Before you ask, fellas, she's taken.
I woke up this morning to my nearly 5-year-old son, his big blue eyes close to mine, saying "Mama! Let's play!" Somehow, I dragged myself to the living room where he had set up dinosaurs. He told me the rules: "My dinosaurs have superpowers and yours don't. Mine find yours and then kill them with their power!" That woke me up. Please, go back to sleep.
I wondered if I should say something to him about killing -- again. I tried to redirect the violence in the play by having my dinosaurs offer friendship and joint living in a cave. He didn't bite. "No! they are not friends! OK mama? OK?" "OK," I said, in resignation. Because at that moment, it felt like I had lost that battle. You didn't even fight a battle. You gave in. No rules lawyering, as he may have expected. You just took it. And the message is clear: he has to take it, too.
What happened to my gentle little boy who would cradle his dolls if they happened to fall on the ground? Where is the boy who would never consider the possibility of intentionally hurting another? And where did this one, who pretends to shoot others, come from? "My son will never do that," I used to say. His cajones are dropping, mom.
As usual, parenting is humbling.
Guns first showed up last year. Amidst his love affair with Mary Poppins and Annie, he also started asking about weapons. He wanted me to cut a gun out of cardboard so he could take it to school. Mortified, I imagined his teachers' reactions when they saw it. Mary Poppins? Really? Maybe his newfound love of guns was his way of saying he was growing up -- and away -- from you.
We talked about how guns are best used for protection, only by those whose job it is to protect -- the police, the army. I told myself that he was interested in guns in the same way he was interested in a policeman's pad, handcuffs and hat -- fun tools of the trade. Protection, right? Cops will be there for you in case of danger; there's just a little five to 15 minute lag between danger becoming apparent and the arrival of the "cavalry".
Eventually, he didn't accept my explanation and started asking questions I didn't have the answers to. And they were questions that I ask myself all the time. Why would we need protection? From whom? Does protecting mean hurting someone else? Yes, it does. Just a guess, you still haven't told him. My advice: give him extra lunch money coz in a few years, it'll be feeding at least one tormentor of your son.
As a therapist, I am fully aware of a child's need to use play as a way to experience anxiety in a non-threatening situation. Through play, children can express what they find confusing, exciting and overwhelming about the world. All that education and you haven't the first clue about kids playing: It doesn't matter!
As a mom, it's not that simple. A therapist is trained to put her own issues aside, or to use them in a way that will benefit the patient. But as a mom, my ego is wrapped up in my son. His behavior often feels like a reflection of who I am and how I am perceived. I know this feeling is detrimental, but it is sometimes hard to shake.
My own associations to guns and violence are not the same as my son's. At just the mention of guns, I feel a wave of sadness and despondence. I think about school shootings, accidental shootings in homes with guns, and wars. Sadness. But then you get over it and your inner fascist takes over, and you support violence to take guns from individuals who have the right to them takes over. You're dishonest and a hypocrite.
My son's interest in guns has to do with his developmental stage as a kid and as a boy. He is becoming more aware of his own agency. He experiments with being defiant. "You are not a good mama!" he says, when he is upset at me. "I hate this food!" he says, about dishes he loved a day earlier. Then he looks up at me with red cheeks to see if he has crossed the line, wanting to make sure that there is indeed a line. Kids test limits. All kids do that. Yours is not so unusual, your advanced education notwithstanding..
He divides the world into black/white, good/bad, yes/no, perhaps as a way to simplify a world that he is beginning to sense is not so simple. You mistake is in thinking because a kid divides the world into black and white, he is suddenly unable to distinguish the shades between. Thought you were a psychologist.
He is becoming more aware of those around him and how their actions reflect on him. He sees fellow students who are older and more competent than he is in certain areas and feels disempowered, just by their presence.
That's why he loves superheroes. Playing games with a clear bad guy to defeat --and a clear good guy who usually has a little extra power born out of goodness -- makes him feel safe again. I get that. It is the preoccupation with weapons and violence that stops me in my tracks. I struggle with whether his play stems from the desire to HURT another, or OVERPOWER another. A little extra power, or a little extra ammunition. And you still don't get it.
So, what do I do? Starting drinking, very heavily.
When I can I play with him, hoping that if he acts out the dynamics of good and bad, powerful and weak, healthy and injured, he is releasing some of his anxiety. He's kid. He's playing whether he is anxious or not, and that play prolly has nothing to do with how he feels at the moment.
On some days I allow him to defeat me with his powerful dinosaurs. I let him make up the rules and I pretend to be scared of his strength. He becomes exhilarated and later seems to be much better company during the dinner/bath marathon. I allowed my daughter to defeat me in wargaming, but then I sucked at wargaming, but that is beside the point. :oP You should be making him aware he just can't make up the rules as he goes along. He won't be doing that as an adult, unless his name miraculously becomes Barak Obama.
On other days I fight back, unable to put my own sense of powerlessness aside. My army people find a place to hide, my dinosaurs demonstrate their own strength and I try to outsmart him (we all know it is impossible to outsmart a kid). I think your kid is already aware that 90 percent of wargaming is won or lost before the game even begins, in the ground rules.
On my worst days I freeze up. He mentions guns and I wonder where I went wrong. I feel as though the future is bleak and full of pain and war, and I couldn't do anything to help, not even raise a mensch. In those moments, I don't allow him to be him.
I talk to him about the difference between play and real life. I tell him that, in real life, guns and weapons can hurt people to the point of death. We talk about what it means not to be living anymore. Shorter: You ruined his game play.
This afternoon we sat down to play again. I was prepared to let him express his every desire and overpower me in whatever way he chose, even if it scared me. This time, he told me that our dinosaurs were cleaning up with sponges connected to the bottom of their feet. No violence, no drama. I was ridiculously disappointed, because for a moment, I thought I had figured out a tiny little aspect of parenting my son.
And then the doozy hit at dinner. What does he want for his fifth birthday? A light saber! Lego Chima! Sword! Stay calm. He needs to play it out to understand it, and he needs to play with someone he feels safe with. Mom's a pushover, so let's go with that.
Little does he know that this playing partner is still trying to work it all out herself, and sometimes feels just as terrified and confused as he does.
#5
You ever notice that the ones who gravitate towards the mental medical arts are usually a bit looney. I think they gravitate to this profession because they're trying to understand themselves thru others.
#9
There is always a promising career in the US Marine Corps.
No, seriously.
You get promoted for being knowledgable and efficient with weapons. And if you are the one in six who gets a kill count you might be given your own Platoon and who knows where that might lead....Regiment or above someday.
"Mama, let's play !" Teach him about flanking and double envelopments and the difference between A and L ambushes.
Find 'em, Fix 'em, Fight 'em, and Finish 'em.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
01/15/2014 7:14 Comments ||
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#11
Isn't the modern artificial urban bubble wonderful? I mean to be able to ignore 4000 years of recorded human history and live in practically the Disney World of human experience all attained by ignoring the thin line provided by the curtains of a very elaborate arrangement of technology and social organization that disappears in hours from a Katrina or Sandy. Si vis pacem, para bellum.
Eventually, he didn't accept my explanation and started asking questions I didn't have the answers to. And they were questions that I ask myself all the time.
There you go: you admit you ask the questions, you admit you don't know the answers, then propose "solutions" that imply that you DO know the answers.
#15
BTW, Besoeker, that deer in #4 - one of yours, or somebody you know? That's quite a whitetail. I'd be smiling a lot bigger than that young guy in the pic.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
01/15/2014 9:43 Comments ||
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#16
We talked about how guns are best used for protection, only by those whose job it is to protect -- the police, the army.
Like about most Europeans I was anti-gun. And one day I read an American liberal proudly saying: "If you try to harm my children you will see how fast I am for calling the police". Whaaaaaaaaat? if you try to harm my children I will kill you and the only reason I am going to call the police is because the bad guy could prevail on me. And I am certainly unwilling to ask police officers to risk their lives in order to save my shildren all while I hide under the bed like that American liberal was apparently planning to do.
Since then I have become a firm partisan of Second Amendment.
#19
Reminds me of a man I talked to who said, "I don't need a firearm. If someone tries to get in my house I'm not taking the law into my own hands but dialing 911. After, I pay my taxes so the police can protect me". I asked him if he was familiar with the Supreme Court decision that declared a citizen has no inherent right to be protected by the police.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
01/15/2014 10:34 Comments ||
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#20
Follup to #16
I am now a knuckle dragging, Bible thumping, gun toting French red neck. :-)
#21
HuffPo author trying to make her way to Salon, apparently
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/15/2014 11:02 Comments ||
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#22
He divides the world into black/white, good/bad, yes/no, perhaps as a way to simplify a world that he is beginning to sense is not so simple.
I worked with troubled teen-agers at one point in my life. One day, one of the kids I was working with brought a gun to the center and threatened me. He told me what he was going to do to me if I continued talking with his parents. The world, all of a sudden got black and white and had a great deal of clarity. I read where the kid later died in a prison killing.
#23
JFM, you must feels as out-of-place in France as I do when I have to go to San Francisco. We need to figure out how you were cured of European-ness and apply that antidote to the rest of Europe and the urban US.
#29
I'd heard folks that many shrinks start off with that major in college hoping to understand themselves better. So start broken and learn to fix and then fix others except what if they can't fix themselves? Then they write for Huffpo I guess.
[DAWN] IN a city drawn into a spiral of violence where crime, politics and extremism are interlinked, law-enforcement agencies are poorly resourced and conviction rates low, where religious institutions with political agendas teach lessons of hate and sectarian fault lines are ripped apart, it is difficult to clearly identify the causes of sectarian violence.
Since 2007, increasing violence in Pakistain -- with forces of Evil targeting politicians, the military and police, holy mans, tribal leaders, Shias, and schools -- has found an urban epicentre in Bloody Karachi ...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It is among the largest cities in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous... . In its latest security report, the Pakistain Institute for Peace Studies (PIPS) reported a 53pc increase in sectarian violence for 2013. More than 85pc of such attacks and 68pc of the people killed were concentrated in Karachi, Quetta, Gilgit and Kurram Agency ...home of an intricately interconnected web of poverty, ignorance, and religious fanaticism, where the laws of cause and effect are assumed to be suspended, conveniently located adjacent to Tora Bora...
Last year, 212 were killed in 132 sectarian-related attacks mostly in Karachi. However, there's more than one way to skin a cat... a cycle of tit-for-tat sectarian killings on Karachi's streets since 2011 has sparked ethno-political violence with various sectarian outfits contributing to the growing body count.
The banned sectarian group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi ... a 'more violent' offshoot of Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistain. LeJ's purpose in life is to murder anyone who's not of utmost religious purity, starting with Shiites but including Brelvis, Ahmadis, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Rosicrucians, and just about anyone else you can think of. They are currently a wholly-owned subsidiary of al-Qaeda ... (LJ), sharing operational and ideological ties with Al Qaeda and the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistain (TTP), demonstrates how militancy elsewhere in the country affects the city through a lethal nexus.
In the case of the LJ-TTP link, Chaudhry Aslam Khan, the head of the Sindh police's CID anti-extremism cell, who was recently assassinated in Karachi, confirmed in an interview shortly before his killing that both conduct joint terrorist activities in the city. The leader of LJ's Balochistan ...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it... wing, Usman Saifullah Kurd, is also connected with Karachi's sectarian hard boys, he had said.
Aslam had said in a January 7 interview that "after the crackdown against LJ in Karachi and Punjab, their cadres had found sanctuaries in the tribal areas." He said that in a raid last November, the police had killed LJ's Karachi chief Gul Hasan, involved in suicide kabooms on the Haideri mosque and Imambargah ...since the country's so religiously correct, Shia Moslems in Pakistain can't call their houses of worship 'mosques,' which are reserved for Sunnis. It's not clear if imambargahs are used for explosives storage like mosques are... Ali Raza (2004) and an attack on the Chief Justice of the Sindh High Court, Justice Maqbool Baqar in August 2013.
Ideological and pie fights between the Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat ...which is the false nose and plastic mustache of the murderous banned extremist group Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistain, whatcha might call the political wing of Lashkar-e-Jhangvi... /Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistain ...a Sunni Deobandi organization, a formerly registered Pak political party, established in the early 1980s in Jhang by Maulana Haq Nawaz Jhangvi. Its stated goal is to oppose Shia influence in Pakistain. They're not too big on Brelvis, either. Or Christians. Or anybody else who's not them. The organization was banned in 2002 as a terrorist organization, but somehow it keeps ticking along, piling up the corpse counts... , following the Sunni Deobandi school and the Barelvi Sunnis, represented mainly by the Sunni Tehrik ...formed in Karachi in 1992 under by Muhammad Saleem Qadri. It quickly fell to trading fisticuffs and assassinations with the MQM and the Sipah-e-Sahaba, with at least a half dozen of its major leaders rubbed out. Sunni Tehreek arose to become the primary opposition to the Deobandi Binori Mosque, headed by Nizamuddin Shamzai, who was eventually bumped off by person or persons unknown. ST's current leadership has heavily criticized the Deobandi Jihadi leaders, accusing them of being sponsored by Indian Intelligence agencies as well as involvement in terrorist activities... , adds to this volatile cauldron. It is incorrect to differentiate between terrorist groups and sectarian outfits because they share similar agendas and religious ideologies, says political analyst Dr Ayesha Siddiqa.
Nobody knows what exactly drives sectarian violence, whether it is the consequence of state policies of Islamisation of laws and education, parallel legal and judicial systems, politicisation of the police force, failure of the state and the military, and the marginalisation of secular forces.
French researcher Marium Abou Zahab believes that links with the Middle East could be part of the explanation (proxy war between Soddy Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face... and Iran) but views sectarian violence as an indigenous phenomenon. With sporadic administrative and legal efforts to dismantle well-entrenched groups, leaders of supposedly banned groups such as the SSP operate with virtual immunity, using new avenues (social media) to propagate their hard boy ideas and enter electoral politics aligned to mainstream political parties.
Aurangzeb Farooqi, the Karachi head of the ASWJ, terms Shias 'infidels', attributing an increase in sectarianism to similar trends observed in the wider Mohammedan world. Condemning violence, he denies links with the LJ, calling for dialogue with 'rival groups.' He blames the police for failing to protect Sunnis as hundreds have been killed in reprisal attacks.
For their part, Shia political party Majlis-e-Wahdatul Mohammedaneen (MWM) claims they do not indulge in violent killing. They might have organised the largely peaceful demonstrations in Karachi and other towns to protest against the Quetta bombings last year, but the police suspect that some have adopted a violent retaliatory path, with a Karachi-based Shia militia responsible for attacks on Deobandi holy mans.
MWM spokesperson Ali Ahmar accuses LJ of fuelling sectarian violence, claiming that 500 Shias, including professors, students, lawyers and doctors, were targeted in 2013 with perpetrators tossed in the calaboose Drop the rod and step away witcher hands up! only in four to five cases. If young Shias are aligning themselves with MWM, then interviews with moderate Deobandi holy mans suggest that the killing of students and teachers is pushing men with no sectarian links towards Deobandi groups.
The cost of militancy includes damage to the economy, national security, citizen morale and political stability. Shrinking space for an alternative liberal discourse is evident as political patronage for the religious right goes unchecked with banned bully boy organizations and madressahs raising their public profile, providing endless recruits and sectarian-oriented curricula and publications to further fuel intolerance and bigotry.
As Karachi's sectarian forces of Evil conduct 'business' on home turf with their political utility intact, the consequences are uncertain but definitely deadly as Pakistain's security establishment nurtures some Taliban groups in the border regions as proxies for the post-2014 period.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/15/2014 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[6 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
#1
I was there when Reagan visited and did the opening ceremony for Ops 2A and 2B. He visited the equivalent of NSOC. I was in A ROF at the time. Even though I was in the Army at the time, I still had to pass the NSA lifestyle poly, which everyone hates. Reagan a far better president than anyone we have had since IMHO.
#2
Back during the Clinton years a small plane crash landed on the White House lawn. Inside joke at the time was that it was then Director CIA James Woolsey trying to get a meeting with the president. Seems to be a pattern.
#1
many lawmakers are convinced that Tehran is bluffing in its threat to walk away from the talks.
So what? new sanctions would decrease the chances of war by keeping Iran in line.
Maybe, but they were not particularly effective against other tyrannical regimes such as Saddams or Pudgy or his father in Norkland.
Sanctions, IMHO, would be crippling strategic carpet bombing but then that's just my jaundiced view of foreign policy.
#2
What's driving dems to defy the Champ on Iran sanctions
Common sense and the desire to be re-elected.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
01/15/2014 17:24 Comments ||
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#3
Methinks its called OWG Globalism + risking traditional US beliefs or identity e.g. WASP-ISM, + US, Western geopol dominance in return for massive uncertainty + poten strategic weakness [read, "GREAT GAME"-STYLE TAKEOVER BY HOSTILE POWERS].
As per #2, it didn't help vee NOT ASKING THE US MAINSTREAM/VOTERS IFF THEY WANTED OWG ANDOR GLOBALISM, LET ALONE SOCIALISM + REGULATORY, SOON-TO-BE-TOTAL TOTALITARIAN, PERENNIALLY DEBT-BUSTING/EXPANDING "BIG[GEST] GOVERNMENT".
E.G. POST-2015 "BORDERLESS" ANTI-SOVEREIGN OWG -
NWO NAU, ETC. AMERIKA = TRADITIONAL "NATIONALIST/
FEDERALIST"-LEVEL SOVEREIGN US GOVT. REDUCED TO STATE OR LOCAL-LEVEL SEMI-SOVEREIGN OR AUTONOMOUS? GOVERNMENT = HIGH POTEN FOR "UNIFIED/UNITARIAN" INTEGRATED GOP-DEM POLITICAL PARTY, ESTABLISHMENT SUBORNED TO OWG "GLOBAL"-LEVEL [NAU, Trans-Pac,Trans-Atlant, etc.] GOVT-ESTABLISHMENT = SYMBOLIZED BY SPECULATION OF HILLARY CLINTON-CHRISTIE POTUS TICKET FOR 2016???
#4
See also TOPIX > US FOREIGN POLICY IS IN SHAMBLES.
Uncertainty = FEAR.
* INDEPENDENT.UK > BRITISH SOVERIEGNTY AT RISK IN EU-US TRADE DEAL, UK IN DANGER OF SURRENDERING ITS JUDICIAL INDPEPENDENCE TO MULTINATIONAL CORPORATIONS [MNC's], WARN ACTIVISTS [+ UK MPS].
INDIAN DEFENCE FORUM > BRITAIN'S [post-911] WARS HAVE "NO STRATEGY", SAYS KEY MILITARY ADVISOR, i.e. Oxford University Prof. RICHARD HEW STRACHEN].
UK = Bammer USA???
* WORLD NEWS > AL-QAEDA'S NEXT COMEBACK COULD BE AFGHANISTAN OR PAKISTAN.
Dats "Nuke-armed Pakistan" to Youse + Moi.
US "going back in", from scratch???
* FREEREPUBLIC > [Gizmodo]CHINA'S NEW HYPERSONIC MISSLE CAN SCREAM PAST US AIR DEFENSES.
RELATED DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS = ... ...
> [House.gov] US CONGRESSIONAL COMMITTEE MEMBERS SEND FEAR OVER CHINESE HYPERSONIC MISSLE TEST |
CONGRESS VOICES CONCERN ABOUT CHINESE HYPERSONIC MISSLE TEST.
> CHINA'S INNOVATION ABILITY IS VASTLY UNDER-RATED.
US Congress recog that East Asia is fast becoming a "powder keg", + few iff any GOP-DEMS know how the Bammer is going to act.
Given ...
* TALKING POINTS MEMO > WHITE HOUSE TO GOP: IFF YOU WANT US TROOPS [back] IN IRAQ, YOU "SHOULD SAY SO".
More Admin-led "Throwing under the Bus" ="Falling on [One's Own]Swords", + NOT JUST THE GOP-RIGHT EITHER???
* US NEWS & WORLD REPORT > US MUST DRAW "RED LINES" FOR CHINA IN WESTERN PACIFIC " DRAWING A RED LINE FOR CHINA.
See "red Lines" for Libya, Egypt, Syria = Baby Assad andor FSA, Iran NucProgs + ...???
* BHARAT RAKSHAK > [Asia Times] CHINA CASTS RED TAPE IN SOUTH CHINA SEA.
* SAME > [PhilStar] REPORT: CHINA PLANS TO SEIZE PAG-ASA ISLAND [China = Zhongye Island] THIS
YEAR.
RELATED GLOBALNATION.INQUIRER.NET > [Philippines]DFA NOT AWARE OF CHINA PLAN TO SEIZE PAG-ASA ISLAND.
ARTIC = US ALLIES + NON-ALIGNED IN EAST ASIA + SOUTH CHINA SEA NEEDS A POTENT, PERMANENT OR NEAR-PERMANENT US NAVY = USDOD? PRESENCE TO COUNTER CHINA'S TERRITORIAL CLAIMS + FISHING RULES, FEES, ETC. LEST CHINA + PLA/PLAN PROCEED = RUN AMOK MILPOL UNCHALLENGED THROUGHOUT THE REGION.
D *** NG IT, WHAT COULD POSSIBLE GO WRONG? A HELLUVA F ****** LOT, + ITS NOT GUARANTEED THE USA OR US-WEST WILL EXISTENTIALLY, ETC. SURVIVE.
#1
The new urban commerce, the sickening reality..... drugs go northeast, the money goes southwest. A stoned constituency is a happy and compliant constituency.
Not exactly a new or startling dynamic. You want to clandestinely influence, sort out the players, or change the politics of a region, no problem. Leverage the existing commerce [drugs, human trafficking, guns] to your advantage.
Be sure you've got the US Ambassador and host-nation 'wired in' where applicable. Pre-fabricated cover stories and scapegoats are also handy, should a logistical cock-up take place. An open and free press, local law enforcement, high fences and tightly controlled borders are inhibitors by the way.
#3
It seems that this whole thing is part of Fallback Position No. 2 or 3: yeah, stuff happened, but Boosh Did It Too. Replace the lie with a half-truth, pretend it's an improvement/"coming clean."
#4
Ditto Snowy. What really bothers me is the growing evidence that Constitutional Democracy and governance are a canard, and that powerful, unelected bodies and agencies with secret, undisclosed budgets are actually controlling the action.
#5
I have been thinking about the "Bush/The Republicans did it too" excuse, and realized that anyone who says that is admitting they copied the idea from Bush/The republicans, thought they could improve on it, AND FAILED. The Original F&F was shut down because the Republican administration then saw it had failed: Democrats revive the program with "mary jane" illusions in their personal narrative of "OF COURSE WE ARE SMARTER, SO WE CAN DO BETTER", Fail, point at the republicans and say "THEY THOUGHT OF IT FIRST!" So they weren't smart enough to see, ahead of time, that it wouldn't work as THEY advertised it?
Ditto with Health Care, Obamacare vs RomneyCare. Despite his faults, Romney said the Individual mandate was a severe solution to a problem CREATED BY DEMOCRATS when they forbade pricing or coverage based on pre-existing conditions, and the insurance market was tanking in Massachusetts. Stupid idiots that they were, the Democrats decided to steal what they thought was a "good idea" from a Republican and make it their own. Think of an idiot addicted to a medicine that a doctor proscribed for another patient who thinks he can satisfy his addition by self-inflicting the disease, then self-diagnosing the disease and the cure.
#6
I read John Dodson's "The Unarmed Truth" and I had this nagging suspicion though the narrative of what if there was more to the story than was being reported--at a level higher than Dodson's pay grade. Such as some alliance with the cartels as described here. I dismissed the thought thinking: "No our government wouldn't be in bed with the cartels. That's just my paranoia talking and in the tin-foil hat realm." Maybe not.
#7
I have been of the opinion for a long time that the war on drugs is a sham. We don't need an alliance with a Mexican cartel, we need security on our Mexican border. I'm not talking about a fence either. I'm talking about a sniper ever 400 yards or so all along the border. Somebody steps across that border without authorization, somebody gets shot. Simple. Cheap. Effective. It's our country isn't it? Don't we have a right to defend it?
But I'm wondering what we'd find if someone was actually able to follow the money. How much of it ends up in the coffers of our illustrious politicians?
[UPDATE 1/14] This post has caused many to interpret that the U.S. government is actively supporting Sinaloa. That has not been established, despite claims by Zambada-Niebla's lawyer and Stratfor's source. What El Universal's investigation and the newly published court documents reveal is that there was a strong correlation from 2005 and 2009 between the rise of the Sinaloa cartel and the DEA's relatively regular contact with a top Sinaloa lawyer.
#9
Many, many people died from F&F weapons walking than Christie's bridge closing stunt. But guess who gets the ire of the . After 5 years they finally have something to investigate in the other party than their own frequent scandals that they will not acknowledge and only Issa will look at in Congress.
#10
A long deceased cousin of my father had too high a GSA rating to be forced out without cause. He started in the OSS then went CIA and State back and forth for decades... When Carter was elected they wanted to force him out so he was appointed acting drug tsar for 6 months. First day on the job it took him about 1 hour to make it through all the security to his new office. He was in it for about 1/2 hour when his new secretary announces that he has visitors he must see now. "he was going WTF?" In walk some drug kingpins stating that if he messed with any of their operation they would kill him and his family... He was thinking "I am a warrior against communism not a friking drug cop patsy for the Dems". He told them that and said "fine tell me your ops and I will make sure they are left alone". He was quickly transferred back to State. I asked why. He said... if they could get to me before I had my first cup of coffee in a new job... then it's obvious they own the DEA. I have no desire to sacrifice myself in a rigged game.
#12
License the right to use drugs. Make it easy to get your drug license if you are 18 and also make sure those with said license are not allowed to vote in national elections and have their name stricken from the books immediately. If they give up the license they can reregister.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Kurram Agency
