“I feel that this particular controversy would not have the traction that it does if it were not for the direct role of the U.S. military, especially in light of the turmoil in Oaxaca,” said Evergreen State College’s Grossman. “Oaxaca is not just any old state in Mexico and southern Mexico is not just any old region in the Americas, it’s an area that has had significant repression in very recent years against indigenous peoples by federal forces funded by the U.S.”
. . .
Adding to the specter of U.S. and state violence and repression in the region, the U.S Joint Forces Command released a report in November 2008 that stated Mexico risked becoming a failed state and, if that were to be the case, it would demand U.S. intervention. Meanwhile, the U.S. House passed a spending bill on February 25 which allocates $410 million for the Merida Initiative, a militarization project modeled after Plan Colombia, to “carry out counter-narcotics, counter-terrorism, and border security measures.”
Mexican Drug Cartel Violence Spills Over, Alarming U.S. (March 23, 2009)
Re “Drug Cartel Violence Spills Over From Mexico, Alarming U.S.” (“War Without Borders” series, front page, March 23):
The drug violence spilling over into the United States is fueled by the profits illegal drugs produce. Mexican drug cartels send us the drugs some Americans want to buy. We send them cash and weapons.
When drug suppliers compete for American market share or try to collect bad debts, violence is the inevitable result. All too often, Americans uninvolved in the drug trade are victims. The war on drugs
has failed.
The solution is obvious. We must find a path to legalization, as we did when we ended Prohibition. Legalization does not mean that we approve of drug use or that drugs now illegal are safe to use. But the
violence caused because drugs are illegal and the expense of law enforcement and incarceration outweigh the cost of managing drug use as a public health problem.
We do that now for smoking and alcohol. Why should these other drugs be treated differently, especially when the current strategy is so obviously failing?
Oaxaca City, January 14th, 2009: Members of Section 22 and APPO came to demand Juan Manuel Martinez Moreno’s release from prison. In the clip, his sister Lybia reads the families statement at the offices of the 5th District Judge. Background info: On October 16th 2008, Juan Manuel Martinez Moreno was imprisoned for the 2006 murder of American Journalist Brad Will, unjustly, as eye-witness and forensic evidence has proved his innocence. He was scapegoated by the Mexican government in order to appease U.S. demands that the case be prosecuted, as a prerequisite for funding to Mexico under the Merida Initiative. He remains
incarcerated at Santa Maria Ixcotel prison, in the City of Oaxaca, to this day.
