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House Hearing on Cartels and Extraditing El Chapo

The House Homeland Security Committee held a hearing on "Taking Down the Cartels" this week. Predictably, several committee members called for the quick extradition of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman.

There were four witnesses at the hearing: James Dinkins, a director of Homeland Security Investigations for ICE; John Feeley, a deputy assistant secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs at the State Dept; Alan Bersin, an assistant secretary of international affairs and diplomatic officer at Homeland Security; and Christopher Wilson, from the Mexico Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars

I just read the transcript of the hearing (available on Lexis.com). A Republican from Georgia named Paul Broun really stood out -- and not in a positive way -- repeatedly referring to El Chapo as "an animal." Here are some of his remarks:[More...]

...if we're going to stop the influence of El Chapo and his cartel and any other cartels, we not only have to get people like him extradited to the United States and put him in a supermax, as the chairman has suggested, as well as get their underlings also brought to the United States where they can be prosecuted, where we will know that we can chop the head off of this poisonous snake. (my emphasis)

...my whole message is that we've got to get this drug kingpin extradited to the United States so that he can be prosecuted and that he can be dealt with because he's a killer, he's one who has not only been involved in outright killing of individuals within the cartel's function, but he's a killer of American citizens and promoting their drug and their alcohol -- well, not alcohol, but their drug business here. He's killing children's lives with the sex trafficking and other things that this animal is doing.

...Get him here, get him here quickly so that we can try this animal in our courts and so that he gets his just due.

He also lambasts the government witnesses and Justice Department for not having made a formal extradition request.

I think it's absolutely unconscionable that this administration has not already asked for the extradition of El Chapo. I think they're not doing so, you all not doing so, ranges from just irresponsibility all the way up to incompetence. (my emphasis)

When Feeley tries to respond, Broun cuts him off:

FEELEY: We will be in discussions with the Mexicans regarding the extradition of El Chapo Guzman. I assure you of that. Those discussions may not produce the immediate transfer of him for the following reasons. He has also committed the same atrocities on the Mexican people and the Mexican --

REP. BROUN: ...I'm going to have to cut you off because my time is limited. I have one minute left.

What did Broun have to add in his last minute? More of the same:

I'm an addictionologist. I treat people that have been affected by this animal. We've got to get him here and try him and have -- go through the due process. But once that due process occurs, let's get him here....Get him here, get him here quickly so that we can try this animal in our courts and so that he gets his just due.

I don't think a Congressman who repeatedly refers to another person, even one charged with crimes, as "an animal" belongs in Congress or should represent Congress at televised hearings the whole world might be watching. It's people like Broun who tarnish the image of the U.S. abroad. He sounds like a nutcase.

As to his sex-trafficking claims: There is not a single indictment against Chapo Guzman for sex-trafficking, here or in Mexico. Broun apparently got his cartels mixed up. Two witnesses tried to set him straight:

Feeley: Of the major trafficking groups, this is the cartel that most exclusively focuses on drug trafficking as opposed to expanding into other areas such as sex trafficking. The ones most associated with that tend to be the Zetas who operate in and fight for territory all throughout Mexico.

Another witness says:

The Federation or the Sinaloa cartel is perhaps the most developed and most organized of all of the cartels. And as I said earlier, it sticks very closely to what it does best, and that's moving drugs. And it's not the most shockingly violent, it's not the one that gets involved in human trafficking. It is depraved and it will use violence and intimidation when it has to.

As for killing American citizens, witness Bersin said:

BERSIN: ....there are two types of spillover violence, one that would involve having Mexican organized criminals come over into the United States and actually shoot up the town. With an exception, quite a while ago now, we have not seen that kind of spillover violence.

REP. RICHMOND: So the cartels, it's not a norm then for the cartels to either have direct involvement or to order violence in our communities, I guess is --

MR. BERSIN: That's correct, Congressman. In fact, the crime records on the U.S.-Mexican border measured by FBI statistics are the lowest that they've been, as Mr. O'Rourke will tell you.

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee's odd suggestion: Let's try Chapo in the U.S. for the crimes he committed in Mexico and sentence him here for them. Mexico shouldn't mind.

One Congressman asked a valid question:

REP. O'ROURKE:....apart from bringing him to justice, apart from the symbolic value that Mr. Wilson talked about...I really want to know what, if anything, is going to change.

And just by way of context -- and my colleague Mr. Richmond talked about this earlier -- you know, we've had a 40-year war on drugs, we had Crockett and Tubbs battling the, you know, cartels and drugs coming in from the Caribbean. We mentioned Pablo Escobar and Colombia. I think we spent $8 billion on Plan Colombia and they were cultivating and shipping more cocaine at the end of that than at the beginning of the $8 billion. We suppressed that to some degree, moved it to Mexico. We've captured Chapo Guzman, and good for all the reasons that we've stated.

What's going to change in all reality?.... We're spending ... it's 2.1 billion (dollars) with Mexico and Plan Merida.

...We've sent them Black Hawk helicopters, you know, kind of law enforcement material. We're now focused on this last pillar, which I think is far more productive, improving civil society, their system of justice, their system of rule of law.

And all those things are great, and I think that especially that last part is a smart investment in Mexico. But from what we measure coming into the U.S., you said this capture makes the U.S. safer. How are you measuring that? Because of his capture, are fewer drugs getting in? Because of Plan Merida, are fewer drugs coming into this country? What are we really doing to address the reasons behind why we began to spend this money in the first place?

...How are we measuring these vast sums that we're committing to border security, 18 billion (dollars), to Mexico, 2.1 billion (dollars), what do I as a taxpayer get out of it at the end of the day?

Rep. McCaul, continued to tout the U.S. active involvement in Chapo's arrest, which the Mexican Government continues to deny. (We tracked him, they captured him.) From his opening statement:

I applaud Immigration and Customs Enforcement for their participation along with DEA, U.S. Marshals, State Department and Mexican authorities for this capture.

Feeley, when it's his turn, lays it out differently (and more accurately.)

We congratulate the Mexican people and their government on the capture of El Chapo Guzman. This was a Mexican operation conducted by Mexican marines and supported by U.S. law enforcement agencies, among them the Marshals, DEA, FBI and my colleagues at HSI. This is how it's supposed to work.

As does Bersin:

BERSIN: we salute the government of Mexico for the capture and apprehension of Chapo Guzman..there indeed was strong U.S.-Mexican collaboration that led to the arrest.

But ... this was, as Mr. Feeley indicated, a Mexican victory won by Mexican marines and Mexican law enforcement officials.

McCaul must have had earplugs in. He follows up with:

Let me just say first to Mr. Dinkins, I want to thank or congratulate you and your agents for a job well done, taking down the largest drug kingpin that we've ever known, one of the biggest threats to the world. ... I just want to say, you know, thank you to you and your agents for what you did.

In closing the hearing, McCaul does it again:

REP. MCCAUL: I also want to thank Department of Homeland Security, HSI, ICE for their efforts in this historic take-down and all federal law enforcement. You are to be commended. This was, again, a very historic event in the war against the drug cartels.

Then he remembered Mexico was watching the hearing, and thanks them for "their cooperation" in the endeavor.

I also know that the government of Mexico and their officials are watching this hearing, and I want to take the opportunity to thank them for their cooperation and encourage this new administration to continue its efforts as we took down the leader of the Los Zetas, or they did, and they also took down El Chapo Guzman who has been on the most-wanted list for decades.

Rep. McCaul, along with Rep. Duncan, also tried to connect the cartels to Iran and Hezbollah. McCaul trotted out this old horse:

McCaul: And the past arrest of an Iranian national suspected of plotting to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in the United States allegedly involved Mexican cartel members.

Rep. Duncan asks:

And it's highlighting the growing operation of Mexican drug cartels with street gangs. So have you seen Iran or Hezbollah seeking to exploit this growing relationship through mosques or cultural centers in the U.S.?

No sale. Feeley responded to McCaul:

The case to which you referred, Manssor Arbabsiar, ... he was in fact a lone agent.

.... again, when he came through he thought he was dealing with Zetas. In fact, he was not. He never -- there is no evidence to indicate that he ever made contact with them. He in fact made contact with a DEA undercover agent.

Same answer from Dinkins to Duncan:

No, we have not seen that in the United States. And I think a driving factor behind that is it's not in the interest of any drug trafficking organization or any type of criminal enterprise to introduce somebody that's going to do harm to the consumer. And ultimately, so it's -- while they're probably not beyond it, it's not in their interest to do so and so we have not seen that type of association.

Bottom line: There was nothing to learn from this hearing other than that Rep. Broun is an embarrassment to his constituents and all of us.

Extraditing El Chapo does nothing other than cost us $27,000 a year to incarcerate him. It shouldn't matter to anyone but Chapo and his family. It's not going to have an effect on drug trafficking or availability or drugs. Sinaloa is not a vertical hierarchy. It has had co-leaders for years. Just as any corporation plans for succession, so undoubtedly have the leaders of Sinaloa.

Contrary to what Rep. Broun thinks, Chapo Guzman is not the devil incarnate. He is a co-leader of an international business that makes a lot of money selling drugs all over the world. He's successful because a lot of people in the world want to use drugs but have no place to get them, since the sale of most recreational drugs is illegal almost everywhere in the world.

His business has to employ a lot of people and retain a variety of service providers to transport its products to the marketplace. It has to pay the manufacturers and suppliers of its products. In addition, it needs warehouses to store its inventory, and regional and retail sales staff. So far, just like General Motors or Amazon.

But because the merchandise is illegal, Chapo and his business can't open stores to sell their wares or advertise their products online. They can't ship their goods via Fedex. They can't use banks to store their profits, pay their suppliers or deposit their sales receipts. They can't use the courts to sue their competitors to enforce or terminate trade agreements. (They have to solve those matters amongst themselves, which usually results in violence.) Just think if Amazon or General Motors couldn't use banks or Apple couldn't sue Microsoft.

They also have a lot of risk, since the global police force known as the DEA is lurking everywhere, either physically or electronically. They can't get take out an insurance policy to assure the safe transit of their products to the marketplace (the streets and corners of every town in the world) and the return transit of the sales proceeds. Instead, the business has to pay a lot of money in bribes to government officials.

Try as they might, the committee members did not budge the hearing witnesses: Sinaloa and El Chapo are not about sex trafficking, randomly gunning down civilians in the U.S., or aligning themselves with foreign terrorists bent on destroying America. (America is their largest customer. Why would they destroy their best market?) El Chapo Guzman and Sinaloa are about selling drugs and making money.

As long as drugs are illegal, and there is demand for their products, this is how Sinaloa and its competitors will operate. They will make tons of money, none of it taxed. Law enforcement can take out the leader, but the band will march on, from suppliers to pilots and shippers and off-loaders, to warehouse owners, regional sales managers, street sellers and corrupt officials. The financial reward is worth the risk to them.

What if instead of outlawing drugs, the Government used part of its enforcement budget to import them directly from the growers or wholesalers in South America, and then gave the drugs away for free to anyone over 18 who wanted them? And spent the rest of its enforcement budget on drug prevention programs and advertising, as it has done with cigarettes? Within 20 years, demand might reduce to a trickle.

That's the theme of "El Capo 3", which just began airing last week, and will continue every weeknight for a few months. Congress might get more useful ideas from watching it than from holding these hearings. I think Rep. Broun should be sentenced to watch it.

Here's the basics (from my limited understanding of Spanish, as there are no captions or subtitles): El Capo, the (fictional) biggest drug lord in Colombia, surrenders in the U.S. and is sentenced to 30 years. He's there about 4 years, when the wife and son of the DEA chief in New York are kidnapped, apparently by a Sicilian or Russian cartel faction. The kidnappers demand the release of El Capo as ransom, within 48 hours. No one knows why, but they probably want to kill him.

The DEA visits El Capo in prison in Florida, and asks if he can help. He agrees but has some conditions. He's wants lots of money, and 1,000 (or 10,000 or 100,000)kilograms of cocaine. Why? He's had a change of heart in prison, and thinks drug trafficking is bad. He's figured out how to end the cartels world-wide: flood the streets with free drugs and step up prevention funding. The cartels will go out of business. He's written up his detailed plan, and insists the DEA Chief read it.

The DEA chief has no way to get him 1,000 (or 10k or 100k) kilos of cocaine, but the DEA does get him some money and secures his release from prison (smuggling him out dressed as a Hasidic Jew, after a rival cartel boss inmate stabs him, hoping to kill him and prevent his release). El Capo then flies to NY and reunites with his old crew of enforcers and sicarios (killers), joined by the cop in Colombia who chased him for 20 years and got him to surrender. His crew has safely stored his millions or billions in cash and they and the Colombian cop join in his plan to free the world of drug trafficking.

Does it work? Who knows, they are only on episode 9 (out of probably 70.) But given that every punitive and prohibitionist plan we've tried has cost us a bundle and failed, another approach is clearly called for.

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  • Display: Sort:
    Paul Broun (none / 0) (#1)
    by CaptHowdy on Fri Apr 04, 2014 at 05:54:24 PM EST
    is a real rising star

    He is the most dangerous kind of extremist.  An educated one.

     Broun is a graduate of Athens High School and the University of Georgia at Athens (B.S., Chemistry, 1967) and earned his Doctor of Medicine (1971) from the Medical College of Georgia in Augusta.[4] His internship was at Good Samaritan Hospital in Portland, Oregon and residency at University Hospital in Birmingham, Alabama. He then practiced general medicine; starting in 2002 he maintained a practice based

    How can (none / 0) (#8)
    by lentinel on Sat Apr 05, 2014 at 10:35:44 AM EST
    educated people be so stupid?

    Didn't W. attend both Yale and Harvard Business School?

    Those two ivy league hallowed halls produced an idiot. A dangerous idiot.

    I have found that most of the people I admire are self-educated. Malcolm X is a glowing example.

    Sometimes I think that institutions of higher learning serve only to squash the innate desire of people to learn.

    In any case - I find their track record to be abysmal.

    Parent

    No, not an animal (none / 0) (#2)
    by Dadler on Fri Apr 04, 2014 at 07:59:19 PM EST
    Simply, like many with arms and power, a complete sociopath with no concern for what, say, twenty hacked up bodies left in the street, do to a population. Phuck him, phuck the military, phuck the police, phuck idiot pols, let good people rule. There is nothing to be found in El Chapo but a digital age psychopath, and there is nothing to be found in the U.S. idiocy for extradition into solitary hell.

    We are phucked either way.

    Hope smarts win out, but they don't exist on either side.

    Why the hell is everything one side or the other?

    I need a drink.

    Peace, J. You do incredible work. I'm just an oddball halfwit sucking on gas.

    Not an animal. (5.00 / 1) (#5)
    by lentinel on Sat Apr 05, 2014 at 10:18:12 AM EST
    As Al Capone said, he's just supplying things to people who want them.

    I think less of General Motors for knowingly sending out defective cars - millions of them - knowing that the defect was potentially lethal.

    In our demented way, we are supporting both industries - the drug empires by keeping recreational substances illegal - and General Motors by giving them billions of our money.

    Our government is dysfunctional.

    Maybe instead of incarcerating Mr. Chapo, we should let him run things. He seems to have a handle on efficiency. Give Mr. Chapo a job and incarcerate Mr. Broun.

    Parent

    I'll join you (none / 0) (#19)
    by CaptHowdy on Sat Apr 05, 2014 at 07:11:06 PM EST
    "Why the hell is everything one side or the other?

    I need a drink."

    Looks lik there May be an answer to that question

    In Kahan's experiment, some people were asked to interpret a table of numbers about whether a skin cream reduced rashes, and some people were asked to interpret a different table - containing the same numbers - about whether a law banning private citizens from carrying concealed handguns reduced crime.  Kahan found that when the numbers in the table conflicted with people's positions on gun control, they couldn't do the math right, though they could when the subject was skin cream.  The bleakest finding was that the more advanced that people's math skills were, the more likely it was that their political views, whether liberal or conservative, made them less able to solve the math problem.

    Scientists' depressing new discovery about the brain


    Parent

    Jeralyn, Paul Broun is simply ... (none / 0) (#3)
    by Donald from Hawaii on Fri Apr 04, 2014 at 10:02:00 PM EST
    ... mugging and posturing for the cameras like some latter-day Mussolini, because he's angling for the GOP nomination for the U.S. Senate seat from Georgia that's being vacated by the retiring Saxby Chambliss (R-Dark Side of the Moon).

    If Broun wins the Republican primary there, well, he's a totally nutrageous wingbat who will: (a) hold rich potential to be the Southern version of Richard "God's Will" Mourdock; (b) prompt most reasonable women to head for the nearest exits in droves while simultaneously cursing under their breaths, "You gotta be phuquing kidding!"; and (c) perhaps hand the Democrats another Senate seat which might otherwise have been considered a safe bet for the GOP.

    Aloha.

    Not an animal (none / 0) (#4)
    by Mikado Cat on Sat Apr 05, 2014 at 05:44:56 AM EST
    I'm sure El Chapo is "misunderstood".

    As others have said, politician running for office, expect rhetoric.

    Solution? (none / 0) (#6)
    by lentinel on Sat Apr 05, 2014 at 10:24:36 AM EST
    Chapo Guzman is not the devil incarnate. He is a co-leader of an international business that makes a lot of money selling drugs all over the world. He's successful because a lot of people in the world want to use drugs but have no place to get them, since the sale of most recreational drugs is illegal almost everywhere in the world.

    If we were serious about ridding the world of "kingpins" like Chapo, it seems to me that all we would have to do is legalize these recreational drugs that just about everyone consumes.

    Is that too simple?
    Is it really more complicated than that?
    I don't believe so.

    I have to wonder about the reluctance of our government officials to endorse legalization. It appears to me as if they are part of the same criminal empire - and they are dependent on keeping recreational drugs illegal in order to keep getting their bloated paychecks.

    Also (none / 0) (#7)
    by squeaky on Sat Apr 05, 2014 at 10:28:21 AM EST
    think of the children!!!..  Politicians make decisions based on getting re-elected, and that does not always mesh with the long term interests of health and well being for our populace.

    Parent
    If they want to get elected, or reelected, (none / 0) (#9)
    by lentinel on Sat Apr 05, 2014 at 10:43:34 AM EST
    why do you suppose that politicians think it is in their best interests to oppose legalization rather than endorse it? They look dumber and dumber.

    I would love to see the response by the people and even of the media of a candidate running on a platform of legalization of pot.

    I think they would win in a landslide.

    Parent

    State By State (none / 0) (#10)
    by squeaky on Sat Apr 05, 2014 at 11:01:50 AM EST
    Still at best for MJ, when asked should it be legal? 51-54% say yes.

    34% GOP, 60% Dem, 55% Ind..

    so in states where GOP is more popular, it would mean losing an election to support pot legalization.

    And, given the context of this thread, legalizing MJ is a non-sequitur. It not on the table given the quote you pasted from Jeralyn's post. lLegalizing all drugs is what is on the table.

    And as smart as that is for a long term solution for drug policy, it is an extreme;y unpopular position. No politician would endorse that expecting to get elected. Think of the children!

    Parent

    I am thinking of children. (none / 0) (#11)
    by lentinel on Sat Apr 05, 2014 at 11:41:42 AM EST
    They're the ones in the crossfire.

    Every time there is suppression, the justification thrown out there is that they're out to protect the children.

    Balderdash!

    You can see how much the pols love children by investigating the sorry state of public education.
    And when the children reach the ripe old age of 18; (or sometimes younger) they throw them into undeclared wars.

    Yeah.

    The pols love children...

    I am, incidentally, for legalizing all drugs.
    Some - like pot, or hashish - should be available at shops in the same manner as alcohol. It's ridiculous to keep up this charade.

    I am also for the legalization of cocaine. It once was, you know.

    I am somewhat conflicted about heroin - but would opt for legalization on the grounds that the quality and strength could be controlled. Overdoses are easily preventable - and with a drug that I have read about - even reversible if administered in a timely fashion.

    Politically, you may be right in saying that a pol running on legalization in a GOP district might be a bad idea. But to tell you the truth, I'm not even sure of that. Once all those self-righteous closet potheads get into the private voting booth...

    But - how about circumventing that and simply putting legalization on the ballot as a referendum?

    Parent

    Fear (5.00 / 1) (#14)
    by squeaky on Sat Apr 05, 2014 at 01:33:11 PM EST
    Fear gets increased when people have children, for many.

    I know an inveterate pot smoker who is against legalization because he is worried about his kids becoming junkies. And that is legalization of weed.

    The pols play on that fear, they could give a sh!t about children or anyone. All they want is to get elected, so they play on the fear of what DRUGS will do to destroy our children. No FUtture with drugs...

    Unfortunately the voters are not able to realize that drug use has not slowed with the trillions spent on eradication. And at this point it is counter intuitive to think that legalization of ALL drugs, and even giving them out for FREE as Jeralyn suggested, would REDUCE drug use over time.

    Parent

    The thing is (none / 0) (#15)
    by lentinel on Sat Apr 05, 2014 at 02:31:14 PM EST
    is that pot, from what I've heard, is very enjoyable. And I truly believe it is absolutely harmless. Or if you want to get into an argument about that - I'll put it this way: It is less harmful that sugar - which people gobble at will without legal penalty or social recrimination.

    So that's the thing:

    At this point, it's folk's who enjoy a martini trying to prevent others from enjoying a puff on a flower.

    It's SOOOOO stupid.

    Parent

    It's really quite simple.... (5.00 / 2) (#23)
    by NYShooter on Sat Apr 05, 2014 at 10:38:20 PM EST
    It's straight out of the magician's playbook. Snap your fingers with your left hand, while manipulating the cards with your right.

    How does a government take your mind off the hegemonic, corporate goal of capturing, and, subjugating the world?

    Simple, find another bogey man to hate.


    Parent

    You'd (none / 0) (#25)
    by lentinel on Mon Apr 07, 2014 at 05:52:59 AM EST
    think that they had enough bogey men - North Korea, Taliban, Hamas, Venezuela, Cuba, Iran, Russia...

    without having to give us aggravation about weed.

    Parent

    Bingo! (none / 0) (#26)
    by Mr Natural on Mon Apr 07, 2014 at 10:58:49 AM EST
    Off topic comments deleted (none / 0) (#24)
    by Jeralyn on Sun Apr 06, 2014 at 12:49:26 AM EST
    Please keep your comments to the topic of the post. I spent a long time writing it. Comments about your family thanksgiving dinners and relatives, having nothing to do with drugs, drug laws, a cartel or cartel member or congressional hearings or congresspersons are not on-topic.