When the government regulates vice, the criminals go legitimate or get caught/killed doing more outlandish stuff.<p>Look at California for just a taste of how it could be. Cartels can't push their outdoor mass produced garbage marijuana in Cali when anyone over 18 can walk into a Doctor's office, get a recommendation card, walk a few feet to the dispensary next door, and receive the most quality indoor, top-shelf, out of bounds Cannabis you could buy. This is decidedly <i>not</i> your father's lid of smoke in a sandwich baggie licked shut. The Cannabis has often been tested for anything from potency (THC and cannabinoid or CBD count) to contaminants. Some 3rd parties are actually certifying Organic Cannabis.<p>Most of that top-shelf Cannabis comes from multi-generational farms in the Emerald Triangle of Northern California (Mendocino, Humboldt, and Trinity). They have farmers who have passed down seed and clones from generation to generation, along with their breeding, growing, and flowering trade secrets.<p>Cartels only know bulk pricing and murder. More legitimized drug trade will not only lower cost and increase quality, but would make Cartels seek other forms as their profit margins evaporate. I'd love to see even the biggest cartels try to compete with Anheuser-Busch InBev, Pfizer, or Altria group once Marijuana is legal in the US.
Here's the thing. This is a huge problem. The cartels have been becoming more heavily armed and more sophisticated for years, perhaps decades. And the problem is that all this money goes into weapons, tactics, etc. On top of that the drug tunnels have been increasing in sophistication quite a bit. One recently discovered one had a railcar system in it. And so the use of predators in the sky will just keep the rest of us cowed, while the real criminals are underground.<p>This is a major national security problem. We can't control our Southern border because the policies we would need to enact to start doing so (drug legalization, immigration reform aimed at a real guest worker program) are political nonstarters. And so we essentually fund a menace on our Southern border, one which has had enough military contacts to do what they want for longer than I have been alive (so more than 36 years).[1]<p>The only sensible policy is to legalize drugs, institute a real guest worker program, and then step up efforts to control the border. But without those first two, the latter won't do anything. We are already out-classed there. We will lose. And if we can't control our Southern border, many bad things will follow.<p>[1] My parents were in Mexico before I was born and have witnessed some things which indicate even then the cartels were able to get the army to do whatever they wanted.
this is sad.... and also a result of a war on drugs. Decriminalization of drug use would actually allow people to get help without losing their job/life/everything. There is no reason for this senseless madness.<p>End the War on drugs. Portugal hasn't fallen apart because they decriminalized:
<a href="https://www.google.com/search?sugexp=chrome,mod=5&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=portugal+drug" rel="nofollow">https://www.google.com/search?sugexp=chrome,mod=5&source...</a><p>... Why should we be any different? Clearly empowering cartels and criminalizing addicts is a problem. Help the addicted!
Based on that extensive (NYT?) article from a few weeks ago, it doesn't look like Mexico will ever be able to pull itself out of this mess. The article suggested that most of the govt and police force was either in bed with the various cartels, or too terrified of them in order to do anything about it. It's a very lucrative arrangement for everybody but the poor bystanders who might become civilian casualties in the endless turf wars.<p>It feels like the only way to fix this is to tweak the "demand" variable, perhaps through legalization.
Just saw Savages (by Oliver Stone). The War on Some Drugs passed the point of believability probably during the Reagan era and is now just another war on Other People. I wish someone like Mark Zuckerberg or Richard Branson would just spend a few million dollars to end it, at least for the benign drugs like marijuana that are provably less destructive than alcohol or tobacco.<p>As a side note, I wonder how things like Silk Road will affect it, once enforcement isn't really feasible anymore.
Looking at those thick arrows reaching into the US, with even thicker arrows close behind them, makes me think that this will be the thing that tips us over into an overt police state.
Couple of interesting points.<p>First, the cartels are probably the biggest supporters of the current drug laws. It's like being given a magic bottle that makes money all of the time -- as long as you're willing to use violence, which was never a problem for them.<p>Second, I am not optimistic about the U.S. political system growing a set of cajones anytime soon, but damned if there isn't a tiny bit of movement, from both parties. <a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48203995/ns/world_news-the_new_york_times/" rel="nofollow">http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48203995/ns/world_news-the_new_y...</a><p>Third, and most importantly, we're always going to have smuggling. Always had it, always will have it. I think the goal here is to allow a lot of things to be smuggled but to keep the total dollar amount down. The drug trade is tens of billions of dollars, and it involves moving plants that grow as weeds. High-value art, rare fish, or any of a hundred other things really shouldn't be getting that much attention. There simply isn't enough money there to corrupt the system. The key problem (as far as customs goes) is rampant smuggling destroying control over the border. That's the problem to address. (I'd add that legalization would sure help a lot to address it.) We need to decrease the complexity of the customs laws and increase the focus of enforcement. Trying to ban something that huge sections of the population consume, or trying to control tens of thousands of random little items, are both ways to destroy the entire idea of having a customs office in the first place.