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Two Mexican drug cartels came to dominate America’s fentanyl supply

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41–50 of 73 posts

Re: Two Mexican drug cartels came to dominate America’s fentanyl supply

#41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I would guess that such a thing would instead be a Pearl Harbor moment, and I think the cartels know this, too. What else might that war teach us? There are 10 million Mexican-Americans by birth in America, and 37 million by ancestry. If America went to war with Mexico, I fear there would be efforts to intern Mexican-Americans as Japanese-Americans once were. Such a war is a horrible idea for everybody. It would cr…

Interning 47M people out of 333M, especially when those 47M represent a large portion of younger, working age people, does not seem like it would go well.

Certainly not, it would be a disaster.

Re: Two Mexican drug cartels came to dominate America’s fentanyl supply

#42

Quoted post unavailable.

isn't MX the country where four dozen activist college students were murdered, many years later a senior, acting Federal attorney was arrested for the covering up the investigation? ( edit )

You are probably referring to this https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Iguala_mass_kidnapping There is also a Netflix docuseries about this, it's called The 43. If you search for "Ayotzinapa" you can find out more.

Re: Two Mexican drug cartels came to dominate America’s fentanyl supply

#43
post #15

Quoted post unavailable.

as someone who vacations regularly throughout mexico (tijuana, rosarito, mexico city, chihuahua and baja amongst the destinations) i find these sorts of comments silly at best. there is no "mexican civil war" there was the Cristero, the reform, and the revolutionary war. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_Civil_War while organized criminal homicides are rising, it is nowhere near sixty-thousand. it has never been…

Gave you an upvote as your sources mostly confirm that Mexico is the worst war zone in the world. I may have the figures off, but, in 2016, at the height of the Syrian war, Mexico was second place to Syria[0]. Problem is, Mexico aren't counting missing people, and there A TON of missing persons, hundreds of thousands of them.

[0] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/may/11/mexico-deadly-...

Re: Two Mexican drug cartels came to dominate America’s fentanyl supply

#44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think legalizing fentanyl is a good idea at all. Look at how many people were killed by easy access to Oxycodone. It's said that one use of heroin will turn someone into an addict, and something like 2% of opioid addicts die per year. Legalizing drugs may make things safer per person, but it will also increase the number of users. Legalizing fentanyl would just flood the streets with something even more poten…

There are steps that can be taken to provide addicts with legal access to their fix in a way that removes cartels from the supply chain and does not equate to "legalizing fentanyl".

Ok. I'll bite. What are the steps?

Re: Two Mexican drug cartels came to dominate America’s fentanyl supply

#45
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not op but legalizing drugs to purify the supply chain, collect taxes, and give people a safe place to do the things they would otherwise do anyways seems like efficient allocation of resources with the benefit of starving the cartels.

I don't think legalizing fentanyl is a good idea at all. Look at how many people were killed by easy access to Oxycodone. It's said that one use of heroin will turn someone into an addict, and something like 2% of opioid addicts die per year. Legalizing drugs may make things safer per person, but it will also increase the number of users. Legalizing fentanyl would just flood the streets with something even more poten…

When will we learn that not legalizing things is not the same as preventing them from occurring? Usage happens today, but with impurities and a supply chain that causes its own death beyond the end users.

If there were a legal fentanyl clinic down the street from you, would you use it just because it was legal? Doubtful. But someone intent on using it would get it anyways so why not get a pure form in a safe place while starving the cartels of capital?

Re: Two Mexican drug cartels came to dominate America’s fentanyl supply

#46
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same thing that prevents any enemy from sending a thousand guys to any other sensitive site - men with guns (and intel and air support and armor). Occasionally the cartel and Texas guard do exchange fire.

You think that if a thousand cartel guys showed up at a nuke plant with the intention of melting it down that armor and airstrikes would help matters? I think that would just help them actually.

...Yes. If you kill the people attacking the sensitive site, they will be unable to attack the sensitive site on account of being dead.

A thousand man force is a battalion. The cartels have no real armor and no air support. No heavy weapons. No training.

The US Army fields 31 brigades. A brigade is 5 battalions.

For every cartel member in your theoretical force, there are ~149 trained, armed, active duty service members in deployable condition for combat roles.

That doesn't include artillery, sustainment, the US Airforce or the US Navy. I am also not including guard teams which are another 27 brigades.

Your theoretical cartel force would also have to go through the Texas State Guard (1,700 people) and US Border Patrol.

Re: Two Mexican drug cartels came to dominate America’s fentanyl supply

#47
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are steps that can be taken to provide addicts with legal access to their fix in a way that removes cartels from the supply chain and does not equate to "legalizing fentanyl".

Ok. I'll bite. What are the steps?

Methadone-type programs, but for other substances.

Ie: go to a doctor or similar health worker, get a prescription for the thing you’re dependent on, pick up that prescription, do your thing and go on with life.

Is this “giving drugs to drug addicts”? Yes.

Re: Two Mexican drug cartels came to dominate America’s fentanyl supply

#48
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cartels are also extorting avocado farmers for a cut of their profits. It turns out that, if you have a lot of bad people in power, they find ways to do bad things for personal enrichment.

I stopped buying avocados for this reason. Its the only way to win.

Easy for you if you can just start and stop avocados whenever you like, but what about the rest of us addicts?

Re: Two Mexican drug cartels came to dominate America’s fentanyl supply

#49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are you suggesting exactly.

I think we are all tiptoeing around the issue to be honest. What is the actual problem here and what can be a possible solution?. The problem is obviously that these cartels from MEXICO are taking away high paying jobs away from AMERICAN drug dealers. One of the possible solutions is to intervene so that those jobs come back to America.

These FOREIGNERS with their synthetic drugs have bankrupted every opium den in my town, and along with it, honorable poppy farming jobs.

Now they’re stuck growing KALE for LllllliBERALS just to afford steak for their children’s breakfast.

Re: Two Mexican drug cartels came to dominate America’s fentanyl supply

#50
post #37
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm talking about if the US already was at war with them and hitting them hard. I don't see what would restrain them at that point.

Military actions have purposes , which do not include acting out your nightmare scenarios and being as horrible as possible. There’s a reason regular armies don’t do that kind of thing; it does not aid their purpose. And I don’t see how such an action could ever aid the cartels. War is not a game where each side gradually loses their “restraint”. Instead, each side carefully considers each possible action and its con…

Hold on amigo, have you seen how cartels operate? They actually do just do as horrible of a thing as possible, just because the top people want to be monsters and show their enemies they can slaughter them. They hang their gutted enemies off bridges, or decimate a whole neighborhood, or you name it. I think you assume they would play by your rules in a war. They might just decide to erase Houston so they can watch those people die in a gas cloud.
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