Mexican Ambassador Sarkhan: Our Cartel Leaders Are Businessmen, Not Terrorists
Posted by Jim Hoft on Tuesday, April 19, 2011, 8:33 PM
Of course they are.
The Ambassador of Mexico wrote this week that the drug cartel leaders are businessmen not terrorist organizations.
Businessmen.
Dallas Morning News reported:
In a letter to the editor today, Mexico’s ambassador, Arturo Sarukhan , comes to the defense of these mass murdering, torturing, dismembering, bombing, beheading, kidnapping and drug trafficking organizations, arguing that they are businessmen, not terrorists. Folks, we have a first here. You will not, until now, have seen any top Mexican official actually defending the cartels to this extent. But Sarukhan, taking issue with our editorial last week in defense of a bill before Congress to put Mexico’s six biggest cartels on the State Department’s list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations, strongly disagrees.Yes, they are very violent criminal organizations, he says. But “they pursue a single goal. They want to maximize their profits and do what most business do: hostile takeovers and pursue mergers and acquisitions.”
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Published May 23, 2012 at 4:57 am - One Comment
8 My Foot commented:
I thought I’d heard everything.
AuntieMadder commented:
Yes, they are very violent criminal organizations, he says. But “they pursue a single goal. They want to maximize their profits and do what most business do: hostile takeovers and pursue mergers and acquisitions.”
Talk about taking “violent rhetoric” seriously!
bitterclinger commented:
Shades of “Ees not a gang; ees a club.”
Scott commented:
I’m shocked…Shocked I tell you to learn of a high ranking Mexican official endorsing the drug trade./sarc
Dave-O commented:
The government of Mexico should be asked to send us a different Ambassador. This one has clearly lost his marbles. Yet, his “reasoning” – if you can call it that – will no doubt resonate with the Chicago-thugs currently occupying the White House.
Scott commented:
51 bodies found in a mass grave…Mr. Ambassadeur, “ees a beezness”
Josh commented:
Well… now we know who else is on the cartel’s payroll.
Josh commented:
This man should be watched closely by the intelligence agencies. He really sounds like he does not want to upset the local cartel.
patman commented:
Walgreen’s will take a sledge hammer and smash your foot, and then sell you shoe insoles.
Yes. The cartels ARE just trying to make a praaafeeeet like any business in Amerika.
dunce commented:
Businesses that americans won’t do. Just what we have been asking for, marijuana, mariachis, and murder.
uggy parfait commented:
“In a letter to the editor today, Mexico’s ambassador, Arturo Sarukhan , comes to the defense of these mass murdering, torturing, dismembering, bombing, beheading, kidnapping and drug trafficking organizations”
++++++======== All this equals Obama’s vision of America’s future, what he calls hope and change. and the republicans are scared and bowing to Obummer’s vision of hell for Ameirca!
Redpillpatriot commented:
He sure found a sympathetic ear, the Dallas Morning News voted the illegal Alien…I mean undocumented worker….the Person of the Year a couple of years ago… Can you believe that SH!T!!! The dallas morning news isn’t worth wrapping day old fish in, in fact it would probably spoil you fish!
We should pull all troops out of Afghanistan and Iraq NOW and put them on the border and in Mexico, and have our Special Forces eliminate the Cartels. We could do it in about 6 months if we had a half @ss president! Col. Allen West comes to mind!!!
What a waste of our best and brightest! having them blown up by IED’s for no F@cking reason. Afghanistan is unwinnable just ask the Russians, they poured everything they had and a hell of alot more troops and money than we have for over 10 years and they got no where. And they had no problem leveling villages, while we send our men in with two hands tied behind their back. We need to send Obama strapped to the hood of a Humvee and use him as an IED detector!!! strap Bush on one as well!!!!!
retire05 commented:
I wonder if the Mexican drug cartels were just trying to maximize profits when one of it’s “employees” shot a Houston police officer in the face, leaving small children without a father. Or when they murdered an Arizona rancher, a Border Patrol agent, and beheaded a man in Arizona?
I have told you and told you that Mexico is as corrupt as they come. The Ambassador proves it. You can bet he is on the cartel pay roll to have said something like that.
And remember me telling you that Congressman Michael McCaul (Tx-R) had proposed labeling the drug cartel as terrorists?
Langdon_Alger commented:
Mergers and acquisitions? Sounds more like those gangs are participating in murders and executions. This guy is in over-the-top “spin mode.” Wow.
kozanne commented:
Amazing. About 3 miles over the mountain from where I live, we had a cartel beheading. I’ve watched flashlights come down the mountain less than a mile south of where I live. I’ll never be convinced that these pigs are ‘businessmen’.
mpw280 commented:
And this just in: Al Capone just ran a liquor store. mpw
chicago commented:
that’s why their drug cartel problem would never get resolved…their own government are protecting them.
The columbians got rid of the cartels only when the people and the government have had enough and started fighting escobar, with the help of the US of course…since Obama doesn’t want to offend illegal aliens, he will not force the mexican government to purge the cartels.
workingclass artist commented:
AYFKM?
What a TOTAL A-HOLE!
workingclass artist commented:
Great way to care about your own people Sarukhan! May you Rot in Hell….
workingclass artist commented:
#17
Meanwhile the Cartels buy real estate in a suburb near you…These “Border Wars” that Soetero, Holder, FatNap & the rest of DC are heading to a neighborhood near you….
workingclass artist commented:
meant to say DC ignoring ( the border wars )…bad key board
bigkahuna commented:
Lets hope the idiot does business with them real soon. Seams to me like that fool is a liabilty and will be eliminated.
Well if the cartels are just doing business maybe he would appreciate the way our Air Force does its business from 10,000 feet above their business.
Mac in NM commented:
When it comes to corruption, Mexico could teach Nigeria a few things.
befuddled commented:
sounds like someone has just talked his way into becoming obama’s new immigration czar. ¡viva méxico!
nothing to fear from Mexican cartels,it’s just some bad press and bad messaging. once they get their own tv sitcom,”Little Cartel on the Prairie”, people will no longer be so xenophobic towards them.
befuddled commented:
“You think I’m stupid?”-Obama
Mac in NM commented:
Mexico has become a cesspool. A loving God would flush Mexico into the ocean like a toilet and start all over again.
tarpon commented:
The Spaniards just want the oil.
akw commented:
Evil: Mexican Drug Cartels Targeting Children – A line has been crossed: cartels have adopted the tactic of deliberately murdering children to sow terror. Will this horror spill across the border? – April 18, 2011
by Alberto de la Cruz
Between 2006 and 2010, nearly 1,000 of the victims murdered by drug cartels were under the age of 18. Recently, many of these child victims have been toddlers and infants.
One infant was shot and killed while strapped into a car seat, while another was murdered while his grandmother cradled him in her arms.
In Chihuahua, a state police commander and her 5-year-old daughter were walking to school when both were shot dead by cartel gunmen.
In another case, three young girls between the ages of 12 and 15 were executed in their home in Ciudad Juarez when assassins showed up at their home to kill their father. When they realized he was not home, they killed his three young daughters instead.
Another savage murder involved a 4-year-old girl found dead with a bullet to the chest, slumped over the body of her murdered, bound, and gagged mother.
In these cases, it appears that the children were not victims of circumstance, but were actually targeted by the assassins. A message is being sent: no one is safe, no one will be spared from the violence. The murder of a rival or a law enforcement official is no longer enough; they now will kill children to reinforce fear.
Along with the recent discovery of several mass graves containing dozens of victims, the Mexican people are interpreting the latest developments as undeniable signs that the drug war is no longer only claiming victims from the drug trade and law enforcement: it is now taking the lives of the innocent and uninvolved.
The Mexican public appears to have reached a breaking point: they are no longer willing to accept the increasing violence and the escalation in brutality. On April 6, thousands of Mexican citizens took to the streets in several cities to protest the unrelenting crime and the Mexican government’s apparent inability to protect them from drug cartel violence. There have been almost 40,000 drug related murders since President Felipe Calderon took office in 2006, and the Mexican people have lost patience and confidence in their president’s handling of the bloody crime wave. The protesters message: they can no longer tolerate living in a state of constant fear.
The protest movement is splintered, however, with some wanting the government to crack down harder on the cartels, with others supporting the legalization of narcotics as the answer.
While the violence of the Mexican drug cartels has appeared in American cities close to the border, the Mexican people have been suffering the brunt of the terror during the past few years. Calderon had vowed to put an end to drug violence, yet the Mexican people have seen not only an increase of bloodshed but a frightening increase in brutality and barbarity. Execution style murders, beheadings, and dismemberments have graduated to the far more disturbing and heinous crime of targeting children.
Mexican society in general is deeply religious; the family is a sacred part of the societal structure. The murder of innocent children by drug cartel assassins is a strike at the heart of what the Mexican people hold sacred, and these savage crimes are being carried out solely with the intention of causing as much terror as possible.
It is important to note that all of these crimes are occuring opposite an almost 2,000-mile border with the U.S., a border that is porous and unsecured. This serious problem has so far not been a priority for Janet Napolitano and the Department of Homeland Security.
The Mexican drug cartels have been able to export their drugs and their murderous violence into the U.S. at will — it may only be a matter of time before they export their newest form of terror and intimidation.
http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/evil-mexican-drug-cartels-targeting-children/?singlepage=true
donh commented:
Looks like these Mexican business men have finally purchased Jan Brewer.
aprilnovember811 commented:
Apparently the Obama regime felt the same way. They were doing business with them buy selling them assault weapons. One of those weapons killed border agent Brian Terry.
archer52 commented:
As a career long police detective and intel officer, I actually find myself in agreement with the Mexican. He’s right but in the sense of it being a distinction without a difference.
Mexican cartels are not terrorists. They use terrorist tactics. Terrorists are more driven by ideology than income. Suicide bombers do not demand a raise or more income before going boom. This is an important distinction especially when you are trying to fight them.
What motivates a bad key is critical. If you hit him where it hurts, he’ll modify his behavior. Oh, he’ll kick and scream, but he’ll change. For example here in Florida there are certain areas where either crime or culture rule the neighborhood. The police are just passing through, unable to make any real difference. In one case I know of, the sheriff’s department as all but handed over the internal management of crime to the crime bosses. The SO doesn’t have the manpower or resources to fight both the culture and the criminal culture it supports. Recently, the SO went out and met with some of the locals and reminded them that if they don’t police their own, it will be forced to assign/transfer the manpower and resources and basically screw up their operation. An immediate correction of behavior occurred.
You cannot do that with ideological terrorists. They don’t care if they die here and now or later. The goal is death and the only measure of success is how many “infidels” they can take with them at the time of their death. Totally different motives.
This is what the guy in Mexico is trying to get across, and generally he’s right. However, the danger with narco-groups like the cartels is they have no moral standard. They are willing, and have, dealt with real terrorists and have sent many across our southern border- if the cash is right.
But it should be noted that once your categorize these people as being driven by profit, you have to also recognize that legalizing drugs in America as a way to stop their activities is also a fool’s errand. Cash is cash. Whether it is spent on a street corner in a hand to hand transaction or bought at the local 7-11 the money will eventually make it back to whoever is growing or transporting the drugs- which means these guys. They have already got the infrastructure in place, the bribes in places the transport routes in place. The only difference is they would truck it across the border in semis, filling out paperwork, instead on the backs of “mules.”
You want to hurt them? Make them go away? Take their money.
archer52 commented:
Seems my post disappeared. Not sure why. Point I was making is that we don’t need to confuse definitions here to be outraged. The Mexican is right. Drug traffickers are not terrorists, they are using terrorist tactics. A difference without a distinction some might think, but the truth is the key to stopping bad guys is to understand their motives.
Terrorists are ideologically based. They want to blow themselves up to prove a point or kill as many “infidels” as possible to gain entry into heaven. Drug dealers are in it for the money. Now, that doesn’t mean they aren’t crazy, violent, sociopathic, etc. It just means if the money went away, they would go somewhere else to make the money. Motive.
I spent a very long time chasing criminals. They are not all in one bag and to assign them a title without justification is a mistake. Be careful with assigning violent dopers as terrorists. That brush gets too broad and you’ll find Tea Partiers and other domestic groups given the same designation. Once the definition gets fuzzy it is not difficult to throw in your favorite enemy- as we’ve seen before.
If you want to stop the cartels, take away the money. No, not legalize dope, all that would do is legitimize their already in place operation. You have to target the cash. Make them poor and they’ll go to another vice to get rich. They won’t go away, that will happen only when you run a high velocity piece of copper and lead through their skulls. But you can slow them down.
That said, the cartels may not be terrorists but they do deal with them. They have sent a good number across our borders over the years, if the price was right. One of these days an event will occur and the FBI will be able to trace (because they are very good at it) the bad guys’ trail all the way back to Mexico. Everybody will be up in arms, yada yada, and somebody will pay somebody off, some lobby will threaten to withhold votes and it will get swept under the PC rug- again.
Andreas K. commented:
A while ago the Turkish ambassador in Austria made a similar statement, prompting a lot of people saying that he should GTFO of Austria.
I always suspected it, but now I’m 100% sure. Our Turks are your Mexicans.
Trialdog commented:
archer52 is correct.
I read the whole editorial by the Ambassador and the news story about the editorial is overblown. The Ambassador was making an analogy, not excusing the cartels.
He argues against designating the cartels as terror organizations. One argument he makes is that if you designate the cartels as terror organizations, then those that facilitate weapons transfers to them are facilitating terror. Er, let’s not forget the Obama administration facilitated the transfer of large quantities of military weapons to the cartels knowing it would cause a spike in violence, which it did.
archer52 points out the cartels employ terror tactics but are not ideologues. True. And if you watch videos produced by the cartels (not recommended – trust me on this) you know their tactics are pure evil. Pure evil meaning worse than al Qaeda videos folks.
Mexico is in a war with the cartels. That I believe. It is a war Mexico must win. I would like to see our government assist the Mexican government in winning that war. I do not think designating the cartels as terrorist organizations will help. But a job needs to be done. Lets do it.
But please Mr. President street agitator hustler extraordinaire, stop arming the cartels so you can argue for more strict gun laws here when Mexican people are killed with the weapons you let the cartels have. You unbelievable prick.
LimoLibsStink commented:
0bama:
I and Eric Holder agree with the ambassador!. These are just businessmen with machine guns! What’s wrong with that?
Let me be clear, it’s time for amnesty for these “Businessmen.” Eric Holder agrees. That is why he is suing that pants off of Arizona. We need open boarders!
Eric Holder has brilliantly handled the Project Gun Runners operation to get guns in the hands of these “Businessmen.” Sure a couple of Boarder Patrol Agents and some innocent Mexicans got killed – big deal! Donations are donations! Votes are Votes!
See: http://tinyurl.com/3drjtpu
Also See: http://www.borderlandbeat.com/2011/04/scorched-earth.html#comments
Further I have directed Eric Holder to stop all high-level Terrorism Prosecutions for the sake of Muslim outreach. I have got to get their vote! Sure this might turn a few Jews off but who cares?
See: http://minx.cc/?blog=86&post=314935
My limousine is running an I have a meeting with Eric Holder. We must get this Amnesty thing push through before the election. Screw the Taxpayers and the Jews! Good day.
LimoLibsStink commented:
Eric Holder has brilliantly handled the Project Gun Runners operation to get guns in the hands of these “Businessmen.” Sure a couple of Boarder Patrol Agents and some innocent Mexicans got killed – big deal! Donations are donations! Votes are Votes!
See correct link: http://michellemalkin.com/2011/04/19/project-gunrunner-update-atf-ignored-warnings-doj-ignores-document-requests/
Mac in NM commented:
They don’t terrorize people, they just tell them ‘pay us or we know where your children go to school etc.’ Let’s declare them ‘non-terrorists’, join hands and sing Kumbaya. That’ll show ‘em!
retire05 commented:
archer52 and trialdog, sorry but you’re wrong. The definition of a terrorist is anyone who uses terror as a tactic no matter the purpose. It doesn’t matter if it is for religious ideology, for political reasons or for the purpose of gaining power and control over others.
And you can say that going after their money is the answer, but there is not an infinite amount of money in the world. If they lose $100 million, they will just rebuild it somewhere else. You have to end the action of terrorism, by ending the life of the terrorist.
Mexico is a corrupt country, probably the most corrupt of all Spanish speaking nations. But it is also a caste system, and those that consider themselves Spanish, and not indian, want to keep it that way. And it has never, NEVER cooperated with the United States when it comes to crime of any kind. Calderon is just a long list of Mexican presidents that have been as corrupt as any tin-horn dictator in any part of the world.
What you want, trialdog, cooperation between Mexico and the U.S. when it comes to the drug wars has been on the table for a long time. It is NOT that the U.S., and our agencies, have refused to work with Mexico, it is that Mexico has refused to work with our agencies. The fact that our DEA agents, working in Mexico to bust up the drug cartels, are not allowed, BY THE MEXICAN GOVERNMENT, to be armed while in Mexico, should tell you all you need to know. Or that when we know which Mexican national murders a Los Angeles cop, who then skips back across the border and Mexico refuses extradition, it is clear that Mexico is unwilling to work with the U.S.
You want Mexican cooperation that is real and not just a head fake? End ALL foreign aid to Mexico. Build the damn wall on the Southern border. Hold the Mexican government financially liable for every damn dime that is spent on their citizens in the U.S. for health services, welfare, judicial action, incarceration, and education. We need (and have needed for a long time) a POTUS who is willing to tell Mexico that we will no longer be held hostage for their oil. Ban all U.S. travel to Mexico (tourism from the U.S. is Mexico’s second largest source of revenue). End all trade. Stop the flow of American dollars being sent back to Mexico by illegals working in the U.S.
Instead, the U.S. suffers from “battered wife syndrome” when it comes to Mexico. We continue to let Mexico act anyway it wants, with its president standing in front of our Congress bashing us for our failure to prevent guns entering Mexico (you know that story already) while they do nothing to stop the flow of humanity and crime across our border. Mexico needs to be declared a hostile nation to the U.S.
The U.S., and the Columbian, governments did not bust up the drug cartels there by going after the money. They busted them up by killing Pablo Escobar, and the other drug lords. But it did not go far enough. We did not kill the lower level lieutenants who simply moved their base of operation from Columbia to Mexico.
As long as our public policy is to cave to the demands of Mexico and act like their whipped bitches, we are not going to end the problems Mexico poses. As long as federal lawyers are prosecuting our police and Border Patrol for trying to take out the Mexican bad guys, Mexico has us by the short hair and they are not going to let go.
And sorry archer52, Janet Napolitano has already declared that TEA Partiers, Iraq war vets, those with anti-abortion and Ron Paul bumper stickers on their cars, and those who fly a Gadsden flag are “terrorists.”
Trialdog commented:
Ok retire05. How about we build the wall, stop the aid, OFFER assistance in fighting the cartels, but in a way we are not hamstrung, and facilitate efficient LEGAL immigration policies for people from Mexico and other southern nations?
Once the wall is up, we deport select criminals from Mexico that are in our jails back to Mexico where they decide whether they want them held.
We drill like crazy for oil in the Gulf, no holds barred. We become the world’s dominant oil producer and we set the going price rather than OPEC.
However, in exchange, I still don’t think we designate drug cartels as terrorist organizations. We can kill them, if taken up on our OFFER, without the designation.
Deal?
Gerry commented:
And Bill Ayers along with the weather underground were not terrorists. They were vandals.
“Bill Ayers still doesn’t regret bombings, says ‘every great fortune involves a great theft’
Ayers continues the rich progressive tradition of renaming things in order to make them appear not as bad as they really are. During a recent interview, he was asked once again if he had any regrets for bombing the Pentagon and other police and government targets. Ayers emphatically said ‘no’ and went on to explain that he didn’t hurt anyone with his ‘extreme acts of vandalism’ towards the government. Ayers highlights the disturbing progressive attribute: the ends justifies the means. If progressives are okay with bombing to stop a war, what will they be okay with doing to stop Tea Parties and conservatives?”
bg commented:
++
Cartel Leaders Are Businessmen
and bin Laden is a “revolutionary”..
“what the fascist left have been aiming for is to “equate” good with evil..
that’s the only way they can appease their conscience in the face of the
harsh realities they are trying to escape from because it does not fit in
with their ideological Utopian matrix.. if there is no good vs evil, then all
is good even if [the] all is evil..” – bg
==
akw commented:
The US needs to designate the cartels as terrorist organizations so that their assets can be seized and it’s easier to prosecute anyone and everyone who deals with them, both in the US and elsewhere. It’s a much needed tool to choke off their funding and their support.
They are terrorists – they use terrorism against innocent civilians, journalists, etc. in order to force out and silence anyone who challenges them. They run entire towns, where there are no other political or law enforcement agencies left.
retire05 commented:
trialdog, the only card on the table is designating the Mexican drug cartels as “terrorist” groups. The federal government is NOT willing to do any of those other things because neither side wants to be portrayed as “anti” Hispanic. Hell, when an American is murdered by an illegal alien, the press can’t even call them what they are, ILLEGAL. Nah, they are “undocumented workers.”
But designating the cartels as terrorists, it gives us wider latitude in dealing with them on them on a global basis. It requires other nations to work with us in the confiscation of their money. It also forces Mexico to participate in the hunting down, and prosecution, of the drug lords, along with the lower level lieutenants.
We do offer assistance in taking down the drug cartels now. What do you think the DEA agent, that was recently murdered, was doing in Mexico? But the dirty little secret is that the cooperation coming from the Mexican government is simply for show. Their heart is not in it.
I have pointed out, many times, that the drug problem in Mexico is not new. Research Amado Carrillo Fuentes. He’s been dead since 1997
Trialdog commented:
retire05, suppose we designate the cartels as terrorist organizations. (Forget for a moment there are different size cartels and non-cartel drug dealers) Then with all this power we get, as well as cooperation forced on the Mexican government, be as efficient as what we get from the Pakistani government?
And will we have to pay for Mexican government cooperation as we pay for Pakistani government cooperation?
We have to cut off aid. You are correct we need border security. We also need efficient immigration policies for legal admittance of people from southern countries.
But if, as you say, and I’m afraid you are correct, the Mexican government cooperation is not in it to win it, then we should not be in it at all. Designation of the cartels as terrorist organizations would force us to be in it no matter what and trap us into paying the Mexican government off.
I envision providing the Mexican government assistance we control. Or no assistance at all. I know there are cooperative agreements but I tend to think we endanger our guys by not having enough operational control.
averagemelon commented:
Maybe it’s time we took over Mexico and cleaned up this problem once and for all. It would also solve the immigration issues.
Might scare the crap out of the world but maybe that’s what it needs.
retire05 commented:
trialdog, we are already “in it”. Research the Meridian Initative. To the tune of $1.6 billion.
And how can we not be in it when the violence, and the crimes, is rolling across our Southern border like a tidal wave? The problem is that even with the cooperative agreements made with Mexico, Mexico demands that we honor their sovereignty, while they thumb their noses at ours.
If you have any doubt that the Mexican drug cartels fit the defination of “terrorist” organizations, look up Black’s Law’s defination of terrorism/terrorist.
gastorgrab commented:
They sound like ‘Central Planners’ to me.
.
Trialdog commented:
Thanks for the conversation retire05. Appreciate it. GTG now. ltr.