Power

Power
Our Fears

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Fundametns In Importance (Memo 2)

Information can be spread out to any one because of the media. This is one of the best tools that society has created to inform and explain in the most complex governments. Without the media most of the information known from the public would not exist. However, governments like this that do not allow media to flow around as easily like this, but that is not even called a government that is called Totalitarian Dictatorship. Media expresses the feelings of those who do not have a voice. The cartels have been acting up, but the media has given the chance of knowledge to the public. Two articles that I have found from the search engines of Google scholar and EBSCO Host explain very thoroughly the effects of the Mexican drug cartels.

The first article was written by Colleen W. Cook. This article is a CRS Report for Congress and the information it contains is about the effects of cartels as well as the many groups that are found all over Mexico. One part of the article it says “Mexico arrested 15 cartel leaders, 74 lieutenants, 53 financial officers, and 428 hitmen (sicarios).” This goes to show that there are many people in this business because clearly it does not only involve twenty or thirty, but it reaches the hundreds. The cartels identified are the following: Gulf Cartel, Sinaloa Cartel, Tijuana Cartel, Juarez Cartel, Colima Cartel, Oaxaca Cartel, and Valencia Cartel. Within these cartels there are groups that follow and distribute the drugs with certain names. For example Los Zetas and La Familia fall under the Gulf Cartel two of the most known groups that are currently in Mexico.

Second Article was written by Jorge Castaneda. The main focus of this article is to describe the reasons to why the government can not fight against the cartels. It describes how the government officials can not really fight off because the forces can not over take these powerful groups. It mentions “There is a tremendous consensus in the country on this matter. We want an army that is corrupt, poorly trained, poorly equipped, and totally useless. Why? Because those armies don't overthrow their governments. We have not even had an attempted military coup in Mexico since 1938.” –Paragraph 9, sentences 4-7. With this statement it clearly describes the effect of the government and why nothing has really changed the outcome. Later on the article points out “since approximately the end of the Vietnam War, the United States has placed a series of restrictions on military aid that involve human rights provisions, military supervision, and instruction, among others. That means that we can't get American aid on our terms, and thus it has been very limited. Who then is fighting the war on drugs? We don't really know.” –Paragraph 12, sentences 4-6. With this you can see that Mexico does need help, but in order to obtain this help US needs so work on Mexican terms. Though they may reach same terms, but there are other reasons to why they can not work together because of the Powell Doctrine.

One Of All (Memo 1)

Hypothesis: The public as a whole sometimes does not know what really goes on around the world since our eyes do not recognize sight and mind of the world. One major problem concerning Mexican territory and has been around for many years are the Mexican drug cartels, and they are still getting stronger to this day. Some people have failed to gain the required education to know about this problem. My hypothesis is if the public were to become informed about this dangerous problem, then that would decrease the chances of someone falling into this business.

Context: The research I conducted targeted mainly high school students and Early College students. These respondents are the most important, because they are starting to grow up and live life with experiences may create an easier way for this influence to reach them. I picked teenagers versus adults, because most teens are an easier target to go for since they are just growing up. Adults in a way have lived long enough to know about most problems occurring in this world.

Results: Figure 1
Ages: 14-15 Ages: 16-17 and +20
Knowledge about drug cartel’s age group Suggests that young teens start to get concerned about this Suggest that older teenagers get concern about this topic
Opinionated Questions
Gave short responses not a lot of knowledge or opinion More interactive with response to question
Level of concern Not a lot
Moderate

Agree/Disagree: Drugs make you more independent Disagree: 5
Agree: 2 Disagree: 5
Agree: 1
Credibility of worse event in the country Drugs
Corruption/Drugs

Self-opinionated personally Strongly personally
Share compassion with others

Genders 3 male/ 5 females
5 male/ 1 female


Data Analysis:

Mexican drug Cartels is a group of people who sell, buy, import, and export illegal guns/ drugs:

- Within the past years it has only been getting stronger more and more members start to join this business, and while the government thinks the cartels get weaker a new event occur within the country to show the government wrong. Nothing good can come from these kinds of groups only hate and suffering. Public audience filled a survey about this topic to express their feelings towards this problem. Early College High School students filled various surveys for a range of knowledge about this topic. Students shared their personal feelings with a self-opinionated question; therefore, teens expressed this feeling with how they answered this question. Also younger teen showed stronger opinion on themselves rather than older teens expressing and showing stronger opinion with themselves and the community. With this information the younger the mind the less they think outside of themselves, and the older the mind they think more about their community.

What are the opinions from these students towards this subject?

- The point of this survey is to express the feelings of high schools students and college students about the drug cartels. This survey has shown a difference in opinion from young teens and older teens. My first finding suggests younger teens lack in information and do not know how to express their feelings to the dangers of the drug cartels. Older teenagers and college students seem to relate better and understand the drug wars affecting the country. This shows a lot of information such as older people tends to have better knowledge, and try to interact more with this situation.

- My second finding in this survey shows how many younger teens consider being more affected at a younger age with the drug cartels. This explains how younger teens usually become influenced into joining the cartels and the troubles it brings. For older adults I consider tend to express better interest, because as you get older you tend to make decisions independently causing you to regret in the future. The answers given about this question explain information affecting a specific age range closer to yours.
- The third finding in this survey expresses the level interaction dealing with the problems or with the questions. Younger teens expressed they were not as concerned with this problem yet as much as they would be in the future. Older teens interacted more with the questions and gave more opinion to the matter being asked.

Follow up: The area where I would like to focus more on my second memo would be how the government plans to stop the cartels. Also with what kind of operations and methods they have taken to implement a greater effect on the drug cartels. The next research question I would like to focus on more would be what if the government where to overpower the drug cartels, how would this affect US and Mexico as a whole? My research has not changed any of the five questions I have created for my project. The questions I have asked will not change because they are the main founding sources to my research project about the drug cartels.

Conclusion: I do still believe younger kids need to become familiarized about this topic so in the future as they grow up they know what to avoid. My research has shown opinions of various people suggesting the younger you are the more concerning it will be. I expected nothing more than just simple logic and that is what I gathered from all this information to that reason is why I still highly support my hypothesis.

Thursday, December 1, 2011

The Vault Of Information

Preliminary links

http://www.statealliancepartnership.org/Resources/CRS%20Report%20to%20Congress%20-%20Mexico's%20Drug%20Cartels.pdf

These cite gives off information about Mexican interactions with US in the illegal export of drugs and guns. It also explains how this organized and specialized group has been getting stronger ever since 1990 because of the demise of Colombia’s Cali and Medellin cartels. The current president of Mexico has declared this violent case as a major war versus this criminal organization threat to the Mexican state. This whole website describes the actions of Mexican laws joined along US laws fighting against the drug cartels.


http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/R40582_20090515.pdf

The cartels fight over the territory and power of smuggling routes into the United States. In the article it describes how the president Felipe Calderon has sent thousands of troops and federal police to fight the cartels. As the years have progressed the years have lead to thousands of lives and have climaxed to a high intensity point that has exceeded past cartel violence. Both the US and Mexico passed the Merida Initiative in October 2007 to send $700 million to help Mexico prepare for the wars and give them better equipment.


http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aqh&AN=48897220&site=ehost-live

It is said that the resulting wars in Mexican territory was a result of Colombia’s successful war on the Cali and Medellin drug cartels in the 1990’s. The leader Pablo Escobar was gunned down by officials and the leaders of the Cali cartel were captured. This weakened them a lot and created opening for Mexican cartels.


http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=11746&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+CatoHomepageHeadlines+(Cato+Headlines)

In the recent years Mexico has suffered problems from the violence and wars that are going on. This article provides information about why the government did not keep a strong military to fight off with. It states that the government stopped with the military because if the military was corrupts, poor built, not strong enough then it would not overflow the government it would be ruled under. That is the reason why every different state has its own police department and deal with their own problems. Also the reason why the government knows that they will not win the war is because if the US can not lower the demand for drugs then nothing will get solved. It has not be able to reduce it in the last 40 years so highly unlikely that it will now.