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In Mexico, cartels are hunting down police at their homes

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Re: In Mexico, cartels are hunting down police at their homes

#201

Post by vagrantJin »

Sacho wrote: post #184
vagrantJin wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article is about Mexican cartels taking the fight to the police. As a South African, I worry that our crime levels probably get more attention than they deserve. The are certainly not much more than any other country. Even on platforms like HN, a few people watch a few videos and see a few social media posts. Conclude the country must be rife with violent crime and proceed to happily spread the word, even when no…

It's difficult to compare crime statistics due to the nature of what is criminalized being different, but the numbers for South Africa are stark enough for this to not matter. Here's a report from the SA police on crime for 2020 - https://businesstech.co.za/news/government/421424/south-afri... I can see that there were 22k murders on a population of about 60 million. I couldn't find USA crime statistics for 2020, whi…

For comparison the USA...

Therein lies my problem. You are going to compare one of the wealthiest, most powerful countries in human history, with South Africa?

Re: In Mexico, cartels are hunting down police at their homes

#202

Post by imtringued »

c0nducktr wrote: post #155
sebmellen wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, they seem to be a more valuable commodity than cash in South Africa: https://www.thesouthafrican.com/news/who-is-leo-prinsloo-dri... .

This is absolutely wild. I had watched that video earlier, and assumed it was a car transporting cash. Someone should start a drone cellphone delivery business for South Africa. It's hard to understand people putting their lives on the line like that to deliver cell phones.

People also put their lives on the line for cellphone towers in South Africa.

Re: In Mexico, cartels are hunting down police at their homes

#203

Post by vagrantJin »

Red_Tarsius wrote: post #197
vagrantJin wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article is about Mexican cartels taking the fight to the police. As a South African, I worry that our crime levels probably get more attention than they deserve. The are certainly not much more than any other country. Even on platforms like HN, a few people watch a few videos and see a few social media posts. Conclude the country must be rife with violent crime and proceed to happily spread the word, even when no…

> The are certainly not much more than any other country. I appreciate your naivete but we have to face the truth. The homicide[+] rate of South Africa (as of 2018) is 36.40. For comparison, Afghanistan is 6.6. The US sits at 4.96. Most of Europe is below 3. And that's just the kiling part. South Africa is notorious for its rampant sexual violence. [++] [+] Within the broad range of violent deaths, the core element o…

This isnt the right thread to wax lyrical about your skill in linking wikipedia articles for crime stats.

Its about cartels on Mexico taking the fight to the police. My point was an aside to OP seeming fascination of including South African crime when it isn't relevant. Wait for the right post and we shall discuss at length about the dangers of painting pictures with mere quantitative analysis.

Re: In Mexico, cartels are hunting down police at their homes

#204

Post by imtringued »

darksaints wrote: post #65
boterock wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe they do the same that politicians do here... they keep the cops busy grabbing individuals, but they turn a blind eye to the shipments of tons that are sent via airplanes that could be intercepted easily. In the end everyone knows that it is a deal between traffickers and politicians.

Large shipments quite literally rely on small individuals being busted. For at least ten years now, border security agencies have been receiving training on how not to act in the face of a small bust. Their typical response is to start waving people through with little to no scrutiny, because all of the agents want to have some part in the bust, if at least just to have a rubbernecked sort of view at the excitement g…

No wonder the "war on drugs" is a failure, it literally is the delivery mechanism.

Re: In Mexico, cartels are hunting down police at their homes

#205

Post by imtringued »

haram_masala wrote: post #54
walrus01 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cartels only exist because of its illegality. Same reason alcohol smuggling gangsters existed during the US prohibition era.

Mexican drug cartels have diversified into other industries, such as avocados. They employ the same tactics as they do with drugs in order to monopolize production. Legalizing drugs would eliminate the risk premium, but both fentanyl and avocados are high-margin products. The problem is at least partially structural and cultural, not merely regulatory.

Ok, Mexico can stay a drug cartel infested country. I honestly don't see the problem with avocado cartels, at least they are not drug cartels.

Re: In Mexico, cartels are hunting down police at their homes

#206

Post by Yoric »

juskrey wrote: post #167
Yoric wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ISIS is wahabist? I thought they were salafist and Al-Qaeda is wahabist (or at least its leadership is)?

wahabis and salafists are sets with large intersection, but for practical purposes they are the same.

Ah, interesting. I had the impression that they were sworn enemies with philosophies that looked very similar from the outside.

Re: In Mexico, cartels are hunting down police at their homes

#207

Post by rnd0 »

Bancakes wrote: post #199
rnd0 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

vices and weaknesses -such as fast food, lottery and tax-free religions? pushers -like the pharmaceutical industry? Pimps like the folks in Hollywood who make money off of titillation (and more -see Harvey Weinstein for one example) and goons such as the ones who raid travellers of cash in the name of "civil forfeiture"(eg https://www.huffpost.com/entry/civil-asset-forfeiture-cash-m... ? ) The difference is becoming…

The biggest fast food chains are a mafia in business terms and treat their employees and IP accordingly. Same with patented Monsanto GMO, for instance. Non-government lotteries are dubious at best and held by the mafia at worst (at least in eastern euro). Non-instituionalised religions prove time and time again to be cults. The pharmaceutical industry is based on science, and subject to audits and regulation. In fact…

"Monsanto GMO, " You made my case for me

"Non-instituionalised religions prove time and time again to be cults."

Institutionalized ones tend to be ...hotbeds of child abuse, spousal abuse, fraud and grift on a mass scale.

"The pharmaceutical industry is based on science, and subject to audits and regulation." You forgot to mention lobbying (AKA legalized bribary) which is used to tailor regulation (writing or enforment) in their favor.

"A small fraction of police still commit violent abuses because America is full of aggressive, suppressed, violent people."

"Folks are basically decent/conventional wisdom would say/but we read about the exceptions/in the papers every day"(Rush, "Second Nature" ) ACAB didn't appear out of thin air, and the "few bad apples" theory doesn't hold up once you consider that those "bad apples" are not held accountable and are supported by the "good" apples.

We are not going to escape the mob (by which I assume you mean criminal?) mentality -just the opposite. Most of history has been strongmen oppressing those who can not fight back assisted by a religion that tells the oppressed that they'll get theirs "by and by" or in another life or that they deserve to suffer full stop (original sin, mixed with the divine right of kings). We had a bright shining moment of roughly half a century -but now that is over, corruption and superstition (Qanon, anti-vax,anti-maskers, flat earthers) are going to take us back to the brutality that most of recorded (and unrecorded) history has been.

The only thing we'll be rooting out is weeds in the muddy fields of our multi-national overlords.

Re: In Mexico, cartels are hunting down police at their homes

#208

Post by [deleted] »

vagrantJin wrote: post #201
Sacho wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's difficult to compare crime statistics due to the nature of what is criminalized being different, but the numbers for South Africa are stark enough for this to not matter. Here's a report from the SA police on crime for 2020 - https://businesstech.co.za/news/government/421424/south-afri... I can see that there were 22k murders on a population of about 60 million. I couldn't find USA crime statistics for 2020, whi…

For comparison the USA... Therein lies my problem. You are going to compare one of the wealthiest, most powerful countries in human history, with South Africa?

[deleted]

Re: In Mexico, cartels are hunting down police at their homes

#209

Post by rnd0 »

zozbot234 wrote: post #96
qPM9l3XJrF wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's a bit more complicated than that. First, just because the state loses its monopoly doesn't mean some other entity gains a monopoly. In Mexico, cartels aren't just fighting the state, they are also fighting each other. If the state collapsed, they will continue fighting each other, and the people of Mexico will effectively live in a semi-permanent warzone. Second, not all violent entities are created equa…

> In Mexico, cartels aren't just fighting the state, they are also fighting each other. To be fair, states also sometimes fight each other. They also tend to de-escalate these fights over time as long-term institutional arrangements come to predominate.

"To be fair, states also sometimes fight each other. "

That's basically European history in a nutshell. The middle ages was basically walled cities fighting other walled cities, renaissance too.

Re: In Mexico, cartels are hunting down police at their homes

#210

Post by Guthur »

Yoric wrote: post #176
Guthur wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which was always the reason I thought there was more to ISIS than the western portrait of a group of extremist ideologues. State construction and maintenance is not a trivial thing and their are not the sort of skills you stumble upon within a group of "madmen". The groups spontaneous arrival and near immediate success in this regard was a little remarkable imo, and raises interesting questions on support and backing…

I think I'm going to earn my Godwin point. My understanding is that Da'esh governance (and recruitment, to some extent) was not dissimilar to early Nazi governance. Yes, they managed their state, but within an ideology based on an imaginary past, on permanent internal violence against real and imaginary enemies of the state, total war against foreign inferiors, and of course genocide (against Yezedi in the case of Da…

Yes, though this also is my point. That Nazi government had a lot of individuals that were experienced in governance.

I'm not talking about rallying people to cause but rather ensuring municipal activity is happening regularly and that one is generating enough revenue to sustain these activities. Arguably Nazi Germany never really had the latter though, and instead needed to borrow heavily and go to war.

These points seemed that gone over the heads of most here who defaulted to the "oh look, bogeymen that we are all so superior to"

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