The more outrageous the lie, right?
"Cartels find help north of the border; Case reveals role of US operatives" by Ceci Connolly, Washington Post | September 26, 2010
EL PASO, Texas — She lived a double life. At the border crossing, she was Agent Garnica, a veteran law enforcement officer. In the shadows, she was “La Estrella,’’ the star, who helped drug cartels make a mockery of the US border.
Also see: U.S. Government Brings Drug War to U.S. Cities
I'm tired of the game.
Martha Garnica devised secret codes, passed stacks of cash through car windows, and sketched out a map for smugglers to safely haul drugs and undocumented workers across the border. For that she was richly rewarded; she lived in a spacious house with a built-in pool, owned two Hummers, and vacationed in Europe.
For years, until an intricate sting brought her down in late 2009, Garnica embodied the seldom-discussed role of the United States in the trafficking trade.
Why would it be seldom-discussed, agenda-setting (and proud of it) media?
Cartels based in Mexico, where there is a long history of corruption, increasingly rely on well-placed operatives such as Garnica to reach their huge customer base in the United States. It is an argument often made by Mexican officials — that all the attention paid to corruption in their country has obscured a similar, growing problem on the US side of the border.
The cartels have grown so sophisticated, law enforcement officials say, that they are employing Cold War-era spy tactics to recruit and corrupt US officials....
That's where I stopped reading this hunk of BS.
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So how is all the cloak-and-dagger, 'er, gun stuff working out?
"Gunmen kill another mayor in Mexico" by Associated Press | September 25, 2010
MONTERREY, Mexico — Gunmen killed a town mayor near the drug-plagued industrial city of Monterrey, authorities said yesterday, the fourth mayor in northern Mexico to be slain in little more than a month....
Drug gangs warring for territory and smuggling routes in northern Mexico have increasingly targeted political figures in the region, though the attorney general said aspects of Prisciliano Rodriguez Salinas’s killing were uncharacteristic of gangs.
But not of intelligence agencies and governments.
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And if Israel can kill an American in international waters and get away with it, why not Mexico?
"Pirates attack pair at Mexico border
DENVER — A former Colorado resident says it’s a miracle she survived an attack by pirates who fired bullets at her on a lake on the US-Mexico border after they gunned down her husband. Tiffany Hartley, 29, a native of Berthoud, told The Denver Post she and her husband, David, were sightseeing on the Mexican side of Falcon Lake when pirates shot her husband in the back of the head Thursday. She says she tried to rescue him but retreated as shots were fired. Texas authorities say David Hartley is believed to be dead. The Post said the couple met in high school in Loveland, Colo., and had been married about eight years (AP)."
Pirates on the high.... lakes?
So when are you going to start securing the borders, government?
ZAPATA, Texas — The Mexican government said yesterday that it has opened a federal investigation into the reported shooting of an American tourist on a border lake and strongly denied accusations that it has delayed action on finding the man or his attackers.
A statement from Mexico’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs “categorically rejects claims to the effect that Mexican authorities are not doing enough to find’’ David Hartley.
Hartley’s wife, Tiffany, says she and her husband were riding Jet Skis back from Mexico on Sept. 30 when they were attacked by Mexican pirates in speedboats who opened fire and shot David Hartley in the back of the head. He fell into the water. Tiffany Hartley has said she tried to rescue him but fled to the US side of the lake as the pirates continued shooting. Falcon Lake is a dammed section of the Rio Grande, 25 miles long and 3 miles across. Pirates have robbed boaters and fisherman on the Mexican side, prompting warnings by Texas officials, but Hartley’s death would mark the first violent fatality on the lake.
Where is the outrage from the U.S. government, huh?
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ZAPATA, Texas — A search for a missing American tourist presumably shot and killed by Mexican pirates on a border lake has been thwarted by threats of an ambush from drug gangs, US officials said yesterday.
US Representative Henry Cuellar told reporters that Mexican authorities are doing everything they can to find David Hartley’s body while trying to keep their own crews safe....
I would like to know why we are fighting wars halfway around the planet when the government can't even secure a dammed-up lake!
Tiffany Hartley said her husband, David, was shot to death by Mexican pirates chasing them on speedboats across Falcon Lake Sept. 30 as they were returning on jet skis from a trip to photograph a historic church in Mexico. Texas officials have warned boaters and fisherman that pirates frequent the Mexican side of the lake.
That part of Tamaulipas state is overrun by violence from a turf battle between the Gulf Cartel and the Zeta drug gang, made up of former Mexican special forces soldiers, and both are battling the Mexican military....
You know, the same ones rustling oil -- and government can't stop 'em, huh?
Zapata County Sheriff Sigifredo Gonzalez sent word to the Zetas he wants the body returned and has no plans to prosecute.
You don't do that to friends.
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Related:
EAGLE PASS, Texas — A US Border Patrol agent tipped off that a pickup truck was carrying a suspicious payload shot and killed the teenage driver, who was apparently unarmed, after a brief struggle, authorities said yesterday.
Just getting even.
Juan Mendez, an 18-year-old from Eagle Pass, died at Fort Duncan Medical Center shortly after the shooting Tuesday, Maverick County Chief Deputy Sheriff Ruben Cano said.
Border Patrol sensors showed that the truck Mendez was driving was carrying suspicious cargo, Cano said. Witnesses said an agent, whose identity has not been disclosed, stopped the vehicle shortly after 9 a.m. and began to question Mendez, he said.
A 15-year-old boy fled from truck, and Mendez also tried to get away but briefly struggled with the agent, Cano said. Mendez broke free and the agent shot him twice, the chief deputy said. No evidence was found that Mendez was armed, he said.
Where was he shot? The back?
Couldn't have just let the kid run away?
Investigators found 325 pounds of marijuana in the truck, Cano said.
Time to LEGALIZE so NO MORE PEOPLE GET KILLED!!!!!
The 15-year-old was taken into juvenile custody....
Or that?
Border Patrol agents are allowed to use lethal force under certain circumstances, and investigators from the FBI, the Texas Rangers, and US Customs and Border Protection’s internal affairs department are looking into the incident, Cano said....
Meaning a cover-up has begun.
The incident is the second deadly shooting of an unarmed teen by the Border Patrol in four months. A Border Patrol agent in El Paso shot and killed a 15-year-old Mexican boy on June 7.
Related: Just Over the Border: The Tunneling Teen
Sergio Adrian Hernandez Huereca was among a group of people in the bed of the Rio Grande who were throwing rocks at the agents.
Also see: Footpath to the New World Order
I wouldn't worry about that right now.
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Why I wouldn't worry about youths in the river:
"Slow-moving storm drops heavy rains" by Associated Press | September 27, 2010
GUATEMALA CITY — The remnants of Tropical Storm Matthew drenched parts of Central America and southern Mexico yesterday, a day after it weakened to a tropical depression.
Another potential hurricane that fizzled.
See: Boston Globe Bulls*** Churn
That is not to say it's harmless.
The storm’s forward movement slowed to a crawl and top wind speeds fell to about 25 miles per hour. Its center was about 40 miles southeast of the Gulf Coast city of Villahermosa, an area already hit by severe flooding in recent months....
Mostly forgotten by the paper; you can see what their focus lies.
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The Globe's follow-up photo that you would never have seen on the web:
"TWO BODIES RECOVERED AFTER LANDSLIDE IN MEXICO -- Searchers recovered the bodies of two teenage sisters yesterday during the hunt for 11 people missing after a huge hillside collapsed in Santa Maria de Tiahuitoltepec in Mexico's rain-soaked southern state of Oaxaca, while a landslide in a neighboring state killed 16 people. Authorities initially said hundreds could be dead in the remote town (Boston Globe September 30 2010)."
Update:
AUSTIN, Texas — A Mexican police commander investigating the reported shooting of an American tourist on a border lake was decapitated, and his head was found in a suitcase outside a Mexican Army base, a Texas sheriff said yesterday.
Ruben Rios, a spokesman for the Tamaulipas state prosecutor’s office, said authorities “don’t know how or why he was killed.’’
**************
Cartels have used beheadings to terrorize the public and to send messages to Mexican law enforcement. US officials have said threats from drug gangs who control the area around Falcon Lake have hampered the search for Hartley....
I'm getting the feeling neither side wants to find anything.
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And here is the answer to the violence:
"Calif. vote won’t deter drug cartels, study says" by Associated Press | October 13, 2010
SANTA CRUZ, Calif. — Mexico’s drug traffickers are likely to lose customers in America’s largest marijuana-using state if California legalizes the drug, but they won’t lose much money overall because the state’s residents already prefer to grow their own, according to a study released yesterday.
And THAT LAST REASON is why it is ILLEGAL!
That means the proposal on the state’s November ballot to legalize marijuana also will do little to quell the drug gangs’ violent and sophisticated organizations that generate billions of dollars a year, according to the study by the nonpartisan RAND Drug Policy Research Center....
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