Five years into Mexico’s U.S.-backed war on drug trafficking, the sale of narcotics continues to be a one of Mexico’s most profitable industries — earning violent cartels an estimated $30 billion each year, or roughly three to four percent of Mexico’s GDP. The country is awash in bloodshed. Since Mexican President Felipe Calderón deployed his military to take on drug cartels in 2006, some 35,000 Mexicans have lost their lives. And now relations between the U.S. and Mexico are showing strain. The U.S. Ambassador to Mexico resigned earlier this month after leaked confidential cables revealed him questioning the competency of the Mexican effort. While many say the war is a lost cause, Calderón and Obama insist they are winning, and that most of violence stems from a power struggle between cartels squeezed by the new pressure. Earlier this month, I traveled to Mexico to try to make sense of this contradiction. For our special report “Mexican Standoff,” we discussed this topic at length with several experts. We heard one proposal you wouldn’t expect to come from a prominent former Mexican government official. Jorge Castañeda, who served as foreign minister under Calderón’s predecessor and now teaches at New York University, thinks the answer is to legalize drugs in Mexico and the United States — starting with marijuana. “Legalization of drugs doesn’t seem to me to be a terribly radical proposal,” he said, pointing out that more than a dozen states already allow the use of medical marijuana, and that California voters came close to legalizing the drug for recreational use. “So why in the world would American presidents declare war on drugs in Chicago or Los Angeles or New York or Birmingham or anywhere else? They don’t want to. What’s incomprehensible to me is why [Mexico] should do it if Americans don’t want to.” Making pot legal, Castañeda says, would kneecap the cartels, which make their profit from the very illegality of the drug they are selling. Drug users are willing to pay a premium for what they can’t easily get; Making pot legal would drop prices and put traffickers out of business. Not only that, says Castañeda, but an above-board marijuana trade would employ thousands of workers, and allow the Mexican government to collect much-needed tax revenues. Lest you think that Castañeda has gone off the rails, it’s worth mentioning that his former boss, ex-President Vicente Fox, recently posted on his blog that he also favors ending the prohibition of illegal drugs, especially marijuana. Both say that doing so will significantly diminish the bloodshed plaguing Mexico and free the country’s strained law enforcement to take on other crimes perpetrated by criminal gangs. “If you look at the polls and you ask Mexicans are they worried about drug trafficking?” he said. “No. Are they worried about drug consumption in Mexico? No. Are they worried about kidnapping, violence? Yes. Okay, so what you want to do is attack those aspects of the violence and insecurity. The collateral damages. You want to stop kidnapping. You want to stop extortion, protection rackets, which are really terribly damaging to communities… Now, when someone says, ‘Well, it’s the drug traffickers who do that,’ well go after the kidnapper. If he happens to be a drug trafficker also, great, you got a two-fer.” For now, it doesn’t appear that anyone in Obama or Calderón’s office will heed Castañeda’s call. For now, it is clear that the drug war rages on. Shortly after I returned from Mexico, it came out that the United States military had even begun flying drones over Mexico to track movements of traffickers — the same type of unmanned aircraft used to track insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan. Dan Rather Reports airs Tuesdays on HDNet at 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. ET and is available on iTunes.
Continue reading …Five years into Mexico’s U.S.-backed war on drug trafficking, the sale of narcotics continues to be a one of Mexico’s most profitable industries — earning violent cartels an estimated $30 billion each year, or roughly three to four percent of Mexico’s GDP. The country is awash in bloodshed. Since Mexican President Felipe Calderón deployed his military to take on drug cartels in 2006, some 35,000 Mexicans have lost their lives. And now relations between the U.S. and Mexico are showing strain. The U.S. Ambassador to Mexico resigned earlier this month after leaked confidential cables revealed him questioning the competency of the Mexican effort. While many say the war is a lost cause, Calderón and Obama insist they are winning, and that most of violence stems from a power struggle between cartels squeezed by the new pressure. Earlier this month, I traveled to Mexico to try to make sense of this contradiction. For our special report “Mexican Standoff,” we discussed this topic at length with several experts. We heard one proposal you wouldn’t expect to come from a prominent former Mexican government official. Jorge Castañeda, who served as foreign minister under Calderón’s predecessor and now teaches at New York University, thinks the answer is to legalize drugs in Mexico and the United States — starting with marijuana. “Legalization of drugs doesn’t seem to me to be a terribly radical proposal,” he said, pointing out that more than a dozen states already allow the use of medical marijuana, and that California voters came close to legalizing the drug for recreational use. “So why in the world would American presidents declare war on drugs in Chicago or Los Angeles or New York or Birmingham or anywhere else? They don’t want to. What’s incomprehensible to me is why [Mexico] should do it if Americans don’t want to.” Making pot legal, Castañeda says, would kneecap the cartels, which make their profit from the very illegality of the drug they are selling. Drug users are willing to pay a premium for what they can’t easily get; Making pot legal would drop prices and put traffickers out of business. Not only that, says Castañeda, but an above-board marijuana trade would employ thousands of workers, and allow the Mexican government to collect much-needed tax revenues. Lest you think that Castañeda has gone off the rails, it’s worth mentioning that his former boss, ex-President Vicente Fox, recently posted on his blog that he also favors ending the prohibition of illegal drugs, especially marijuana. Both say that doing so will significantly diminish the bloodshed plaguing Mexico and free the country’s strained law enforcement to take on other crimes perpetrated by criminal gangs. “If you look at the polls and you ask Mexicans are they worried about drug trafficking?” he said. “No. Are they worried about drug consumption in Mexico? No. Are they worried about kidnapping, violence? Yes. Okay, so what you want to do is attack those aspects of the violence and insecurity. The collateral damages. You want to stop kidnapping. You want to stop extortion, protection rackets, which are really terribly damaging to communities… Now, when someone says, ‘Well, it’s the drug traffickers who do that,’ well go after the kidnapper. If he happens to be a drug trafficker also, great, you got a two-fer.” For now, it doesn’t appear that anyone in Obama or Calderón’s office will heed Castañeda’s call. For now, it is clear that the drug war rages on. Shortly after I returned from Mexico, it came out that the United States military had even begun flying drones over Mexico to track movements of traffickers — the same type of unmanned aircraft used to track insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan. Dan Rather Reports airs Tuesdays on HDNet at 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. ET and is available on iTunes.
Continue reading …Five years into Mexico’s U.S.-backed war on drug trafficking, the sale of narcotics continues to be a one of Mexico’s most profitable industries — earning violent cartels an estimated $30 billion each year, or roughly three to four percent of Mexico’s GDP. The country is awash in bloodshed. Since Mexican President Felipe Calderón deployed his military to take on drug cartels in 2006, some 35,000 Mexicans have lost their lives. And now relations between the U.S. and Mexico are showing strain. The U.S. Ambassador to Mexico resigned earlier this month after leaked confidential cables revealed him questioning the competency of the Mexican effort. While many say the war is a lost cause, Calderón and Obama insist they are winning, and that most of violence stems from a power struggle between cartels squeezed by the new pressure. Earlier this month, I traveled to Mexico to try to make sense of this contradiction. For our special report “Mexican Standoff,” we discussed this topic at length with several experts. We heard one proposal you wouldn’t expect to come from a prominent former Mexican government official. Jorge Castañeda, who served as foreign minister under Calderón’s predecessor and now teaches at New York University, thinks the answer is to legalize drugs in Mexico and the United States — starting with marijuana. “Legalization of drugs doesn’t seem to me to be a terribly radical proposal,” he said, pointing out that more than a dozen states already allow the use of medical marijuana, and that California voters came close to legalizing the drug for recreational use. “So why in the world would American presidents declare war on drugs in Chicago or Los Angeles or New York or Birmingham or anywhere else? They don’t want to. What’s incomprehensible to me is why [Mexico] should do it if Americans don’t want to.” Making pot legal, Castañeda says, would kneecap the cartels, which make their profit from the very illegality of the drug they are selling. Drug users are willing to pay a premium for what they can’t easily get; Making pot legal would drop prices and put traffickers out of business. Not only that, says Castañeda, but an above-board marijuana trade would employ thousands of workers, and allow the Mexican government to collect much-needed tax revenues. Lest you think that Castañeda has gone off the rails, it’s worth mentioning that his former boss, ex-President Vicente Fox, recently posted on his blog that he also favors ending the prohibition of illegal drugs, especially marijuana. Both say that doing so will significantly diminish the bloodshed plaguing Mexico and free the country’s strained law enforcement to take on other crimes perpetrated by criminal gangs. “If you look at the polls and you ask Mexicans are they worried about drug trafficking?” he said. “No. Are they worried about drug consumption in Mexico? No. Are they worried about kidnapping, violence? Yes. Okay, so what you want to do is attack those aspects of the violence and insecurity. The collateral damages. You want to stop kidnapping. You want to stop extortion, protection rackets, which are really terribly damaging to communities… Now, when someone says, ‘Well, it’s the drug traffickers who do that,’ well go after the kidnapper. If he happens to be a drug trafficker also, great, you got a two-fer.” For now, it doesn’t appear that anyone in Obama or Calderón’s office will heed Castañeda’s call. For now, it is clear that the drug war rages on. Shortly after I returned from Mexico, it came out that the United States military had even begun flying drones over Mexico to track movements of traffickers — the same type of unmanned aircraft used to track insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan. Dan Rather Reports airs Tuesdays on HDNet at 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. ET and is available on iTunes.
Continue reading …Five years into Mexico’s U.S.-backed war on drug trafficking, the sale of narcotics continues to be a one of Mexico’s most profitable industries — earning violent cartels an estimated $30 billion each year, or roughly three to four percent of Mexico’s GDP. The country is awash in bloodshed. Since Mexican President Felipe Calderón deployed his military to take on drug cartels in 2006, some 35,000 Mexicans have lost their lives. And now relations between the U.S. and Mexico are showing strain. The U.S. Ambassador to Mexico resigned earlier this month after leaked confidential cables revealed him questioning the competency of the Mexican effort. While many say the war is a lost cause, Calderón and Obama insist they are winning, and that most of violence stems from a power struggle between cartels squeezed by the new pressure. Earlier this month, I traveled to Mexico to try to make sense of this contradiction. For our special report “Mexican Standoff,” we discussed this topic at length with several experts. We heard one proposal you wouldn’t expect to come from a prominent former Mexican government official. Jorge Castañeda, who served as foreign minister under Calderón’s predecessor and now teaches at New York University, thinks the answer is to legalize drugs in Mexico and the United States — starting with marijuana. “Legalization of drugs doesn’t seem to me to be a terribly radical proposal,” he said, pointing out that more than a dozen states already allow the use of medical marijuana, and that California voters came close to legalizing the drug for recreational use. “So why in the world would American presidents declare war on drugs in Chicago or Los Angeles or New York or Birmingham or anywhere else? They don’t want to. What’s incomprehensible to me is why [Mexico] should do it if Americans don’t want to.” Making pot legal, Castañeda says, would kneecap the cartels, which make their profit from the very illegality of the drug they are selling. Drug users are willing to pay a premium for what they can’t easily get; Making pot legal would drop prices and put traffickers out of business. Not only that, says Castañeda, but an above-board marijuana trade would employ thousands of workers, and allow the Mexican government to collect much-needed tax revenues. Lest you think that Castañeda has gone off the rails, it’s worth mentioning that his former boss, ex-President Vicente Fox, recently posted on his blog that he also favors ending the prohibition of illegal drugs, especially marijuana. Both say that doing so will significantly diminish the bloodshed plaguing Mexico and free the country’s strained law enforcement to take on other crimes perpetrated by criminal gangs. “If you look at the polls and you ask Mexicans are they worried about drug trafficking?” he said. “No. Are they worried about drug consumption in Mexico? No. Are they worried about kidnapping, violence? Yes. Okay, so what you want to do is attack those aspects of the violence and insecurity. The collateral damages. You want to stop kidnapping. You want to stop extortion, protection rackets, which are really terribly damaging to communities… Now, when someone says, ‘Well, it’s the drug traffickers who do that,’ well go after the kidnapper. If he happens to be a drug trafficker also, great, you got a two-fer.” For now, it doesn’t appear that anyone in Obama or Calderón’s office will heed Castañeda’s call. For now, it is clear that the drug war rages on. Shortly after I returned from Mexico, it came out that the United States military had even begun flying drones over Mexico to track movements of traffickers — the same type of unmanned aircraft used to track insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan. Dan Rather Reports airs Tuesdays on HDNet at 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. ET and is available on iTunes.
Continue reading …CBS Notices Obama Administration Playing Politics With Nuclear Waste Disposal, NBC and ABC Silent
April 1, 2011 No Comment
Since Japan's earthquake and following nuclear crisis, the CBS Evening News has done two reports on the Obama administration blocking use of the Yucca Mountain storage facility in Nevada to safely dispose of U.S. nuclear waste. Meanwhile, NBC and ABC have ignored the controversy. The first CBS report on the issue came on March 22, when Evening News anchor Katie Couric declared: “The crisis in Japan has renewed the debate over nuclear power in this country. Today a federal appeals court heard arguments in a lawsuit over what to do with spent fuel rods.” Correspondent Jim Axelrod explained: “An estimated 66,000 metric tons of spent fuel are stored at 77 sites around the country. That's more than 145 million pounds….Plans to make Yucca Mountain in Nevada a long-term storage site were scuttled by the Obama administration a year ago, after 20 years of planning costing $14 billion.” In a follow-up piece on Thursday's Evening News, correspondent Armen Keteyian went further in laying blame on the Obama administration: “There was one site designed to hold all of our nation's nuclear waste and it's right here in the high desert of Nevada, at a place called Yucca Mountain. Today, the federal government won't let our cameras anywhere near it. It's shut down, locked up, caught up in what critics charge is nothing more than pure politics.” Fill-in anchor Erica Hill teased Keteyian's report at the top of the broadcast: “Why did plans to bury nuclear waste inside Nevada's Yucca Mountain get killed? Was it safety fears or politics?” Keteyian described how the, “Obama administration kept its campaign promise….And shut down Yucca Mountain. Now the Nuclear Regulatory Commission must decide if it wants to restart what is already a 25-year, $14 billion project, in the face of tough opposition, like that from Harry Reid, the Democratic Senate majority leader from Nevada.” Keteyian also pointed out the political background of the head of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission under Obama: “A former staffer for Senator Reid, Greg Jaczko, now chairs the NRC. Jaczko recently came under fire after shutting down the agency's safety review of Yucca Mountain and after key safety recommendations were redacted, cut out, from a long-awaited NRC report.” In the March 22 report, Axelrod noted: “The head of the NRC may not see a pressing problem, but the states now suing did not want to take that risk before Japan's disaster and certainly don't want to now.” On Thursday, Keteyian challenged Jaczko: “Critics charge that you were simply doing the bidding of your former boss, Senator Harry Reid, a fierce opponent of this project.” Keteyian concluded his piece: “The NRC inspector general and Congress are now investigating the decision to shut down the safety review. Still, nuclear waste is scattered across 35 states, and Yucca Mountain sits silent and empty.” Here is a full transcript of Keteyian's March 31 report: 6:30PM ET TEASE: ERICA HILL: Why did plans to bury nuclear waste inside Nevada's Yucca Mountain get killed? Was it safety fears or politics?
Continue reading …CBS Notices Obama Administration Playing Politics With Nuclear Waste Disposal, NBC and ABC Silent
April 1, 2011 No Comment
Since Japan's earthquake and following nuclear crisis, the CBS Evening News has done two reports on the Obama administration blocking use of the Yucca Mountain storage facility in Nevada to safely dispose of U.S. nuclear waste. Meanwhile, NBC and ABC have ignored the controversy. The first CBS report on the issue came on March 22, when Evening News anchor Katie Couric declared: “The crisis in Japan has renewed the debate over nuclear power in this country. Today a federal appeals court heard arguments in a lawsuit over what to do with spent fuel rods.” Correspondent Jim Axelrod explained: “An estimated 66,000 metric tons of spent fuel are stored at 77 sites around the country. That's more than 145 million pounds….Plans to make Yucca Mountain in Nevada a long-term storage site were scuttled by the Obama administration a year ago, after 20 years of planning costing $14 billion.” In a follow-up piece on Thursday's Evening News, correspondent Armen Keteyian went further in laying blame on the Obama administration: “There was one site designed to hold all of our nation's nuclear waste and it's right here in the high desert of Nevada, at a place called Yucca Mountain. Today, the federal government won't let our cameras anywhere near it. It's shut down, locked up, caught up in what critics charge is nothing more than pure politics.” Fill-in anchor Erica Hill teased Keteyian's report at the top of the broadcast: “Why did plans to bury nuclear waste inside Nevada's Yucca Mountain get killed? Was it safety fears or politics?” Keteyian described how the, “Obama administration kept its campaign promise….And shut down Yucca Mountain. Now the Nuclear Regulatory Commission must decide if it wants to restart what is already a 25-year, $14 billion project, in the face of tough opposition, like that from Harry Reid, the Democratic Senate majority leader from Nevada.” Keteyian also pointed out the political background of the head of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission under Obama: “A former staffer for Senator Reid, Greg Jaczko, now chairs the NRC. Jaczko recently came under fire after shutting down the agency's safety review of Yucca Mountain and after key safety recommendations were redacted, cut out, from a long-awaited NRC report.” In the March 22 report, Axelrod noted: “The head of the NRC may not see a pressing problem, but the states now suing did not want to take that risk before Japan's disaster and certainly don't want to now.” On Thursday, Keteyian challenged Jaczko: “Critics charge that you were simply doing the bidding of your former boss, Senator Harry Reid, a fierce opponent of this project.” Keteyian concluded his piece: “The NRC inspector general and Congress are now investigating the decision to shut down the safety review. Still, nuclear waste is scattered across 35 states, and Yucca Mountain sits silent and empty.” Here is a full transcript of Keteyian's March 31 report: 6:30PM ET TEASE: ERICA HILL: Why did plans to bury nuclear waste inside Nevada's Yucca Mountain get killed? Was it safety fears or politics?
Continue reading …CBS Notices Obama Administration Playing Politics With Nuclear Waste Disposal, NBC and ABC Silent
April 1, 2011 No Comment
Since Japan's earthquake and following nuclear crisis, the CBS Evening News has done two reports on the Obama administration blocking use of the Yucca Mountain storage facility in Nevada to safely dispose of U.S. nuclear waste. Meanwhile, NBC and ABC have ignored the controversy. The first CBS report on the issue came on March 22, when Evening News anchor Katie Couric declared: “The crisis in Japan has renewed the debate over nuclear power in this country. Today a federal appeals court heard arguments in a lawsuit over what to do with spent fuel rods.” Correspondent Jim Axelrod explained: “An estimated 66,000 metric tons of spent fuel are stored at 77 sites around the country. That's more than 145 million pounds….Plans to make Yucca Mountain in Nevada a long-term storage site were scuttled by the Obama administration a year ago, after 20 years of planning costing $14 billion.” In a follow-up piece on Thursday's Evening News, correspondent Armen Keteyian went further in laying blame on the Obama administration: “There was one site designed to hold all of our nation's nuclear waste and it's right here in the high desert of Nevada, at a place called Yucca Mountain. Today, the federal government won't let our cameras anywhere near it. It's shut down, locked up, caught up in what critics charge is nothing more than pure politics.” Fill-in anchor Erica Hill teased Keteyian's report at the top of the broadcast: “Why did plans to bury nuclear waste inside Nevada's Yucca Mountain get killed? Was it safety fears or politics?” Keteyian described how the, “Obama administration kept its campaign promise….And shut down Yucca Mountain. Now the Nuclear Regulatory Commission must decide if it wants to restart what is already a 25-year, $14 billion project, in the face of tough opposition, like that from Harry Reid, the Democratic Senate majority leader from Nevada.” Keteyian also pointed out the political background of the head of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission under Obama: “A former staffer for Senator Reid, Greg Jaczko, now chairs the NRC. Jaczko recently came under fire after shutting down the agency's safety review of Yucca Mountain and after key safety recommendations were redacted, cut out, from a long-awaited NRC report.” In the March 22 report, Axelrod noted: “The head of the NRC may not see a pressing problem, but the states now suing did not want to take that risk before Japan's disaster and certainly don't want to now.” On Thursday, Keteyian challenged Jaczko: “Critics charge that you were simply doing the bidding of your former boss, Senator Harry Reid, a fierce opponent of this project.” Keteyian concluded his piece: “The NRC inspector general and Congress are now investigating the decision to shut down the safety review. Still, nuclear waste is scattered across 35 states, and Yucca Mountain sits silent and empty.” Here is a full transcript of Keteyian's March 31 report: 6:30PM ET TEASE: ERICA HILL: Why did plans to bury nuclear waste inside Nevada's Yucca Mountain get killed? Was it safety fears or politics?
Continue reading …CBS Notices Obama Administration Playing Politics With Nuclear Waste Disposal, NBC and ABC Silent
April 1, 2011 No Comment
Since Japan's earthquake and following nuclear crisis, the CBS Evening News has done two reports on the Obama administration blocking use of the Yucca Mountain storage facility in Nevada to safely dispose of U.S. nuclear waste. Meanwhile, NBC and ABC have ignored the controversy. The first CBS report on the issue came on March 22, when Evening News anchor Katie Couric declared: “The crisis in Japan has renewed the debate over nuclear power in this country. Today a federal appeals court heard arguments in a lawsuit over what to do with spent fuel rods.” Correspondent Jim Axelrod explained: “An estimated 66,000 metric tons of spent fuel are stored at 77 sites around the country. That's more than 145 million pounds….Plans to make Yucca Mountain in Nevada a long-term storage site were scuttled by the Obama administration a year ago, after 20 years of planning costing $14 billion.” In a follow-up piece on Thursday's Evening News, correspondent Armen Keteyian went further in laying blame on the Obama administration: “There was one site designed to hold all of our nation's nuclear waste and it's right here in the high desert of Nevada, at a place called Yucca Mountain. Today, the federal government won't let our cameras anywhere near it. It's shut down, locked up, caught up in what critics charge is nothing more than pure politics.” Fill-in anchor Erica Hill teased Keteyian's report at the top of the broadcast: “Why did plans to bury nuclear waste inside Nevada's Yucca Mountain get killed? Was it safety fears or politics?” Keteyian described how the, “Obama administration kept its campaign promise….And shut down Yucca Mountain. Now the Nuclear Regulatory Commission must decide if it wants to restart what is already a 25-year, $14 billion project, in the face of tough opposition, like that from Harry Reid, the Democratic Senate majority leader from Nevada.” Keteyian also pointed out the political background of the head of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission under Obama: “A former staffer for Senator Reid, Greg Jaczko, now chairs the NRC. Jaczko recently came under fire after shutting down the agency's safety review of Yucca Mountain and after key safety recommendations were redacted, cut out, from a long-awaited NRC report.” In the March 22 report, Axelrod noted: “The head of the NRC may not see a pressing problem, but the states now suing did not want to take that risk before Japan's disaster and certainly don't want to now.” On Thursday, Keteyian challenged Jaczko: “Critics charge that you were simply doing the bidding of your former boss, Senator Harry Reid, a fierce opponent of this project.” Keteyian concluded his piece: “The NRC inspector general and Congress are now investigating the decision to shut down the safety review. Still, nuclear waste is scattered across 35 states, and Yucca Mountain sits silent and empty.” Here is a full transcript of Keteyian's March 31 report: 6:30PM ET TEASE: ERICA HILL: Why did plans to bury nuclear waste inside Nevada's Yucca Mountain get killed? Was it safety fears or politics?
Continue reading …Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer has an idea for how to raise money for the state’s Medicaid program: charge obese people and smokers. Brewer’s proposal would require smokers or obese people who don’t follow a doctor’s weight loss program to pay a $50 fee if they are enrolled in Medicaid. If…
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' Bones' star pregnant | Wow Hollywood ‘ Bones’ star pregnant . April 1st, 2011. Email Story; Print; Size A A A; Report Typo. Emily Deschanel
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