I said I would talk about a strategy, but the first question is "strategy to do what?". After all, I could be talking about our strategy for dealing with the South China Sea (and btw, if you want nightmares...just think what would happen if one of those flybys turned into a shooting incident after we elect the next president.) Or I could talk about our strategy for fighting slavery. Or our strategy for improving schools.
But in some ways those don't seem appropriate right now. So to steal a campaign slogan, I want to talk about a strategy to Make America Great Again.
Immigration is a hot topic, right? I've talked about how I don't think a wall is an appropriate answer, mostly because you'd have to staff the wall well enough to respond to any attempts to tunnel under or fly over the wall. Plus you just push illegal immigration to other channels.
But if a wall won't work, what will?
Let's start talking about supply and demand. Illegal immigration is a problem for two reasons. One - people are coming from places where the economy sucks. Two - smuggling people over the border is a business closely tied to the drug trade. The coyotes and so forth often also smuggle illegal drugs, and may even use these immigrants as drug mules.
So we need to do the following: reform our drug policy, encourage development and stability in the economies to our south, and create a closer relationship with Mexico.
I started with our drug policy, because the war on drugs has ramifications far greater than just filling up our prisons, putting money in the pockets of criminals, and costing us money in terms of law enforcement and prisons. The war on drugs has, frankly, failed. I have heard a cop say that they won't even bother arresting someone for marijuana, not unless the person is being arrested for something else and they want to add to the charges. My town, btw, had a referendum on marijuana. Not anything binding, no legislation changing policies. Just something to see what support there was. I stopped by there but couldn't vote in it because technically I live outside the city limits. There was a tremendously long line and the local newscaster was there trying to find someone who opposed the measure. Nobody, and I mean nobody, did. When you've got a law that's not even being enforced by the people who are supposed to be enforcing it, you've got a bad law.
Aside from all our domestic issues, however, our policies also have a direct impact on Mexico (and other nations to our south). We apply pressure to them if they even talk about changing their policies, in order to try to stop the flow of drugs. Meanwhile, our attempts at interdiction raise the price of drugs...put more money in the hands of the criminals, and makes it easier for them to corrupt law enforcement and state officials in their home countries (and some of the money gets into the hands of terrorists and other enemies of the US, but that's another story). While I don't think we can claim all the credit, or blame, for what goes on elsewhere our policies do have an impact. And a pretty bad one, at that.
End the war on drugs. But don't do it stupidly. I'm not going to say exactly what the policies should be (i.e. legalize everything? Decriminalize it? Decriminalize some and legalize others?) but we clearly would have to focus more on rehabilitation. That, and we'd have to decide how to handle criminals in prison for drug-related offenses. We now have some examples of what may or may not happen. We can look at Portugal, or if you insist on something domestic we can look at the states that have already gone down this path. I am, btw, very annoyed that I can't find an awesome article about a man who helped end the criminal organizations that grew during Prohibition. He basically ensured that alcohol wasn't taxed too highly at first, so that the industry could compete with those who were still illegally selling it. Once he put them out of business then they raised the tax rate. Fascinating article, wish I could find it.
With the tax money (and that would be at the state level, so it's really up to them) the money should be used to revitalize our infrastructure and schools.
I brought this up as a serious proposition, not because I want to get high and not because of any libertarian views, but because our drug wars also have an impact at the strategic level.
As for development - given how little we actually seem to know about developing other countries (ex. Haiti) this would require a great deal of discussion on what would actually work. Some of the problems seem tied to our own patronizing attitudes and poor understanding (i.e. let's fly in, save the day by building a school, and pat ourselves on the back for doing a good job regardless of whether the school is still in use a year later). Since I'm trying not to get into the nitty gritty details yet, I'll leave that for another time.
As for creating a closer relationship with Mexico, that's partly for geo-strategic reasons as well.
But in some ways those don't seem appropriate right now. So to steal a campaign slogan, I want to talk about a strategy to Make America Great Again.
Immigration is a hot topic, right? I've talked about how I don't think a wall is an appropriate answer, mostly because you'd have to staff the wall well enough to respond to any attempts to tunnel under or fly over the wall. Plus you just push illegal immigration to other channels.
But if a wall won't work, what will?
Let's start talking about supply and demand. Illegal immigration is a problem for two reasons. One - people are coming from places where the economy sucks. Two - smuggling people over the border is a business closely tied to the drug trade. The coyotes and so forth often also smuggle illegal drugs, and may even use these immigrants as drug mules.
So we need to do the following: reform our drug policy, encourage development and stability in the economies to our south, and create a closer relationship with Mexico.
I started with our drug policy, because the war on drugs has ramifications far greater than just filling up our prisons, putting money in the pockets of criminals, and costing us money in terms of law enforcement and prisons. The war on drugs has, frankly, failed. I have heard a cop say that they won't even bother arresting someone for marijuana, not unless the person is being arrested for something else and they want to add to the charges. My town, btw, had a referendum on marijuana. Not anything binding, no legislation changing policies. Just something to see what support there was. I stopped by there but couldn't vote in it because technically I live outside the city limits. There was a tremendously long line and the local newscaster was there trying to find someone who opposed the measure. Nobody, and I mean nobody, did. When you've got a law that's not even being enforced by the people who are supposed to be enforcing it, you've got a bad law.
Aside from all our domestic issues, however, our policies also have a direct impact on Mexico (and other nations to our south). We apply pressure to them if they even talk about changing their policies, in order to try to stop the flow of drugs. Meanwhile, our attempts at interdiction raise the price of drugs...put more money in the hands of the criminals, and makes it easier for them to corrupt law enforcement and state officials in their home countries (and some of the money gets into the hands of terrorists and other enemies of the US, but that's another story). While I don't think we can claim all the credit, or blame, for what goes on elsewhere our policies do have an impact. And a pretty bad one, at that.
End the war on drugs. But don't do it stupidly. I'm not going to say exactly what the policies should be (i.e. legalize everything? Decriminalize it? Decriminalize some and legalize others?) but we clearly would have to focus more on rehabilitation. That, and we'd have to decide how to handle criminals in prison for drug-related offenses. We now have some examples of what may or may not happen. We can look at Portugal, or if you insist on something domestic we can look at the states that have already gone down this path. I am, btw, very annoyed that I can't find an awesome article about a man who helped end the criminal organizations that grew during Prohibition. He basically ensured that alcohol wasn't taxed too highly at first, so that the industry could compete with those who were still illegally selling it. Once he put them out of business then they raised the tax rate. Fascinating article, wish I could find it.
With the tax money (and that would be at the state level, so it's really up to them) the money should be used to revitalize our infrastructure and schools.
I brought this up as a serious proposition, not because I want to get high and not because of any libertarian views, but because our drug wars also have an impact at the strategic level.
As for development - given how little we actually seem to know about developing other countries (ex. Haiti) this would require a great deal of discussion on what would actually work. Some of the problems seem tied to our own patronizing attitudes and poor understanding (i.e. let's fly in, save the day by building a school, and pat ourselves on the back for doing a good job regardless of whether the school is still in use a year later). Since I'm trying not to get into the nitty gritty details yet, I'll leave that for another time.
As for creating a closer relationship with Mexico, that's partly for geo-strategic reasons as well.
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