so long trying to set up regulations that a lot of potential dispensary owners lost interest.  I suspect the general public, even in "liberal" California won't be thrilled with another experiment in better living through chemistry, especially since the pharmaceutical companies can be expected to fight long and hard alongside the liquor industry again to defeat the proposition.

And that's a shame.  The state could make some easy cash on taxing the weed.  And it just might make a dent in the illicit drug trade being run by the Mexican cartels and their gangster sales reps.

I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Drone On

Atrios uses the term "security theater" to refer to government projects allegedly designed to protect us. His most recent post will give you some idea of the term. What these projects do is kind of murky. They are very expensive and very complex and very impressive and, did I mention?, very expensive. The expense is justified because we live in a very dangerous world. The loss of civil liberties which ensues from these projects is justified on the same basis. The problem is that these projects rarely actually result in increased security.

As evidence of my thesis, I offer the use of drones (thankfully, up to this point, as far as we know, unarmed) for patrolling our border with Mexico to keep those dirty brown people from entering our pristine republic and to keep out the nasty drugs that country insists on foisting upon us.

Now, as I noted recently, because of several factors, primarily the US economy, the flow of undocumented workers from Mexico and Latin America has dropped dramatically. That means that the primary justification for the use of the drones at the border has to do with the drug trade. And those expensive little buggers are just not as effective as they have been touted to be.

The mixed results highlight a glaring problem for Homeland Security officials who have spent six years and more than $250 million building the nation's largest fleet of domestic surveillance drones: The nine Predators that help police America's borders have yet to prove very useful in stopping contraband or illegal immigrants.

The border drones require an hour of maintenance for every hour they fly, cost more to operate than anticipated, and are frequently grounded by rain or other bad weather, according to a draft audit of the program last month by the Homeland Security Department's inspector general.

Last year, the unmanned fleet flew barely half the number of flight hours that Customs and Border Protection had scheduled on the northern or southern borders, or over the Caribbean, according to the audit.

And the drones often are unavailable to assist border agents because Homeland Security officials have lent the aircraft to the FBI, Texas Rangers and other government agencies for law enforcement, disaster relief and other uses. [Emphasis added]

Each drone costs $3,000 an hour to fly, which must pull a huge chunk from the DHS budget for border security, so some adjustments had to be made.

To help pay for the drones, Customs and Border Protection has raided budgets of its manned aircraft. One result: Flight hours were cut by 10% for the P-3 Orion maritime surveillance planes that hunt smuggling ships on the West Coast and in the Caribbean.

The amount of illicit drugs seized in Predator raids is "not impressive," acknowledged Michael Kostelnik, a retired Air Force major general who heads the office that supervises the drones.

Last year, the nine border drones helped find 7,600 pounds of marijuana, valued at $19.3 million. The 14 manned P-3 Orions helped intercept 148,000 pounds of cocaine valued at $2.8 billion. [Emphasis added]

Presumably the same problems noted for the drones used in patrolling the border also will crop up in the drones all of the local law enforcement agencies are clamoring for, but that doesn't seem to matter. The "eye in the sky" is just what the dictator ordered, so by god, we're gonna have them.

Once again I'm going back to bed to pull the covers over my head. Don't call me until the revolution has been underway for at least ten minutes.

Uneasiness

This recent AP article made me uncomfortable, even after several readings. We're using drones to patrol our border with Mexico.

Last week's mission was just another night out for a Predator program that is playing a larger role in border security as the U.S. Customs and Border Protection adds to its force of unmanned aircraft. The agency received its second Predator B aircraft in Texas last month and will add its sixth overall on the Southwest border when another is based in Arizona by the end of the year.

The aircraft are credited with apprehending more than 7,500 people since they were deployed six years ago. They bring the latest in military technology to one of the oldest cat-and-mouse pursuits in the country. But on the border, even sophisticated devices struggle with the weather and conditions — just as humans do. ...

The Predators, which are being used in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, were introduced on the border in 2005, the year before Mexican President Felipe Calderon declared war on his country's drug gangs and violence along the border exploded. Since then, the aircraft have logged more than 10,000 flight hours and aided in intercepting 46,600 pounds (21,100 kilograms) of illegal drugs.

"It's like any other law enforcement platform," said Lothar Eckardt, director of the Office of Air and Marine's Predator operation housed at Naval Air Station Corpus Christi. "No different than a helicopter." [Emphasis added]

I attributed part of my discomfort to the fact that I wasn't aware that the drones were being used for so long. I doubt there was any cover-up, especially since several congress critters from states along the border have been working hard to get additional Predators assigned to their states and the Mexican government has gone along with their use, even over Mexican territory. I suppose I just missed the import of the news that what we have come to see as a battlefield tool is now flying over the US and Mexico.

And that leads to another source of uneasiness: the use of a weapon developed by the Pentagon for use in war. I've never been happy with the term "War on Drugs" for what I consider to be a foolish policy. The euphemism has led and continues to lead to an expensive and mostly failed attempt to control the use of "illegal" drugs in this country. It also serves to excuse blatant incursions on civil liberties. That said, however, I also admit that the violent Mexican drug cartels are wreaking havoc on both sides of the border. It's just that our military's involvement in the program is worrisome.

There is no indication that the drones being used along the border have been loaded with missiles, but they could be. That would be the next logical step. And that takes the program beyond just another Defense Department initiative that benefits the civilian population. This is not at all like the internet (originally designed for the Pentagon), nor even the GPS satellites which run our smart phones and our on-board driving directions systems.

And, of course, a drone is not "just like a helicopter." It is a lot more expensive, even without the missile. Surely there are better uses for the millions now being spent on these fancy "eyes."

But nobody appears to mind, especially given the amount of marijuana and cocaine, not to mention "illegals", being captured. I suppose that outrage won't come until a drone is loaded with weaponry and takes out a couple of people breaching our sanctified border to look for work, if then.

I'm still uneasy.

Target Practice

The Drug War continues under President Obama. The first signal that there would be none of the change he promised during his campaign was his administration's refusal to reclassify marijuana from the dangerous drug listing. The second is the announcement that medical marijuana dispensaries are being targeted for closure here in California.

From the Los Angeles Times:

Federal prosecutors in California are threatening to shut down medical marijuana dispensaries throughout the state, sending letters to warn landlords to stop sales of the drug within 45 days or face the possibility that their property will be seized and they will be sent to prison.

The stepped-up enforcement appears to be a major escalation in the Obama administration’s bid to rein in the explosive spread of medical marijuana outlets that was accelerated by the announcement that federal prosecutors would not target people using medical marijuana in states that allow it. ...

The latest letters have baffled the state’s medical marijuana activists, who believe the president has broken his word. “Obama says, ‘Yes.’ The conservatives say, ‘No.’ So they get together and huddle and they settle on no,” said William G. Panzer, an Oakland lawyer who helped draft the state’s medical marijuana initiative. “The Obama administration has been incredibly disappointing on this issue.”

What is so infuriating about this move is that while dispensary growth did sky rocket in California, the state and local authorities had already stepped in and shuttered those too close to schools and parks, investigated "pot docs" who were writing the necessary "recommendations" without examining those requesting the script once the requisite "fee" was paid and referred them to the disciplinary boards, and enforced the rules for how much marijuana could be grown for medical purposes by each outlet. The state was keeping its end of the bargain.

This is a new policy, one that quite probably came as some kind of deal made with unhappy conservatives. And it's a deal that targets all dispensaries, not just those which don't comply with state law, something Obama promised wouldn't happen. That means people undergoing chemotherapy won't be able to obtain the pot that quells the nausea which accompanies such treatment. Those with AIDS who also depend on marijuana to assist in keeping weight on will also be shut out. Their only choice now is the dangerous one of depending on street dealers.

This isn't just a war on drugs, it's also a war on science, which has found that marijuana does in fact provide some medical benefits, something which the boneheads in the White House refuse to acknowledge.

A pox on them and on their misguided and antiquated policy.

Who Could Have Predicted?

Sometimes the universe is kind, giving a little relief by providing news that makes me smile. This article did just that. Here's the grin inducement section:

In another change of tactics precipitated by the new Nogales border fence, smugglers appear to be making narcotics hand-offs from Mexico to the U.S. through the bars of the barrier, authorities say.

Lt. Gerry Castillo of the Santa Cruz County Metro Task Force said his office is looking into a case that began in July when investigators discovered a number of oddly shaped bundles of marijuana during a seizure at an undisclosed location.

He said the investigators at first thought the 48 pounds of marijuana that had been wrapped in thin tubular packages might be "tunnel bundles." However, upon closer examination, they discovered that the bundles were not dirty.

That's when investigators decided that the packages had likely been passed through the fence, which features interconnected, concrete-filled steel tubes with an approximately 4-inch open space between them. [Emphasis added]

It didn't take the pot smugglers long to find a way get through the new fence near Nogales, Arizona. Completed this summer, the 2.8 mile stretch of border fence cost the taxpayer $11.6-million. While it may be keeping those awful Mexicans out, job one for the fence being built along our southern border, it obviously is not deterring the drug flow, which is the other reason for its existence.

Gee, maybe there's a cheaper alternative to pot smuggling than a fence which costs about $5 million per mile. Like maybe we could decriminalize marijuana, regulate it the way we do alcohol and tobacco, and tax it.

You think?

Science Disconnect

Earlier this month, I noted the Obama administration's backtracking on the promise to review the drug laws. In an opinion piece written for the Los Angeles Times, Stephen Gutwillig and Bill Piper also excoriate the administration's sudden push against state medical marijuana laws, noting its deliberate disconnect from the science of the issue. Gutwillig is the Drug Policy Alliance's California state director; Piper is the group's national affairs director.

The administration's disconnect from science is shocking. A federally commissioned study by the Institute of Medicine more than a decade ago determined that nausea, appetite loss, pain and anxiety "all can be mitigated by marijuana." The esteemed medical journal the Lancet Neurology reports that marijuana's active components "inhibit pain in virtually every experimental pain paradigm." The National Cancer Institute, part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, notes that marijuana may help with nausea, loss of appetite, pain and insomnia. Sixteen states and the District of Columbia, home to 90 million Americans, have adopted laws allowing the medical use of marijuana to treat AIDS, cancer, glaucoma, multiple sclerosis and other ailments. The federal government itself cultivates and supplies marijuana to a handful of patients through its "compassionate-use investigative new drug program," which was established in 1978 but closed to new patients in 1992.

Marijuana use, like any drug, certainly carries risks. When it comes to policy, however, these risks should be weighed against the harms associated with current marijuana laws. It is notable that every comprehensive, objective government commission that has examined marijuana throughout the past 100 years has concluded that criminalization of adult marijuana use does more harm than marijuana use itself. Moreover, the risks associated with marijuana use are demonstrably far less than those associated with Oxycontin, methamphetamine, morphine and other drugs currently available for medical use. It defies not just science but common sense for the Obama administration to be so aggressively anti-marijuana, especially for medical use. [Emphasis added]

By refusing to acknowledge the science it promised to honor, the Obama administration callously cuts out what is an important tool in treatment which in the long run is cheaper and safer for people suffering from various illnesses and the treatment for those illnesses. The states with medical marijuana laws have agreed to police the distribution of the drug and to regulate its usage. Why the administration is being so callous at this point is a mystery, unless, of course, it is more swayed by pharmaceuticals who will lose some money on prescription drugs which have more serious side effects or by those with a vested interest in continuing the ridiculous War On Drugs than by the science available.

For whatever reason, the administration is wrong in this.

Nope, No Change Here

The Obama administration has continued the tradition of treating marijuana as a gateway drug, one just as dangerous as heroin, and therefore not worthy of consideration as a viable medical treatment. Apparently more than sixty years of propaganda weighs more heavily than sixty years of hard scientific research.

From the Los Angeles Times:

Marijuana has been approved by California, many other states and the nation's capital to treat a range of illnesses, but in a decision announced Friday the federal government ruled that it has no accepted medical use and should remain classified as a dangerous drug like heroin.

The decision comes almost nine years after medical marijuana supporters asked the government to reclassify cannabis to take into account a growing body of worldwide research that shows its effectiveness in treating certain diseases, such as glaucoma and multiple sclerosis. ...

DEA Administrator Michele M. Leonhart sent a letter dated June 21 to the organizations that filed a petition for the change. The letter and the documentation that she used to back up her decision were published Friday in the Federal Register. Leonhart said she rejected the request because marijuana “has a high potential for abuse,” “has no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States” and “lacks accepted safety for use under medical supervision.”

This is the third time medical marijuana supporters have had their petition to reclassify marijuana denied, but at least it only took the DEA a couple of months to deny, rather than years. The supporters can now appeal that decision in the courts. While the past two appeals failed, supporters hope that with the growing body of research which substantiates the medical benefits of cannabis the third time will be the charm.

I think the administration fears are bogus. I think they are concerned that with the legalization of commercial growth (with proper safeguards and appropriate regulations) might undercut the oh-so-important War Against Drugs and all that entails. In that respect, they are probably right. If this country allowed legal growth and distribution (and taxation), we wouldn't need that stupid program because the Mexican drug gangs would lose an important source of revenue.

Morons.

Not So Fast

Whenever the Obama administration makes a quick and hard decision, I get suspicious. It's not something that happens every day with this soft and easy White House. That's why the news contained in this article had my blood pressure up this morning.

Calling the global war on drugs a costly failure, a group of high-profile world leaders is urging the Obama administration and other governments to end "the criminalization, marginalization and stigmatization of people who use drugs but do no harm to others."

A report by the Global Commission on Drug Policy, which includes former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and past presidents of Mexico, Brazil and Colombia, recommends that governments try new ways of legalizing and regulating drugs, especially marijuana, as a way to deny profits to drug cartels.

The recommendation was swiftly dismissed by the Obama administration and the government of Mexico, which are allied in a violent 4 1/2 -year-old crackdown on cartels that has killed more than 38,000 people in Mexico. [Emphasis added]

Like the Global War On Terror, this White House loves itself some Global War on Drugs, especially those coming from Mexico. The fact that neither has been particularly effective, and the latter has resulted in thousands of deaths without slowing the traffic one bit, doesn't seem to bother this White House, just as it didn't the last one. Keeping that war going is all that apparently matters.

Instead, President Obama would rather add a few dollars to the budget for drug prevention and will offer some verbal support to drug courts at the state level, while he funnels millions of dollars into military assistance to the president of Mexico to defeat the drug cartels in that country. At the same time, his Attorney General has decided to start harassing states in this country with medical marijuana provisions.

Zero tolerance, no matter how wrongheaded it is (and it usually is, no matter what the subject) is the justification usually given, but the report addresses that as well.

The new report said the world's approach to limiting drugs, crafted 50 years ago when the United Nations adopted its "Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs," has failed to cut the supply or use of drugs. The report, citing figures from the world body, said global marijuana consumption rose more than 8% and cocaine use 27% between 1998 and 2008.

The group cited a U.N. estimate that 250 million people worldwide use illegal drugs, concluding, "We simply cannot treat them all as criminals."

More treatment options for addicts are needed, the report said. And it argued that arresting and incarcerating "tens of millions" of drug-producing farmers, couriers and street dealers have not answered economic needs that push many people into the trade.

The assessment cited studies of nations, such as Portugal and Australia, that found decriminalizing the use and possession of at least some drugs has not led significantly to greater use.

It doesn't matter to the current White House. It's got a war going on. It doesn't have time to listen.

Morons.

Well, Duh

I'm beginning to think one of the reasons I haven't been able to arise before dawn so that I can drink coffee with the early morning Atriots is that I dread reading the news before I hop over. It's been pretty dreary on all accounts.

OK, that's my excuse for sleeping in today.

Actually, the news wasn't all bad this morning. The US Supreme Court in a predictable split decision has agreed with a lower ruling that the State of California has to reduce its prison population because the massively overcrowded conditions amount to cruel and unusual punishment especially with respect to providing medical treatment. The state must now find a way to reduce the number of those incarcerated by 30,000.

Governor Brown, who as Attorney General fought the required reduction, had already planned to shift non-violent offenders to county jails and hoped that he could keep current "temporary" taxes in place to pay the counties for the new burden. That would be some help, but the time line to implement the plan would have exceeded that ordered by the courts.

The editorial board of the Los Angeles Times has a much better suggestion.

At last count there were 142,000 inmates in California prisons, which are so overcrowded that some prisoners must be housed collectively in gymnasiums or alone in phone-booth-sized cages. Under the order upheld by the Supreme Court, the state must reduce its inmate population to 137.5% of the system's capacity — meaning about 110,000 — within two years. ...

...the truth is that experts have been suggesting responsible ways to ease prison overcrowding for years. One way is to create an independent panel to revise the state's haphazard sentencing guidelines, which all too often result in excessive terms that worsen overcrowding. In other states, sentencing commissions have lengthened penalties for truly dangerous felons while finding alternative punishments for minor offenders. [Emphasis added]

Bravo!

One place such a sentencing commission could take a good hard look at sentencing is the area of non-violent drug violations: an inordinate number of California prisoners are facing long terms for the simple and non-violent crime of possessing and/or using drugs. Most belong in rehabilitation, not prison. While the state does have such a diversion program on the books, it's pretty much limited to first-time offenders, and the program just isn't funded adequately for ongoing treatment. That means the first-timer becomes the second- and third-timer and faces years in prison.

But I'm not holding my breath for such a movement. The clamor has already arisen with respect to the fear that releasing so many prisoners will destroy neighborhoods and cause an furious up-tick in crime. Justices Alito and Scalia started that ball rolling in their alarmist dissenting opinions. We're still stuck in the vengeance mode.

So, somehow, the state's going to have to find money from somewhere to build more prisons or to pay other states to take our overage. Early education programs can wait, as can health care programs for the poor and the state's crumbling infrastructure.

Doin' The Science

Here's today's good news: medical marijuana provides benefits to the patients using it. A center was set up by the California state legislature a decade ago to conduct research into whether marijuana actually has a positive, verifiable effect on people with pain disorders and other calamitous medical conditions. The answer is yes:

Much of the research is still underway or under review, but five studies have been published in scientific journals. Four showed that cannabis can significantly relieve neuropathic pain and one found that vaporizers are an effective way to use marijuana. Another study, submitted for publication, found that marijuana can reduce muscle spasms in multiple sclerosis patients. ...

The center funded a range of research, including six studies of whether marijuana reduces neuropathic pain, which is caused by a damaged or abnormally functioning nervous system. A UC San Francisco study of patients with HIV-related pain found that 52% of those who smoked marijuana experienced significant relief.

"I think that clearly cannabis has benefits," said Dr. Donald I. Abrams, a San Francisco oncologist who led that study. "This substance has been a medicine for 2,700 years; it only hasn't been a medicine for 70."

That's the good news. The bad news is that the funding for the center's research is about to run out and the state clearly doesn't have the money to refund the program. It's about time for the federal government to step up so that the research can continue. It's also about time for the federal government to reclassify marijuana. Now that the benefits of the drug have been shown scientifically, marijuana needs to be removed from the "Class 1" category.

You might want to send your congresscritters the link to the article provided above with a polite request that they get moving on the issue. Point out the health aspect, but don't be afraid to remind them how many people are filling our prisons and depleting our budgets for use and sale of cannabis. It is, after all, the 21st Century.

Left Hand, Meet Right Hand

A couple of days ago, the NY Times published an article that caused all sorts of raised heart rates and blood pressures among the younger members of the lefty cause.

ZOMG! The CIA is paying a drug dealer in Afghanistan for help and he just happens to be the brother of the current Afghan President!

Here's the lede from the article:

Ahmed Wali Karzai, the brother of the Afghan president and a suspected player in the country’s booming illegal opium trade, gets regular payments from the Central Intelligence Agency, and has for much of the past eight years, according to current and former American officials.

The agency pays Mr. Karzai for a variety of services, including helping to recruit an Afghan paramilitary force that operates at the C.I.A.’s direction in and around the southern city of Kandahar, Mr. Karzai’s home.

Oh, please.

This has been going on for at least the five decades I've been following the news. And it's not just the CIA protecting and serving American interests. If past history (especially in Latin America) is any measure, members of the CIA have made a tidy profit from the drug trade, and don't think the rest of the world hasn't noticed. A brief trip to Watching America made that clear. This article showed just how pervasive the CIA is with respect to drug distribution. It's from Germany's Junge Welt.

Here's what that article had to say:

“There’s no significant drug trafficking anywhere in the world in which the CIA isn’t involved.” This truism has again been confirmed by a report in the New York Times. While in the past it was limited to hanky-panky with drug lords in Latin America or Southeast Asia, this time the agency, according to the New York Times article, is actually part of an organized crime operation in the Hindu Kush war zone. Active and former U.S. intelligence personnel claim that Ahmed Wali Karzai, brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, is a known key player in the Afghan drug world but has nonetheless been on the CIA payroll for the past eight years. It is therefore absurd that U.S. politicians and the American media are condemning President Karzai for not prosecuting his brother. ...

The CIA helped President Karzai’s brother by ridding him of two bothersome competitors: Matiullah Qati, Police Chief of Kandahar province, was “accidentally” shot to death by a CIA special operations unit, and Karzai also inherited drug baron Hajji Bashir Noorzai’s business after Noorzai, with Ahmed’s help, fell into an American trap, was arrested, later convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment. The New York Times reached either the pinnacle of naïveté or was playing administration apologist by saying, “CIA practices in Afghanistan suggest that the United States isn’t doing everything in its power to eradicate the lucrative narcotics trade in Afghanistan.”

Of course the US isn't doing "everything in its power" to stop the illicit drug trade in Afghanistan. That would cut off some serious bucks to people that apparently even the Obama administration fears angering or there would have been some immediate action, something I haven't seen in this administration or any other administration in the past 30 years. What is especially noxious about this connection between the CIA and the drug trade is that it is going on while American and allied troops are fighting a war in the middle of it. I think an argument can be made that the CIA is making it harder for those US soldiers to do their jobs so they can come home.

President Obama is currently facing a decision on increasing troop levels in Afghanistan. He still labors under the delusion that this war, the "good one" can be won. If he really wants to win, then he ought to be considering a few options besides sending more soldiers into Afghanistan.

It's clear that the Taliban are using the opium trade to finance their war. Opium is not just the source for "illegal" drugs, it is also a source for a legitimate medical anodyne. We could invite the United Nations or some other respected international organization to step in and to negotiate with Afghan opium farmers for their crops for that drug. Giving the Taliban some competition for the crops would allow the Afghan farmers to continue growing what they seem bent on growing without worrying about recrimination which comes in the form of bombs from both sides of the war.

With a reasonable expectation of income, Afghan farmers and citizens might get the message that being conquered is not the intent of the rest of the world. I think that might make a difference.

That would cut out not only the Taliban, but also such "organizations" as the CIA from the loop, and that just might give the US a way to rein in an agency which has members who've turned rogue, and who've been allowed to do so under the cover of protecting America. Come on, folks, all those agents have done is protect their bank accounts and their power. They could care less about the nation or the world.

That suggests the second move President Obama could make, although perhaps not on Prime Time television. He could make it clear that the easy flow of money to the CIA and its operatives was over. A super investigator general would be appointed to oversee the CIA when it comes to these kinds of operations and expenditures and that investigator would be given prosecutorial powers. That might get a little attention.

All of which is to say that the US doesn't need to send more troops. It needs to send more intelligence, real intelligence, the kind that sees the whole picture, not just the cropped corner of the photograph that has dollar signs attached to it.

And the US needs to put the choke chain on such organizations as the CIA and yank it. Hard.

Drug Wars Being Lost

There aren't many ways the 'drug war' in Mexico can still be called a winning proposition. Rafts of money and lives have been lost, and the trafficking in drugs haven't been dented.

Now the war is against the corrupt police forces that are keeping a hand deep inside the profits. A simple solution would be to legalize drugs, but with the immense profits being made there is increasing evidence that we are up against the usual suspects who will continue the nonsensical war on drugs as long as they're making a profit.

Ten Mexican police officers have been detained in connection with the torture and murder of 12 federal agents during a major escalation in the drug war.

The arrests come as more than 5,000 troops and federal police are deployed in the western state of Michoacan.

The troop surge, one of the biggest in the anti-drugs campaign, comes after a local drug gang launched co-ordinated attacks in 10 cities last week.

The state governor has protested against the "military occupation".

The federal authorities say they are investigating links between the municipal police and drug traffickers in the murder of the agents, whose bodies were found bound and gagged and shot through the head next to a major highway.

In a statement, prosecutors said the detentions would enable them to strengthen evidence that the officers "undertook criminal acts" in support of the Michoacan drugs gang and to "determine their responsibility for the murder of federal agents".

The corruption that goes so deep can be ended, but not by the methods that have only made it worse.

The forces that tout this war are unlikely to be acting in good faith, as there is absolutely no evidence the action they've taken to date has done anything but increase the trafficking, the violence and the profits.

Thursday Birdblogging

Black-billed nightingale thrush;

The Black-billed Nightingale-Thrush (Catharus gracilirostris) is a common species of the highlands of central Costa Rica, southeast into western Panama. It is the species of Catharus with the smallest distribution of any member of the genus, and is restricted to wet-montane forest and paramo areas from 1800 m up to timberline. Here it prefers to forage in the ground or at low vegetation, both in forested areas as well as human-disturbed habitats. Also it is a prolific singer, with males singing their highly melodic songs for long periods.

Wonders Never Cease

Imagine, if you will, a governor suggesting that now, in 2009, it might be time to revisit the issue of legalizing marijuana use and its production. Pretty crazy, eh? I mean, sure more than half of that state's voters are in favor of legalizing the drug, and sure legalization would be accompanied by government regulation and TAXATION, but actually debating the issue? It would take a Lewis Carroll-like mind to script such an announcement. Now, imagine that the announcement came from a Republican.

And yet that's exactly what happened on May 5, 2009 in the year-of-our-whatever in California.

From the Sacramento Bee:

The governor was asked about a recent Field Poll showing that 56 percent of registered voters support legalizing and taxing marijuana to raise revenues for cash-strapped California. Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, D-San Francisco, has proposed legislation that would legalize the drug for recreational use, rather than just medical purposes.

"Well, I think it's not time for that, but I think it's time for a debate," Schwarzenegger said. "I think all of those ideas of creating extra revenues, I'm always for an open debate on it. And I think we ought to study very carefully what other countries are doing that have legalized marijuana and other drugs, what effect did it have on those countries?"

OK, Governor Schwarzenegger has been dealing with budget problems that are akin to those facing Barack Obama, although on a slightly smaller scale. And he's not exactly a Jeff Sessions kind of Republican. In fact, he's not even an Arlen Specter kind of Republican/Democrat.

Sure, an argument can be made that he's just opening the door for discussions that will ultimately involve such agri-corps as ADM, or that he's just looking for an easy way to raise revenues to stave off the still possible bankruptcy of his state on his watch.

He's also governor of a state that is suffering directly the drug wars that are spilling from Mexico into the US border states of California, Texas, and Arizona. He knows that his National Guard might very well be shifted from Iraq and Afghanistan to the border at the height of fire season as a result of the increasing violence, thereby putting his state at risk, on his watch.

He also is fully aware that one of the biggest expenses in California is the prison system where thousands of inmates are incarcerated for drug related offenses connected to marijuana use or sales. Accompanying that is a federal law suit for horrendous medical treatment for inmates because of overcrowding and lack of funding, which has resulted in a the very real threat of a complete federal takeover of the California penal system, on his watch.

And it's not like he's calling for the legalization of marijuana with governmental regulation. He's just calling for an open debate.

And that's all we need, just that opening.

I don't care what his motivation is, this time he got it right.

Militarizing the Border

Secretary of State Clinton's recent visit to Mexico was a significant one, primarily because she spoke candidly. The increasing violence at the border and spilling into the US is caused by drug traffickers, and both countries are at fault for the the escalation. She frankly pointed to the failure of the "War on Drugs" waged by this country for decades and to the insatiable market for the illegal drugs in this country which makes it lucrative enough for the drug gangsters to take risks that have resulted in the deadly surge.

So far the Obama administration has resisted the call issued by likes of CNN's resident xenophobe Lou Dobbs to send military troops to the border, but DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano recently implied that the option is still under consideration. That should worry residents of both countries who live near or on the border, and obviously does. An editorial from Mexico's La Jornada makes that clear.

Militarization of points along the border by the Mexican government and police reinforcement ordered by U.S. authorities across the Rio Grande are not necessarily correct steps in the fight against drug traffic, representing, instead, bilateral, ambiguous security. After all, the border between the two countries is only one realm of organized criminal activity, a place to gather and express in particularly violent ways the symptoms of a process of social and institutional decomposition much greater than the space on either side of the border, itself. The passage of drugs, arms, and criminals over the common border is, in effect, the culmination of processes that gestate and develop over time, processes that require attention from both governments in geographic areas far from their common boundary, with spheres of action much broader than police and military.

With these considerations in mind, it can be said that the deployment of a sizable number of security forces to the region does not, in itself, constitute a blow to the power of drug cartels or their logistic and financial structure; instead, it exposes these troops - civilians and military, and Mexicans and U.S. citizens - to infiltration and bribery by criminal groups.

Furthermore, governments of both countries do not seem to be aware that measures being discussed involve undesirable risks for the population along the border - the proliferation of annoyances and outrages – already occurring in Mexico. A consequence is the risk of feeding popular animosity against government troops. Moreover, history indicates that circumstances, such as the one under discussion, tend to multiply border incidents, violations of territorial integrity, and violations of the sovereignty of countries. It would be particularly disastrous if the actions announced yesterday not only fail to end drug traffic, but give rise to conflicts between elements of the Mexican Army and U.S. security agencies.

In summary, measures announced yesterday by Washington, as well as the satisfaction expressed by the Mexican government, have put in place a flawed security strategy - shared, though it is - to focus on fighting superficial expressions of the complex and deep-rooted problem of drug trafficking. If the goal is eradication of the base of [drug trafficking] and other crimes, then the governments of Calderón and Obama should not focus on police and military pursuit, which so far have proved inefficient. Instead, they should address the social, economic, and institutional factors that foster these crimes; undertake effective policies to combat addictions, in order to reduce the demand for illicit drugs; combat the corruption eroding the institutional structure of both countries and, in Mexico, develop and apply a coherent strategy to fight misery, to alleviate poverty, and to reduce lacerating social inequality.

Like most of the problems inherited by President Obama, this one has no easy fix. Sending in the Marines, however, is only going to complicate the matter. Sharing intelligence by the two countries is a good start, but the US is going to have to make some tough social and political decisions that bear on domestic policy if even that is going to have an impact.

First of all, an overhaul of the laws concerning drugs is long overdue. The Obama Justice Department has already indicated that it will no longer consider busting medical marijuana outlets a priority. At this point, the administration should go further, and revise the laws on drug possession and use. Drug addiction should not be treated as a crime but as an illness, and our laws should reflect that and money should be appropriated for sensible research into and treatment of that illness. If we can reduce the demand of what is deemed contraband, the bad guys lose their power and their incentive.

That, I admit, is going to take some education and some time. There are, however, some things that this country could be doing in the meantime. One of the top priorities should be to come down with heavy, hobnailed boots on those US gun dealers who are cheerfully selling the drug gangsters the heavy weaponry which is being used to wreak havoc on both sides of the border, including cities located some distance from that border. Tighter gun laws and heavier penalties for those who funnel weapons to the gangsters are needed. A "well-armed militia" is one thing. A well-armed gang of thugs pushing the hard stuff is something else entirely.

Finally, since this administration has adopted a lot of the lingo from the last one in disappointing ways, such as issuing "benchmarks" to such nations as Iraq and Afghanistan, maybe it could also develop some benchmarks for the Mexican government when it comes to aid. Rooting out corrupt police, soldiers, and office holders should be a goal of both countries, but the aid right now is flowing in only one direction. Make it clear to the Mexican government that they have step up as well, and not just when it comes to combating drugs.

That would be a nice change.

Escalating War

Not Afghanistan, Mexico. Recently President Calderon sent in the army to carry on a fight that has totally gotten beyond the capacity of police to manage. For the first time, a bombing occurred, two blocks from the police station in Mexico City

No group has claimed responsibility for the bombing, which sent shock waves through the heart of the Mexican capital. But officials on the case have said they are investigating whether it could be the work of drug cartels reeling from a crackdown by President Felipe Calderon. Leftist guerrilla groups also have a history of bombing in Mexico, but they have normally hit political or commercial buildings at night without leaving casualties.

If drug gangs are proven to be behind the blast, it would show a worrying escalation in the battle between organized crime and the government. Since Jan. 1, drug cartel gunmen armed with huge arsenals of automatic rifles and grenade launchers have slain more than 30 police, soldiers and judges in ambushes and assassinations. The attacks come as Calderon has made record drug busts, sent 25,000 police and soldiers against the gangs, and extradited alleged kingpins to the United States.

While the Mexican crime families do not have a history of using bombs, explosive devices used to be a favored tactic of their associates in Colombia. In the 1980s and 1990s, the Medellin cartel responded to a government crackdown with bombs on street corners, cars and even one passenger jet, killing hundreds. Colombian gangsters have long been selling cocaine to the Mexican cartels, who smuggle it into the United States. "The cartels could be turning to this Colombian tactic of using terror to pressure the government to back off," said Mexican drug expert Jorge Chabat. "They may be trying to raise the political cost for Calderon of carrying out his campaign."

Police say the man killed in the blast was probably himself carrying the bomb because the device went off about a three feet from the ground, blowing out surrounding car windows but not causing a crater. "The man completely lost his hand. He surely did this when he was handling the explosive device," Mexico City Police Chief Joel Ortega told reporters.

The occupation by army forces has been protested in Ciudad Juarez, Nuevo Laredo and Reynosa by hundreds of people blocking the bridges and stopping traffic. Of course, murders have been constant, gruesome beheadings among them.

The drug wars are supported by the U.S., and recently that war was condemned by a panel formed by Latin American governments alarmed at the violence.

As drug violence spirals out of control in Mexico, a commission led by three former Latin American heads of state blasted the U.S.-led drug war as a failure that is pushing Latin American societies to the breaking point.

"The available evidence indicates that the war on drugs is a failed war," said former Brazilian President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, in a conference call with reporters from Rio de Janeiro. "We have to move from this approach to another one."

The commission, headed by Mr. Cardoso and former presidents Ernesto Zedillo of Mexico and César Gaviria of Colombia, says Latin American governments as well as the U.S. must break what they say is a policy "taboo" and re-examine U.S.-inspired antidrugs efforts. The panel recommends that governments consider measures including decriminalizing the use of marijuana.

Such sanity seems far removed from any action that our government took over the previous eight years. With a large community still holding control of seats in Congress who would never let sanity break out, my optimism is somewhat constrained. Yes, that's unusual for me. This is a growing situation on the border of the U.S. that were we not in over our ears in the Middle East, our government might provide some help with. As it is, I think we will give our Latin American neighbors more grounds to despair of us.

For now, I will repeat a friend's advice when I left her home on Padre Island for a trip to the Big Bend area, planning to make a quick trip over into Mexico. Her advice: Go in a rural area, stay away from the big cities, only go by day. I had a lovely visit and went on my way to Alpine, where I was delighted to see the Marfa lights. No hallucinogens involved, just forget you thought that.

Pawned

Emilio Gutierrez Soto is an unusual kind of victim in the drug wars. A Mexican journalist, Gutierrez wrote several articles exposing the questionable tactics used by the Mexican military in their drive to put down the drug gangs in Mexico. His exposes upset Mexican authorities enough that they began harassing him. When the harassment turned to overt death threats by the military, Mr. Gutierrez and his fifteen year old son made their way to the border, crossed it, and then turned themselves over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to seek political asylum. That turned out to be a mistake.

Gutierrez and his son, Oscar, crossed the border in June and turned themselves over to immigration authorities, saying they feared for their lives if they remained in Mexico.

The reporter said he had been threatened after writing several articles critical of the tactics of the Mexican military, which has been attempting to crack down on drug traffickers. ...

A few months after Gutierrez and his son were placed in custody, the teenager was released to family friends in the U.S. But Gutierrez remained locked up.

His lawyer, Carlos Spector, complained that the reporter had not received a prompt hearing, unlike many illegal border crossers.

After a postponement, the case was scheduled for March, more than eight months after he arrived in the U.S. [Emphasis added]

Mr. Gutierrez has spent the last seven months held in a detention center in Texas, which is indeed a long time, given the speed with which the US has deported most illegals caught up in work place raids. I can't help but wonder why his case was so dramatically different. Did the Mexican government intervene and request the Bush administration keep him on ICE as a way to silence him? It sure looks that way, although, ICE and Department of Homeland Security officials had no comment for the Los Angeles Times reporters covering the story.

Yesterday, without announcement or explanation, Mr. Gutierrez was released from custody. While the good work of Reporters Without Borders and sympathetic articles in US newspapers must have had some effect, I think the new administration has more to do with his release. If I'm right, that's evidence of change I can believe in and welcome.

Good job, Secretary Napolitano, but don't stop there. Grant Mr. Gutierrez asylum. He deserves it.