I just finished an excellent book on the sad situation in Mexico and I recommend it. El Narco: Inside Mexico's Criminal Insurgency, by Ioan Grillo. The dusk jacket says "Ioan Grillo has reported on Latin America since 2001 for international media, including Time magazine, CNN, the Associated Press, PBS NewsHour, the Houston Chronicle, CBC, and the Sunday Telegraph. He has covered military operations, mafia killings, and cocaine seizures, and has discussed the drug war with two Mexican presidents, three attorneys general, and the U.S. ambassador. A native of England, he lives in Mexico City. El Narco is his first book." Grillo also got out there on the streets, barrios, and prisons and talked to the criminals themselves. There are areas of Mexico where most cavers are not going these days. I have projects in Tamaulipas and Guerrero which are on indefinite hold. I got scared off by things that really happened, witnessed firsthand by me. Bill Steele In a message dated 7/7/2012 7:25:14 A.M. Central Daylight Time, freddiepoe...@yahoo.com writes:
It probably is. I still go to Mexico quite frequently and what I have noticed is that what makes the news here, I don't see in the news there, and visa versa. Makes me wonder where this news is coming from and how much of it is true. Meanwhile, I do not know of a single person who has witnessed any of it firsthand. Nonetheless it has been very effective in scaring off American tourists including what I formerly considered brave American cavers. --- On Fri, 7/6/12, Mixon Bill <bmixon...@austin.rr.com> wrote: From: Mixon Bill <bmixon...@austin.rr.com> Subject: [Texascavers] Mexican drug wars To: "Cavers Texas" <texascavers@texascavers.com> Date: Friday, July 6, 2012, 9:09 PM For those wanting to keep up on the Mexican drug wars, there's a long article in the July 2 issue of The New Yorker. I recall earlier press reports that the Mexican army had seized a remarkable about of meth. From the article: "In February, the Army announced that it had seized, in a "historic bust," in Tlajomulco [Jalisco], fifteen tons of methamphetamine. The street value of that much meth was, by the Army's figuring, some four billion dollars. If true, that would make it the largest meth bust in history. But was it true?... "I tried to get to the bottom of a single bust--the "historic" meth-lab raid in Tlajomulco that confiscated some our billion dollars' worth of drugs. Were the drugs seized really worth that much? Well, no. The more experts I consulted, the lower the number sank. Maybe it was a billion, if the meth was pure. Then was it really fifteen tons of "pure meth," as widely reported? Well, no. There had been some confusion. There were precursor chemicals. A lot of equipment--gas tanks, reactors. Maybe it was eleven pounds of pure meth. Eleven pounds? Nobody wanted to speak on the record, but the spokesman for the federal presecutor's office in Guadalajara, a young man named Ulises Enríquez Camacho, finally said, "Yes, five kilos." Eleven pounds. The fifteen tons had been methamphetamine ready for packing, according to the Army. But it was not "finished product," and there had been only five kilos of crystal. In the U.S., where meth is often sold by the gram, that amount might be worth five hundred thousand dollars. So the reported value had been inflated by a factor of eight thousand?" I hope the body count is not off by a factor of eight thousand. --Mixon ---------------------------------------- I'm walking down the street with Leonardo da Vinci. He says, "The things your science has created are indeed wonderful. You must explain to me how everything works." That's when I wake up. ---------------------------------------- You may "reply" to the address this message came from, but for long-term use, save: Personal: _bmixon@alumni.uchicago.edu_ (http://us.mc451.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu) AMCS: _editor@amcs-pubs.org_ (http://us.mc451.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=edi...@amcs-pubs.org) or _sales@amcs-pubs.org_ (http://us.mc451.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=sa...@amcs-pubs.org) --------------------------------------------------------------------- Visit our website: _http://texascavers.com_ (http://texascavers.com/) To unsubscribe, e-mail: _texascavers-unsubscribe@texascavers.com_ (http://us.mc451.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com) For additional commands, e-mail: _texascavers-help@texascavers.com_ (http://us.mc451.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=texascavers-h...@texascavers.com)
