Coming into the blog project, I knew quite a bit about the drug war in North America. I live in a mexican community and took spanish at my high school so the culture was all around me. Plus, I like to keep updated on news events that are going on around me. However, I was suprised how much work goes into stopping the drug cartels and just how hard it is. Also I learned about other drug wars with my occasional reports on drug trafficking in other countries. What is the most important issue to grasp is that everyone is affected by the drug wars because it is our tax money that is fighting off these criminals. Plus we might know someone who uses these narcotics, therefore only helping out the drug cartels even more. Therefore, since I am constantly surrounded with the drug war, it is only assumed that I will continue to learn about this topic. To get more involved yourself in this issue, please visit the Guide to Action page.
In Conclusion
La Familia Michoacana
Over this last week, the United States Justice Department organized raids all over the country that arrested 303 members of the dangerous and terribly influential drug cartel group La Familia Michoacana. This group is known to behead its enemies and are super religious, describing their actions as messianic. This is a major accomplishment of the United States Justice Department because they have disrupted the distribution system of a hard-core narcotics distributer in the United States. This is helping us win the battle in the drug war and help us keep the war out our country.
Emphasis On The Violence
There is this New York Times article that has been up on the website for a week titled “In Mexican Drug War, Investigators Are Fearful” by Marc Lacey. I have avoided reading it because it was so intimidating, but as of this morning I read the entire thing. I realized it was a perfect article for describing the drug war to people who had limited knowledge on the subject. However, it also emphasized how incredibly violent the war is. It begins, “The hit men moved in on their target, shot him dead and then disappeared in a matter of seconds. It would have been a perfect case for José Ibarra Limón, one of this violent border city’s most dogged crime investigators — had he not been the victim” (Lacey). This four page article does not make the police force tackling the drug cartels look very strong. They keep getting murdered, corrupted, and quitting. Therefore, the overall feeling I got from this article is that we are hopeless against the drug cartels.
Now for a drastic change in tone, I commented on Claire Murphy’s blog about water conservation. You can reach it at this link. http://whereisthewater.wordpress.com/background-analysis/
Other Blogs
As part of my Q Class, I have to look up and comment on two to three other people’s wordpress accounts. I commented on two of my cohorts blogs, smosier42 and ameleo. Smosier42 has decided to write about the global unemployment crisis and ameleo has decided to write about organ trafficking. Both have very tough topics to keep a steady blog on. You will find my comments at the bottom of their breaking news pages. Here are the links:
http://smosier42.wordpress.com/breaking-news/
http://ameleo.wordpress.com/breaking-news/
Anyway, the news is overblown with news on how drug cartels have brought their business over the border and are inciting violence over here in America. I have posted a video and some breaking news articles on my blog talking about it.
Who’s Really Fighting This War?
Is it the drug cartels? Drug addicts? Police officers? The Drug Enforcement Agency? The CIA? Our tax money? Who is really fighting this North American drug war? I assume it is all the categories I have mentioned. We are all part of this war, whether we know it or not. Legal action is being made to try to get marijuana legal or be kept illegal in various parts of the country, while our tax dollars go to fund the police and border control officers who are the physical fighters in this war. Then the drug addicts are the reason this war is still going on because if it was not for them, there would be no reason for drug cartels to exist. Therefore, it is very important that I make myself clear. While drug trafficking might not be the most important global issue for you, it is certainly affecting you in some aspect.
As an update, I have posted a video on my blogroll titled “Mexican Drug Cartel Threaten to Kill Texas News Reporters”. The real plot of the video is an analysis on a border town and the ongoing war and corruption that pursues there.
Canada
Canada. A country of the cool, calm, and legal marijuana. With the legalization of marijuana, why in the world would there be a drug war? There the people do not have to hide their drugs from the police, they are alloted to buy it freely. However, it is not marijuana that is causing the rising drug war in Canada. It is cocaine and crystal meth, drugs not allowed in any country. Therefore now with a drug war in one of the most drug tolerant countries in the world, it must be understood how important this topic is.
So far I have only discussed in my Breaking News bulletins the drug wars in Mexico, the United States, and Afghanistan. However, my topic is drug cartels and the drug war in all of North America. Therefore, I recently updated the Breaking News and posted an article about the up-and-coming drug war in Canada. It is amazing how one country’s fight can spread to another so quickly and so unwarrented.
Other Countries
I mostly have focused on the North American drug trafficking problem, as it is my topic, but I would just like to tell all the readers that Mexico and the United States are not the only major drug trafficking countries out there. According to the annual list presented by the President of the United States to Congress, there is about twenty countries deemed to be major producers and traffickers of illicit drugs. According to StoptheDrugWar.org, these countries include Afghanistan, Bolivia, Brazil, Columbia, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, Haiti, India, Jamaica, Laos, Mexico, Burma, Nigeria, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Peru and Venezuela. The article also mentions that President Obama singles out Bolivia, Venezuela, and Burma for having “failed demonstrably” in meeting their anti-drug obligations.
I have also added one more Breaking News story and Blogroll updates. These specific updates are a little different from my chosen topic, but they are meant to try to help the reader understand drug trafficking and not just in a centrally located area.
Multiple Drug Cartels
As research continues, I realize how many Mexican drug cartels exist. Just to name a few prominent groups, there are Los Zetas, Juarez Cartel, Tijuana Cartel, Sinaloa Cartel, and many others. However, each cartel runs a certain area of the country. For example, the Sinaloa Cartel is based in Culiacan, Sinaloa and the Tijuana Cartel is based in Tijuana, Baja California. But even with their different locations, they still consider themselves all rivals since the drugs the ship out could go to the same customer. The drug dealing business is a tough, dangerous business.
To give an update on the status on my blog, I have added three Breaking News to the roll… which brings it to a total of three. I was a bit confused on how to do it earlier on, so when I eventually found out how to do it correctly, it took me a while. So go check out Breaking News!
Project Underway
It has been a few weeks into the blog and I learn more and more about drug cartels each day. Drug cartels do not only exist in Mexico, but in the United States and any other country that has a mafia as well, such as Afganistan and Colombia. As I have decided to focus my blog on the drug cartels of North America, I still find it interesting that countries all over the world deal with narcotics problems like we do every day.
Also, I have added four web-sources on blogroll to help your experience on my blog. They help explain drug cartels as a whole then narrow it down to Mexico and the United States. I soon plan to add opinionated articles on the blogroll, but for now, there are articles that are meant to help beginners in the area.
The Illegal Drug Trade: The Dominance of Drug Cartels
It is common knowledge what the side affects both physically and mentally illegal drugs can cause the users body. However, what do we know about the bad and dirty business on how illegal drugs get shipped and delivered out? Especially recently, it has grown to become a much more deadlier process than the drug using process itself. This blog’s purpose is to highlight the importance drug trafficking has all over the world, while focusing mostly on its primary country, Mexico. Its hope is to create awareness on how drugs truly control the global economy and politics.
