| | |  Editorials | Opinions | December 2008 
Mexico's Drug War
 Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
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Every gun fired by drug traffickers dealing death in Mexico is one that might as well be aimed at the heart of U.S. well-being.
As the Homeland Security Department has acted as if illegal immigrants doing U.S. jobs represented the dire threat, Mexico bravely has launched a campaign against the drug violence that has claimed more than 8,000 lives since President Felipe Calderon assumed office in December 2006. More than 5,000 have died in 2008 alone.
It's a fight that the United States cannot allow Mexico to lose. It has pledged $400 million for Mexico's police and courts, releasing $197 million of that recently.
It's not enough.
This country long has recognized what economic distress in Mexico has meant — more immigrant workers. This, at least, has had distinct benefit for this country. But there is nothing beneficial about this other export, which will only increase in volume should Mexico not prevail.
And while there is no comparison between what Mexican economics and Mexico's traffickers deal, there is a similarity in why each occurs. The U.S. offers a market for both. If there weren't so many drug users here, Mexico wouldn't have the problem it has. And if this country didn't have so many guns, the Mexican traffickers' wouldn't have so many at their disposal.
This presents the United States with both an obligation and a necessity. It must curtail the drug market here — and not purely with the blunt instrument of law enforcement.
The fight at our doorstep is particularly important. Instability in Mexico has consequences for the United States that instability elsewhere does not.
The new administration must give Mexico at least as much attention as it does the world's other hot spots. |
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