I have linked two news articles below about corruption that was paid for by the violent Mexican drug cartels. The corruption reported in these two articles takes place on both sides of the border.
From the Los Angeles Times
Former Starr sheriff pleads guilty
Senator Schumer and his open borders colleagues on Capitol Hill may be content with the situation to be found along the border that is supposed to separate the United States from Mexico, but I can tell you that the border is anything but secure.
The first article which is part of an ongoing series entitled, “Mexico Under Siege” in the Los Angeles Times paints an extremely disturbing picture of how widespread the corruption is within high ranking officials in Mexico. The second article deals with a single American law enforcement official, an American Sheriff, Reymundo “Rey” Guerra of Starr County, Texas, who violated his oath of office for a couple of thousand dollars.
Of course the amount of the bribe or the sort of coercion that may have been brought to bear against him and his complicity may be greater than what was reported or may be greater than what he has pleaded guilty to – a single count of conspiracy to distribute narcotics.
The issue is that when a law enforcement officer is corrupted he not only places his own life in immediate danger, he endangers his colleagues in the law enforcement community and may also endanger the residents of the community he is supposed to protect. According to the news report, Guerra also endangered the safety of an informant.
The disturbing issue is that with corruption being so widespread in Mexico, it is almost impossible for our government to know who can be trusted if the two countries are to work cooperatively to combat the drug cartels. The sharing of intelligence creates a literal “life and death” situation for law enforcement officers and for confidential informants when those who are given access to the information have been corrupted or coerced.
Corruption has been the one constant in every effort of the United States to work cooperatively with Mexican law enforcement officials and the news report does nothing to suggest that this situation has improved.
Meanwhile, the administration appears to be determined to implement a program that would provide Mexican truck drivers with unfettered access to our nation’s roads. If the goal is to thwart efforts of the cartels to smuggle their drugs into the United States and then distribute them throughout our country, then it makes absolutely no sense to provide those thousands of trucks complete access to our nation’s roads.
I have, on previous occasions, compared the spread of the Mexican cartels throughout our country to a metastasized cancer. One of the newest treatment strategies for combatting cancer is to go after the mechanism by which the patient’s blood vessels nourish the tumor. To our nation, the highway system should be seen as the parallel of the arterial system of a person. Providing easy access to Mexican truck drivers would open up all sorts of possibilities for the Mexican cartels to pay the truckers bribes to carry their narcotics. Where the truckers would refuse the bribes, they may well find that the threat of violence against their family members would “convince” them to do the cartels’ bidding.
Think about the harm done to citizens in both Mexico and the United States when NAFTA was implemented. The North American Free Trade Agreement caused many Mexican farmers to lose their farms, some of which had been held by Mexican families for generations. Under NAFTA, American jobs were exported, causing many Americans to lose their jobs and their ability to support their families.
Now the push is on to open our highways to foreign truck drivers who may be hauling more than their paperwork would indicate even while Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano is tasking our agents with checking vehicles leaving the United States to make certain that guns or money is not being moved from the United States into Mexico.
Additionally, giving those Mexican truck drivers unlimited access to our nation’s roads would also cost thousands of hard working American truck drivers their jobs, providing yet another compelling reason why this proposal should not be implemented. In less than two years each and every member of the House of Representatives is up for reelection. In less than two years more than one third of the members of the United States Senate will have to face their constituents. They need to be reminded that they work for us, We the People!
The large scale apathy demonstrated by citizens of this nation has emboldened elected representatives to all but ignore the needs of the average American citizen in a quest for massive campaign funds and the promises of votes to be ostensibly delivered by special interest groups. There is much that we cannot do but there is one thing that We the People absolutely must do- we must stop sitting on the sidelines!
The collective failure of We the People to get involved in make our concerns known to our politicians have nearly made the concerns of the great majority of the citizens of this nation all but irrelevant to the politicians. I implore you to get involved! We live in a perilous world and in a perilous era. The survival of our nation and the lives of our citizens hang in the balance.
This is neither a Conservative issue, nor is it a Liberal issue – simply stated, this is most certainly an AMERICAN issue! You are either part of the solution or you are a part of the problem! Democracy is not a spectator sport! Lead, follow or get out of the way!
