As summer arrives in Afghanistan, it's not just the temperature that is heating up.

A Danish court has ruled that the residents of Copenhagen's Christiania neighborhood have no right to use the property they have called home since 1971.

Prohibition has made the drug lords so powerful that the jails won't hold them:

Mexico City - A convoy of cars carrying more than two dozen suspected drug cartel members disguised as Mexican police officers arrives at the Zacatécas state prison before dawn. Their helicopter hovers overhead. Minutes later, the men help more than 50 inmates – many of them suspected drug traffickers – flee the prison. A countrywide manhunt ensues.

No, this is not a script for a B movie. It's just another day in Mexico's high-stakes war on drug trafficking – Saturday, in fact. [Christian Science Monitor]

Nothing works in the Mexican drug war. Nothing at all. Anyone who thinks we're on pace towards addressing any dimension of this problem will be proven wrong over and over again.

Calderon and Obama think their bloody war sends a message to the cartels, but the drug lords are just laughing their asses off:

Rather than hiding in remote mountain redoubts, Mexico's most wanted traffickers — some with prices of 30 million pesos ($2.1 million) on their heads — are partying openly. In April, police arrested the alleged top recruiter of another cartel, La Familia, at another baptism party held by capos at a resort in the western state of Michoacan.

"This indicates, along with another famous wedding that happened, that they don't have any fear at all of the authorities, none at all," said Samuel Gonzalez, Mexico's former top anti-drug prosecutor. "They are sending a message that they aren't afraid." [AP]

Maybe the reason they aren't afraid of getting caught is that they can just break out of jail anytime they want.

Via NORML's Russ Belville, CBS's Bob Schieffer asked President Obama about the drug war violence in Mexico and got this surprising response:

President Obama:  Well, what’s happened is that President Calderon I think has been very bold and rightly has decided that it’s gotten carried away. The drug cartels have too much power, are undermining and corrupting huge segments of Mexican society. And so he has taken them on in the same way that when, you know, Elliot Ness took on Al Capone back during Prohibition, oftentimes that causes even more violence. And we’re seeing that flare up.

I honestly cannot believe the president is looking towards alcohol prohibition for a little perspective on our present predicament. Everyone knows that story. Elliot Ness didn't defeat those cartels. Legalization defeated them.

The United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) met this week in Vienna to draft a

• read full post
• 29 comments

Does Felipe Calderon even know what he's doing?

MEXICO CITY (AFP) — President Felipe Calderon Friday acknowledged the country's drug war is bloodier and tougher than he thought when he first took office in 2006, but vowed to eradicate the "cancer" that is consuming Mexico.

Really? That's odd because this has gone exactly as I expected and I haven’t been to Mexico in 20 years. He's the president. Why is he struggling to understand the basic dimensions of his own drug war?

If he admits that he didn't know it would get this bad, one wonders what else he doesn’t know. There were 6,000 people killed in Mexico's drug war last year alone and things appear to be getting worse, not better. Even Calderon's updated assessment may be proven horribly naïve.  

How much longer can the leaders of the drug war continue feigning surprise when their policies fail?

Sandwiched between violent cartels and a brutal military occupation force, the Mexican people are understandably running out of patience:

Hundreds of people in Mexico have blocked key crossings into the US in protests against the deployment of the army fighting drug traffickers.

Traffic was brought to a halt on a number of bridges in several border towns in northern Mexico.

The protesters accused the army of abuse against civilians. [BBC]

We tend to view the U.S. and Mexican governments as well as the cartels as the primary actors in shaping the discussion of the nation’s drug war, but the Mexican people themselves will likely begin to play a more visible role as the situation further deteriorates. Rampant civil rights abuses by the Mexican military are quickly becoming regarded as a cure worse than the disease and it may only be a matter of time before public sentiments tip in favor of a dramatic change of course.

As one might expect, the Mexican government has been quick to dismiss the protestors, even going so far as to accuse them of collaborating with the drug traffickers:

…the governor of one state - Nuevo Leon - said he believed the Gulf drugs cartel and its armed wing, the Zetas, were behind the border protests.

"There are reasons to believe it has to do with the Gulf cartel and the group known as the Zetas," Governor Natividad Gonzalez said.

Unbelievable. I guess the idea that the citizens of Mexico would complain about human rights violations by their own military is so inconceivable that it simply must be the drug lords who made them do it.

Ultimately, it should prove difficult for the government to continue portraying public opposition as a PR experiment sponsored the traffickers. Trivializing public sentiment is a losing proposition in the long term, especially when you’re thoroughly unprepared to address the conditions that are pissing everyone off.

If anyone is serving the political and financial interests of the drug traffickers it is the U.S. and Mexican government officials who continue to champion the failed drug strategy that is ripping Mexico apart before our eyes.

Pete Guither and Dave Borden already mentioned it, but I just can’t get enough of this quote from the Wall Street Journal:

"If the drug effort were failing there would be no violence," a senior U.S. official said Wednesday. There is violence "because these guys are flailing. We're taking these guys out. The worst thing you could do is stop now."

So let me get this straight. According to the U.S. government:

No violence = drug war is failing
Intense violence = drug war is going well

So when do we win the drug war then? When everyone’s dead?

A blue-ribbon commission of Latin American leaders has issued a report saying that the US-led war on drugs has failed and it is time to consider new policies, particularly treating drug use as a pu

Lately, the drug war is sounding less and less like an actual government policy and more like a distopian future from a science fiction movie:

As the nation's drug war rages on, with its weekly tallies of headless torsos, it is getting harder to produce a shock wave in the Mexican media. But the gruesome recipes of "The Stewmaker" have gripped public attention here, as authorities describe how a "disposal expert" working for a Tijuana drug cartel boss allegedly got rid of hundreds of bodies by dissolving the corpses in vats of caustic liquid. [Washington Post]

They call him "The Stewmaker" and his henchmen attacked the police station with machine guns after he was captured.

Does any of this sound like the story of a drug policy that works? How much more of this unfathomable gory mayhem do we feel like putting up with? We’ve crossed the line into some seriously dark territory here and it’s way past time something is done about it, something completely different from everything we’ve tried before.

They’re even doing their own diplomacy:

CIUDAD JUÁREZ, Mexico – Mexico's warring cartels are negotiating a truce that, if it holds, could end one of the bloodiest eras since the 1910-20 Mexican Revolution, according to a U.S. official and experts familiar with the talks.

A peace agreement would be the second in two years and, like the last one, its chances of surviving are slim, the U.S. official said.

"In the end, greed prevails over reason," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. [Dallas Morning News]

Actually, it was the drug war that prevailed over reason. We were all watching when Calderón declared war on the cartels and…wait for it…a huge bloody war broke out! Why is anyone acting confused or surprised by what happened? It’s all perfectly clear. If you throw rocks at a beehive, expect swarms of angry bees.

The fact that they’re negotiating their own peace agreements does not reflect well on the decades-long war that was supposed to disrupt the drug industry. They’ve become a second government that even controls its own territories:

Already, the violence is crippling regions and cities, some of them on the border with Texas. Some top U.S. officials and analysts describe these cities, including Ciudad Juárez, across the border from El Paso, as "failed cities," in which cartels, not city or police officials, have control. [Dallas Morning News]

Amazingly, the U.S. and Mexican governments actually believe we should continue the policies that produced this outcome.

Someone help me understand what Mexico’s U.S. Ambassador Tony Garza is thinking:

"Calderón must, and will, keep the pressure on the cartels, but look, let's not be naïve – there will be more violence, more blood, and, yes, things will get worse before they get better. That's the nature of the battle," Garza said. "The more pressure the cartels feel, the more they'll lash out like cornered animals." [Dallas Morning News]

This is correct except for the part about how Calderón has to do this (no, he doesn't) and the part about how things will get better (no, they won't). We’ve heard all this a thousand times before and it just gets sillier every time. The bottom line is that cracking down on the cartels either works or it doesn’t. It makes no sense to say that aggressive drug war policies will create violence in the short term, and then eventually that same approach will begin reducing bloodshed. That’s not logical.

The drug war causes violence. Just admit it. Stop pretending that it’s going to produce the opposite result at some point in the future. It isn’t going to.

Every day, the stories coming from Mexico get worse. Nothing surprises me at this point. Not even this:

MEXICO CITY – Elementary school teachers are the latest victims of an exploding extortion racket in the border city of Ciudad Juárez, as criminal gangs threaten educators to either hand over their coming Christmas bonuses or see harm done to their families or students, teachers' groups say.

With Monday a school holiday and news of the threats spreading in the media, on the Internet and by word of mouth during the long weekend, there were fears that an increasing number of parents would keep their children at home today, forcing additional schools to close. [Dallas News]

Is anybody going to come forward and claim this is just a temporary problem? Shall we double our drug war donations to restore law and order? Let’s get real. The drug war is destroying the entire country before our eyes and there’s no limit to how bad it can get.

It’s amazing to witness the criminal feeding frenzy that is now erupting all over the country now that the drug war has turned Mexico’s justice system into a complete mockery. Dangerous levels of police corruption have created a horrific laboratory in which violent criminals have begun experimenting with all sorts of terrible schemes. Can you even imagine what’s next?

If anything can solve the crime problems plaguing Mexico, it will have to be the exact opposite of everything we're doing right now.

The harder we push back against Mexican drug cartels, the more violence we’ll begin see within our own borders. Just look what’s happening in Pheonix:

A CBS News investigation has discovered that as of last weekend, there have been 266 reported kidnappings and 300 home invasions this year alone. Sources say the real figures could run as much as three times higher because so many go unreported.

"It wasn't uncommon to have a new kidnapping case coming into our offices on a daily basis," Burgett said.

Law-enforcement sources say the kidnappings signal the brutal expansion of the raging Mexican drug wars spilling across the border.
…
Now CBS News has learned enforcer gangs just south of the Mexican border have added military-grade hand grenades to their arsenal - something special agent Jose Wall expects to see in Phoenix any day.
…
It's not just hand grenades, kidnappings and home invasions that have law enforcement on edge. They say it's only a matter of time before innocent civilians are caught in the crossfire. [CBS News]

It’s really just amazing that this can continue to escalate before our eyes without provoking a widespread, spontaneous revelation that something is fundamentally wrong with our drug strategy. How much more obvious could it be? The harder we push the worse it gets. That’s how this works. It’s the only outcome the drug war formula ever produces.

The only thing we’ll get in exchange for the hundreds of millions we’re pouring into the Mexican drug war is more violence within our own borders. Nothing short of a full reversal in our strategy can prevent that result. And since Obama has pledged to continue this madness, we can be reasonably sure this is going to get a lot worse before it gets better.

Further evidence that the Mexican drug war is making progress…in the exact wrong direction:

MONTERREY, Mexico, Nov 11 (Reuters) - Companies in Mexico are scrapping plans to float shares on the stock exchange for fear of raising their profile amid a brutal drug war and a surge in kidnappings, the bourse president said on Tuesday.

Stock exchange President Guillermo Prieto said that aside from market volatility in the past two months due to the global financial crisis, crime was a major issue for firms thinking about initial public offerings (IPOs).
…
Going public to raise funds for expansion requires far greater company disclosure and a higher public profile for company executives who go on roadshows to attract investors.

This is a whole new level of economic disruption, as the drug war begins to chip away at financial institutions. If this kind of thing continues, there’s no limit to how far-reaching the damage could become.

Violence and corruption are just the first symptoms of the disease of drug prohibition. If left untreated, the sickness spreads throughout every social institution, weakening anything it touches.

The human rights group Amnesty International harshly criticized Colombia in a 94-page

• read full post
• add comment

In August, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) released its annual survey of Afghan opium production,

A troubling alert from the FBI:

The FBI is warning that one of Mexico´s most brutal drug cartels is attempting to violently regain control of drug trafficking routes in the United States and has been ordered to engage law enforcement officers to protect their operations, according to an intelligence report obtained by The Washington Times.

Los Zetas, the enforcer of Mexico´s infamous Gulf Cartel, is reinforcing its ranks and stockpiling weapons in safe houses in the U.S. in response to recent crackdowns in the U.S. and Mexico against drug traffickers, said the FBI San Antonio Field Office's Joint Assessment Bulletin. The bulletin was dated Oct. 17 and was sent to law enforcement officials in the Texas region. [Washington Times]

As difficult as it is to imagine Mexico-level drug trade violence within our borders, it’s a much more likely outcome than, say, winning the drug war. The harder we push, the more bloodshed and disorder awaits us. And just as intolerable levels of violence have invigorated the drug war debate in Mexico, there is no doubt that increased casualties here at home would draw yet more attention to the role of prohibition in funding and sustaining violent organized crime. Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.

Everywhere you look, it is just so obvious that the drug war is making Mexico’s problems worse, not better:

A record number of Mexicans are fleeing to Canada, claiming their own country cannot keep them safe as it struggles to contain a grisly narcotics war that is spilling into nightclubs and restaurants.

There are currently 9,070 Mexican refugee claimants waiting to have their cases heard, the largest number yet from one country since the Immigration and Refugee Board was established in 1989.
…
The brutality is intense: human heads lobbed into discos; bound men found asphyxiated in cars; shootouts in shopping centres in the middle of the day. In September, grenades were lobbed at a public celebration of Independence Day in Morelia, a colonial town about 240 kilometres west of Mexico City, prompting some to call it "narco-terrorism" as the victims were civilians. [Globe and Mail]

How much more of this can the Mexican people withstand? The number of refugees may soon grow exponentially as it becomes increasingly clear that there is no plan to stop the violence, or rather, that the plan currently in effect is exactly what’s causing the problem. As bad as things already are, the potential for greater bloodshed and disorder is virtually limitless and it seems we’re now marching forth into a true test of wills as the drug war faithful must behold and somehow defend the unfathomable disaster they’ve created.

It stands to reason that there exists a threshold beyond which the insanity of the drug war cannot be sustained. This has to stop somehow, because it really is as bad as the drug war’s critics have long maintained. I believe we may be witnessing the emergence of a tipping point at which the totality of drug war destabilization, festering for decades, has now exploded all over the map. Calderon can’t turn back without admitting the drug war’s failure, nor can he push forward without placing in great jeopardy the very foundations of the society he’s sworn to defend.

We are witnessing the deadly consequences of a failed international drug strategy. The virus of prohibition that entered the sociopolitical bloodstream decades ago is now shutting down vital organs and inflicting damage that won’t soon heal. It cannot be allowed to continue as it has for so long. This must end and although legalization isn’t a magical or perfect solution, it is at least something that can be tested and manipulated to maximize benefits and minimize harm.

Already, the most apocalyptic visions of drug legalization’s legacy pale in comparison to the nightmare of prohibition that smolders right in front of us. It may soon become very difficult for our opponents to continue presenting reform as the dangerous, frightening approach to the drug problem.

If the traffickers don’t surrender soon, drug czar John Walters will kill them with his bare hands:

U.S. drug czar John P. Walters, in Mexico City to reassure officials that aid to fight drug gangs is in the pipeline, said traffickers resort to "fear and horror" in their campaign to take over government institutions but will ultimately fail.
…
Ultimately, he said, the drug lords will face a stark choice: "They surrender, or they die." [LA Times]

Walters then pulled a hand grenade from his vest and destroyed a speeding SUV from 100 yards away.