Pubdate: Wed, 16 May 2012
Source: Indianapolis Star (IN)
Copyright: 2012 Indianapolis Newspapers Inc.
Contact: http://www2.indystar.com/help/letters.html
Website: http://www.indystar.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/210
Author: Ruben Navarrette

MEXICO MUST FIGHT DRUG DEALERS, NOT ITSELF

When you're addressing a crowd, there are those not-so-subtle
indicators that your message is not getting through. For me, the hint
came when, during a recent talk in which I declared my support for the
Mexican drug war, a woman in the audience yelled: "Sellout!"

It was startling but also refreshing. As a Mexican-American, I'm often
accused by the right wing of being -- as one reader put it the other
day -- a "pro-illegal-alien opinion writer." It was a nice change of
pace to have someone on the left wing accuse me of not being
supportive enough of a liberal cause. It tells me that I'm just where
I need to be.

Where I was that day was an annual cultural celebration in San Jose,
Calif. -- a city sandwiched between Silicon Valley and San Francisco
- -- where I was appearing alongside Mexican poet and peace activist
Javier Sicilla. The audience was mainly Latino and left-of-center.
During the question-and-answer session, several of them identified
themselves as having been born in Mexico even though they now live in
the United States.

Many of them thought that both countries should legalize drugs, and
that both governments are to blame for a war that has resulted in the
deaths of about 50,000 Mexicans -- including Sicilla's son. And they
didn't want to hear from anyone who disagreed with them.

Like me. The three main points I strived to make that night were that
legalizing drugs would only increase drug use and, in both countries,
destroy the institution that Latinos care about most -- the family;
that it is wrong, dishonest and pointless to blame the governments of
Mexico and the United States for fighting a war that needs to be waged
when we should blame the drug cartels that are terrorizing the Mexican
people; and, finally, that one reason Latinos have never matured
politically is because, on controversial issues, we believe that our
opinion is the only acceptable one and we tend to attack those who
disagree.

The last comment was met with a round of boos, which is ironic when
you think about it. Here I was telling the crowd that they were
intolerant and they reacted by being more intolerant.

Sicilla was more polite, but just as closed-minded. He said that he
was "surprised" by my views and shocked that I would continue to
support a bloody war being carried out by a corrupt government in Mexico.

I responded that he shouldn't be surprised. After all, I said, we hail
from different countries and so we have different perspectives. Both
are legitimate. Besides, I said, Mexico has always been corrupt and
that has nothing to do with drugs or the war to stop their
proliferation.

At that point, there was more jeering and booing. Another woman told
me to pipe down.

"We came to hear Javier!" she shouted.

Finally, I drew a parallel between the drug war and the war on terror.
Nobody wants to fight these battles, but they have to be fought. If
the United States lets its guard down, Islamic radicals will strike
again and kill more Americans. Likewise, if Mexican President Felipe
Calderon surrenders to the drug cartels, there will only be more bloodshed.

Just this week, Mexican police found 49 mutilated bodies -- their
heads, hands, and feet chopped off -- on a highway not far from the
U.S.-Mexico border. At the scene, a white stone arch was spray-painted
with "100% Zeta" apparently in reference to the ruthless Zetas drug
cartel made up of former elite members of the Mexican military.

The hornets are out of the nest. And, as is their nature, they're
stinging people. Why blame Calderon for disturbing the insects when
all we should worry about is getting rid of them?

As I've written before, the drug war has become a turf war with the
half-dozen or so Mexican cartels fighting to get their hands on real
estate. Yesterday, the battleground was Monterrey; tomorrow,
Guadalajara. Whatever the Mexican government does, whether the victor
in July's presidential election escalates the war or surrenders it,
that struggle will go on. We can argue all we want, and we should do
so with civility. But we can't change that fact.

Whether you live in the United States or Mexico, all that matters is
that you live in the real world.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Matt