The Mexican Cartel's Hi-Tech Drug Tunnels 448
In the past five years, more than 100 drug tunnels between Mexico and the U.S. have been discovered. This is double the number found over the previous 15 years. Not only are they growing in number, but the tunnels are becoming much more sophisticated, including electric rail systems, hydraulic elevators, and secret entrances (one opened via a fake water tap). From the article: "When architect Felipe de Jesus Corona built Mexico's most powerful drug lord a 200-foot-long tunnel under the U.S.-Mexican border with a hydraulic lift entrance opened by a fake water tap, the kingpin was impressed. The architect 'made me one f---ing cool tunnel' Joaquin 'Shorty' Guzman said, according to court testimony that helped sentence Corona to 18 years in prison in 2006. Built below a pool table in his lawyer's home, the tunnel was among the first of an increasingly sophisticated drug transport system used by Guzman's Sinaloa cartel. U.S. customs agents seized more than 2,000 pounds of cocaine which had allegedly been smuggled along the underground route."
Sounds like (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Sounds like (Score:5, Funny)
Funny I was thinking they watched too much Hogan's Heros.
Re:Sounds like (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
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This might work as a game mode, where everything would have a local price. Few teams would secretly burrow, one team would build fences and vandalize. (i forgot how minecraft vandalism is called)
Re: (Score:2)
It's called "griefing".
Re: (Score:2)
Some griefers are professionals too.
Ah, the war on drugs... (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Support American Farmers
Boycott Mexican Dirt Weed
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Libertarian bumpersticker:
-- Drugs Not Thugs --
I think "Drugs AND Thugs" would be more appropriate.
Re:Ah, the war on drugs... (Score:5, Insightful)
The right to have control over your own body.
substance DEPENDENCE (Score:3)
The right to have control over your own body.
Right. Yeah, see, there's a reason they call it substance dependence [wikipedia.org].
That's the whole fucking point. With many drugs, you don't have any control without (significant) outside interference.
Meanwhile, you destroy your body. Your life falls apart. You hurt people close to you emotionally and physically, sometimes for life (children of alcoholics are a good example.) You commit crimes to pay for drugs. You lose control and inhibitions that keep you from
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
More than that, the right to only be searched under a court order, the right of freedom of movement, the right to work, the right to live (trigger happy cops), the right to not be discriminated, the right to enjoy equal protection under law. Now, the war on terror is part of the slippery slope. "We are searching you because we are fighting those evil terrorists, also, we are fighting those evil drug smugglers. Do you resist? Are you in favor of terrorists and stoners?"
Re:Ah, the war on drugs... (Score:4, Insightful)
Driving is a separate action from drinking or taking drugs.
Anyway, Google and others are working on driverless cars. Hopefully the problem will resolve itself.
Re:Ah, the war on drugs... (Score:5, Informative)
Let's see... drug testing as a requirement of employment, jack booted thugs throwing flash bang grenades terrorizing your family and killing your pets in the night from bad intel, drug interdiction techniques by the police that profile citizens and justify searches (and if you exercise your right to refuse, they will go over the situation with a fine tooth comb and find a reason). They make no apologies for these acts, in the name of the War on Drugs.
It may not have happened to you personally, but you should not accept that behaviour because it just as easily could.
Re:Ah, the war on drugs... (Score:5, Insightful)
jack booted thugs throwing flash bang grenades terrorizing your family and killing your pets in the night from bad intel,
You can add to that list people who've been killed in their own homes by jack-booted police, because the police failed to announce themselves as police and the homeowner thought they were dealing with an armed robbery.
try walking around with $10,000 in cash (Score:5, Informative)
Since most people on Craigslist require cash transactions, that jeopardizes a great many peoples' right to presumption of innocence. After the money is confiscated, they are put into the position of proving they are innocent.
Seth
Re:Ah, the war on drugs... (Score:5, Informative)
The right to keep your property unless there's due process: under "civill forfeiture" laws, police can and do seize cash from people without even filing charges and keep it for themselves.
In one notorious case, the first item in the "investigation" folder for a "drug" case was an appraisal of the person's house.
Yes, you can theoretically sue to get your property back. But there are also cases where the government has seized lawyer's fees after they've been paid, alleging that they were proceeds of criminal activity.
It's working (Score:5, Funny)
Clearly the war on drugs is very successful and victory is immanent.
Re:It's working (Score:5, Funny)
Just like the war on spelling.
Re:It's working (Score:4, Funny)
Hay! Knot owl off use half spill chuckers!
Re:It's working (Score:5, Insightful)
Immanent: taking place within the mind of the subject and having no effect outside of it.
Re:It's working (Score:5, Insightful)
If the leader of Mexico's most powerful drug cartel says "build me a tunnel", do you have to option of saying "no sir, that stuff is BAD for people"?
I know, it's a mistake to second-guess a jury verdict that I know almost nothing about, but superficially, 14 years in prison for choosing the "I'll stay alive, thank you," option seems like a lot. It's almost enough to make me wonder how effective the US drug enforcement laws and policies are.
Almost. But not quite. When it's time, I'll just head back to the voting booth and vote the way the straight-talking folks in my political party have told me is best. Thank you, "vote by party" option!
Re:It's working (Score:5, Insightful)
You are assuming that he was willing to speak to the police at all after he was arrested. He may have been more fearful of his life then.
Unfortunately letting all underlings get off the hook with "They'd kill me if I didn't (x)!" would pretty much let all of them operate with impunity. Either they risk their life saying 'No' to the boss, they risk their life testifying against their boss when they get caught, or they take the prison sentence and be given a comfortable retirement by the mob when they are released (as their reward for serving a sentence in silence). This is assuming we won't give them all witness protection, which I guess we don't.
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There's a lesson to be learned here... if building a tunnel for a mexi drug lord, ensure he pays you enough to get far away and live comfortably upon completion.
Re:It's working (Score:5, Insightful)
But the problem is, how do you negotiate that wage? Your "or I won't do it" is much less convincing than his "or I'll kill you and your family".
Re:It's working (Score:4, Insightful)
But then again how many people are qualified to build a tunnel? I'm sure you gotta factor stuff in like the ground composition and in this case the engine for the hydraulic pump, I'd imagine good tunnel builders are hard to find. Otherwise, take the "Breaking Bad" approach and eliminate your competition :) , doesn't make you much better than the cartels, but your no good dead either. I can't imagine the cartel threatening him like though, if they deal like that w everybody, nobody will step forward to do anything for them, and kidnappings only get you so far and probably cost more than just paying the guy.
He must have had a reason for working w the cartel in the first place though.
Re:It's working (Score:5, Funny)
Wages? (Score:3)
If what I have heard is correct, the drug smugglers often kill the low level after their work is done. ( Low level as in diggers This gives the term a whole new meaning. ) They do this because the workers know the location of the tunnel and "dead men tell no tales". The architect probably didn't have to be killed if he just designed the tunnel and didn't know where it was. At any rate, if they plan to kill the workers later for security reasons, they can promise very high salaries knowing that they won'
Re:It's working (Score:4, Interesting)
Yeah, like the kidnappings of telecom workers in NE Mexico. Unlike all other kidnappings, there has never been a demand for ransom, just dead bodies of those who chose the "I won't do it" option. There have been mass kidnappings at conferences. The cartels are building their own communications infrastructure.
Re:It's working (Score:4, Interesting)
...or they take the prison sentence and be given a comfortable retirement by the mob when they are released (as their reward for serving a sentence in silence)...
I can't offer a source (sorry), but I was listening to this podcast on criminal justice a few years ago, and they talked about it being semi-common in Japan for the Yakuza to assassinate their own members in prison. It wasn't because they were afraid the guy would rat them out, it was because he was just a low level employee that they didn't feel like they owed very much to, and it was cheaper to pay for him to be killed then to be obligated to pay his retirement when he got out.
I wonder if that ever happens stateside.
Re:It's working (Score:4, Interesting)
Of course, the original point is still valid in the general case and possibly in Corona's too, assuming that he didn't enter into the deal willingly. How might an honest Mexican safely decline a job once they have ascertained that their employer's trade typically has a very literal implementation of "head count reduction" with regards to terminating employment? Given the alledged levels of corruption within Mexican law enforcement, I doubt their Witness Protection Program is going to be seen as a particularly safe option...
Re:It's working (Score:5, Insightful)
Clearly the war on drugs is very successful and victory is immanent.
Actually, I think it has been successful. How else would law enforcement have been able to convince people that they need automatic weapons, panopticon surveillance capabilities, and the right to seize private property and recycle the proceeds into their own budgets? The war on drugs has been vastly successful for all the prison companies and their investors, the firearms companies and their investors, surveillance equipment makers, and all those politicians who can always vote for more war-on-drugs funding as a way to get some cheap votes.
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It'll certainly blow up in their faces one day, but remember who is leading the war on drugs, and that's parents who are too lazy / stupid to teach their kids not to snort coke at 16. They are the loudest and most obnoxious about fighting drugs and thus get law enforcement their autos and their abusive rights.
I'm interested in seeing what my generation does though, there is almost nobody who doesn't know what the drugs are or their effects if not first handed, and the current generation's political influen
Re:It's working (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm interested in seeing what my generation does though, there is almost nobody who doesn't know what the drugs are or their effects if not first handed, and the current generation's political influence fades off. But for us to replace those people is another couple of decades, so bear on I guess.
Nope, doesn't work like that. Hell, my generation - who grew up in the '70's did plenty of drugs. So did half the current lawmakers. More than half if you include alcohol as a 'drug' (it is but most people don't think so - denial is a wonderful thing). Funny thing, entrenched bureaucracies tend to remain entrenched bureaucracies. That and the weird Calvinist (the preacher, not the kid) mindset that is deeply embedded in this country's psych will keep the Boogy man alive for many a generation.
Re:It's working (Score:5, Insightful)
If people would, you know, just stop buying the damn stuff
But they won't. Any other fantasies you'd like to share?
Re:It's working (Score:5, Insightful)
The real solution is to legalize drugs, and tax them. Instead of spending all sorts of tax dollars on a losing proposition, the government could be making hand over fist in revenue AND take the narco gangs out of the picture. Mexico isn't a dangerous place because of drugs, it is a dangerous place because of the WAR on drugs.
But then again, that is pure fantasy of mine.
Re:It's working (Score:5, Informative)
Most of your points are refuted by the result of the 18th amendment, and it's ultimate repeal via the 21st, in the US. The mob flourished after prohibition was repealed because we gave them the opportunity to make huge margins and create vast networks for their business, and once alcohol was removed they just moved to other things, fully funded. It's taken decades to reduce the grip of national organized crime.
Although there is a black market for tobacco and alcohol in the US, it is relatively small. The goal of any regulation and tax scheme is to make it difficult and expensive to obtain the "sin" items, without making it so difficult or expensive that the black market can make a profit off of it.
People in the trade will not magically become good, but it would be nice to start reducing the participation of new drug runners in their illicit endeavors rather than encouraging it through the promise of easy wealth.
As for health care, stop covering those diseases, and make it public that smoking, alcohol, an drug related ailments will not be reimbursed by taxpayer funded health care.
Re:It's working (Score:5, Insightful)
1. Legalizing drugs would lead to more drug users and addicts. A vast majority of crime is perpetrated by drug users (alcohol included)
This is unsupported by data. Wherever drug laws are liberalized drug use stays the same or decreases. Also, you're starting off on a disingenuous note. The vast majority of *everything* is perpetuated by drug users because the vast majority of humanity uses drugs.
2. Legalizing and then taxing drugs would lead to... wait for it... black market for untaxed or cheaper drugs ! (see cigarettes, alcohol, past attempts at legalizing drugs like opium)
We already have a black market for untaxed drugs. Legalizing would move at least some of that into the legal market. Looking at alcohol and tobacco, most of that traffic is legal. Wouldn't we benefit by doing the same with other drugs?
3. Legalizing and sanctioning drugs would lead to drugs with potentially limited potency due to Government control on the product which leads to.. black market
Which is why a sound drug policy wouldn't do that.
4. Drug dealers, runners, and general baddies are not going to suddenly because good citizens just because drugs can be purchased over the counter. The sell this shit for money, cause they want money... See #2 and #3 - they won't be out of a job anyways.
Organized crime will never disappear, but we can make it less profitable. You've offered no reason why we shouldn't.
5. Imagine our healthcare costs when we increase drug users drastically by making drugs acceptable and more available. We've already wasted lives, energy, and costs on smokers and heavy drinkers, why on Earth would we want to add more to this???
It's more likely that drug abusers will die more rapidly than the rest of the population. That will save us money on end of life health care. This is the case with tobacco today.
Legalizing these things just redefines the problem.
F. U. D.
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I tend to think the reach and power of Mexican drug cartels to drive up to the Beltway and assassinate U.S. politicians is exaggerated. They have a lot of crazy fuckers playing on their teams, but last I heard they don't have any T-800s yet.
And yet... every urban street dealer loves the movie Scarface. That scene where they put a bomb under the guy's car? That was because he was on his way to the U.N. to give a speech about legalizing drugs. Not cracking down on drugs, but legalizing them. I think everyone
Re:It's working (Score:5, Interesting)
I love the way people blame the War on Drugs for all of the related problems.
It is responsible for all the related problems.
If people would, you know, just stop buying the damn stuff then the cartel's main income would dry up within a month
Yeah, and if the cat would stop puking on the floor I wouldn't have to clean it up. The same was said about alcohol in the 1920s, but guess what? Alcohol consumption doubled during prohibition. People have been intoxicating themselves since before they were people, and they're not going to stop just because some idiot writes a law against it.
The only way you're going to stop the violence, graft, corruption, and all the other ills caused by the drug laws is how we stopped it in 1933 -- legalize, tax, and regulate. You'd have far fewer heroin overdoses if purity was standardized.
If crack was legal and crackheads could buy the stuff for a dollat an ounce they wouldn't have to break into my house to support their habits. The drug laws are counterproductive and insane.
Re:It's working (Score:5, Informative)
The same was said about alcohol in the 1920s, but guess what? Alcohol consumption doubled during prohibition.
I'd like to see your source for that. Most studies [wikipedia.org] say that consumption went down 20%-30%, but people drank more during each drinking session.
Re:It's working (Score:5, Insightful)
It is responsible for all the related problems.
If crack was legal and crackheads could buy the stuff for a dollat an ounce they wouldn't have to break into my house to support their habits.
Hang on, how is a crack-head's addiction a consequence of the war on drugs?
I don't think that's what mcgrew was saying. I read that as "if it was legal, it would be cheaper. If it was cheaper, crackheads could beg just like the alcoholics do to support their habit, rather than breaking into my house to pay for the shit.".
Re:It's working (Score:4, Interesting)
I've often said that organized crime is simply the government for things the main government refuses to deal with. They create rackets (departments) to handle their various operations, and when they don't get their way, they break out the guns.
Re:It's working (Score:5, Interesting)
"Essentially legal" and "actually legal" are very different.
The "legal" dispensaries have essentially the same supply issues as the street dealers and in some cases are competing with them for the same product and have to match street dealers for supplies. And the whole supply chain is still considered illegal.
In some cases, dispensaries may have a supply advantage (grow operation) but they also have to supply a high quality product that its more expensive to produce and also seem to provide a lot of high quality variety which, again, comses from a constrained and illicit supply.
In short, the dispensaries have high supply costs, just like street dealers, and they also have to supply high quality -- no brown Mexican crap.
Even if the dispensaries had lower supply costs, they are selling something else -- high quality and more importantly, the convenience and safety of a retail purchase.
If marijuana was ACTUALLY legal, the supply constraints go away -- what does it do to prices when farmers figure out how to grow high quality marijuana measured in the millions of bushels? When 'elite' brands can setup hydroponic grow operations in half-million square foot warehouses?
At this point retail competition will push the price down since there's little incentive or need to keep it at parity with street prices.
Re:It's working (Score:5, Insightful)
Others have already pointed out the fallacy in your argument, so I'll zero in on this:
it will be very, very difficult to implement any sort of drug testing for employment. You really can't test for and ban employment because of a legal substance. For example, it is not legal to exclude someone from a job based on alchohol use, although you can fire them later for being drunk on the job.
That's a GOOD thing. If the bus driver isn't getting high on the job then there's no reason she shouldn't be driving a bus, any more than she should be fired for having a beer after work. Sorry, but your argument is just stupid.
Re:You just can't legalize ALL substances. (Score:5, Insightful)
If some of the "harder" more addictive substances were legalized and made cheaper we would see a huge increase in abuse.
That's a fallacy. Alcohol use and abuse soared during prohibition. Tobacco use has been falling for decades, while marijuana use has increased. Cocaine was still illegal in the eighties when crack was invented.
Crack use has declined because people see what it does. Anybody who would smoke crack under any circumstances at all is already smoking it. Would you smoke it if it were legal? All of the illegal substances are easily obtained on the black market. The laws aren't stopping anyone.
Re:It's working (Score:5, Insightful)
I love the way people blame the War on Drugs for all of the related problems.
If people would, you know, just stop buying the damn stuff then the cartel's main income would dry up within a month, compared to the years to decades it'll take to convince the USA and other nations to legalise the stuff.
Well, that would be simple, now wouldn't it? I take it you have no vices? If we arbitrarily made your favorite food illegal, I assume you would just stop eating it and be happy with that outcome.
Really though, the reason the War on Drugs is blamed is that it is what causes the violence and crime. If drugs were legal, the black market for them would cease to exist, or at least become a shadow of its former self. It is that black market, and the risks it entails, that causes the crime, not the drugs themselves. Alcohol prohibition should have taught us this, but we are slow learners it seems.
If you want to take drugs that's fine, it's your choice. But it's also your choice to give the money to the people who commit these crimes. Are the thrills really worth that, or do the users just not give a damn what they're doing to the Mexican people so long as they have their fun?
Again, it is not the user who causes the crime and violence. It is the behavior necessitated by the illegality. The ones who do not care about the suffering of the Mexican people are the Mexican and US governments. For it is they who keep the laws in place that cause the violence, corruption and crime. If they would allow a free and fair market to exist, we wouldn't have the trouble we have.
Or, we could just try your solution. It seems much more simple, right? All we need to do is stop millions of people from doing something they like to do. How hard could it be?
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Well, that would be simple, now wouldn't it? I take it you have no vices? If we arbitrarily made your favorite food illegal, I assume you would just stop eating it and be happy with that outcome.
Drugs like heroin and cocaine are not just arbitrarily made illegal, they are considered unhealthy and dangerous enough to require prohibition. You can argue about whether this is true or not, but you can't just say they're as harmless as eating a particular biscuit or something.
Re:It's working (Score:4, Insightful)
yeah, no one thinks about that stuff
money from pot and cocaine goes back to mexico and filters through the rest of south america, fueling all sorts of violence across the border. heroin funds those same people, plus ends up in the hands of the warlords in afghanistan and pakistan that our troops are fighting. But the disconnect is too great for anyone to correlate their use to the massive amounts of violence at the other end of the chain.
But then, if our concern was trully about the welfare of people, whether they be our own people who are either addicted or rotting in jail, or people in the source countries who are living lives under constant fear of the drug funded narco groups, we'd have to look at things objectively and ask: "which is more realistic, asking the millions of us citizens who are well aware of these dynamics to put aside their vices, let alone asking people whose drug use has escalated to the point that they no longer care about their own well being to endure withdrawal and the complete change of lifestyle required to get off of the stuff, in order to help nameless, faceless peasants half a world away OR legalizing the stuff, regulating it, and allowing companies and individuals to produce it here and distribute it on the cheap, thereby removing billions of dollars from the narco groups coffers?"
One solution requires the getting millions of people who are either unaware or willfully ignorant to make substantial changes to their lifestyle for no descrenable benefit. The other solution requires the majority of about 535 people who are either well informed on the direct and indirect consequences or who are surrounded by people with a lot of knowledge on that issue, to write legislation that would put a permanent end to the black market and all the associated woes involved.
I tend to think the second solution is the only realistic way to put an end it. If you think otherwise, perhaps you'd suggest a realistic solution.
Where does the money go? (Score:3)
If they were legal, the money wouldn't be going to violent criminal gangs that terrorize whole cities.
One of the most addictive drugs on earth, nicotine, is legal. My mother smoked. She died quietly, in a hospital, with pain medication. No bloggers got beheaded by the companies who sold her the tobacco.
Geek In Us All (Score:5, Insightful)
This kind of thing speaks to the geek in me.
I mean, who else hasn't daydreamed about how we would do crime. Personally I'd never actually do anything of this nature... not only for reasons of morality and ethics.. but because I'm somewhat of a coward.
The thing that really gets me, is that we only hear about the guys who screw up.. and usually they screw up for dumb reasons. This would indicate to me that there are smarter people with even crazier schemes that have and will go undetected.
Re:Geek In Us All (Score:5, Funny)
Like the guys at wall street.
Re:Geek In Us All (Score:5, Interesting)
This kind of thing speaks to the geek in me.
I think of it just like building a model railroad, except its a model subway. And its about half scale instead of "N" or "HO" scale.
It would be fun to have your own subway, just for the sake of having your own subway.
And you get to build an electric car, well, a electric railroad car, without having to hear an infinity of people whining about how it only has a 300 mile range per charge and is therefore useless under all conditions.
If I ever have enough rural property to build a railroad, I'm going to way outdo the live steamers have a subway instead of an aboveground railroad.
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> I mean, who else hasn't daydreamed about how we would do crime. Personally I'd never actually do anything of this nature... not only for reasons of morality and
> ethics.. but because I'm somewhat of a coward.
Well ethics? I dunno, that all depends on where your ethics and morality derive from. Law is not ethics, and neither is morality, all three can be in conflict. There is nothing unethical, or immoral, about breaking the law, especially if you don't believe in the rights of the government to restr
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Have you seen some of the research into serial killings? One study [physorg.com] from 2007 implied that we may underestimate the number of people killed by serial killers each year by a factor of 10.
So yeah, I agree that there are probably hundreds of thousands of small- to big-time crooks that are getting away with their crimes on a year-to-year basis, undetected, not making all the dumb mistakes. Occasionally one of them gets caught and makes the news and we're all horrified that this was happening "just under our no
We won! (Score:5, Funny)
With the discovery of this tunnel and the seizure of 2000 pounds of blow, the War on Drugs is clearly all but over.
Re:We won! (Score:5, Funny)
With the discovery of this tunnel and the seizure of 2000 pounds of blow, the War on Drugs is clearly all but over.
In other news, after the 250 pounds of blow was submitted into evidence, a flood of cheap blow somehow made its way onto the streets.
Obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
I see nothing! I know nothing!
- Schultz
You'd think... (Score:5, Interesting)
...that they could detect the activity required to build a tunnel.
I've never used marijuana, but at this point I don't see its' continued illegality being beneficial. Legalize it for those of-age, require standards for safety, and regulate it in a fashion similar to tobacco and alcohol, where one can't smoke it in public generally outside of the marijuana-equivalent of a beer garden similar to how tobacco consumption is prohibited in many places, where one can't drive after consuming it like a DUI, but where some businesses could get licenses to allow consumption on the property, and where people could consume it in their homes, provided that it doesn't impact their neighbors and if they're renting, that it's permitted by their landlord, similar to cigarettes. Allow employers to dismiss employees who show up high in the same fashion as dismissing employees who show up drunk.
Do that and you just gutted much of the business of the cartels, put many of the street gangs and lowlife dealers out of business, and would prevent it from being cut with dangerous chemicals.
Re:You'd think... (Score:5, Insightful)
...that they could detect the activity required to build a tunnel.
Which 'they' are we talking about here? If you're talking about the Mexican authorities, bear in mind that right now just about any officer that attempts to do something about the cartels is killed off fairly quickly.
It's not as easy as you think. (Score:2)
It would look just like any other building project, since you always have to dig a hole in the ground for your foundation. Sure, they'd be removing more dirt, but it's not hard to conceal that.
Also, this tunnel as used for moving cocaine, which also should not be illegal.
Re:You'd think... (Score:4, Insightful)
I've never used marijuana, but at this point I don't see its' continued illegality being beneficial. Legalize it [..] Do that and you just gutted much of the business of the cartels, put many of the street gangs and lowlife dealers out of business, and would prevent it from being cut with dangerous chemicals.
You're going to have to add in cocaine, too: Forget Taxing Marijuana; The Real Money's In Cocaine [npr.org]
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
Because plenty of reputable guys on Wall Street are selling Abilify for $700 for 60mg. I don't think ACTUAL illegal drugs are that much per gram to make to feel good.
Why would anyone want to abuse Abilify? That stuff has a massive list of severe and nasty side effects and doesn't do anything to make you feel good; it pretty much just steamrollers your emotions flat -- unless you hit some of the emotional side effects which pretty much just make you want to kill yourself.
My daughter is on Abilify and it actually does seem to help her, but she has a serious mood disorder. Even though it helps stabilize her moods, her psychiatrist is taking her off of it because of the
As always ... legalize it and tax it. (Score:5, Insightful)
1. Move the production from off-shore to real USofA American farmers and small businesses. Then tax them.
2. Make sure that the products from #1 are "clean" and "certified". That means jobs for government workers filling in the paperwork and running the labs. And fees.
3. Distribution. Real Americans driving real trucks. (Tax their paychecks.)
4. Sales. More taxes.
One important thing would be to maintain the same price in every market in the nation so that there is no profit in smuggling it any more.
Another would be to limit the production by each grower. You do not want mega-corps involved. This is just to fight drug-related crime. Not to drive brand marketing. No "Joe Camel" ads. No ads at all. Plain black on white labels with the product name and the growers government ID and the health warning.
And dump some of the tax profits into FREE programs to get people to stop using the products.
Most of the people out there would be fine as recreational users. Just as with alcohol.
Re: (Score:2)
I actually wonder about the economics of this.
One would need to create all kinds of new laws, regulations, and enforcement agencies.. none of which would be particularily cheap.
I still think it's the right thing to do. As I see it crime around drug dealing is the big problem with drugs, not the drugs themselves. There is crime around drug using as well, but the same can be said about alcohol .. and more importantly it's not going anywhere. At least if drugs were legalized, we'd get rid of _some_ of the drug
Re:As always ... legalize it and tax it. (Score:5, Insightful)
Drug use is expensive - let's not kid ourselves. Look at health care expenditures for our favorite drugs in the US - alcohol and tobacco. Hell, those drugs have their very own federal bureau. But humans do things that are counterproductive to our health and safety. It isn't the government's business to keep us all safely cocooned and protected from ourselves - it's the government's responsibility to keep us safe from each other.
So, yes, regulation (and treatment programs for those folks that get in trouble from the drugs) is expensive but that's what money is for. Good luck getting that bit of enlightenment past the brimfire and damnation ethos that runs through vast tracks of this country.
Just like Slashdot's inability to figure out the Apple demographic, most of us can't quite figure out how fucking weird an enormous swath of the US really is when it comes to moral issues. I mean, Michelle Bachman? Really? She makes Sarah Palin look sane.
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Pharmaceutical interests?
It wouldn't surprise me at all.. but I can't think of a reason for them to care.
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What would happen if the general public realized you can eat/smoke this simple plant to ease your pain, nausea, insomnia, depression, anxiety, etc? Instead of paying hundreds of dollars a month to pharmaceutical companies an individual could just grow a couple marijuana plants.
Obviously there is a need for medicine. I am not saying we should replace penicillin with weed.
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Painkillers like Advil and Tylenol can be easily and much more cheaply replaced with their herbal options.
Palliative care, oncology and minor surgical procedures would be a lot cheaper when patients (or a hospital) can just grow their own medicine.
Re:You'd think... (Score:5, Interesting)
I am with you but...on some things I have to ask why?
Why should we assume that the exact same regulatory scheme is correct for pot as it is alcohol? In fact, there is ample evidence that they are wildly different, and should be treated as such.
Should prohibition on driving, for example, be based on actual evidence of risk? Sadly, only one study has ever been done that wasn't tained by bad process. I hope we can all agree that pulling non-smokers off the street, to experience it for their first time, for driving tests is not an accurate measurement of impairment. Secondly, I hope we can agree that looking at "marijuana related accidents" without any attempt to seperate out those on marijuana from those drunk who also smoked (which accounted for the majority of cases btw)...is also suboptimal.
Only one study (of which I am aware), by the UK Highway Safety Administration, saw these errors, commented on them, and did a better study, using actual smokers in actual impairment tests. What did they find? They found little to no impairment. In fact, they found that what little decreases in reaction time were measured were more than made up for by an abundance of caution on the part of drivers.
So... shouldn't we.... actually attempt to get some unbiased studies around the issue BEFORE we decide how to regulate it? Maybe, I don't know, take the ability to approve or disapprove studies away from the NIDA who has no interest in anything but proving their existing conclusion?
Re:You'd think... (Score:4, Insightful)
Well I see, if "some guy on slashdot" went and "put a camera on his car" that sounds way more valid than a test done by a real organization whose entire existence is to research how to make highways safer. Of course, your assessment of that rigorous study does, in fact, agree with the UK Highway Safety Council. They did, in fact, find they could measure reaction times as slower.... but... thats not really the whole story.
Driving is not all about reaction time and who can twitch on the brakes the fastest, The person who gives more following distance, and avoids situations where he doesn't have an out (among other good habbits) doesn't put himself in as many situations where he needs those twitchy reactions.
Having been drunk and stoned at various points, I can honestly say, the difference is pretty fucking obvious to me. Alcohol's worst effect, in my mind, is that for many people it increases confidence and makes people think they are capable. I remember my first time drunk, sitting on a couch next to a friend of mine, plastered off my ass, saying "I don't see the problem, I could totally drive right now, no issue"... at which point i stood up, took one step, and fell flat on my face. I have seen similar countless times, and even seen people jump in the car and drive away in that state.
This is an effect, very specifically, of alcohol. By the same token, ive seen people take a few hits of some pot, and then insist that they can't get off the couch, and are far too stoned to even talk (or so they claim.... verbally.... talking....)
Some drugs have similar effects to alcohol, but many don't. Hell even cocaine shouldn't be in the same discussion, or meth. Can you really argue that meth causes impairment when its given to fighter pilots who have to stay up for inordinate amounts of time?
Each is different, if we are going to have these sorts of regulations, they should be based on scientific evidence not guesses and anecdotes.
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I've never used marijuana, but at this point I don't see its' continued illegality being beneficial.
Same here. But in the unlikely event that a politician starts making progress toward rolling back the New Prohibition, they'd probably be assassinated by someone who'd stand to lose gigabucks if they succeeded.
But no politician is going to make progress on that topic in this f*cked up country. So the best approach for citizens is to adopt vices that don't put money in the hands of organized crime or neighborhood thugs.
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All about the drugs, guns and gasoline .... (Score:5, Insightful)
As a former politician recently said, the truth with politics is that *everything* revolves around money generated by drugs, war and energy.
It's just like Prohibition! (Score:2)
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Damned outsourcing!
Perfect spot for underground explosives tests... (Score:2, Interesting)
Why not bore holes along the US/Mex border, about 50 ft deep, drop in some TNT and break up the rock?
You can't dig a tunnel through sand.
Seems some seismic listening devices could be used, as well, to identify tunneling activity.
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It can be done if you use a 'Tunnel Shield':
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/buildingbig/tunnel/challenge/sand/shield.html
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Your plan sounds flawless, except for two minor quibbles, so minor that I feel almost bad for bringing them up...
Quibble one: a smidgeon under 2000 miles of border takes a lot of dynamite to turn to sand (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico%E2%80%93United_States_border).
Quibble two: the evil Mexican drug runners might have access to Wikipedia too, and might find out that it is, in fact, entirely possible to tunnel through sand. The tunnel shield method was even patented in 1818 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki
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Just convince the oil companies that there are billions of billions of barrels of oil down there on the border. They just need to frack it enough to get it out.
Frack it really hard.
All that fracking ought to make tunnel building a bit uncomfortable.
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What a waste of time, money, and explosives. I have a better question.... why bother? The drug war is not just a lost cause, it was never a great idea to begin with. It was predicated upon lies, and the need to find something for federal agents to do once alcohol prohibition was over. Its results have been far worst, and far more damaging than alcohol prohibition ever was.
All to deny people their most basic human right, the right to make decisions for their own bodies and minds. It is disgraceful.
What a waste of time/money (Score:5, Insightful)
It's pointless trying to shut these operations down. The cartels don't care about loosing a tunnel or the drugs; they will just use/build another. The loss is written off as operating cost. I don't understand what drives the gov to continue this stuped cat-and-mouse game. I'd love to see the numbers for the US cost for one of these seizure operations though.
Ban Assault Shovels! (Score:5, Funny)
We should obviously BAN illegal assault shovels! No citizen needs a shovel that's painted black and has rubber grip with finger grooves! (http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1v/R-202562616/h_d2/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053) Or one with a adjustable handle! (http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1v/R-202819477/h_d2/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053) Just like a telescoping stock, these adjustable shovels only have one use: to build hi-tech drug tunnels!!
I say we force landscapers, contractors and other manual laborers to be fingerprinted, obtain a shovel license and be limited to buying one shovel a month. Who the hell needs more than one shovel a month! Plus, you must specify the make, length and blade material on your shovel application. And specify exactly show good cause for needing a shovel. Though, the licensing officials will never objectively define what "good cause" is.
The first to build a Star Trek transporter . . . (Score:4, Funny)
. . . will be a Mexican drug cartel. Hey, that's where the money is to be made, and will attract he best and brightest, and be able to invest the most money in the new technology.
Wow! Won't that be ironic . . . the first stuff to boldly go . . . will be drugs.
A Better Pipeline (Score:2)
You can shove a hell of a lot more materials through a pipe, even a small one, than you can through a man size tunnel.
If I were the feds I'ld be watching & listening for horizontal drilling or use of old unused water, drainage and oil pipelines that can be commandered.
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Cocaine hydrochloride ("powder") is water soluble. The freebase is solubl
Why do they need tunnels? (Score:4, Insightful)
Why don't they just run a 6" pipe under the ground and package the pot in cylinders moved by little cars - they can even slope the pipe so the cars just fall down - ?
That would be lots harder to find.
Re:Why do they need tunnels? (Score:5, Informative)
Someone (or many someones) probably are.
That's the interesting thing with this stuff. We only hear about the guys who get caught. We don't get to hear about the guys who run their operations successfully because success is pretty much defined by not getting caught.
--Insert comment about war on drugs-- (Score:3)
Submarines too! (Score:4, Informative)
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/06/pictures/110624-cocaine-subs-submarines-first-submersible-science-colombia-drug-smuggling/ [nationalgeographic.com]
junkie-geek sezs.... (Score:3, Interesting)
... (Hi, my name is Yuropian Stonah and I'm an addict!) a few things.
First, I cannot believe how many uninformed, apologetic postings in favor of current US / EU drug policy are gathered here. Come on, isn't this a hub of scientists, bright minds and people who know their empirics from mere belief? Every scientific evaluation of man's natural tendency to get high - and it's just that, a natural tendency ranging from apes in Africa eating moldy fruit to get their groove on to Professor Shulgin making crazy new synthetical enthegoens - has shown just how futile a totally abstinence oriented lawmaking ethos is. I mean, we can probably all agree on the fact that humankind is flawed in some aspects, for example I doubt anyone here would say there's any way to get rid of our general egocentrism, so any man-made system is probably subject to corruption. Why not just once and for all accept that people are going to do drugs, no matter what? The most popular ones, caffeine, alcohol and nicotine for our Western world and current time period, are usually just seperated from most of the other narcotics in their status in most people's thoughts. That doesn't make them, and here is the part where I really think the scientists in you should have no problem understanding, NOT DRUGS. Yeah, a lot of functioning people punch down a liter or two of red a night. Every other TV series has that male, older character with the complete bar in his office gulping down Scotch while handing down jovial advice to other characters. I for one, mid twenties German addicted to morphine and some other pharms with a rich history of drug abuse, state that alcoholism is worse and more devastating than any opiate addiction could ever be - 72 hours in hell and you're off smack for good whereas I remember people withdrawing from as little as a bottle of wine a day in their third week of detox still having seizures and crying for help at night. I guess what bothers me is, like everywhere else, the hypocrisy of advocating abstinence without admitting to the fact that a great, great majority of society IS in fact suffering from some kind of addiction. If you are telling people to not use drugs, why use made up arguments?
Heroin, for example, will shorten your life by not a single day IF administered in pure form. Of course, that also calls for sterile equipment and firm background knowledge on the topic. So why is it banned? I mean, seriously? Maintenance treatment with methadone, buprenorphine, morphine or heroin itself has shown how people on those drugs for decades have little to no tendency to crime or other life-shortening hobbies if given the chance to take part in social life without stigma. Cocaine and methamphetamine etc. are all quite strainous on the heart, yeah. But lots of the negative effects of black market usage are due to the life style forced onto people with a taste for these kinds of yummies. Switzerland research on Cocaine addict maintenance on pharmaceutical stimulant drugs has pretty much shown how unnecessary that is, though.
I for one am getting my daily dosage of morphine from the nice guy at the pharmacy with whom I often chat about recent developments in his scientific field. I then go about my academic/social/professional life which I will not, for obvious reasons, further depict. But I can tell you, my not-12-stepping-kinda-NA-group consists of two thirds academics, a lot of medical doctors and even people in administrative, political positions. You'd be surprised. I for one have pretty much recovered from the blows my life got delivered from the struggle that is illegal drug addiction and have been focused on my academic work ever since. I'm on enough morphine to kill an elephant (900 milligrams/day over 24 hour slow release) and 80 milligrams of methylphenidate for ADHD treatment, but neither prevents me from getting good grades. Or having a social life. Hell, I even get along with my family again since admitting to my addiction, seeking and getting help. But it's my personal luck that I have found both a very
Portugal (Score:4, Informative)
Concealed (Score:4, Informative)
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Why are there no Mexican Olympics? All the Mexicans who can run, swim, and jump are already in the USA.
In Texas it's popular to call Mexicans "wetbacks", because some of them got there by crossing the Rio Grande.
I'd like to ask the AC poster how much water *his* ancestors crossed to get here.
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Hmmm, While living in farming areas growing up, That name was given because they worked out in the hot weather and sweat, a lot. Since they were bent over forward, their shirt would only get 'wet in back'...