Whack-a-mole: Washington Post thinks the U.S. falls short in helping Mexico end its drug war

Editor's comment: The Washington Post, like the U.S. government, continues to misunderstand the so called "drug war" and, therefore, err regarding the solution.  The Merida Initiative, either well or poorly executed, will not solve the drug problem in Mexcio or in the U.S.

U.S. falls short in helping Mexico end its drug war: "For the Merida Initiative, Congress has approved $1.3 billion since 2008. ... As of March, $121 million of that appropriation -- or about 9 percent -- had actually been spent. Much of the rest, according to the GAO, was bogged down in more than a dozen federal agencies.... At a discussion sponsored by the think tank Third Way in Washington last week, Mexican Ambassador Arturo Sarukhán pointed out that ... "Mexican citizens on my side of the border . . . believe that we're paying a heavy toll for what is basically a U.S. responsibility." So will they vote for a presidential candidate who would continue to pay that cost when Calderón's term ends in 2012? The ambassador said he thought so. But he might have added: that may depend on whether the Obama administration and Congress do more to help turn the tide in cities like Ciudad Juarez. " July 26, 2010, Washington Post editorial by Jackson Diehl