drug cartels

DRUG CARTELS


I went ahead and bought the generator this weekend. I actually got it on Friday and only later realized I had bought it on the last day of the year, making it a tax write off ( I think they only give you 20% credit a year so it is nothing too exciting ). The total cost for machine, tax, oil, gas can, gas and a plastic tote to keep it out of the weather was $197. I tested it out on the batteries, which weren’t yet charged by the sun ( it figures that the day after I buy it all the clouds go away ) and it took less than ten minutes to charge. But, having no way to test the battery level ( I’m not spending $40 for a tester, and I don’t know if I have other options ), I just hooked it up, ran it, unhooked it and looked at the normal regulator on the solar panels that read “charging” or “charged”. Not a perfect solution, since if I’m running the generator at night I can’t get a “charged” reading even if full. It says it trickle charges up to 10 amps, but the instruction manual is even less helpful than the box advertising. It does claim to get 16 hours off one gallon of gas, which even if taken with a grain of salt is still very good. I can easily go over a month, every other day for a half hour, on one gallon of gas. My five gallon can will get me through almost half the year. I’ll be putting a hundred hours a year on the thing, so I really can’t see it not lasting three years or so.

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Sam, I just got your middle of November care package. Thanks! Coffee and fruit cake. Well, a European version of fruit cake, but still. Good thing it wasn’t American cake moist since the freight company sent it by mule for delivery. And I noticed Sam was rather smart, not sending a can of coffee but a bag. I’ll drink the bag, but a can would have gone into storage. I can’t help myself. I even started buying two extra cans a month of Wal-Mart $5 coffee to increase the stash. I swore I wouldn’t buy anymore after it went over $4 a can, but now that $8 or even $10 generic coffee is right around the corner, I can’t help but stash.

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Drug cartels are pretty much an American subsidized institution. Even if you don’t believe the movie “Air America” or the book “Crossing The Rubicon” the simple fact is that DC has been making drugs illegal for about 80 years. And vigorously enforcing the laws. The firearm aspect of the ATF ( or whatever they are calling themselves now, BATFE- I liked it when they all stuck to three letter acronyms ) has of course gotten a lot of press, what with kitten stompings, sniping mothers holding infants, incinerating children in Texas, 3am KGB/Ninja raids so that armed defenders could be shot ( yes, yes, if ten guys shoot one man with automatics, then the 9mm actually becomes effective ) and whatever other atrocities the government cares to dish out. The same folks that only have your pension and savings accounts best interests in mind. But far more lives have been ruined by making drugs illegal. To list a few, we could actually have been much better off energy wise if we had embraced hemp rather than wind and nuclear. Instead, we all get to die a horrible and lingering death soon as our oil imports decline almost ten percent a year ( for at least three years if not four, so far ). Victimless crimes still result in very long prison sentences. It isn’t unusual for rapists to serve less time than holders/users of drugs ( the next time you tree hugging leftie commie bitches engage in sexual chocolate fantasies of your hero Obammy, keep in mind he COULD have made your chances of rape lessoned if he vigorously punished that crime instead of drug possession ). And perhaps you could argue that alcohol prohibition or even the WW1 Sedation crimes were very harmful to civil rights, my guess would be that the Drug War has caused the most harm over time to our liberties.

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I’m not trying to spew libertarian ramblings here. My main point is that without the American federal governments prohibition against drugs, there would be no profit incentive globally to run illegal drug cartels. Oh, sure, perhaps Europe would want them banned, and dictatorships such as China or her neighbors might also, but, again, just spitballing here, I think it is pressure from the feds, along with the carrot of military welfare that makes almost all other countries take an interest in fighting drugs. If there was not a huge captive market in America for the globes drugs, there would be almost no cartels in Mexico or any other place. When our country starts to disintegrate- and it will fall apart without a central governments ability to transfer its military about with reliable transportation- the drug cartels will no longer be a military force. Their market disappeared. There will still be foreign crime groups, but their reach will be limited unless they can produce another printable activity. Off hand, I can’t imagine what will take the place of drugs. Drugs are low volume packages, high mark-up. You might have limited drug running. Drugs into China, as they will most likely keep prohibition just for control purposes ( assuming they don’t break up ). Drugs into, perhaps, the middle east ( don’t the Muslims frown on drugs-or is that just alcohol? ). It will be small groups of businessmen, old school smugglers. But not rich and powerful cartels fielding their own intelligence group and army.

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Will cartel fighters really provide that much of a threat in the near future? Deprived of money and nice equipment, are they a credible threat? A few smart ones directed well might use the last of modern resources to move into other criminal endeavors. Most will not, being just as dependant on food from two thousand miles away, unlimited ammunition from the factory, cell phone service, gasoline for fast transport as the rest of us.

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