Scholars, advocates, and activists seeking to make the U.S. a more responsible global partner.
drug war
Obama’s Mexicogate?

Obama’s Mexicogate?

by | Apr 20, 2011

A secret operation to run guns across the border to Mexican drug cartels — overseen by U.S. government agents — threatens to become a major scandal for the Obama administration. The operation, called “Fast and Furious,” was run out of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) office in Phoenix, Arizona. ATF sanctioned the purchase of weapons in U.S. gun shops and tracked the smuggling route to the Mexican border. Reportedly, more than 2,500 firearms were sold to straw buyers who then handed off the weapons to gunrunners under the nose of ATF.

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Presidential Meeting Puts US-Mexico Relations Back on Track – In the Wrong Direction

by | Mar 11, 2011

The presidential meeting this week between Mexico’s Felipe Calderon and Barack Obama looked from the outside like a hastily arranged exercise in damage control. But while most analysts emphasized the tensions between the neighboring nations going into the meeting, the real crisis behind the visit was the failure of what the two leaders most strongly agree on: the war on drugs south of the border.

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The Murdered Women of Juarez

The Murdered Women of Juarez

by | Jan 19, 2011

Marisela Escobedo’s life changed forever in August 2008 when her 16-year-old daughter Rubi failed to come home. What was left of Rubi’s body was found months later in a dump — 39 pieces of charred bone.

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Don’t Celebrate Mexico’s Independence…Yet

Don’t Celebrate Mexico’s Independence…Yet

by | Sep 15, 2010

Contrary to common belief, Cinco de Mayo is not Mexico’s national holiday. That date is September 16, which this year marks the bicentennial of the independence of Mexico. In 1810 Mexico started its independence struggle against Spain, its formal colonial ruler. One hundred years after that, in 1910, Mexico rose up to free itself from three decades of dictatorship under Porfirio Díaz and leave behind the unjust redistribution of wealth, the concentration of large extensions of land (latifundios) in a few hands, the exploitation of workers by capitalist industrialists, corruption, the denial of democracy in elections, and other historic problems.

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60-Second Expert: Plan Colombia in Mexico?

by | Sep 15, 2010

In response to a recent question about the American government’s actions (or lack thereof) regarding drug-related violence in Mexico, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton offered the administration’s boldest statement yet on the question of military intervention. Mexico, she said, “is looking more and more like Colombia looked 20 years ago.” Likening Mexican drug violence to a FARC-like “insurgency,” she declared that, “[I]t’s going to take a combination of improved institutional capacity and better law enforcement and, where appropriate, military support for that law enforcement…to prevent this from spreading and beat it back.” Clinton maintained that Plan Colombia “worked” and added, “We need to figure out what are the equivalents for Central America, Mexico, and the Caribbean.”

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