US to launch $1bn ‘Plan Mexico’

[seafan]

Source: Financial Times

The US intends to supply Mexico with a $1bn aid package to help combat an increasingly costly and violent war against drugs, according to a top Mexican diplomat.
The agreement, which some experts have dubbed ”Plan Mexico” after the controversial multi-billion-dollar anti-narcotics package that the US established with Colombia in 2000, would be spread over two years and include the supply of intelligence, training and equipment such as helicopters and boats.

However, Carlos Rico, Mexico’s undersecretary for North American affairs, said the plan would not resemble the aid package with Colombia. In particular, he said, no US troops would be allowed to operate on Mexican soil, thus sidestepping the particularly sensitive issue of Mexican sovereignty.

.....

Arguing that drugs gangs have taken control of large swathes of the country and that organised crime has infiltrated institutions, Mexico’s head of state has become increasingly vociferous on the need for US assistance.

”The truth is that the US is jointly responsible for what is happening to us,” he told the Financial Times in an interview this year. ”In that joint responsibility, the US has a lot of work to do.”

Read more: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/474a42be-7506-11dc-892d-0000779fd2ac.html

[robinlynne]

1. You know that the "war on drugs" is now all being done by contractors.....

[sbyte]

13. They need to redeploy out of Iraq.

[Vincardog]

2. Or they could legalize drugs and make a Billion in taxes. Plus there would not be

all that money to corrupt the police and politicians. Oh yeah the * crime family would not want to loose all that revenue. Never mind

[leftysopaw]

5. legalizing drugs would be a big mistake

the best thing to do is offer medical care to those who become alcoholics and addicts.

[ixion]

18. yeah, without all those non-violent offenders, who would suport the private prison industry?

:eyes: :sarcasm:

[Vincardog]

25. SEnd them to Federal lock up for treatment? How would decriminalizing personnel

medical decisions be a big mistake? Don't you believe people can make their own decisions?

[Bitwit1234]

3. Where the hell are we getting all this money bush is doling out to other countries.

He vetoes all the bills with social programs to help the people in this country and gives our taxpayers money to other people.

[Deja Q]

4. In other countries who don't like us, or whose inhabitants come here and put their flag above ours.

[leftysopaw]

6. why dont they like you?

placing one flag above another is guaranteed by the 1st amendment.

[Donnachaidh]

9. oh please -- not with the flag thing again!

This is coming through my groups as well.

When OUR Government is selling OUR country off to cronies, when people are dying because they cannot afford health care, when grocery prices are going through the roof and people of limited means are probably getting sick because of the diet they can't afford to fix, when jobs are being sent overseas and they are NOT being replaced here --

FOCUS on the REAL problems! Not on a piece of material and where someone hangs it! Personally, I don't CARE if someone wants to hang both the Mexican flag AND the American flag out of their asses, with the American flag on the bottom. It's a DIVERSION -- it's NOT the problem!

It's ridiculous to even see this NON-ISSUE in a country of IMMIGRANTS. Technically, the flag that should be above everyone else's is the flag of the Lakota Nation, or whatever Native American tribe was on the land you now live on.

Jeez Louise! FOCUS PEOPLE.

[leftysopaw]

10. Amen

:)

[VP505]

7. If its irresponsible

to increase funding for children's health care why is it not irresponsible to piss away money on a program that has absolutely No chance of being successful. Especially in a country with so much corruption that its unlikely that some of that money if any of it will be used for what its intended.

[puffymuffins]

8. Asinine

Fuck that. Charity begins at home. We should be spending our money on our people. God knows that there are millions here who need help. Our tax dollars should fund programs that help people HERE. Mexico should be taking care of their own fucking problems. Nobody sends aid to us to help solve our problems, and no one should expect us to throw our money at their problems.

[leftysopaw]

12. It's Asinine alright

to call this charity.

[puffymuffins]

14. It's a figure of speech.

Our tax dollars should be spent helping our fellow citizens in need. Do you agree?

[leftysopaw]

15. No, I do not

The U.S. is bribing Mexico. Same as the drug traffickers do. The U.S. has to compete for loyalty because americans like to use drugs.

Do you agree?

[puffymuffins]

19. No I do not.

"Americans like to use drugs" is a silly self-deprecating statement. I'm an American and I don't use drugs, nor do I hang with anyone who does.

Are you an American? Do you like to use drugs?

[leftysopaw]

11. here's a thought

"Mr Rico said that the agreement between the two countries would also involve the US cracking down on the illegal flow across its southern border of arms and chemicals used in the production of synthetic drugs. It would also do more to combat drugs consumption at home.

[ProudDad]

16. Decriminalize, regulate and tax

The fucking phony "war on drugs" is a failure.

It's the CAUSE of the majority of urban murders.

It's the CAUSE of overcrowded prisons and jails.

It's expensive in terms of lives, communities and money...

It's TOTALLY FUCKED UP...


DECRIMINALIZE...

REGULATE...

and TAX...

And use the money for reasonable, rational, TRUTH BASED anti-addiction campaigns and ON-DEMAND Rehab...

Once again, the cops, the military, the VIOLENT "solution" is the WRONG thing to be doing...


But, they ain't gonna do it...

'Cause

It would cost the fucking banks -- they launder the drug profits...

It would cost the fucking politicians -- they wouldn't have that knee-jerk campaign issue any more...

It would cost the fucking prison-industrial complex and prison guards -- they'd have less than half as many occupants without the phony "war on drugs"... They'd have to CLOSE prisons instead of build more new ones.

It would cost the fucking gun manufacturers -- won't be nearly as many stupid guns on the streets...

But...

It's too damn good an idea for "We the People" vs. the powers that be -- that's why it won't be done in this benighted excuse for a country...

[Egnever]

17. Lovely

so we cant pay for insurance for kids but we can throw a billion here or there at mexico for "the war on drugs".

What a waste.

I agree with the mexican pres though if there werent a war on drugs making the drug business so profitable then the problem would likely not exist.

[Jackpine Radical]

20. That is exactly right. I have said for years that the DEA

is nothing but a price support mechanism for the drug cartels.

[Tzimisce]

21. Never ceases to amuse me...

...how we're running this huge deficit (a good deal of it, probably the vast majority, driven by military spending, yes) but we can still find all this money to sling across the globe to combat problems that, in a lot of cases, have nothing to do with us. It's heartwarming that we're so quick to rush to the aid of those in need on the other side of the planet, but while we're doing that, the homeless are dying of starvation or exposure in our nation's capital. It's amazing to me, really.

Our misguided foreign policy is the cause of our reputation in the world taking it across the knees, but it seems like our leaders figure throwing the dollaz at the problem will make everyone love us. No, they'll take our money and still hate us because the root cause of their hate hasn't changed a whit. If our leaders are bound and determined to "stay the course" with our foreign policy, then as far as I'm concerned, take that money and spend it here to combat hunger, disease, lack of education, and the host of other ills that plague us as a society.

In the end, it makes us look like imbeciles for telling other folks how to manage their house, when they can look in the windows of our own and see the mess we so studiously ignore. Fix the US first, then we can work on helping others. A blind man makes a really shitty guide, yanno?

[bdamomma]

22. how about $1bn for this country instead.

[Solar_Power]

26. How about another tax cut?

That will raise the funds for these kinds of lavish "gifts"

[Toots]

23. I seem to remember a completely different tune when Clinton LOANED Mexico money

The GOP was completely up in arms about squandering money. Mexico repaid in timely fashion and GOP was once again shown to be the fools they are. Will America ever learn. "Is our children learning" at all?

[Acadia Blue]

24. LOL the Mexican president is in on the drug trade. They have

always been part of it. A corrupt country who has more billionairs than Switzerland that is so filthy greedy that people have to leave to make enough money just to have enough food to eat. I know because as a college student, I lived there about 2 years. The woman who I rented from told me to never pay a maid more than 20 American dollars a month so they would not learn to expect more. Americans have no idea what it means to enable this country and the greedy filthy rich who run it.
The poor Mexicans are treated as badly as slaves.

[JCMach1]

27. How about a $1billion war on poverty in Mexico?