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c-span2, 48 hours of nonfiction authors and books every weekend. >> john gibler talk about the drug war in mexico which has claimed the lives of 40,000 mexicans since 2006 and the involvement of the mexican army and police in the drug trade. he spoke at moe's books in berkeley, calif.. >> thanks to moe's books and thanks for coming out. in late march of 2010 a photographer in monterey, northern mexico got a call at 5:30 in the morning. his editor said there had been a shoot out. he gets in his car and is driving to the outskirts of monterey city and his editor calls back and says it is not a

shoot out but looks like a body has been dumped in this field. get the picture anyway. he goes out to the scene before any other reporters. there is only a municipal police truck and some municipal police. the body has been taped off and state police have arrived yet and no other reporters so he was able to get to work. he approaches the body and starts taking photographs. after taking a few photographs the body is racked up in a blanket. there are several theatrical styles of execution in the context of the current drug war which has their own names. when would be in blanket. all these terms refer to the theatrical style in which an execution is presented to the

world. this body wrapped in a blanket with a bullet through the head in a barren field and potto is taking photographs and glances at his screen and recognizes something strange. he recognizes the color of the tee shirt. he looks more closely at his digital camera and recognizes the brown shirts with the letter be and the chest. he goes back to his car and opened his laptop and checks out his photographs. the day before there had been a shoe out in another region and he had gone to cover the shoot out. he got there after the events had taken place and the mexican navy cordoned off the air and had several people who had been wounded or apprehended in a municipal police office and at one point lead the mouth,

soldiers with their slack jackets and bulletproof vests and face masks and kevlar helmets and assault rifles, let these people out of the room. he is taking photographs. he took a photograph of men wearing a brown shirt with the orange letter be on it and he was in navy custody. he was completely uninjured and was being led by several navy commandos into a helicopter. 15 hours later he was found dead, his body wrapped a blanket with a bullet through the head three miles from the naval base. in the drug war is your did you are dirty. it kills your life and your name and history. the body is presented to the world as a death without a name or humanity.

that is one of the first acts of stripping away the possibility of knowledge as well as any ability to fight what is happening. in the law the of the drug war you are dead, you are dirty. since december of 2005, the president told cnn that 90% of the executions that have taken place during his term to various criminal gangs fighting over territory and under such pressure due to the drug war in the of the government, the police and military operations against them. under such pressure that they are escalating their comeback and fighting each other and this is the logic, the bodies we see daily. he didn't cite any figure or

study to justify that number but the number corresponds insidiously to another numbers that is backed up with documentation and that is the mexican federal government investigates less than 5% of the murders that have taken place since the drug war which corresponds neatly to the general rate of guaranteed impunity in mexico for the act of murder. since 2006 more than 41,000 people have been executed. 95% of those murders are guaranteed impunity. there's not even an investigation open into the act of murder. we see the numbers coincide neatly. 90% with no supporting documentation corresponds to these drug war cartels battling each other and 95% corresponds

to the fact of no investigation. murder and impunity are the central facts that set the coordinates for understanding of what is happening. first, what they tell you. drugs are illegal because they are harmful to your health and create criminals. the government is waging a war on drugs. that is how desperately they want to protect you against these substances that are so dangerous. this war leads to unfortunate acts of violence that are inevitable as these criminals fight each other but can be overcome with the ultimate victory of the government in their war on drugs.

that is a clean story that fits in a nice package and corresponds to fiction. there is no basis in the reality of 40 years of the drug war that story to what we have seen. in 40 years we have seen explosion of the marketplace. more drugs are available on the market at lower prices than any time in history. in the united states we have seen how drug laws have reconfigured in the new jim-crow the legalized segregation of the jim crow era into drug war policies that criminalizes largely african-americans and has created in the last 20 years since the reagan administration the largest per-capita incarcerated population in the world the vast majority of which is disproportionately african-americans on drug

charges. that is the neat story. the story they don't want people to say is that drugs are a major global industry. the united nations estimates 350 to $500 billion a year are generated in cash in the global narcotics market place. that is a huge transnational industry. forbes magazine has taken to including the men suspected of being the largest drug lord in their list of billionaires. in a rare moment of honesty of capitalism the first year they listed him they have number one on the list and it will say industry, how this individual generated their fortune. they don't say theft but they

will say telecommunications. they say industry shipping. that was a rare brilliant moment of honesty of forbes reporting on the true nature of the economic activity of the individual including their list of billionaires. drugs are a major global industry. illegality -- an interesting way to think of it is the principal feature structuring that global marketplace and it does so in two principal ways. illegality increases the value that becomes part of a commodity and the risk is so high it justifies these price markups estimated around 3,000% price

markup between the coca leaf sold by the producer and the cocaine sold to the user in the united states. illegality structures the marketplace in another way. one of the principal structuring features of the publishing industry is physical weight, bulk. one of the largest expenses of publishing houses is shipping. physically moving their product around the country and around world. that is why the publishing industry is undergoing such intense and rapid change as new technology devised ways to get around that principal obstacle or cost to the marketplace. digital technology and one that will do. in the drug market illegality is a similar parallel principal obstacle for the functioning of the market. you have to move the products to ship them. you have to ship them across borders in a way that is not

officially seen because they are illegal. almost like you have to budget in visibility into your shipping industry. one of the principal ways to do that is to hire employees directly inside the state. you have to have people working in customs and police forces and at various levels of government in every country. corruption is not a unique feature of one country or another. the united states government and media enjoy very conscious exploration of chaos. colombia or mexico is inherently corrupt. that idea is bogus and useful only in the logic of racial discrimination. corruption is -- i think we should question that idea.

direct participation of employees of the state in industry is a necessary feature of the functioning of the industry and if the united nations says somewhere between 350, and $500 billion generated year means a lot of employees. corruption also is a last gasp effort to maintain legitimacy of the state like just some individuals who either through greed or low salary or in sane social pressure has to go to the bad side. it fits in this cops and robbers good and bad logic which is useless in understanding the scale of the global marketplace. illegality is a necessary feature of the industry. of the product is illegal you ship it over borders and do so with direct participation of people in the structure of the

state. a third way illegality is a central feature is murder. if your product is illegal and moving the product is illegal and producing or growing it is illegal selling the product is illegal, if someone steals your product you can't go to the police officially. you can go in visibly but you can't call 911 and say someone took my stash. when you have conflicts in an illegal industry use of them outside the structure of the open institution of the law. murder becomes the most cost-effective way to engage in conflict resolution when your product is illegal. that leads to an important point. the logic is all the people

being killed in mexico are the result of this war between the various organizations. that ties in to this idea that illegality generates murder. that is true. that murder while it takes place does not explain what has happened in mexico in the last four years. brief bit of history. in 2006 there was incredible social upheaval and protest movements. they took to the nation's street conducting a nationwide tour called the other campaign, a mobilizing effort that traveled through 20 states before stopping in mexico city after a police raid and staying in mexico city before later in the year going to northern part of the country and eventually

travelling to mexico and oaxaca. a teachers strike was repressed in 2006 and the popular rejection of that act led to a six months popular uprising which effectively occupied peacefully and held control for six months. after the july 2nd elections there were massive protest movements alleging fraud that was employed in called around --caldero --calderone's victory. that occupied city square next to the city. they shutdown the central downtown avenue for two months. mexico in 2006 was in the grip

of incredibly inspiring mobilizations with massive participation. calderone takes office on dec. third, 2006 and had to sneak in the back door at midnight for his inauguration ceremony. i was with several friends in mexico city. we noticed you could see the soccer game on the tv screen and we looked up and saw him with the presidential sash at his face looking like he had been spooked. it was the next day already. he snuck in the back door because of the intense protests tied to taking control inside the senate. his first action in office was to raise the salary of the mexican army generals to appear in public in military uniform, send the army into the streets to wage a war on drugs. when he took office the year

before, 2005, there were less than a thousand executions related to the drug trade. in 2006 the number went up to a thousand. in 2007 it would triple. in 2008 it would double. in 2010 it would double again. by 2010 more than 13,000 people were executed at your money in mexico leading to the number now of 41,000. that context is important. when he takes office drugs and drug violence although real and taking place was not the perception or danger to society has become. when protesters fought back against police repression against a flower vendor's march in a tiny market place that led to 3,000 federal police arresting more than 200 people

in a brutal act of repression. 40 of the women who were arrested were driven out and raped by the police. they had condoms in their uniforms. when a real act of violence in relation to the drug war took place later that month in may of 2006 five heads were rolled on to the disco floor. there was no swarming of 3,000 federal police officers. the acts speak to the perception of the threat. social mobilization was an intense threat. that year 2006, every candidate tried to of wood violence related to the drug industry. what calderone did was his version of bush's pre-emptive

war. he had a perceived threat of his own illegitimacy and creates a war to strive for a perception of legitimacy through military action in the streets and also to preemptively act against the incredible social movements and popular uprising over the previous 12 months. than the facts speak for themselves. take the case of caesar juarez. there were 1500 executions. calderone send the army and and the execution rate doubled. he replaced the army with the federal police and the execution rate went up by 50%. now it is a city in which you cannot travel or be outside for five minute without seeing an armed convoy of army, navy or militarize federal police pass by you in the street. men wearing masks, assault

rifles pointed at people in the street. yet every day ten people are executed in that city and no one is found. 5% of the homicides are investigated. the drug war has its deepest roots in racial discrimination and social control. the first with eighteen 75 against opium in san francisco, part of an entire sweep of legalized forms of discriminating against and marginalizing and repressing the chinese migrant population. that history continues up until the reagan era with the disparity between crack and powder cocaine sentencing laws. mandatory sentence of five years for sentencing -- possession of crack cocaine which created criminalize an entire generation

of young african-american men. the drug war has its deepest roots in obscuring and wrapping up the logic of u.s. imperialism. both the involvement of the cia in the drug trade to finance the nicaraguan exposed by gary webb in his 1996 series barked alliance documented cia participation dating to the 1950s and 60s in southeast asia but the logic of u.s. intervention throughout latin america justified by the perceived threat of drug trafficking and drug lords, people are consuming them. real issues of substance abuse, community health issues are ignored because since the substance is deemed illegal user is a criminal and social health

response is denied so massive investment in public education and health clinics instead of police forces and criminalization is pursued. one of the key fact of the insidious nature of the drug war is the perception of cartels and cash and the cops and robbers image of a black market leads us to forget the banality of the wealth generated by the war itself. police forces are funded through asset forfeiture laws. the appropriations budget year after year is expanded to $50 billion a year for policing the prison industrial complex that has exploded as a response to the creation of the largest incarcerated population in the world directly linked to the

drug war. in 1989 there are more people in prison on minor drug charges that had been imprisoned for any charge 20 years prior. that they now the of wealth is a deeply rooted part of the industry itself. when we think the united nations estimates like $500 billion a year that excludes the wealth in the normal functioning of the government waging the war, military police and prison budgets. which leads to a question i want to pose. who is benefiting from all this? drug users are getting the same drugs. they are harmed by the fact that people who want to seek

treatment or have access to paraphernalia that is not contaminated with hiv or hepatitis c are at the most risk and the criminalization of their activity, they could be thrown in jail and their lives are ruined. who benefits? police forces benefit. the state benefits lot. capital seems to benefit. in 2008 was the collective markets crashed the united states and globally, the united nations put out their special office on organized crime, put out a little bulletin saying they detected some where $320 billion u.s. dollars laundered into the global economy from the drug trade. that fits their estimate of what is generated in the black market. what is interesting is in a year

that was unusual from the perspective of capital something steady seemed to have been useful. i read about this in the london observer and the article said in 2008 this influx of drugs cash saved the bank. in mexico in 2010 the federal treasurer said there's an estimated $10 billion in cash in the mexican banking system that cannot be accounted for in the normal functioning of the economy. these numbers are estimates. they are suspect but they also speak to the enormous scale of the industry. commodities are linked to imperialism. think of the birth of capitalism as a system or imperialism as a global phenomenon with the

invasion of the americas and dried on the thesis of a sociologist who talks about the concept of modernity, imperialism and capitalism all built at the same time together and that was largely on appropriation of labor and land theft and commodity trades principally mining. to european global markets. in what way has the drug industry become a commodity, a new form of colonialism? in what way as the drug law structure -- the marxists talk about original accumulation. not only original accumulation of cash money but also labor

through an incarcerated under class in the united states? in what way has the drug economy benefited from the north american free trade agreement? in one southern state in mexico are traveled to a put the region and spoke to several people who told me and >> guest: 90s, 5 hour drive to the nearest marketplace the only thing people would buy is poppies. what if we were to reorient our questioning about the logic of the drug war away from proven

failures of criminalization to address real social community health issues and substance-abuse? a way from cops and robbers good guys and bad logic and police officers and the concept of corruption which serves to maintain the overall integrity of the perception of the state. we thought of this has huge global industry, illegality being the structuring future. in what way is that carried out by state? the failure of the drug war leads us to see the most endemic problems in contemporary society. it looks at the failure of the drug war and you see social control and u.s. imperialism

abroad. in mexico if you look through the lens of the drug war you immediately see the fundamentally colossal issue in mexican politics of impunity and the fact the state has been constructed over 71 years in a single party to entrench a system of mafia like political power that is untouchable. you also look through that lens and the factors of internal colonialism taken from the mexican sociologists casanova who talked about it as a way to understand the state's indigenous populations of mexico and indeed in mexico the logic of the drug war has been used for decades and is still used as a logic of militarization way before calderone went across the country previous administrations had done so with the presidents of indigenous land organizations and armed movement. ..

enmeshed in institutionally created and locked in forms of social marginalization and poverty. we've seen the capitalist class begin to step away from the rhetoric of drug war. recently the global policy commission -- or global commission on drug policy put out a report strongly arguing for decriminalization, president carter pushes an op-ed in in the

"new york times" about decriminalizeation. you should look through it to see what are really the deep issues. i think -- i will try to leave it there. otherwise i will talk too long. the book contains -- the initial part of this talk provides an analytical structure of sorts to question some of the principle myths, i think these myths of cops and robbers, a true drug war, and if you're dead, your dirty. those myths have to be shattered before any kind of deep understanding and thus effective political action can be engaged in. the book largely chronicles the experiences of mexican journalists working for local media in some of the most -- in

monterrey, and also profiled several endemic cases where there were survivors to speak with and family members of people who fell victim to the violence. i tried to take a side view and not simply go back and forth between the state, the police, who have easy hack certification i think to large media, don't even shoe-string alteratives to seek them out as much, and also the killers. i wasn't looking to score the clandestine interview with the drug killer but to take a side view that hasn't been seen as much in english in the united states from the people living in the region. indeed one of the reporters in the book, valdez, when i was asking him -- asked the reporters, how can you cover this well? what i think he said, don't come

here and just count the dead. profile the stories of fear. the culture of what this is doing a society, where 16-year-old kids have already gotten used to seeing bodies in the streets, where people don't -- children think it's factable to have a big truck, a fistful of cash and a gun, where people think, assume, they won't live to make their mid-20s, question this culture of fear, which is a kind of death, he said, and perhaps even worse. [applause]

when calderon went to wage war, he targeted everything except the one to be the largest and the strongest, the finoloa cartel. and there's a perception that the government is supporting that cartel and are directly receiving money from them and working with them. other folks say they're targeting everyone else, and indeed, several studies, one reported -- analyzed arrest records in chihuahua state and discovered 90% of the arrests were the enemies of the cartel, and national public radio here in the united states did a similar study of the mexican federal attorney general's arrest records, and found that

89% of those arrest corresponded to members of the so-called cartels that were enemies. one known as the gulf, which split off in 2010. the family, and in the past four years new names have popped up. self story -- several stories of the group that split, and while these things correspond to reality, like the cartel pacifico, and the finaloa cartel, that happened, and they described -- valdez described it to me, imagine a shootout in a house where a family divides and people are shooting from the kitchen into the living room, and from the upstairs library down into the bathroom. that's what is was like to live

there during this time because these people had been so intimately connected for generations and they were godfathers and cousins and now where each other lived and made an incredibly desperate and violent situation, but also i think there's something -- a couple things to be questioned about the very concept and idea of the cartels itself. i think that idea reinforces an assumption that these organizations exist entirely independent of the state, and they have some kind of almost soap opera quasi-mythic character. they cannot function if they don't have direct participation from state employees. and that happens at every level. so you'll have -- that's why sometimes the violence can get very intense, because either groups split and they have contacts at every level of state police, municipal police, double

agents and sometimes people are going from one side to the other, so information becomes a prime commodity in those conflicts. but also a second thing -- sort of to restate that. i think quell the notion -- question the notion, the romantic notion that the cartel is necessary. individuals with names and address like the beltran or the fuentes don't exist. they do. but for those organizes to function as they do, they have to have real estates -- relations to the united states, and it's multifaceted. and a friend of mine was into ice climbing, and he said you have to be careful but you think something is solid and it opens up into a crevasse and you file 200 feet. so that's my perception of trying to navigate this world of

drug trafficking organizations and their relationships to the different factions of the state, because you think you're on solid ground for a moment, and then something happens and it entirely blows up and divides, and where you thought you stood, there's now nothing beneath your feet, and it makes sense in that organizations -- if legality is the -- illegality is the factor, and you don't want information to be public, especially participants in the state have to keep their participation outside of public view. so it's always intensely murky, and many of the reporters i spent time with who you up in these -- who grew up in the cities, they raised their families there, they know whos who and who works for which organization, which politicians work for them. which businesses launder money, and they know head. javier would tell me we can't

publish 90% of what we know because the next day there would be an armed squad outside my house and i would be history. the director told me it would be easy to be a hero. i could publish everything i know and tomorrow you'd walk in this office and there'd be a little black ribbon on the door with my name on it. so, -- but there's a second, i think, interesting thing to be questioned. this whole idea of the cartels and the capos. can anybody name who is the main capo in the united states? or can anybody name the different names of the organizations in the united states? isn't that interesting? we have this soap opera vision of the life stories of these cartels, and the gulfos, and epic include all of their histories and lineages and we hear stories of their veteran el capo marries an 18-year-old and the senators get off the plane, and it gets into the u.s. media,

and we don't know the name of a single drug traffic -- major national drug trafficking notion the united states. the u.s. government and the media will just talk about all these media kind of stories about the penetration of the mexican cartels into the united states. but i think people have been selling drugs here for a really long time, you know? and i think that kind of predates -- in fact this is the principle marketplace and has been kind of for the entire modern history of the country so i don't think that accurately represents what is going on. if according to dea estimates, the mexican economy receives somewhere between 30 and $60 billion in cash a year from moving drugs over the border. this is a number that is entirely suspect and who knows how they get it and it's been the same number for 15 years and what in the global economy has stayed the same for 15 years? not much. so the number is suspect. if we take it as an vacation of

-- an indication of scale, that makes drugs the single largest source of cash in the mexican economy. so the price markup goes up again several hundred percent. the big money is here. it's not in mexico or colombia or guatemala, the real big money is here, and we don't know. that work hasn't been done and that's part of the idea that united states media culture, and definitely the country, enjoy, if they don't do it on purpose, this perception of chaos as coming from other regions and coming from over the border, and even the language -- i remember in 2009 and 2010 they were talking about spillover violence . across the border there were four suicides.

spill you're violence? and there's no question of the everyday drug violence that takes place in the united states in mexico, we can say since december 2006, 1,000 -- 41,000 people have been executed in this so-called drug war. what's the number for the united states? how many people are killed every year in violence related to drugs, whether it's combat over territory, police brutality, or a result of police as the assumption in the case of mexico, directly aiding one organization over another, whether or not at it one form of crime being masqueraded as another, and there's one case where one of the young reporters went out to cover an execution scene, and the body was already wrapped up. there's a narko message stabbed into the chest, that says don't

cross the line, referring to the juarez cartel, and the reporter saw a woman crying, and the woman was this young man's mother, and she told the story that her son had been kidnapped and held for ransom. the family scraped together the money and paid it. the kidnappers said, oh, you have movement we wanted again. so twice the ransom, so again, put together as much as they could give it to the kidnappers, and the next thing they knew their son was found wrapped up with a blanket and a narko message stand into his chest. so here's a form of violence that has nothing do with the drug trade, or if it does, it's not that the person receive that violence did. main the killers are moonlighting as kidnappers in addition to their other activities, and indeed, one of the kind of lines in the book is the drug industry over the past several years has expanded and the global economy and it seems to enjoy diversifying its

investment portfolio. you see an explosion of human trafficking, kidnapping across mexico, the absolute takeover of the undocumented labor migration routes across the border. "the new york times" published an article saying, it's over, the historic migration of mexicans to the united states to work here has slowed to a trickle, why? because of increased border security and better economics in mexico. they didn't report on the several year reception mexico has -- recession mexico has been and didn't define the people living in poverty and didn't report on the fact that the drug-trafficking organizations and all of their relationships in the state have completely taken over the border, and that they've been kidnapping directly

labor migrants until at least 2007. so, it's incredibly long answer to your question, which probably didn't even answer it. next? >> i was just -- i was just wondering what your thoughts are on the push to legalize marijuana here, and how that might affect things. >> that's a complex -- i personally -- i think drug prohibition has been a colassal, wretched failure and should be stopped. that's not a route like even the deepest problem. the deeper problems are the construction of the state and our current political system known as capitalism. so, the short answer is, i mean, if that is a part of a movement

strategy to slowly chip away at the prohibition regime, which could also be combined, i would think, with other forms of social mobilization in this country to radically change society, support it. i think there was a lot of opposition to the proposition 19 on several levels. one was the way the law was written it would give counties control to prohibit and so that would be a step backward in tumors of the existing statewide medical marijuana legislation, and then also the people involved in the trade counterculture, or hippie, who are making a lot of money with marijuana in it's now quasi-legal state in california, and they would probably lose money. so i think that was probably part of a lot of folks opposing it. growers and people directly involved in the medical marijuana movement as well as in other factions of that movement.

i think, again, if legalizing marijuana as a step in a much longer series of social actions, then i think it's a good step, but it must be seen as what it is, very small step. >> i haven't read your book yet but i want to, and i was just wondering what you feel like -- what we need to do? what's the next step? i say we because obviously, as you said, the united states is very much a part of the problem, as much as everything that's going on in mexico. so, where do you begin with everything that's gene -- going on? you may answer the question in the book bought -- but i thought i'd ask it. >> what can one do is almost the hardest and most urgent

question. a few thoughts. what would a direct action campaign in the united states against the drug war look like? what kind of creative social mobilizations could cared out sneer i fully agree that in the context of political united states, if we take a global world systems theory view of the drug industry, it's ground zero and the principle market consumption zone as well as the principle political machine exporting the prohibition globally. so a popular movement perhaps in conjunction with legal strategies and trying to get ballot initiatives and state laws passed ending prohibit base and also creating initiatives for public health clinic and all of that can be important. personally i'm interested in what would it look like if people in the united states

became outraged over the everyday war over the drug war in the mexico and one example in mexico, in mexico the -- the facts, just the overwhelming brutality of the violence and murder and the absolute culture of impunity in which it's taking place has had an intensely wakeup effect on the population, and there's a story of a poet whose son was killed in march this year, and when his son was killed he was in a poetry conference in the philippines, flew back to mexico, was immediately confronted with the mexico national media. he was a famous person, known in the political culture, wrote and still writes a column for a magazine, very respected political news weekly in mexico, and so javier cecelia, different from the 40,000 -- i'm sorry --

80,000 fathers and mothers of people who have been executed, before his son was executed or killed in this logic of drug war, he was confronted with the national media, and he immediately spoke out not only against his son's murder and calling for justice but against the entire climate of inputin in the country, and he immediately sparked a social movement that is going in mexico against the drug war and against the violence, and one of the early actions which they did, which i thought was immensely powerful, they marched in april to the state house, the government house, and they had made metal plagues with the names of the seven people who were killed, pulled out of a car on march 27th, 28th, late as night, 2011, and so javier cecelia drilled into the stone wall of the government palace these seven names, and they called on other people to bring the names -- make plaques and bring

the names of family members or friends to drill into the government wall, and by the end of the day they had 96 plaques drilled into the wall, and they're there to this day. it was written about in narko news and he called it a dilemma action bought -- because the state was putt in the del lem marks if they leave the plaques up it's a -- attack against the immunity, the simple fact that the government isn't investigating anything, but if they take them down it's another act of oppression, almost a willing participation, open participation in the culture immunity. what kind of creative actions might we do here in the united states? i think to get started, one of the first thinks is to learn from our mexican neighbors and,

like, start counting. start putting together the list. start creating the consciousness that people are being killed in this country in the logic of a racist, imperialist drug war. >> yeah. now, what you're saying is that the government and police are involved, and i agree with that, but the number of people in the lower ranks who don't belong to a police and don't belong to a government, a lot -- they are lot more than the people that are involved in drugs. so they have a social base. the drug cartel, the drug

traffickers or a social base. and that is only possible because there's a population that have no ability to form an organization to confront what you call the system, capitalism, blah blah, but the reality is they either deal drugs or cross over to the united states to scab on u.s. workers and that's the reality, and that unless you change the vision, you say the government is the problem. i agree with that. how you change it, by building a revolution movement, not legalizing drugs or participating in drug deals, and, yes in the united states every day, the police are arresting mexicans who are involved in marijuana planting, who are involved in

methamphetamine, every day, and they're in the paper. they have family and others who are actually living the business. so, don't tell me that there's no news about it. there is. just have to look for it. >> i actually disagree emphatically with your statement there's no social organization in mexico. mexico i think is a country of incredibly rich and intense history of deep social organization. just in the recent years, everything from the army of national liberation, to the 80,000 -- 20,000 strong teachers union, section 22, in oaxaca, to the rural movements in guerrero state, like the police. there is just to name a few for reasons i'm more familiar with,

like a deep and vibrant political culture of organization in mexico. even more vibrant and more alive than that in the united states. and in terms of the news being reported, what i was hoping to kind of contribute here is a questioning of the character of the news that's being reported and not simply that there are stories, but the stories in the most or -- a large number of the stories in the united states, mainstream media, perpetuate simple myths about the drug war that don't help us understand and get a deeper grasp on what is happening and thus be able to really address it, and i agree with you that revolutionary movement is needed. >> deep throat said, follow the

money so i wonder what information you have about that, and, for instance, what institutions are involved, the extent of their involvement, anything you know, i'd like to know. >> excellent question about the money lawnerring and following the money. there's a quote from the wire, the television series, that says, follow the drugs, you know where it will take you. you follow the money, you never know where you'll end up. but indeed there's -- i think that's one of the areas where the least amount of work has been done and a large amount of work needs to be done to really probe the areas of involvement and penetration of the drug industry in the global economy. there have been a few little blips on the map. one recently was a drug deal gone bad. they confiscated an airplane,

they traced the sale of the airplane and found out that the money for purchasing the airplane had been moved through wachovia bank, and they gave this glimpse of how cash used in major purchases is moving through the banks. but there's been little work, and i think desperately more needs to be done. i myself have done no original research or investigation into money laundering and can't speak on a professional level of depth but fully agree it's urgent to look into, and so far what we know are very isolated kind of almost accidents that then, interestingly enough, don't get followed up on. there's another story from the mid-'90s, where -- i think it's the customs agent in san diego was inspecting an 18-wheeler coming from tijuana

for propane and found several empty false chambers felled with tons of powder cocaine, went to talk to the driver, and the driver was gone, disappeared, and that case ended up getting entirely buried. the propane company, opened by a very powerful and political family in juarez, and now -- i can't remember -- the customs agent ended up getting run out of his job, and i -- it was the right wing -- the rightish paper, the washington times, that did a largest expo say on this during the clinton administration, and you can look it up. but you get little blipsed and what is consistent is the money is connected to huge, large financial entities. the national banks, transnational correspond. it's not just the idea of cash

getting snuck into mexico in backpackspacks and satchels on e backs of miles. that doesn't describe the penetration in the global economy, the drug trait. >> i'm aware of the response in the united states to the world drug council report but i have no idea how it was received in mexico. can you speak to that? >> in mexico there's been a growing push, and definitely an expansion of the debate around the issue of legalization and decriminalizeation. the drug policy report was a national headline for a day, basically. of course, it was also seen in the mexican media as through the participation of very famous mexicans in the commission, fuentes, and fox.

but it didn't have a kind of larger political impact that one might have hoped to see or depending on your political perspective. but one interesting thing there about the participation in that report. the report said the drug war has been an absolute failure, it should be stopped. drugs should be decriminalized and state resources should be directed to public health strategies. and the man who signed off on the report can speak about failures. during his administration he created the antinarcotics elite squad, who later were purchased whole sale by the so-called ghost cartel. they were purchased by cardenas, about 30 of them, and they were the birth of the pair -- parra

-- paramilitary group that is linked the gulf cartel, and linked to the former president of mexico, his brother raul was in jail for elicit enrichment. some $80 million they found in a swiss bank account. and that, of course, paramaltier -- paramilitary, had direct connections with the counterinsurgency force, and had received training from the israeli defense forces. i saw one point they had taken classes in such tactics like firing assault weapons from high-speed ground vehicles, things that later they came to deploy with great success. that left us with 15 years later split off from the stuck tour of

the gulf cartel and has become what is considered one of mexico's most heinous drug traffic organizations. he also just another little like kind of moment of failure -- his first ever drug czar was a general named rubio. he is now in federal prison, charged with protecting a cartel family. when the reporter gained access to the maximum security prison, and interviewed all these superhigh level political and major crime figures in the prison, he interviewed rubio, the general, and the general said, no, no, i was not taking money from the cartel, the opposite. i found money connections from the family, his brother, and the juarez cartel, and i gave that report to the president, and the president responded by putting me in jail. so we get to take our pick.

the first ever drug czar in mexican history was either busting out the president's family for involvement in the drug trade and thus thrown in prison 0, he was directly involved in the drug trade and was thrown in prison. either way it's another kind of window into the depth of penetration or participation of the state. it's not the only time. fastford -- fast forward, 2008, the chief of the special crime unit in mexico, was busted for receiving a suitcase of $450,000 from supposedly theel, -- the cartel and thrown in prison. she's got a microphone for you. >> i was going to ask about the labor unions in mexico. they're one of the organized

factors sometimes north and how are they reacting? you mentioned the teachers union in oaxaca, the electrician's union lockout. there is any organization in the labor unions? >> prior to javier cecelia's son's murder and his activism, most sectors of the organized sector were not directly acting upon the drug war. the marcos, the national army of lib e.r.a. -- liberation, started putting out texts or letters, analyzing the drug war, and previous months, but really an organized social grassroots response was not taking place, and that's one of the things that has been positive about cecelia's activism, although now there's always a lot of risks of division on the left, and

stories that one could go into, but since that several the unions called for a national mobilization on may 8th. the army of national liberation sent out a communique supporting that call and marched, some 20-30,000 members. but there is movement but at it only just starting very recently. >> my question, i guess you were talking obviously about the culture of fear and how families talk about going home and trying to talk to their family members and friends about and it everyone is scared to talk in general, even if their name

isn't connected to them. so i'm wondering your experience with the reporter and with the people you're talking to and also like your fear in talking about these issues. >> well, one of the things as a reporter i was really going to profile in depth mexican reporters who have to live and work in the zones where they publish. those are the people who really face the most serious risks. people like myself are at the low end, i think, of the risk spectrum, people who come from other countries, are in mexico for extended stays and travel back and are constantly moving, publish in different languages. i publish in spanish but less, it takes a while to translate something. then another level your mexican reporters based in mexico and traveling around the country, anywhere you go it's risky, and -- but then the people who really, i think, are in danger and their everyday reporting and

lives are an intense struggle, are those living and reporting in the same cities, same zones, and yet they're still doing it. there's places where it's small. so many places where reporters have just given up. i've interviewed a reporter who won the national journalism prize for this in-depth investigation of a military massacre in 2002, an excellent reporter, knows how to craft a story, find documents, won the national journalism prize, and he told me, just last year, investigative journalism here is dead. you chant -- can't do it. all i do now is count bodies. and yet there are people, like javier valdez, who is constantly pushing the border of fear, right? he is -- he knows he can't say everything. he has to constantly -- his verb was -- i constantly have to

gauge or literally administer the information that i'm putting out. indeed, javier -- i asked him, have you ever been threatened? his response is, it's not necessary. they come and tell you. like living here every day is a threat. a great young reporter and novelist who lives in mexico city, who in an article about reporters has a section called, the risk of being alive. and the idea is that there are places where simply being there is itself a danger, and that leads to something another of these statements that is used commonly, the idea of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. often time government officials responding to act -- acts of violence -- like there was massacre in a night club, and the next day the chief of security of the state comes out

and tells reporters, first off, you know, we're really glad that during the whole recent carnival festival not a single tourist was killed. then he says, we don't have a cop for every drug dealer who killed or wants to kill. and then one of the reporters, a young man, martin, asked him, how do you know who is a narko and who is not? because they don't investigation anything. and the guy said, well, you know, by the company they keep, and so martin said, and the 19-year-old woman, she was a nackit snow he said, unfortunately sometimes there are innocents who fall victim to their violence, who their only sin, he said, is to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. so, that's true. if that's the government perspective, then one needs to say, okay, will you tell the nation that the wrong

place at the wrong time is going to a restaurant? going to a bar? walking down the street? do you really -- would they own that before the international media and the tourism industry? like, that logic also is still always a way to displace blame on the people who are receiving the violence. >> i hate to interrupt but one more short one? >> one more shot great. >> reading the book, one of the impressions i got was that it was not so much matter of random violence and wrong place at the wrong time, but it looked extraordinary like psychological warfare waged as a form of counterinsurgency. so i was wondering if you could say anything about that genealogy, if you know anything about that. >> absolutely. i think, again, very kind of simplified summary of looking at mexico before this whole

calderon administration drug war began officially, country in the grip of social mobilization, and the first act of the new administration is to send the army into the streets. i reported on some of the first army deployments in early 2007, in michoacán. calderon's home state and governorred by -- govern bid the opposition party. in 2008 there was a shootout, and a supposed involved person in the drug trade, as well as two army officials, were killed. the army got the i.d. card of the suspected drug trade participant, and his last name was mondregon so they went to the national statistic agency and found there was a lot of people with that name in it.

and so they arrived in helicopters, stormed the community, beat people down to the ground, stuck rifles -- i went out there and interviewes folks in the community. five-year-old girls who hat m16 rifles stuck in their mouths. they took cigarette lighters to several of the men and tortured them, beat them, said, tell us where your cousin is, do you know him and confess, and then grabbed about 11 people, took them to jail, and were torturing them brutally. one of them says you have to take the fall you guys decide, and no one would do it. so they kept beating them and eventually let them go, and in a nearby community they took four young women into a helicoptery they raped them. and i entire one of the survivors. so the army it was a campaign against farmers and people in a small town, campaign of fear,

massive deployment of military technology. in fact in that first deployment in michoacán, the magazine ran a cover with all the helicopters landing in dry riverbeds and called it calderon's iraq. >> a lot more could be said. [applause] >> this event was held at moe's books in berkeley, california. you can visit the store online at moe's books.com. >> what are you reading this sturm? booktv wants to know. >> reading the book about -- quite frankly, i have held on to this book, not wanting to open

up the pages to it. it goes over the korean war, and for most people, who are familiar with the korean war, said you don't want to know. what do they mean by that? well, i was in korea when the chinese actually surrounded the entire eighth army, and it was nightmare, and fortunately to the best of my knowledge, i haven't suffered psychologically about that war. it pains me when i think of the number of americans that died in korea, and even becomes more difficult when people ask me to explain my heroic actions in a

country i have no idea where i was or why i was there. so, i thought it would be better not to expose myself to anymore of this nightmare, and i left it alone. i had about six different copies of this one book by david halberstam. somewhere were in korea, interestsome had loved ones in korea, but all of them say that their worst thoughts about what happened was actually proven by this book, as to why we got involved, did we know what we were doing, was it successful? so, i feel secure enough now at 80 years old to take a look at what happened over 60 years ago

and see where this actually takes me. i know one thing, that in june of 1950, i was 20 years old, i was in the second infantry division, and i was told we were going to stop the communist invasion of south korea. i don't know whether i said this publicly, but i had no clue of where the hell korea was, or what the invasion they were talking about, and even when i came back home, one of the most tragic things was, one, i never was missed, and, two, i couldn't properly explain where the hell i was. now i can see that out of the ashes of a broken-down community that had been crushed to the

ground, that out of all of this has come one of the greatest democracies and economic powers of the region and a long-time friend of the united states. and that's one of the thoughts, i was in korea in 1950 and helped to preserve and continue the expansion of a democracy, but quite frankly, i may not want to know why i was there, and i'm going to do this during the summer so if it does have any adverse effect, won't be on the floor of the house of representatives. >> tell us what you're reading this summer. send us a tweet at booktv. >> there is a nonfiction author or book you'd like to see featured on booktv? send us an e-mail.

>> here at book expo america, the publishers' annual convention in new york city, we're going to preview some of the fall 2011 book title. we are joined be the publisher, margie ross. you just signed a deal today. what's the deal? >> guest: the big news for regnery is we just signed a big book with donald trump, and we're going to do a political book with him this fall, and we're really interested in doing this book because we feel that he touched a nerve with our marketplace and with a lot of people out there in america who said, gosh, he is saying lot of things i agree with. i agree what he has to say about oil and china and trade and the taxes and the economy, and isn't

its refreshing to have someone who is able to say these things and not be afraid. >> speakingspeaking of me and bn franklin. >> shows up in the book store. >> so we're very excited about this book, how to put america back on top. how to make america number one, how to make america rich again. there's no one better than donald trump to talk about how to be competitive, how to get what you want out of any deal or negotiations, whether it's a real estate can deal or you're a country negotiating with another country. >> you're saying this book is coming out in fall 2011. >> we're probably the experts for better or worse or crashing books because we do so many current event books, news-driven books, we do something that most of the rest of the industry doesn't do and we put books on a very fast track, and we known the one tour -- capture the

imagination of the audience, we want to get it us as fast as possible. we're putting it on the fast track and we'll have it out there before christmas and we're very excited about that. >> host: well, you have a couple other books we want to talk about. let's start with newt gingrich's most recent book. >> guest: we are very excited also to be having our next book with newt gingrich. we have done several books with newt over the past six years. they've all been big best-sellers, and he is a real leading figure in the conservative marketplace and has driven in a lot of ways the discussions about the important topics that are going to be coming up in this election cycle. so this book is a little different from the books we have done with him before. previously his books were policy heavy and talked about solutions for problems we face and what he is doing with this book, which is called "a nation like no other" is taking a more

historical viewpoint, which of course newt is perfectly poised to do because he is a historian -- and talking about what makes this country exceptional, what makes this country great and how are we in danger of losing that. one of the most interesting things he said to me was that in polls across the country, when you ask americans do you believe in american exceptionalism, they say, yes, we do. when you follow up and say, what does that mean? moe of them don't know or can't answer it, and his argue. is that gives the liberal elite an opportunity to denigrate us and say, american exceptionalism, that's just bragging about how wonderful we are and we're no better than anybody else, and newt gingrich makes the argue. it's not about us being better or more talented or smarter. it's actually about being luckier than everyone else for having the good fortune to be born in a country that really is

based on freedom of expression, freedom of speech, freedom to work hard, reap the results of that and live your life with great individual liberty. >> host: margie ross, for the first time in six years, mark stipe has a new book coming out. >> guest: he does, and we've waited a long time. markstein, one of the best writer's most insightful writers on the political scene, wrote a book for us six years other, call "america alone." it was an instant best-seller and now this is the followup. we're very excited. comes out in august and it's called "after america." and it is as ominous as it sounds himself previous book argued that america was alone in sticking to the principles that made western civilization great, and the followon is, not so sure that america is on the right

path anymore, and i we abandon those things, which made us great, we are very much in jeopardy of losing it all. >> now, mr. steyn is -- i use the word reclues and maybe i'm wrong. >> i use that word, too. >> will me be going on tour? >> he ill, he is one of those rare authors who said, why would i be on tv if i don't have a book to promote? which are wonderful words to hear as a publisher. but he is excited about promoting the book and he is a terrific spokesperson, white and funny and insightful and because what he is saying is so frightening and devastating, you need to add a little humor and wit, and he has a perfect combination of those things. >> host: marjorie ross, a publish her of regnery.

you have a new book coming out. >> guest: we're very excited about launching a new line of books on military history and american history in particular. we have published history books in the past and they've done quite well. we've done the occasional history book. we realized that, a., this is a category that our market is interested in and likes a lot, and, b., we were publishing history books on the same sort of crash breakneck schedule we were publishing our current events on, and this time around we said we're going dedicate a team and we're going to put these teams on the kind of timeline that really makes sense so we can give. the all the support, the long lead media, we can let them have galleys and arcs and get them in the hands of reviewers in advance, and it's proving successful because our first

book out, called "omar bradley" a biography of the great world war ii general -- that book has been picked up by both the military book club and the history book club. so when we give ourselves enough time, we see that these books really will thrive and we're excited about that. and. >> host: what's one of the history books coming out? >> host: a very interesting book called "bully." it's a book not surprisingly about teddy other. -- teddy roosevelt. and it includes 200 plus original vintage political cartoons, and woe feel there are a lot of people out there who are big t. r. fans and a lot of wonderful books at teddy roosevelt, but this book is unique, and these cartoons are unique because most of them have never been scene since they were

published a hundred years ago so this illustrates his life, the times he was giving in and gives a flavor to a buy ago agree -- by biographyy of one of the most interesting presidents. >> we've been talking to maggi ross, getting a preview of upcoming books. >> thank you very much. >> one of the great beauties of your book is the actual unfolding othe gunfight, in step-by-step fashion, and in a way that seems boast inevitable and a total accident, if that makes sense, and you get to the final moment, and virgil has whats to me to be an "oh crap"

movement, like custer got on the ridge and saw all the indians in the world down there or travis had when he realized nobody was coming to save him at the alamo. what does that -- virgil says, hold, i don't mean that. what does that tills -- tell us about how this event happened? >> guest: i'll repeat that i think something was bound to happen. whether it was going to involve these specific individuals or others, there was just too much tension and too much mistrust. james earp said later he thought there 'twas a certain amount of pressure put on virgil by some of the towns people that -- if that hadn't happened, none of this would occurred. i liked virgil a lot and ended up feeling sorry for him. i think he tried very hard to be a good lawman in the eyes of average americans today, the gunfight at the ok