Mexico: FAIL thread

[Adios]

Not really.

Governance costs money, it is something you have to invest in.  The Sinaloa Cartel are businessmen, first and foremost and they care more for profits than taking on additional burdens.

I don't doubt they'd use strategic bribes and assassinations in order to create a suitable business environment, but they'd want to leave that to someone else.

The ideal world for any cartel leader would be one where every other cartel is killed off and the government returns to busting low-level competitors and users.  The Drug War is actually a massive failure for everyone involved.

This makes sense.

[Dysfunctional Cunt]

It begs the question that if the cartels were openly in charge of the country (I say openly because I think they probably are running it behind the scenes now anyway) would they go legit?  Would it improve the welfare of the country? 

I wonder this because we elect criminals every day, put them in positions of corporate power and so forth.  At least in Mexico they are a bit more honest about it.

Just random tangent thoughts this line of conversation has led me too....

[Cain]

Either Los Zetas or the Gulf Cartel, the former's former employers, set fire to a casino in Monterry, killing dozens.

Just came up on the BBC breaking news feed.

[The Johnny]

53 so far, sure theres more.

But eh, it pales in comparison to the narcofosa of San Fernando with 500 corpses...

[The Johnny]

After alerting clients in the lower floor, they doused the place in gasoline, shot their weapons and threw an IED which provoked the fire.

"They arrived and told people to leave because they were gonna set the place on fire"

"All the emergency exits were locked" said another witness that managed to escape"

So the objective wasnt doing a massacre, it was a payback for not paying their dues and bribes.

It did turn into a massacre because the fire exits were closed by the establishment; earlier that month the casino was closed by the State for failing security measures, but they used an "amparo" a legal recourse to keep the business going while the trial went on.

ETA: seriously, i would even call the narcos "decent" in this ocassion by their track record, fucking casino with its fire exits.

[Cain]

I did think a casino was a slightly unusual site for a massacre.  I mean, obviously it depends on the casino, but as a rule I'd expect that kind of place to be off limits to everything except, as you say, shakedowns for protection money.

[Cain]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-15037535

In his speech to the UN General Assembly in New York this week, Mexican President Felipe Calderon defended his policy of using the army to aggressively disrupt the drug cartels who are at war with each other and the state.

Some in Mexico are critical of Mr Calderon's stance, not least political cartoonists Jose Hernandez and Antonio Helguera, who use their drawings to pillory the president.

Shannon Young, a Mexico-based reporter for The World progamme on American public radio - a co-production of the BBC World Service, Public Radio International, and WGBH in Boston - explains the meaning behind some of the images being used to attack Mr Calderon.

[The Johnny]

The "no more violence" stickers spread all over the city are as meaningful as the american flags in SUVs after 9/11.

BTW i forgot to mention 2 weeks ago on the eleventh:

Its funny how 3000 dead at the towers fosters all kinds of things like group cohesion, loyalty and submission as long as the enemy is external.

But what does 40,000 dead over 5 years do to a nation when the enemy is ourselves? Fear, angst, uncertainty...

[BabylonHoruv]

The "no more violence" stickers spread all over the city are as meaningful as the american flags in SUVs after 9/11.

BTW i forgot to mention 2 weeks ago on the eleventh:

Its funny how 3000 dead at the towers fosters all kinds of things like group cohesion, loyalty and submission as long as the enemy is external.

But what does 40,000 dead over 5 years do to a nation when the enemy is ourselves? Fear, angst, uncertainty...

those flags were meaningful, they signalled widespread acceptance of giving up freedom for security.

[Cain]

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/09/cartels-snuff-social-media/

A scrawled sign was placed next to a decapitated body near a main road in the Mexican border city of Nuevo Laredo. Its message was simple: Stop talking about drug cartels on the internet — or anywhere else. "Nuevo Laredo en Vivo and social networking sites," the sign read, "I'm The Laredo Girl, and I'm here because of my reports, and yours."

The execution of Marisol Macias Castaneda — known online as "The Laredo Girl" and as "Nena de Laredo" — is the latest in a series of attacks against Mexicans who go online to discuss drug violence. It's an epidemic which a new report describes as "so horrific as to approach a civil war."

The report, released Monday by the Texas Department of Agriculture and authored by retired Major General Robert Scales and retired General Barry McCaffrey, describes a conflict in which drug cartels have forced the "capitulation" of Mexican border cities, killed more than 40,000 people and have fueled "an internal war in Mexico that has stripped that country of its internal security to the extent that a virtual state of siege now exists adjacent to our own southwestern states."

Residents in towns along drug trafficking routes have been forced out by cartels, leaving them abandoned. Throughout northern Mexico, civil society has "severely deteriorated."

The authors go on to claim Mexican cartels have moved into Texas border counties to use as safe havens: hiding out from Mexican authorities under the nose of U.S. law enforcement, directing drug shipments into the United States interior and engaging in kidnapping. Cartels have built command centers in Texas comparable to brigade-level headquarters.


Cartel operatives are also becoming more confident. The authors note pickup trucks emblazoned with large "Z" stickers and Ferrari logos — symbols used by the Zetas cartel — are an increasingly common sight in Texas. Drug traffickers have also been spotted in uniform and have shown willingness to confront U.S. law enforcement.

During a press conference Monday, Texas Agriculture Commissioner Todd Staples even warned that without adequate U.S. assistance to Mexico, the Mexican government may be forced to negotiate with the cartels following presidential elections next year. The Mexican government strongly denies any consideration of negotiating with criminals.

[Jenne]

Sheeit.  Fuuuuck.

Well, I'm wondering how our local media are faring...we have quite a few border-crossing reporters who regularly report on the shit going down in TJ and environs.

jesus.

[The Johnny]

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/09/cartels-snuff-social-media/

A scrawled sign was placed next to a decapitated body near a main road in the Mexican border city of Nuevo Laredo. Its message was simple: Stop talking about drug cartels on the internet — or anywhere else. "Nuevo Laredo en Vivo and social networking sites," the sign read, "I'm The Laredo Girl, and I'm here because of my reports, and yours."

The execution of Marisol Macias Castaneda — known online as "The Laredo Girl" and as "Nena de Laredo" — is the latest in a series of attacks against Mexicans who go online to discuss drug violence. It's an epidemic which a new report describes as "so horrific as to approach a civil war."

The report, released Monday by the Texas Department of Agriculture and authored by retired Major General Robert Scales and retired General Barry McCaffrey, describes a conflict in which drug cartels have forced the "capitulation" of Mexican border cities, killed more than 40,000 people and have fueled "an internal war in Mexico that has stripped that country of its internal security to the extent that a virtual state of siege now exists adjacent to our own southwestern states."

Residents in towns along drug trafficking routes have been forced out by cartels, leaving them abandoned. Throughout northern Mexico, civil society has "severely deteriorated."

The authors go on to claim Mexican cartels have moved into Texas border counties to use as safe havens: hiding out from Mexican authorities under the nose of U.S. law enforcement, directing drug shipments into the United States interior and engaging in kidnapping. Cartels have built command centers in Texas comparable to brigade-level headquarters.


Cartel operatives are also becoming more confident. The authors note pickup trucks emblazoned with large "Z" stickers and Ferrari logos — symbols used by the Zetas cartel — are an increasingly common sight in Texas. Drug traffickers have also been spotted in uniform and have shown willingness to confront U.S. law enforcement.

During a press conference Monday, Texas Agriculture Commissioner Todd Staples even warned that without adequate U.S. assistance to Mexico, the Mexican government may be forced to negotiate with the cartels following presidential elections next year. The Mexican government strongly denies any consideration of negotiating with criminals.

I really find it hard to believe that fascist-war-monger USA authorities would allow 3,000-5,000 (brigade?) strong cartel command posts within texas.

Anyhow, i restate that, cartels are a consequence of poverty and the moral-pushing that "drugs are bad", this is all Bush's fault and Calderon's policy of dick sucking and right-wing politics.

[Cain]

I think they mean brigade level in terms of importance/how many people overall they command, rather than how many people are actually present.

Either way, it is awkwardly phrased.  Anyway

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-15104022

Mexico's Supreme Court has upheld an amendment to Baja California's state constitution that stipulates life begins at conception, in a move hailed by anti-abortion campaigners.

Although seven of the 11 justices deemed the measure unconstitutional, eight votes were needed to overturn it.

More than half Mexico's 31 states have enacted right-to-life amendments that severely restrict abortions.

However, Mexico City allows abortions in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy.

Anti-abortion campaigners cheered after hearing the Supreme Court ruling.

"We have to continue working so that life may triumph," Jorge Serrano, leader of an anti-abortion organisation Pro-Life, told Reuters.

The Supreme Court is due to consider a similar amendment in the state of San Luis Potosi, where the law also says that life begins at conception.

Justice Fernando Franco proposed the motion to declare Baja California's law unconstitutional but the opposition of four judges sank the measure.

Giving their ruling, the justices said they based their analysis "strictly on constitutional issues. That is, the issue under debate was the power of states to legislate on topics that are not expressly determined by the federal constitution".

However, some women's rights activists fear that allowing individual states to decide their own rules may create a divide between those able to go to Mexico City for a legal abortion and those living in states where it is largely restricted.

Mexico City government's Human Rights Commission said the court's stance would worsen the serious public health problem of clandestine abortions.

[Disco Pickle]

At the risk of over generalization, the populous at large is still pretty heavily catholic, so that doesn't really surprise me very much.

The spanish really did a number on em with that.

[Jenne]

Aren't the schools over there pretty much parochial still?