New dumping ground for prohibition-related writings.
In 2007, police swept on a Mexico City mansion to find $207 million piled up in huge mountains of notes in what the DEA said was the biggest cash bust in world history.
The homeowner Zhenli Ye Gon, a Chinese national, was later arrested in the United States, where he is now standing trial for selling raw chemicals to cartels for the production of meth.
For those unfamiliar, Zhenli is someone worth googling; it is not as simple as that^.
Zhenli owned unimed(amongst other pharm co's), and imported pseudo into mexico with gov sanction until '05. The charges he faces are that he had a shipment afterwards. Now, while you probably didn't remember his name, you probably remember the pic of some of the cash found at his mansion:
Wondering why a "meth lord" was keeping ~$200M+ in his personal mansion? Me too; not really in keeping with someone who considers the $$ to be contraband... Zhenli claims that ~$50M of it is his, the rest is $ he was safeguarding for/at the instruction of Calderon's party(PAN). Not surprisingly, this has been dismissed as nonsense by president calderon (the majority of mexicans *do not* side with their government in this case, which is a large media topic in mexico. "I believe the Chinaman" or something like that (lol) bumper stickers are a common sight)
Zhenli intended to seek political asylum in the US, and was with his (wife? friend? meh) eating near a mall (no hiding, no bodyguards) when 7-8 DEA agents came in and escorted him out.
The US DOJ (not Zhenli or his lawyers) filed motion to dismiss the case in june'09,
citing Mexico's interests as well as evidentiary concerns. The case was dismissed(with predjudice) in august'09, and he's awaiting what he fears- extradition to mexico (note that your typical narcotrafficker is the opposite- teh US justice system is to be feared/avoided)
Hopefully *someone* here is familiar enough with this case to elaborate for us. I'm very interested to know what mexican interests our DOJ would cite in dismissing a case that's over enough pseudo for ~$700B+ ice. Their interests to produce cheap ice? The interests of calderon to be just as involved as any druglord, despite being the one waging the obscenely bloody mexican drug war we've seen these past years?
(
this is our way of regulating the narcotics industry? if we're gonna have our fingers in it from chinese pseudo to US street dealers, let's just legalize, nationalize and tax the fucker already, and watch what it does for social concerns and the US economy (both from direct effects and from secondary things, like strengthening mexico economically. Think of what teh drug war does to mexico, and then realize that all ethical/humanitarian concerns aside, they are our 3rd largest trade partner, and they're living under war/drug lords in HUGE parts of the country))
Zhenli isn't the only high-profile narco-case that has the potential to show some serious foul play by gov's. Cannot recall names(I suck at recalling spanish names lol) but if you care to google you'll find the big sinaloa bosses* case where they're making the (believable)claim they are immune and were acting with US/DEA sanction. Their case is not without merit.
FWIW, Zhenli's supposed allegiance was with sinaloa (very strong evidence that sinaloa is the "sanctioned"/ignored cartel by mx/us authorities). Also of interest is the $100M+ that Zhenli spent (read: laundered) at one of Sheldon Adelson's casino's in vegas (edit: perhaps much more, see:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/stevenb...s-targeted-in-money-laundering-investigation/
The dollars spent by junkies such as Stuart provide immense wealth south of the border.
What a disingenuous, ignorant way of stating it. Stuart's addiction would require only dollars' worth of meth at true production costs- the "immense wealth" provided to traffickers/terrorists/criminals comes from the artificial inflation created by the drug war, not directly from junkies' consumption needs. Stated another way- stuart's usage would provide no money to shady organizations on its own, but we've gone ahead and effectively subsidized these massive criminal org's by instituting an obscene markup, paid for in US addicts' dollars, and US agents' blood.
Such immense profits lead to bloody turf battles in a country where the minimum wage is just $5 a day.
this dynamic is what makes our domestic fallout from the drug war seem like a walk in the park. this, combined with the prices that otherwise cheap commodities could never have reached w/o artificial hiking from prohibition, creates government-like powers for the narco industries. What we're seeing now in mexico isn't new, just look at what happened in colombia after we declared war on drugs in '71, we turned the FARC into a well-funded, full-fledged terrorist organization (which saw the creation of AUC in response), and the country has been in full-fledged civil war since (a war that we are party to, not just wrt its inception or in some ideological sense, but in a real sense of $, personnel on the ground and training. Some would argue that ends justify means, and that a lot of this is necessary-evil, to keep influence in the region <some say this for our involvement in the 2nd largest drug-producing state behind colombia: afghanistan>. A simple glimpse of the $#'s would show that, ethics aside, this can be accomplished far cheaper through legalizing and controlling hte markets directly).
Drug money liquidity saved many banks from collapse(and the global economy from such impact) in '08. The illicit drug economy accounts for about 1% of global GDP, as it stands right now. Again, one could put aside morality, ethics and human-rights concerns, and contend that such an industry clearly does have huge economic implications, and that the 1%GDP is only that high because of artificial-inflation, ie that such a large market only exists by virtue of prohibition. This is short-sightedness at its worst. If you do not see how legalizing drugs will, after some years, allow economies and nations to repurpose resources and citizens into more productive uses, you're being incredibly ignorant. The money and effort wasted to turn a profit in the global drug market would have to find new venues if drugs were legalized, and not only would this create more total productivity<as effort and money is not wasted on fighting an artificial barrier ie the drug war>, but the $ goes to different parts of society<ie doesn't enrich criminal/terrorist org's to nearly the extent we do today. Our drug war directly funds these people.)
Vested interests in the current state of affairs include almost everyone, sadly, except ideologically-concerned anti-prohibitionists (basically, nerds like myself). Government officials and large banks*, as organizations, are BETTER OFF if we legalize- the same cannot be said about *specific* politicians and bankers, ergo a strong resistance to change at the levels where change typically comes from, or at the very least, must enjoy support from.
[*read: HBUS and HBMX to see how institutionalized the black-market profits have become]
Yet another "unintended consequence" of prohibition, we have allowed massive power accumulations in institutionalized areas such as these banks, or the DEA, that are now very very threatened by the prospect of legalization, despite it providing a net-benefit to governments as a whole, or the banking industry as a whole.
