More victims in Mexican massacre found across border

OCD_OCD: WASHINGTON - A wave of violence in Mexico has led to a string of gruesome discoveries.

The bodies of nine people were found hanging from a bridge in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, just 6 miles from the U.S. border. Five were men and four women.

Pictures showed the nine bound, gagged and hanged.

A message left with the bodies identified them as members of the Gulf cartel. A rivaling cartel, Los Zetas, is believed to be responsible for the deaths.

All of the victims showed signs of torture. Their hands were tied and their eyes covered, sources tell WTOP.

Mexican authorities say they also discovered 14 headless bodies stuffed into black bags and left inside a van. Fourteen heads were later found outside the mayor's office, preserved in ice boxes.

Mexican military and police authorities are investigating the 23 deaths. U.S. Homeland Security officials are watching the situation carefully because of its proximity to the U.S. and the encroaching violence growing out of the cartel drug wars.

The bodies of three Mexican journalists were discovered Thursday afternoon in the state of Veracruz. They had been dismembered and stuffed into black plastic bags dumped into a waste canal.

At least seven current and former reporters and photographers have been slain in Veracruz over the last 18 months.

More than 50,000 people have died in drug-related violence in Mexico since President Felipe Calderon launched a war on cartels, according to the Los Angeles Times. Former Mexican President Vicente Fox recently told the newspaper that the global war on drugs "useless" and an "absolute failure."

OCD_OCD: The border violence just continues to escalate. 50,000. that is a lot of people. :sad:

southern77: obama and company says it safe on the border... kinda like being in your mamas arms

so dont worry

OCD_OCD: The cartels have all but taken over Mexico and the border areas. and the border violence creeps farther inward...

southern77: ocd please dont be fooled... its already here and has been

OCD_OCD: Sadly, being from Texas, I know how bad it is. But there are times when news reports like this slap you in the face and you wonder if it will ever end or is this to be our future.

davidk14: .

I live within 100 miles of the border with Mexico. I see border patrol agents armed to the gills as they say. I've seen stuff....I can honestly tell you the cartels are here.

.

StuckInTheSixties:

There's a remedy for this:

Legalize drugs and eliminate the black market.

davidk14: .

After thinking about it...I think legalizing drugs or at least pot to start will fuck them up.

.

StuckInTheSixties:

Legalize (all) drugs.

Tax them heavily, with the drugs that cost the greatest harm to society being taxed the most heavily, and those that cost the least harm to society the lightest.

Use the tax revenue to offset the inevitable social damage that occurs from legal drugs.

The result would be a net social gain.

It'll never happen.

Who is to blame?

Every politician that endorses drug prohibition, and to a lesser degree, every citizen that endorses drug prohibition. We have this mess because we allowed it to happen. Arguably, we deserve it.

Comrade_:
Are you sure about legalizing all drugs?

I'll post an extreme scenario:
Making it legal in the US, it will still be illegal in other countries. What you'd get is a bunch of drug tourist (similar to Amsterdam). In the worse kind since the heavier drugs are more addictive and harmful (hallucinations, violence, etc). As an addiction and youths taking it because it is legal and easier to get, you have that break down, right there.
It can still be sold on the black market to avoid taxing and high prices. -Gang effect within the US will still be there when they boycott the legal system.
The only plus side will be that the imported products to make the drugs might increase, cutting the gangs in outside countries and increasing jobs.

Hyenablood: sigh, if this many deaths (killings/murders) happened in one night in any US city where the bodies were publicly displayed with the severed head being sent to a public official. For sure the city would be hunting down the sick F#$% who did it. Sadly murders do happen in US cities all the time, and some are gruesome.

Comrade_:
It's gruesome to add the fear factor, just sick what people will do for money..that is what it goes down to for them.

StuckInTheSixties:

Jack says:
"Making it legal in the US, it will still be illegal in other countries. What you'd get is a bunch of drug tourist (similar to Amsterdam)."

That could possibly happen unless other countries also went legal. But if you want to make the comparison with Amsterdam, ask yourself what is worse: having the thriving black market in existence today, with all of the evils that come with it, or what they have in Amsterdam?

Jack says:
"In the worse kind since the heavier drugs are more addictive and harmful (hallucinations, violence, etc)."

That 's true. Legalization would come at a social expense. Consider alcohol. Having legal alcohol comes at an expense.

But the NET expense to society would be less. Prohibition and the existence of a black market cause terrible effects on society. Start listing the bad stuff that would disappear with a drug-legal society, and it becomes a big list of very expensive things: crime, gangs, prisons, police, customs, corruption, bribery, drive-by shootings, etc. etc. etc.

All of those sorts of things that take a horrible personal and financial toll on society would vanish. In their place would be other things, particularly at first, but that personal and financial cost would be far less.

Jack says:
"As an addiction and youths taking it because it is legal and easier to get, you have that break down, right there."

Wrong. Illegal drugs are easier for kids to get than legal alcohol by virtue of the very illegality. Note that there's no black market supplying alcohol for kids in an alcohol-legal society. Kids would have no black market sources, like they do now for drugs. (Their black market source is generally some other kid.)

Jack says:
"It can still be sold on the black market to avoid taxing and high prices."

I can't see how that would be likely to actually occur. Although the taxes would be high on those drugs, even with the taxes, the price would be far less than they are in a black market, for obvious reasons. Want proof? Do you see a black market for alcohol? No.

Jack says:
"Gang effect within the US will still be there when they boycott the legal system."

That makes no sense whatsoever. Legal drugs would be far cheaper, quality controlled, and available from the same sort of source as alcohol is now. If you were a drug consumer, would you want to buy more expensive drugs with questionable purity from a bunch of criminals? Or would you want to buy cheaper, quality controlled drugs from a licensed controlled "drug store" (or whatever it would be)?

Jack says:
"The only plus side will be that the imported products to make the drugs might increase, cutting the gangs in outside countries and increasing jobs."

What "imported products to make drugs"? Drugs could be cheaply manufactured (or grown) right here in the USA. There's nothing they have elsewhere that we can't have right here.

Comrade_:
"That could possibly happen unless other countries also went legal. But if you want to make the comparison with Amsterdam, ask yourself what is worse: having the thriving black market in existence today, with all of the evils that come with it, or what they have in Amsterdam?"

-You will not get what they have in Amsterdam. Keep in mind what they have in Amsterdam is only marijuana, it's light compared to the other hard drugs as cocaine and what little I know of things there, they do have special places to smoke it and it seems organized as limiting the amounts that a person can have etc. It is a drug that can be managed.

"That 's true. Legalization would come at a social expense. Consider alcohol. Having legal alcohol comes at an expense."
-Also Alcohol is light, it wouldn't cause most of the ills that the heavier drugs will. Yes it has it's expense which we still haven't overcome, I don't see the 'expense' that a heavier drug being less or similar to alcohol. The main drug I'm thinking of is the heavier ones and what I see they have on people.

It made no sense because you separated it from what was stated ahead of it: "It can still be sold on the black market to avoid taxing and high prices. -Gang effect within the US will still be there when they boycott the legal system."
Meaning the gangs will run the underground markets that sell the drugs cheaper, boycotting the system (depending on the cost, if it will be cheaper to import). Keep in mind there are 2 sides, the buyer and the seller. People sell drugs as income, it will not stop them if there is a financial gain to them.

Using the legalisation of Alcohol to compare a new change in the drug system has it's faults. As alcohol was never on the level with illegal drugs. Correct me if I'm wrong but it was always generally legal there was not underground market or system already in place for it as drug is on a level by itself.

I get that your point is a scenario, as mine is also a scenario. Part of it is to show the worse case scenarios and how those scenarios will be maintain or prevented.

Yan26: @ SITS. I dont know much about the situation in the US.
Your eg of alcohol is correct. But there is 1 difference. Alcohol is much less addictive than drugs.Also alcohol is much less dangerous than drugs too. A person who drinks one beer a day is not an alcoholic. But I am guessing even half the frequency of drugs would result in a person becoming an addict. But out of curiosity wouldnt legalizing drugs create a contradiction. On one hand you would have programs instructing kids on how they should never take drugs .On the other hand you would have the government generating large profits( higher taxes more money more profits) from the sale of drugs. Do you think this kind of a contradiction would confuse kids as to how dangerous and addictive drugs are for them and there by result in a larger nos using it?

StuckInTheSixties:

This is rapidly turning into one of those things were I say something, Jack responds to it, I repeat Jack's response, and respond, Jack repeats his first response, my response to that, and his response to that ...etc. etc.

I'll run the risk of appearing that I'm conceding the "last word" on most of that because frankly, I don't give a shit, and it's too tedious to continue on an endless spiral of having each post consisting of point added to point added to point added to point. Fuck it.

But Jack, I'll ask you a simple question:

Alcohol is legal and taxed. Why aren't gangs in the business of selling black market alcohol that hasn't been taxed? They once were, during prohibition. Now they're not. Why not? Because when there is a legal market, the necessity of a black market simply disappears for all kinds of reasons, mainly economical reasons, which is the only reason for any gang to sell anything. Black market expands the price so far out of proportion to the cost of manufacturing/growing that it dwarfs the cost of a legal product even if it's taxed heavily.

As for Yan, he is woefully mistaken about alcohol not being addictive and dangerous, and about the drug culture in the USA, in general.

I tire of this conversation.

Yan26: I simply stated that alcohol is not as dangerous or as addictive as drugs. Implying that drugs give you a very little margin of error.EG - Had too much alcohol. You might get drunk and do something stupid maybe throw up. Had too much drugs you simply OD and die.
Second I didnt state anything about American drug culture.I clearly stated that I dont know anything about it . On the contrary I asked you a question precisely because I dont know about it and wanted to know your opinion.

Comrade_:
If you say fuck it then why ask questions as if you're interested in a discourse? You are already convinced of your own view then why bother with anything else.

If you wish to compare alcohol to cocaine or other hard drugs then you are free to. If you think that legalizing all drugs (light and hard) will go smoothly as legalizing alcohol then you're free to that as well.

StuckInTheSixties:

Look, read the first post of this thread. You want that, you continue prohibition as it is. You want to change it, you get rid of the prohibition.

Comrade_:
You think it is easily patched by legalizing all drugs, without weighing what problems might occur after? Drugs are illegal for a reason, gangs stemmed from that for a reason for (money and power), junkies stem from that for a reason too.
If you can't stare at all parts of the issue then it will not change, it'd just change to another problem that will need patching up later on.
We're not changing the world in a thread, so I'd not press anything, I don't like the drug system as everyone else. It's nothing new and not limited to one country.

StuckInTheSixties:

"You think it is easily patched by legalizing all drugs, without weighing what problems might occur after?"

Re-read my posts.

Comrade_:
Yes I have, your legalization suggestion is what I was referring to. Much heavier problems than you placed forward.

StuckInTheSixties:

You'll have basically the same problems we have now ... people determined to fuck themselves up. The difference is that they'll be able to do so legally, and the economic and social costs associated with that are dwarfed by the economic and social costs of prohibition. If you think I am blithe at the negative effects of legalization, you misunderstand me. Legalization will entail a host of terrible effects.

But the NET costs will be less.

Again, it's very simple: You want what we got now, then you continue with the way we deal with it now. You want change, you change.

OCD_OCD: I have to say that I'm not averse to legalizing pot.

Other drugs, no. I can't even conceive of legalizing meth, which literally everything under the kitchen sink goes into the making. People who have used meth are effed up forever.

Another problem is knowing the huge taxpayer expense we already incur for drug and alcohol addiction programs. The cost of addiction care on the public would sink the taxpayers even further into the toilet.

StuckInTheSixties:

Drug and alcohol programs are expensive, but miniscule compared to the greater current costs of prohibition.

Remember, if you're comparing costs, you must consider the NET costs of everything involved. How much does our entire prison system cost? End prohibition, and cut that to less than half of what it is now. How much does the DEA, and all other drugs agencies, cost? End prohibition, and the cost of those goes to ZERO. The Coast Guard cutters, aircraft, etc. searching for drug shipments? ZERO. Customs efforts to find imported drugs? ZERO.

Those are big ones. There are zillions of small one, too. Your local police drug sniffing dogs? Cost after prohibition? ZERO. Those idiot "reverse buy" street arrests we see on COPS on television? ZERO. Narcotics divisions in every police department? ZERO.

Consider the unpleasant reality of corruption that goes along with prohibition. Legalize, and say bye bye to that.

Meth is terrible, as is crack, heroin, etc.

But if drugs ... ALL drugs ... were legal, most people would naturally gravitate toward substances that were less harmful. It would take time, and the change-over would be mess, and fraught with all sorts of difficulties and anecdotal tragedies, but eventually, it would sort itself out.

Look at alcohol usage, which is legal. As a society, we long ago gravitated toward beer, not whiskey, not tequila, not gin, not 181 proof rum, not pure grain alcohol. That wasn't always the case. Spirits were far more popular during the Prohibition Era. We gravitated toward beer.

Consider winos. They're laying around in alleys. Their lives are wrecks. And they drink the cheap, shitty, very destructive fortified wine. They present an image to us. They're winos. No one looks at winos, and thinks: "Yeah, I want THAT!"

Same with paint sniffers. They're the dregs of society. No one aspires to be a paint sniffer. They're an aberration.

The harsher drugs, if legal, would eventually become like cheap, shitty fortified wine and paint. People would use them, but nearly everyone would gravitate away from those substances and to other substances which are less extreme. It seems unintuitive that if you made those things more available, they'd be used less. But it only seems that way if you don't consider that other, less harmful substances would also be available, just the same way that beer is available.

Meth-heads, crack-heads, and junkies would become drug-winos, tragic, but less harmful to society than they are with prohibition in place, and everything that entails.

There's one other remedy for that "Mexico problem," and the drug problem, in general, that hasn't been discussed here:

We could decide, as a number of other countries have, that we simply won't tolerate it, and go to really super-harsh penalties, such as using the death penalty on the common pot smoker.

But we're not going to do that.

Nor are we going to legalize, nor are we going remove the black market through ultra-suppression.

We're going to continue with the mess we have now.

Tra-la-la ...