This is just shocking:
Dutton and Gonzales said small aircraft regularly drop drug loads on ranches or other properties along the U.S.-Mexico border, and that some U.S. law officers escort the loads to the next stop.
The two whistle-blowers said that drug cartels have managed to obtain computer access codes to U.S. surveillance systems that let them see where and when Border Patrol agents are monitoring the border.
They also alleged that drug cartels have given big donations to politicians, which are unreported, to influence appointments of key law enforcement officers.
Why, it’s almost as though outlawing non-coercive personal activity makes it more lucrative and inherently corrupting.
[Update a while later]
The death toll in Mexico as a result of “Fast and Furious” is now up to two hundred. Really, this was an act of war.
[Update a few minutes later]
As the body count grows, so does the cover up:
After reiterating that every law enforcement agent that has been asked about Operation Fast and Furious has said that there is no way that it could have been a viable law enforcement operation, I asked Chairman Issa if there was any evidence of another reason for the implementation of Operation Fast and Furious and the other alleged gun-walking operations.
“This was dumb, it was useless, and it was lethal,” was the soundbite most of us will take away from the call in answer to that question, but his longer answer — which I regret I do not have a transcript of — is far more telling.
Nothing in his response could be construed to mean that Rep. Issa thought Operation Fast and Furious was a legitimate law enforcement operation. And if it does not appear to have been implemented as a legitimate law enforcement operation, then we are left with the possible alternative that the goal of the operation was both illegitimate and unlawful.
Issa put it rather bluntly: “The administration wanted to show that guns found in Mexico came from the United States.”
Even if they had to deliver them themselves.
It’s too bad we don’t have any prior experience with a ‘commodity’ that was LEGAL, then made ILLEGAL, where a criminal element took over the ILLEGAL trade, and where those traders stayed in business by killing off, literally, their competition, and then ultimately the ‘commodity’ returned to the LEGAL status, thus undercutting the ‘traders’ and removing them from the game.
If ONLY!
(Legalization / Taxation / Education / Rehabilitation )
>Der Schtumpy–Heh! “Those who fail to learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them.”
Of course, the main folks who aren’t learning are making far too much money and POWER to want to repeal the prohibitions. This one’s going to be much more difficult to uproot than the last one was.
Don’t forget opium in China.
Perhaps we could pass a constitutional amendment? Nah, when have we ever done something like that?
Maybe we could unpass a constitutional amendment? I don’t think we’ve ever done that; the most we’ve done is repeal part of a constitutional amendment.
This is what comes of fighting a war (the war on drugs) that you don’t want to win.
“Don’t forget opium in China.”
I assume from the Opium Wars that the PRC learned to legalize narcotics and that attempting to stop people from taking drugs is bad. What are there treatment programs for addicts?