In the video above, Rodolfo de la Garza of Columbia University discusses developments in Tijuana’s drug war after 37 people were killed in the city over the past weekend.

It’s increasingly clear that Mexico’s drug violence is reaching epic proportions and President Calderon’s efforts are insufficient to date. The Bush Administration proposed the Merida Initiative:

The Initiative’s Scope
The Merida Initiative is a multi-year program to provide equipment, training, and technical assistance to support law enforcement operations and for long-term reform and oversight of security agencies. This year, Congress approved an initial $400 million for Mexico and $65 million for Central America, the Dominican Republic and Haiti, which was passed in the FY08 Supplemental. The President’s FY09 budget proposal for the Merida Initiative includes $450 million for Mexico and $100 million for Central America.

Drugs, Violence, and Gangs in the United States
The effects of Mexican drug trafficking organizations and Central American criminal gangs are felt in nearly all parts of the United States. Many state and local governments are diverting scarce resources from key areas, including education and housing, to focus countering the effects of Mexican and Central American gangs and trafficking organizations. An estimated 30,000 transnational gang members operating in the United States engage in serious crimes such as murder, drug trafficking, extortion, human smuggling, and prostitution. Mexican drug trafficking organizations operate on both sides of the border, resulting in violent gun battles which have killed or wounded dozens.

$400 million is a start but I suspect it will require hundreds of millions more in assistance. Or we could think outside the box and perhaps starting looking at drug addiction as a medical problem and not just a criminal one. At some point, the United States has to start taking responsibility for the demand side of the equation. Then there is the problem that Mexican gangs are sourcing an estimated 70% of their weapons in the United States. We provide the ammo, Mexico provides the bodies. Not exactly a fair trade especially as the toll of innocents adds up.

I suspect that in 2009 Mexico’s drug violence will be a more common topic of conversation. It is one of the under-reported stories of 2008. Drug violence-related deaths have surpassed 4,000 this year, up about 50% over 2007.
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In the last year alone, over a million people have fled the fighting in eastern Congo. Worldforcus correspondent Michael Kavanagh tells one family’s story.

While this war has largely been fought and affected the eastern most provinces of the DR Congo, the war is really the aftermath of the Rwanda genocide. In 1994, Hutu militias in Rwanda killed some 800,000 to a million people, mostly minority Tutsis, and then fled into eastern Congo as a Tutsis rebel army based in Uganda reclaimed the country in the wake of a power vacuum. After taking control of Rwanda, the Tutsi-led forces responded by invading Congo in 1997 and 1998, denying it each time initially but later taking responsibility. Those invasions catalyzed years of war that drew in the armies of six African countries. It appears that Rwanda is once again stirring the pot. From the New York Times:

There is a general rule in Africa, if not across the world: Behind any rebellion with legs is usually a meddling neighbor. And whether the rebellion in eastern Congo explodes into another full-fledged war, and drags a large chunk of central Africa with it, seems likely to depend on the involvement of Rwanda, Congo’s tiny but disproportionately mighty neighbor.

There is a long and bloody history here, and this time around the evidence seems to be growing that Rwanda, or at a minimum, many Rwandans, is meddling again in Congo’s troubles. As before, Rwanda’s stake in Congo is a complex mix of strategic interest, business opportunity and the real fears of a nation that has heroically rebuilt itself after near obliteration by ethnic hatred.

The signs are ever-more obvious, if not yet entirely open. Several demobilized Rwandan soldiers, speaking in hushed tones in Kigali, Rwanda’s tightly controlled capital, described a systematic effort by Rwanda’s government-run demobilization commission to send hundreds if not thousands of fighters to the rebel front lines.

Former rebel soldiers in Congo said that they had seen Rwandan officers plucking off the Rwandan flags from the shoulders of their fatigues after they had arrived and that Rwandan officers served as the backbone of the rebel army. Congolese wildlife rangers in the gorilla park on the thickly forested Rwanda-Congo border said countless heavily armed men routinely crossed over from Rwanda into Congo.

A Rwandan government administrator said a military hospital in Kigali was treating many Rwandan soldiers who were recently wounded while fighting in Congo, but the administrator said he could get thrown in jail for talking about it.

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Actually, it’s more like Joe with ghost author Thomas N. Tabback who has one work of historical fiction with a religious bent to his name but whatever. Joe’s book, Joe The Plumber: Fighting for the American Dream isn’t as yet available but being the one-man marketing machine that Joe is, you can pre-order it. Buy it now and you can chat with Joe on his up-coming blog, plus you’ll get a one year subscription to “Joe The Blogger” Newsletter. But wait there’s more, act now we’ll throw in free shipping on all “Shop Joe” merchandise. Thankfully, his shelves are bare for a quick perusal of his on-line store reveals not a single item beyond the aforementioned upcoming book.

Joe, however, does have a dream and a website Secure Our Dream. Here’s his message to President-elect Obama:

Congratulations to Barack Obama. The American electorate has decided that he will be our next president. As I have stated, I will honor and support my president, but there will be no free ride. When President-Elect Obama takes office in January, his term of service to the American people begins. We wish our new president blessings of wisdom and good judgment, and we pray he hearkens to our voice if ever we feel our American Dream is being threatened. It will be a loud voice, so good luck trying to ignore it.

Since we have launched this website, tens of thousands of you have expressed your desire to join this movement. I am truly humbled by your support, your kind words of encouragement and your becoming a part of something that I believe we all feel can truly change the course of this country for the better.

For those of you just visiting this website, remember that real change in America will only begin if the backbone of this country becomes personally involved in demanding more from our elected officials, and by helping one another in times of need. This is our mission. This is our fight. This is our time to secure our American Dream.

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Al Jazeera’s Inside Story looks at the selection of Senator Clinton as President Obama’s Secretary of State and what it means for the United States’ position and image around the world.

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