This week, a horrific tragedy unfolded in the high desert of Northern Mexico, where three SUVs full of women and children were gunned down with automatic weapons and subsequently burned to ashes. The fact that these folks were members of a Mormon fundamentalist sect that emigrated to the area in the late 19th century and still hold dual US / Mexican citizenship has refocused US attention on the ongoing Mexican Drug War -- an ongoing low-intensity conflict that has killed hundreds of thousands of innocents (as well as plenty of not-so-innocents) and disrupted one of the world's largest economies for the past 15 years or so.Steve and Soumi peer through the lens of this outrage to examine Mexican and American policies towards the cartels; the basics of supply and demand; endemic violence and state failure; and who we think is ultimately to blame (hint: they're not in Mexico).Further reading:Bloomberg: AMLO Declines Trump's Help After Six Children Killed in Attack CNN: Amid Mounting Drug War Deaths, Mexico's President Sticks to his Strategy
This week, a horrific tragedy unfolded in the high desert of Northern Mexico, where three SUVs full of women and children were gunned down with automatic weapons and subsequently burned to ashes. The fact that these folks were members of a Mormon fundamentalist sect that emigrated to the area in the late 19th century and still hold dual US / Mexican citizenship has refocused US attention on the ongoing Mexican Drug War -- an ongoing low-intensity conflict that has killed hundreds of thousands of innocents (as well as plenty of not-so-innocents) and disrupted one of the world's largest economies for the past 15 years or so.
Steve and Soumi peer through the lens of this outrage to examine Mexican and American policies towards the cartels; the basics of supply and demand; endemic violence and state failure; and who we think is ultimately to blame (hint: they're not in Mexico).
Further reading: