[FoxNews] Designating Mexican cartels as Foreign Terrorist Organizations is the first honest step Washington has taken on this issue in decades
On President Donald J. Trump’s first day in office, he issued an executive order designating human and drug trafficking cartels as Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs).
This week, the other shoe is expected to drop, as the State Department under Secretary Marco Rubio names names, designating six Mexican cartels as FTOs.
Official Washington has long peddled the comfortable fiction that Mexico is an honest partner in the fight against drugs and human trafficking. This myth persists, despite decades of overwhelming evidence that the Mexican government is at best willfully negligent, and at worst, in active collusion with the criminal networks destroying lives on both sides of the border – cartels that Trump just called out by name.
Trump has put a forceful end to this lie. Trump’s action exposes the inconvenient truth: Mexico, first under former President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) and his Morena Party and now with President Claudia Sheinbaum, is no peer ally. It is a state deeply compromised by cartel corruption and control.
While Washington elites fret over diplomacy and stability, tens of thousands of Americans are dying from fentanyl poisoning every year. This crisis is directly fueled by cartels operating with impunity in Mexico and with material, financial and intelligence support from China.
#1
What about the comfortable fiction that none of our own politicians have succumbed to plata o plomo?
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
02/17/2025 13:27 Comments ||
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#2
The key to understanding Mexico is to realize that what we call the Mexican government is just largest of the cartels vying for influence and power.
#3
The legislation that established the office in question was signed by the President in, I think, the 1970s and amendments also signed by the President were passed in the 1980s, 1990s and subsequently.
The legislation says the Special Counsel can only be fired for a finding of inefficiency, malfeasance of neglect of duty (which have not been alleged).
To uphold the firing, the court would have to determine that the law itself was unconstitutional despite the cooperation between Congress and the President in developing and strengthening the law over several decades.
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
02/17/2025 16:12 Comments ||
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#4
despite the cooperation between Congress and the President in developing and strengthening the law over several decades.
There was lots of that with regard to Separate But Equal before the US Supreme Court ruled the entire principle was unconstitutional. Precedents as an argument is only lasts until the underlying principle faces the critical Constitutional challenge.
but the Special Counsel legislation was specifically designed to curb the power of the executive branch unlike the doctrine of separate but equal
notably, there are laws that delegate tariff and warpower authority to the President, passed by Congress and signed by the President, that seem to explicitly violate the separation of powers doctrine -- if the special counsel legislation is unconstitutional I have a hard time understanding how the tariff and warpowers legislation isn't also unconstitutional, but of course that will have to wait a legal challenge
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
02/17/2025 17:14 Comments ||
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[VDH on AG] Democrats seem stuck in a cycle of rage and resistance, recycling failed anti-Trump tactics while losing ground with voters and donors alike.
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/17/2025 08:57 ||
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[11136 views]
Top|| File under: Tin Hat Dictators, Presidents for Life, & Kleptocrats
#1
Not yet - lots of kneejerk reaction but they're watching closely to see what works. I assume Antifa/BLM/Illegal/unemployed bureaucrat riots are in the planning stage.
#8
#6 - Mao and Stalin. That's getting into the Left's own territory. Outside the zombies and npc who's going to believe a billionaire capitalists ranks among them?
[GreyDynamics] In-Q-Tel (IQT) is a legally independent, investment capital nonprofit organisation that was conceptualised and chartered by the CIA, with which it still has contracts. IQT invests in startup companies worldwide that develop technology that is considered advantageous to the US intelligence community’s mission. Since the advent of In-Q-Tel, other entities, like the U.S. Army, have followed suit and created investment companies that straddle the public-private sector divide.
1.3 History
The origins of the venture capitalist firm lie in the CIA’s broad discretionary spending powers, as established by the Central Intelligence Agency Act of 1949, just two years after that Agency’s founding.
The CIA established In-Q-Tel in 1999. Norman Augustine, former CEO of Lockheed Martin, served as In-Q-Tel’s first leader. One of the reasons IQT was founded is that the CIA felt that it would keep up with emerging technologies more effectively if it outsourced some of its research and development. Although the organisation was originally US focused, it has expanded its scope of investment internationally. It focuses on connecting the intelligence and defense communities to the private sector where R&D is occurring naturally.
1.4 Similar Organizations
Since the advent of In-Q-Tel, different organizations have taken inspiration and begun their own investment firms. For example, The U.S. Army started its own venture initiative called OnPoint Technologies in 2002. NASA charted Red Planet Capital which also invests in up and coming technologies.
2 IN-Q-TEL AS AN ORGANISATION
2.1 Business Structure
Although In-Q-Tel is a legally independent company, it is directly funded by the CIA’s budget for the Directorate of Science and Technology. IQT is given a yearly budget with which they can make equity investments in private sector firms. The IQT Interface Center (QIC) works to bridge the gap between the CIA and IQT. QIC communicates needs or problems to IQT, which then leverages its place in the private sector to try to find solutions.
IQT typically makes between twelve and fifteen yearly investments, ranging in value from half a million to three million US dollars. In-Q-Tel, like many investment firms, functions as a board observer in the companies in which it invests. This allows IQT to have direct access to information about the company and the products they are investing in. In-Q-Tel also retains the right to pull out of investments. As a nonprofit organization, any incidental gains are directed back into IQT operations.
In-Q-Tel has a presence in Singapore, London, Sydney, and Munich. These offices allow the organisation to invest in companies on the ground outside of the US, as well as collaborate with the intelligence communities of these countries. These offices benefit both U.S. interests and those of allied partners.
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.
