ribbons. and he threw him back at me, he said, i want anything to do with us. i said why? i came in first. and he said, no, you just told me didn't do your best. he said all i ever wanted from you is to do your best. and every day of my life, i tried to live up to that standard. that combat veteran, the dedicated father, dedicated husband, one of my favorite memories in the book about my dad was as your vice president, when my first trips was to travel to korea. we were driving through the capital of seoul, and they had billboards at the bus stations. they said, welcome, vice president pence. and then right underneath that, it said, and thank you, lieutenant ad plants, r freedom.

s of language as something good. community, this expression of dope is very popular, very important. and it's usually used and the dynamic use of language and that is called, dope, they drop to without. us i think that this book demonstrates that as well and is it going way. we're about to get some truth on the subject that's been misinterpreted, twisted, missed talked so much in american schools, an american media. and so forth and so on. we're getting ready to get the

dope truth broken down to us. doctor benjamin smith, is professor at a university over in england. and i want you to tell us more about some of you're research there. benjamin holding conversation with our very own christy thornton. here at john hopkins in latin american studies. you should definitely follow her research and pick up her writing. i want us all to give a big round of applause presenting the dope, real history of the mexican drug trade. give a real radical noise for doctor benjamin smith. [applause] >> you pull another mic closer. perfect. thank you everyone for being

here. and for being in conversation about this terrific book. i'm sorry my colleague couldn't join us tonight. the original idea was to have a conversation where we brought the drug trade, drug war, in baltimore together with the drug trade and the drug war in a place like mexico. we're gonna try to continue to do that. although i don't have brandon's deep contextual knowledge of the city. but as a big fan of his writing, and deep redirect his, all try to bring what i've learned from him. into the conversation. i want to start by saying, that this is a remarkable book. i'm so glad it's here. and that it's out in paperback. it's purchasable here at -- >> and it's really a tremendous history, if you have not yet had the chance to read it, then does an incredible thing which is that he makes, he absorbs a massive corpus of very detailed historical facts about the

history of the drug trade in mexico, really the entire country of mexico, north to south. and he makes them into this very readable, very lively, very engaging book that will as analysis was saying, flipping some knowledge while we're learning these very engaging stories about the people who participated in the mexican drug trade overtime. , so i really recommend that folks pick up the book, you can see how heavily annotated my copy is here. i've taken copious notes. we have so much to teach us about this history, and i wanted to start with the question that i think analysis put on the table in his introduction. which is to say, i want you to describe for people what it is that you think here in the united states, in the uk, and

in the global north perhaps. what is you think we've got him wrong about our understanding of this history? about our understanding of the history of mexico's role in the global drug trade. about the way that it has actually developed, the role of the mexican state in that history. we obviously, have all these perceived ideas, drugs are massive in popular culture here in baltimore, we have the wire, we have narco's and mexico, we have this kind of received idea both the drug trade looks like. what is that your book wants us to think is wrong about that received history? >> thank you. this is an extraordinary space by the way. i feel really honored to be here. thank you so much, and thank you for christie to organize this. it's a big honor. i don't normally -- they don't normally let me loose from bookstores. it's normally academic departments. so, thanks i suppose the kind

of key, so huge mythology surrounding the mexican drug trade. and surrounding the latin american drug trade. as a whole. so, characters like pablo escobar, -- narco, el chapo, or breaking bad. they all many of them start out by attempting to humanize the drug trade. but one thing i discovered by looking over this popular culture. was that at the end of the day, however much they additionally humanize these characters. by the end of the series, we are pretty much stuck in a more normal binary, on the one hand you have the good cops, who however much they may have done drinking, who are behaved in a bad manner, they're genuinely fighting for the good of humanity. and the good of society. and on the other hand, you have these bad drug traffickers, who have -- they may have been trying to

take care of their family, make money for them, but by the end there full-on psychopaths. essentially, all of this popular literature, and popular media, and film. about the drug trade are essentially set up its moral binary. good cops, that traffickers. i think that's where i wanted to initially when i got into this, program i would been doing this related long, i've been researching for 18 years. and initially when i started off, it was something i believed, and i'd spend a long time in mexico i'd seen some of the fairly horrific acts, undoubtedly done by drug traffickers. and i bought into this idea. this very simple moral binary. the more i look to the archives, the more i took -- involved in the policing of the drug industry. the more easy moral categories

fell apart. and by the end, it was a very, very gray area. and the idea of good cops, -- far too simplistic from what i've observed. now, but also throughout mexican history. >> one of the really key lessons from your book about that mexican history is about the role of a mexican state. that's one of the through lines here, it's one of the most important things that i take away from the book. the way i frequently talk about it when i'm talking to people, and i wonder if you think this is a fair characterization. this is my question to you. one of the ways i read this history, is that the state is the organizer an organized crime. and i wonder if that's what you're getting out here? >> that's a pretty good way -- i wish you could read this and then edited it more carefully than it was edited.

yeah, you're absolutely right, good line. so, effectively the mexican state has all is catholic drug traffickers. traditionally, again, this is something we see in the media, and the kind of public perception of a mexican state. as we call this corruption. we call this mexican governors, league officials, taking money for, to look the other way while drug traffickers traffic essentially. , so this is how we perceive, it we think it's a bad thing, we probably think these police officers, or these governors have spent the money on luxuries, properties, or garages full of lamborghini's. an actual fact, one thing i found, was that the mexican states certainly after the 1990s, was spending at least some of this money on what we might call building the state. some of the stuff is relatively palpable. so, it's schools, hospitals,

roads. during the 1960s, a 1970s. on the mexican state was involved in a fairly brutal counterinsurgency against so-called communist guerrillas it was involved in this palatable blitz of state building. -- giving them uniforms, army, the military. but some of this money, that was coming from illicit activities, drug trafficking, was going towards building mexican states. by 1985, there's some people who are telling. me that the ministry of the interior, had no -- it'll mexico. so much of their money was coming from drug trafficking. from principally the trafficking of -- so, i think a, my idea was to turn these ideas as simply condemn this as kind corruption on their had. but to see the state as integral as building up the industry. but also it's widely accepted

to a certain extent. >> so, you describe this in the book through the idea of the protection racket. think about what you mean, what is the protection racket? and what some against mexican state doing in this rocket? it >> essentially, protection rackets a term take into criminologist, -- what the mafia do. the mafia woke up to mostly illicit businesses. core value businesses. and we'll go, we'll protect you. -- they won't let anybody's help for as long as you pay the percentage of the profits. attacks, essentially attacks. so, the mexican state as a tax on normal businesses. like your garage, your mechanic shop but it also have the police and mexico up to the 90s. have attacks on illicit industries. so, that was brothels, human trafficking organizations, but

also the drug trade. us right.latest sensual, protem persecution. we won't give you up to the dea, we would extradite you to the u.s.. we won't stick you in jail for four years. if you pay as a percentage of your profits. so, that's how it was organized for 7 to 8 years and mexico. that was the system that was in place. that was half taxation, and it's difficult -- in some ways, we don't really lack -- i don't get too technical into this. will be black the language. it's half packed. it's half organized crime. and it's somewhere in the gray area between. the tax collectors and mexico, the semi family was -- municipal level. and they were alarmed. -- my grandfather in britain was a tax collector. he was a fantastically boy -- he repeatedly told me. however, tax cuts in mexico

particularly at the local level would collect taxes and a half. and they would collect them from traffickers, bars that opened, brothels, basically anyone who is right in the gray area of what was allowed. but this money did, some of the money meant that the main, some of them was used for parties, some were used for fairly dubious investments. some of the money went to the municipality. , so as they say it's part tax and part organized. crime >> there is a famous formation that war making instate making his organized. crime and as the maxim in mexican state rebuilding the 20th century after the revolutionary war, it seems like that's playing in a certain role. >> yeah, it's absolutely crucial. and kind of -- that formulation which has come

up, charles philly, the idea that is eventually if you make enough money, you don't need to rely on organized, bullying people for tax. the maximum and day to not do that. it has to rely to a certain extent. in fleecing organized criminals. it never gets to the stage where we have an orthodox income tax regime like any other country. you never thought that you come for a discussion on tax. >>, so one of the discussions that's troubling. is the distinction between illicit and illicit. which is one of those myths that i think your book is trying to break down. that there's a kind of hard barrier between illicit economy, the state, the above lord business. and below board. so i think someone important

mohsen between that drugs have played the foundational role in the mexicans to eight. i want to ask you about writing that book and finding sources that the lawyer to get to. that one of the things that comes out of my understanding. one of that i've learned from brandon soderberg and folks that work on drug policing works in cities like baltimore. and then the abolitionist movement more broadly in the united states. the extent to which what we know about drugs, comes from cops? everything you know from drug trafficking for a long time came from of the state. it came from police forces. we started to have different understandings as we move into the 19 80s and 90s. we had anthropologist embed themselves and drug traffickers. we began to get a less mediated versions of this.

but in researching this as a historian, you need to rely on the archives of that kind of state power. you need to rely on the archives the police forces. so, i wonder if you can talk about the sources that you used for this. and the strategies you have to use to read them. in order to be able to pull out how you actually understood how drug trafficking worked. that wasn't entirely through the lens of law enforcement agencies want to tell us about? it >> wilder, is when huge advantage that i have. which is the dea is the worst record keeper on earth. , southeasterly, i think you tried freedom of information act. it's pretty much impossible. i found out that the dea -- worked in the 1970s they all said, and struggle to keep our pride. and certainly, when they left their offices above a strip joined in d.c.. and moved to the pentagon in 1989. they lost their entire archive. so, in some ways i had a

massive advantage that i didn't have to read certain bet some mediated stuff. the other thing i had, was one thing you get to learn as a political historian, is institutions in the government really hate one another. and they really resent the amount of -- hobby horse, so gratuitously, i had the mexican secret service, which low the mexican police that were in bed with the dea. , so they undercut a lot of the things the dea in the cox had to say. i had the state department, that occasionally gets in bed with the dea. and occasionally actually loads it. i had the cia, mostly always loathed -- so, in some ways there were ways to undercut this narrative. what i found most difficult, was the newspapers. not everyone is a brand, i was amazed by how credulous so much

of the media, and i think i might be underestimated. i think we have a tendency, for the written world, to overestimate how much the price, how much power it has. but there's a -- story after story. there's an uncomplicated moral story of a good cop, and this terrible trafficker and there was these completely unproven stories of doing absolutely horrendous things. you start to poke, just no evidence there, they made this stuff up. at the momentum looking at an extraordinary story about this woman, let nafta, who basically runs -- heroin. heroin trade. for about 14 or 15. years between 1930 and 1980. she's the nonviolent, grandmother of heroin trafficking on the east.

and texas. and the east coast of texas. and one thing that really struck me, so many legends about. are all created by the media. the way she came to power is that she massacred all the chinese. ensued out herrera's, pistol toting, psychotic kobanî and clyde. of total nonsense. there is nothing there, there was nothing there an actual fact it seems to work -- to provide opium for them. you have a much more corporate view of it because they're making money. one thing i think that we overestimated, one thing that the priceless distress, is the idea that cartels and drug traffickers are kind of natural capitalists. they always want to kind of fight for their little space in time. but an actual fast, most want to cooperate. the market in the u.s. is infinite. there's no need, some -- sell in san antonio. just go to chicago, right?

it's not like selling on the street corner. the u.s. market is vast. there's no need to cooperate. that was the real -- anyways, i got off that question. i apologize. >> talk about some of the sources you are able to find and mexico to get at the stories. these are not necessarily stories that, when you walk into an archive and you ask, i'm interested in this famous drug trafficker. archithey might look at you a e askew. what sort of things were you able to use and mexican archives, primary sources, interviews i know you did as well. how did you get that on the mexican? side >> on the mexican side, there's two things that opened up. one, i personally do a lot of work, i'm sure this will surprise, and virtually none of you. here -- and 19,000 mexico's are deported each year from the united states. and i work with a lot of tempting to gain asylum. or least not get kicked out of

the country. and i've been working on this for about six or seven years -- i was lucky enough to do lots of interviews with people. -- but they were persecuted by groups that call themselves cartels, organized crime. these are often, owners of attack -- people who were involved in very, very low levels of the dog. trade taking half a key of cocaine over the border, because they owed money to some guy and organized crime. i got lots of stories. those are for the last three or four chapters of the, book which were i'm grateful for. in terms of the other stuff, i came across no one never looked at this. i don't get too nerdy about. it but so huge quantity of judicial records. like court records basically, that no one in mexico has ever really looked at.

and these, they're up to the 1970s, they're probably not elicited by post 1970, they're really problematic to read. but one thing, as there is also a judicial system in mexico for all its faults, it allows people to complain when they're being tortured. you can read these statements, which do discuss the mechanics of the drug trade. but you can also see how the police got this information out. which was frankly, from 1970 onwards mostly by torture. we can get into the discussion, i know you know quite a lot about this. but we talked a larger, didn't come organically out of mexico. which -- or did it come from usa to operate in mexico. and if you ask me, i can stand advance i don't know. but yeah, those bits of

evidence are pretty startling, quite difficult to access. i mean there is a huge warehouse outside of mexico city, it contains all these records. there is currently a truth and reconciliation commission. and i'm an attempting to get it go look at the archives. if you don't know many people were tortured and mexico during the dirty war. you should probably go there and it seems to be a stern reluctance. and there's suspicion that not everyone wants to know those levels. >> so, you put together, you triangulate as you said, the sources, u.s. law enforcement sources, media sources, these mexican judicial sources. the stories that people have told you. the legend that people have passed down about these traffickers. one of the things that's interesting in the book, is the question of violence. you've spoken about violence looks like. the state violence of the 1970s. we know of course after mexican president philip but got iran,

sends the military into the streets. and his war on drugs and organized crime. after 2007, the levels of violence really escalate. but one of the striking things about your book, for the vast majority of the 20th century, violence is not a big part of the drug trade as you narrate. can you please talk about the question of violence and how it changes overtime? >> right, yeah, i suppose that's why i started writing this book. because when i came to mexico in 2000. mexico was an incredibly at the same moderate as the united states it was a place of democratization, indigenous movement, cultural effervescence. by 20, ten and have the highest murder rates in the world in certain cities that have the same rights as baghdad, or kabul. it was a real question, how did this violence kind of increase. i think the assumption was, when i came, was cartels are kind of these jealous,

combative institution, desperately trying to fight for territory and for markets. over who' that didn't actually seem to be the case. as i said, the market is fast. you don't need to fight over who's going to sell to the united states. because the markets almost infinite. and if not, just take the drugs to asia, europe, and that's effectively what the cartels have done over the last decade. they've taken the cocaine industry to europe. which americans have much less -- and europe in particular the uk takes me more. so, that didn't seem to be the. case what i did find was that what looked on the surface to be cartel scraps. are often app actually deliberately designed. i think this was one of things that i did not expect. effectively, policing drug

trafficking is really hard. most of trafficking networks are closed, family run networks. people are related or they grew up together. and they're linked by blood in marriage. it's really difficult to infiltrate these things. it's not like policing drug sales, you can't go to a corner and pick somebody up, and just bust them for selling new drugs. you've got to get inside the network, and support the dea and the mexican police would do. which is arrest somebody, normally torture them, make them tone informant, and make them squeal on their fellow drug traffickers. so, i think the thing that was most, the most obvious example of this, was chapo guzman, for a decade he was the dea's most wanted. he was also the dea's key

informant. number one in form. and released floyd or was. so, effectively the day and the cops would do, is they take one drug dealer, toronto an informant. make him turn on his allies. and then that which causes these divisions within the drug trafficking organization. perhaps most famously, in 2008. chapo guzman, is basically threatened. they say, you're gonna go away to jail, will capture you, we will get 30 years -- in supermax. or you can turn, you can squeal on some of your allies. i think it's relatively care, he squeals on his cousins, who've trial -- it causes them enormous confrontation, between on the one hand chapel is gang, and on the other hand -- so, on the surface but look like cartel beef, are quite deliberately engineered by

police they take these cartels, they pull them open, they wedge them up. i think often, we have this discussion, we assume that all governments are trying to keep the violence down. but certainly, for the diab it's crucial for their policing. because it makes more people squeal on their allies. >> that wasn't the case on the earlier parts of your. box in the early parts of the 20th century, when the mexican state is acting as this protection racket. and doing this effect of taxation of this. it's a relatively non violent trade. >> there's nothing innately and drug trafficking it -- like i said, if necessary -- farmers to get on with your buyers. to get on with the wholesalers. to get on with a person under the truck. and these are often families, friends that grew up together. so, yeah, it really is extremely peaceful. mexico's had peak --

mostly to do with religion on land. but not actually to do with drugs. so, the violence is the last 20 years is something totally novel. before that, you know, when others act -- sinaloa's been historically since 1930s, the biggest producer of opiates. one of the biggest producers of marijuana. i'm pretty much every drug trafficker has ever heard has come. from but up to 1974, it was one of the safest places it. had the lowest moderate in mexico. and partly because the money is being distributed among people, poor people. so, there was no need to go and take land of the slightly wealthier farmers or whatever. so, it kind of smoothed over social divisions. again, it's not palatable. maybe >> that's precisely the question, we have a situation, most of the 20th century in

which the next -- authority that's >> -- does this taxation sort of keep things in shock. and there's not this kind of violent history. i think that's a really important lesson from this early merck -- i want to take us back, for just one and i want to return to some of the interesting historical stories that come here. we all want to talk about what has happened in mexico since 2007. and mentions of el chapo, and even -- there is a very interesting character in your book. you've written about previously. but particularly well in this book. and that's this guy -- can you tell us about salazar, who was, and when he tried to do? he's a progenitor of what we might recall, a harm rejection approach to draw the drug use in mexico city in the 1940s. it's a completely forgotten

story, can you tell us about salazar and what he tried to do, and what happened to? yeah >> yeah, he's an extraordinary kind of freethinker. mexico has this big, social, political revolution in the 19 times. and this creates a pretty far-reaching set of social reforms. they give out land back to the presidents, they get pretty good education to indigenous people, there are some moods for gender equality, but it is basically a fairly radical revolution nothing on the role -- but, also much less bloody. the world of the revolution in the world of three thinking comes really late but sometime in the late 1930s a group of psychiatrist doctors decided that drug punishment may not be working and there's one guy salazar, who's pretty much kind of the leading doctor, the

great brain. the einstein of mexican doctoring at the time. he comes up, two things, he's a very, very clever psychiatry this but also he's a marxist and we effectively thinks the problems with drugs is not the chemical effects right, but rather the assumptions we have when we take drugs. this is incredibly far-reaching, and actual fact timothy leary says exactly the same thing during the 1960s. while being creepy and a bit full of himself. leopold salazar saying this stuff in 1930. and rather than timothy leary who thinks that fall free autonomous sovereign hippies, and we can decide what attitude will take -- take acid. instead salazar is a marxist. he thinks the burj law have already decided the format. so, when you smoke marijuana

you behave in a bad manner. which many people thought, you do in mexico, that's because the bourgeoisie said, when you smoke marijuana you're gonna behave in a violent, batter, terrible way. so, he comes up with this kind of idea of why drugs effect this uncertain way. he says the best thing is to remove these kind of prejudices about drug use. and rather than criminalizing people, rather than demonizing these drugs, we should instead pretty much give them out free. and the state should take control. it's kind of genius, right? a, he's a marxist who thought quite deeply about how drugs affect us in certain ways. but he's also a brilliant -- so, his real big solution to it. it's okay, we want to get rid of people being at a. so, we want to get rid of the prejudices surrounding drugs. we also want to get rid of the illicit economy. so he says we should create a state monopoly.

that gives out, he says we'd, but he also says giving out morphine. he gives out and opens up these clinics which give out basically free morphine it's not dissimilar to harm reduction today. he gives out state morphine to adickes. and they can do jobs, -- that the drug traffickers are selling in the peddlers are solids. it only cost 40 cents to buy your cheap bit of state. morphine -- so, people are getting managing to keep down jobs all being attics. some of them -- they're getting medical care, they're not dying -- they're getting medical grade morphine. they're not dying of all the stuff that's in the dodgy street morphine. all of the stuff is going well, until have a wild guess what

country gets rid of this plan? yes, it's terry and sling, or the predecessor of the dea. basically, a psychopath -- he decides the spectacularly bad idea. that people might have the same idea in the united states. any effectively, mexico at that time is not producing enough morphine to get out to its attics. so, as a result it needs to buy from america. so afghans linger, for some reason is in charge with how much morphine the u.s. sends to mexico and he decides to send none. this project, basically goes down the toilet. plus, loads of people who were dying of cancer, another things all die in pain, because they can't get morphine from relief. but this is a small price to pay because and linger winds.

the entire, project disappears. he's a radical revolutionary with far-reaching thoughts and he's totally forgotten the only people that remember him are in the 1960s, we need smokers, call our joint of any -- he was pro legalizing we. that's the last memory of him. as i say, he's a fascinating character and i kind of, other people have attempted to rescue him. i thought it was fascinating that he was -- the fact that they all came out of this marxism. was fascinating. -- >> it really brings us to thinking about the role of the united states is played. so, you've mentioned the d and number. times i should, say that today on the day that were filming that, it's the day we're having this conversation. the biden menstruation's made some important moves. pardoning everybody with a federal possession charge for cannabis.

it should be a thing that exists. but apparently there's thousands of people -- he's instructed states to think about pardoning as well. he's instructed secretary of health and human services think about rescheduling cannabis on the drug schedule. so, there are small moves being made. we before electoral reasons here in the united states. but important passages forward, so i wonder, characterizing the role of the united states over this long period, the long 20th century of u.s. mexican drug relations. what would you say about that, how do you think about the role of united states here? >> i think the one thing that struck me, is how the u.s. is often, the u.s. has much bigger fish to fry than simply drugs. when it comes to massacring communists, it'll put its money into that. when it comes to opening markets to u.s. products. that's where it cares. what happens is from time to

time, when there are those concerns. certain institutions principally the dea, has decided that exporting the drug war is a really, really good way to a, save their skin and the save their budget. one thing that struck me about u.s. history, which i'm not an expert. on is how often federal drug agent says -- have almost been closed down. multiple different occasions, for huge corruption scandals. like 1968 i think about a third of the federal borough was on the take. from the french connection. during the b and d d close a 1973, they're still on the topic. the dgas almost closed down in 1975. because they're still on the take. there's these corruption scandals again, and again, and again. and often away -- i maintaining a budget, is to

say, look at those foreign countries, and if we can -- and the countries also maybe having a communist insurgency, and we can ally with the state department in order to go after these. people than all the better. so, -- the and knowing where to go after. the most example as recently, afghanistan. where, the dea yet again got a huge militarized group of what they call teams that were basically the war on terror, partner on drugs. they sent them to afghanistan, but then they killed lots of people by mistake. so, yeah it's not all the time, it's not only present, but one nda or at least these drug

institutions are in trouble, they often export the drug your outside. >> the democratic struggle for position, for higher levels of budget, that's frequently driving what's going on here. that's a very different story, that kind of sociological bureaucratic story. it's a very different story. and that story we for an academic literature. it looks not written as an academic book, it's not written as a kind of dry academic history. in fact, if you are an academic historian as i am. you'll find yourself frustrated by the lack of footnotes. so, one of the things i know you try to do in this book. is to kind of is appropriate the right word, appropriate some kind of genre of true crime. with a different political and. i wish brandon was here with us because his book between him and boehner -- i got a monster. it does something very similar. just tremendous work that uses

the color of these stories. in a way that it's very similar to what we might think of as the true crime leondra. with a very different and. i wonder how you think about that. what's your approach here in the way that you've written us. i know it's really readable, despite the fact that it's chalk full of names, eights, places, and all the historical facts. you fly through it in this way. so, i wonder about your approach to the idea of true crime. which has some reaction and tendencies. so, how do you approach that and what do you think about your actual approach of the widening? >> i'm not sure calling it a reaction tendency, someone's waited for the reaction. it's grown up in lockstep with mass incarceration. and with the racialized asian of policing, and all these kind of things. it's a problematic genre, in

many ways, so i was really wondering how to write this. i felt slightly queasy at times, may be leaning into certain aspects of that genre. and i'm not sure that it works all the time. but i also think, that if you try and escape too far from the true crime genre, you're gonna lose your -- are -- it was a really difficult kind of balancing act ahead. i felt you need to make it readable, approachable, but at the same time, say something different. i had one advantage that i hope -- i try to make put jokes in which perhaps doesn't -- they don't translate but i think i try to bring some kind of levity to this. otherwise i can get very, very serious. and maybe a dryness of humor. i hope that undercuts the put

ten just-ness of true crime to a certain extent. but i did read a lot of james elroy. who is also quite problematic. before i wrote. it onion, a lot of true crime. >> there is a sum version of the genre that goes with using that form. and then tell a story that turns the finger around and pointed at the state. it turns the finger around and says, in fact the people you think are the heroes have also been something closer to the villains. >> yeah, that was brought -- this is been done. i think now we all live in a true crime podcast world. this continual noise about how you get around that. so, people have started to do this to a certain extent. in that genre. and no doubt, but also in some documentaries. but one thing the doors open to

undermining the true crime genre, and it's slammed. i wonder -- we've turned on some netflix documentary about crime and gone, wow they're trying to undermine this narrative. oh, i like that. and then bank, slamming your. face they were actually quite bad. although they're wonderful documentary about crockett had some -- i had some wonderful speakers ahead. a friend of yours wasn't it, and had brilliant people -- but it was also -- it left the cops off pretty easy. there were certain aspects of it that were not terribly helpful i felt. are not that -- >> so, i do think there is particular, i was lucky i had a last publisher, i studied that, this is exactly what i'm talking. about the u.s. publisher let me put on the front cover, what i think the moving in the.

something i think really sums up what's going on the mexican drug trade. there's a young girl, and a massive field of poppies. which i think shows the fact that it's not just about gum touting psychopathic bratton man. that are threatening to come over the border, and threatening. you that was on the u.s. cover and they were very kind. on the uk cover, there was a massive fight, and he refused to not let me put psychopathic, and m16 wielding man. and eventually, i think i got on -- i didn't get. the habit and the paperback they insisted on putting it. i have to have a big fight not make them look next again. it's absolutely absurd. they were attempting to close that door, attempting to we gotta keep this to true crime, it's gotta be in the true crime column, or won't sell enough. so, there is that problem. >> received stories about the mexican drug trade, what that looks like, are difficult, still difficult to fight

against. >> yeah i think it's something that's completely instilled i think we assume that this is something that started with americas, it didn't start with marcos even the narco's -- it's been told once before an incredibly boring budget. it's by michael mann, does everybody know michael mann? right.his first effort, tv seris called the camera -- and was basically about marcos, mexico, that was done in 1989. these ideas, these tropes that the mexicans are invading, that they're particularly cruel, vicious. they go back to the 30, 20, is they go back to the fans. -- it's this weed adult troops that are allegedly violating white women. absolute nonsense. >> they use that to nationalize u.s. cannabis control. it goes from being in the 1930,

when i moved from trey state control of cannabis to federal control, it's the specter of the mexican immigrant using the cannabis, and being preseason this way. this is the moment of reform that-ness, it's always racialized in that way. and various drugs have been racialized in that way opium with the, mexicans cocaine thinking about african american people in the south. it's always racialized other against a white body politic. and pollution of that white body politic. >> i think it's also something that might be, you are absolutely correct, it's undeniable in the northeast. particularly, racialized and it's been racialized against puerto ricans, columbians as well. against african americans -- a constant. it's always being about keeping the border closed. it's always been about the threat south of the border. you're absolutely right. there's a racialized nation,

for example you're right with decaying, and there's a racialized asian certainly in the early 19 hundreds. where they linked to african americans, and again in the 1930s, and again in the 1980,'s got the borders always been the kind of, the bottom line on this. >> in baltimore, baltimore is a pioneer there in the way -- pioneer of racial segregation. that municipal ordinances. baltimore is one of the first places that creates one of these anti-cocaine ordinances in the case in 1910 it's called swans cocaine ordinance. when i cast the line was written article -- baltimore revisit. at an incredible story of the wear which baltimore is a place that very much innovates these kind of crime control measures that are entirely racialized. >> and creating internal? borders >> the way we sit around fremont avenue, along one of our internal avenues in baltimore. i want everyone to say thank you to ben smith before i turn

it over to questions. [applause] and i think we're happy to take questions, there is a mic here if anybody wants to cause. we have the gentleman in the back. >> and when i go around and -- keep your questions rather truncated, there's so much to unpacked. we're gonna be here all night, keep the questions brief and truncated. we'll take at least a few questions. we always invite diversity of questioners. so, please think of some things that you may want to ask. >> my name is thomas, i say -- afghanistan and all that. i've been in foreign countries and all that. -- they're doing good. [inaudible] but you can understand, man, if you're in a foreign country i've got a cc, shot my leg and

all that. i've been working in the city and all that. you can't justify what you're saying. i don't believe that. on third -- and all that, so i just left somewhere else simply station with etfs. , so the thing is, man, my language isn't good, -- so, who do a lot of work in the city. we take care of good. i love miss vamos, she's making sure everybody is good on this side. i love miss most, period. when my mother died and all that i just, but you can't say that, my first tour wasn't in beirut, four -- [inaudible] so, if you're telling me about people. it's about getting back to the

community. packed club, they started from matt schaffer, and packed club did it, ramos is doing it now. we've got to get it together. >> thank you. that points to the role that you mentioned kind of afghanistan, the way that drugs have frequently gotten in the way, or have come into conflict with other u.s. geopolitical goals. that's something we've seen over time. the way in which the drug war when it's convenient will be the priority. and when it's not convenient, will be left to the side. and we've seen that throughout history. >> yeah, it's completely true. >> thank you. >> there's questions, so much excellent stuff to unpack. in which we had more time to do so. you touched on this, but i'm going to imagine myself questioning from the u.s.

right. >> and saying that what about human trafficking? and everybody is concerned, right, left, center about human trafficking. something that shouldn't happen. but, again of questioning from the u.s. right, and i say, isn't human trafficking caught up with the drug trade, and therefore we need to increase border police. because we have trafficking on this woman and so on we know all that's tied up to the drug trade so we had to -- police enforcement from that. and respond to that, this aggregate those two things if you will. >> that's a sensible question, my response to that is just a really tedious economic one, which you put more border control there, becomes more difficult for people to get through. when you put a bigger walls,

and you've got more narrow space to get through. so. organized crime can charge more to get people through effectively. the natural fac now, but i know how many people have been following this. there is an enormous amount of people crossing border -- were not wrong about this, there's a lot of violence in central and mexico, central america, venezuela, and mexico. which is seen a lot of people flee. but the prices for getting across the border the border patrol's been off, have gone through the hoof. 15 grand to go over the border. more border control brings more power. and the organized crime groups that -- it's like you come down on the drug trade bringing more power to the -- drug traffickers. there's an academic article i once read that really brought

this home to me. drug policing is utterly counterproductive. -- we clap, we think this is a great thing. we dump it on the table, that's good, it's not going up somebody's nose or whatever. however, all that does incrementally make the price of cocaine on the street more expensive. because it's less coke. now what does that do, essentially, that incentivizes more people to get involved in the drug industry. because they can make more money. , so the whole premise of drug policing. it doesn't work. even if you take half the drugs off the streets, all that would mean is the price of drugs will go out, that more people want to go and sell drugs. it makes no sense. i think that was a big pretty obvious in some ways but it was

a big kind of discovery for me. >> they creates the black market. it's a lesson we should've learned during -- one that we did not and -- that's a lesson we continue to reflect. on >> you now having to say, i think it's really important to keep in mind that it's all very well said. we should be criminalized, and we should legalize narcotics or create a state monopoly. you've got to create a whole kind of medical and psychological infrastructure. around. that regulatory apparatuses and that's kind of why would salazar is trying to do. he's trying to put lots of doctors in charge of his clinic. -- we're also trying to help, that's also really important,

and so however far america's moving on this. it always makes me somewhat worried that they're not moving with health care regular -- health care are health for people. >> the other thing that your response of analysis says that it's not just that it makes the trafficking of people or the trafficking of drugs more expensive it actually makes it more dangerous for the regime it makes the drugs that come across more dangerous. as one of the huge reasons we're seeing the overdose crisis. now you create incentives for people to find new synthetics. bulky cannabis is true big, they move into heroin, they move into cocaine, and once we got the abilities to traffic small amounts of the synthetic drug. in people's backpacks going across the border. crossing in checkpoints. that incentives created by the prohibition regime. and it's bringing more dangerous drugs. making crossing the border that much more difficult with the

extortion and the levels of violence that are being taken out on migrants. >> -- do you think someone's going to snitch on you know, and you're gonna get 20 years, you're whacked. we are not just gonna go, i might be snatched on, six months and then get out. the harsh of the prison sentence, the more likely that somebody who's being pushed into acting as a criminal's gonna act in a more criminal manner. , so it's completely illogical. yeah. sorry, getting annoyed. >> there's intersectionality in all these things. you made me think about -- chasing the screen. which ties a lot of these things together. which leads me to remind everyone, everybody watching, how do you get these books. how do you get the dope, how do you get christy thornton -- [interpreter] you go to red emma's bookstore

coffeehouse -- read emma's dot org. you can order and purchase the book there. well within the united states. go there now, -- i know you want to go ahead and get the buck. those of you with us, you have it right here, those of you watching us, please go to read emma's dot org. get these books, it's crucial. got another question. >> thank you. thank you so much, this was interesting. i was just curious, i have gotten into this abet a moment ago. in the last, in the last couple of years. there's been what's described as a change in the job market due to synthetics. that also because of what happened during covid, this freeze on the. market which has created a vacuum and also lead to i'm doubling down on a lot of the intense drug or rhetoric here. i'm just curious, can you speak

to how that's playing out in mexico? >> it's a really good question. i'm not entirely sure the mexico quite know is that -- mexico's not doing. is looking to its addiction problem. one thing that happened during the pandemic, as a lot of the drugs were being sold in the u.s.. and suddenly, they got sold in mexico. so, mexico now has a larger methamphetamine than marijuana use. it's really seriously problematic. and yet, the mexican government is in denial frankly over this. so, a lot of, the mexican government at president has done a rather good job in pushing the dea out. and not going after king. pans and not making things worse. but it's done a very bad job it's frankly not to admit that it has a major drug problem that has to be solved with him reduction, health care, psychological care, et cetera. it's on -- current government is trying to

do. in terms of synthetics, the other thing it's really done is it's cut peasants out of the drug business. that's something that i think, again, the mexican government isn't taking seriously. one of the reasons why there's been a big move, one of the reasons why a lot of people are at the border, but a lot of the reasons they're turning up in the outskirts of mexican cities. is because the opium market has gone through the floor. we did some work on this, we found that the opium market. ecently isyou can get about 20%o be able to get for opium in the villages, one of the interesting they found out recently, is the sinaloa cartel, it actually it's kind of interesting, it keeps the level -- at a much higher level. because, basically their families come from these villages. and they do have, and if they want to run away from the dea, these can go after these villages. they want to keep it sweet by

still paying them half decent fees. where is the rest of mexico, the price of opium is gone down through the pan basically. yeah, multiple things that are happening. it's happening very fast. and no one's really fighting this kind of stuff out. we still have the data on drug addiction and use in mexico. and it's hopeless. -- compared to what you get in the u.s.. >> there are so many of those ways that the changes, we said this earlier, the ways in which this is a demand driven market. it changes here in the united states. just wreaks havoc on supply countries like mexico. , so the legalization of cannabis in a number of states here really devastated the marijuana market in mexico. no one was buying marijuana that was produced in mexico. all the sudden we had all of these really good organic produced in california, washington, and similarly won synthetics came on the market. the market for opium in poppies

>> the economic impact in the countryside, the countryside devastate the free trade agreements. anna claps of the coin economy. you see once again, it's the mexican peasantry in the countryside, support people that lose. >> it's one of the other things is that it's been much greater economic and crime links, with asian markets. i've been watching -- has anyone ever heard of trapped tenure? there is a weird mixing of trap music and -- which sounds just as weird as you -- buy, i was watching some of these videos. and one thing that struck me, is the amount of asian man in the video. which was really surprising. besides these kind of romanticize versions of what it's like to be a drug dealer and sinaloa, there is ways, asian fentanyl supplier in the background of these videos, a

fictionalized version -- but it was, that's also become, it's way more important to get on with your foreign suppliers, then it is on with your peasant suppliers. >> full, circle back to the -- >> kind of, yeah. >> hi, thank you so much, i'm wondering about your method a little bit, allow, yeah, i'm just thinking about how you do this kind of work in a non extracted way, an unethical. way especially, i mean if you've watched the series, documentary now, it's spoofs the vice, the documentary going, they said like three different white journalist with no spanish to investigate, not because, it is one do this in the sense that it lifts people up, and wants to give us a sense of justice? >> it's a really, really good

question. it's something i can continual come back to. i'm not sure if i've really come to terms with that. so, two things. one, if we believe in the power of books. and we believe in the power of argument, then i've got to believe at least to putting a sensible argument that says, this is the devastation, in the war on drugs is -- brought, it can make incremental changes. and maybe hopefully in the end, powerful policy changes. i think the second thing, you're absolutely right, there's an extra active element to what i do, which is somewhere between journalism and anthropology. so, one of the things that i did when i was writing the book, was i did a lot of -- pro bono work for deportees. i felt, i don't think you ever work this out. you feel to western extent, you're balancing out.

in the big scheme of things maybe. but you're right, there's no doubt. you take quotes from people, i think i start with this story of this devastating story of a guy who is really. sad he's like a family man, living up in the northwest, picking our polls, i think he had three kids in his. family and they found out he had some kind of drug, a minor drug offense in mexico. ck to mexicothey made out that o escobar. and he was just -- anyway, he was sent back to mexico but i used this case to open my book. to disguise it heavily there is really none of historian of the fact of the story that. remains which is identify i'm, there's no doubt i use the story. it could've helped other people like him. they didn't get sent back, and, b let's hope stories like that

maybe the judge who reads this twice before setting this person back from the reason. -- >> we're having this conversation in the u.s., and of course we're talking about to a large degree, the miss education and lack of political media really literacy in the country. that literally half of it was mexico at one time. and you had all of -- these because we talked about two border countries and what have you. i can imagine the conversations you will have, on tour with this book and some of the pushback. what is the sensitivity and understanding of all this -- i wonder. i assume, that the miss education on these topics and the lack of critical media criticize pretty much the same over there. but i could be wrong.

or if you want to rephrase it this way, do you get or expect to get last push back on some of these things in you're -- in the u.s. when you have ground zero for the type of friction that were discussing. >> it's a really good question. so, in some ways britons has or more backward on policy than the united states. in terms of the amount of white, non-white people in jail. it's pretty much the same as the u.s. it's completely out of whack with the actual population. so there is way more mostly asian and afro caribbean get stuck in jail -- then why people do despite the fact they take drugs in pretty much exactly the same quantities as white people. so, we have problems like. thought through --

legalizing marijuana. and we have a government that doesn't understand basic economics. , so, i'm not sure where in some ways or far away. having said that, there's a freedom to speaking about mexico. basically because mexico -- think it's a place, somewhere near ten arif. it's so alien, but you can kind of talk in a slightly more complex manner. what people don't go, we're seeing the mexico governments corrupt. >> it's terrible, -- you would get a slightly more critical come back or whatever. it's basically we have an empowering -- in britain. there is a bigger space to talk about this stuff in a way. >> you can actually write. on >> exactly. sadly, in a way. but at the same time, understandably so. >> fascinating conversation.

before we get one final round of applause to our speakers. i want to again invite everybody to come to see us here at our new location in baltimore, at 30 1:21 green mountain avenue. that's in the waverly neighborhood. come see the new red emma's bookstore coffeehouse space. please do check us out online, at randomized or. not only so you can purchase this excellent book, so you can get other books, so you can read about our history and our philosophies of our project. go to the events tab, hopefully you can get to baltimore so we can see you live at some of our ads. so you can check out some of our youtube recorded advance. and thanks of that nature. and fortress c-span covered events. this is been a fascinating conversation, let's give it up one more time for dr. christy thornton and dr. benjamin smith [applause] . >> the university of washington

professor chantal pratt, explores how each brain is different. and what we can do to better understand the functions of our own brains. her book is, the neuroscience of you. here's a portion of her talk. >> if that was your goal. give done a good job on. that >> it's actually hard, double means one of the things i feel through my husband, who is a model -- when you know a lot about something, it's way harder to write about. -- i can see the forest, i can see the forest. so, dopamine is a thing, or war, the way that drives us through life is a thing that i gave in bets. i really wanted to tell the truth. and tell the whole truth, in fact when i wrote the book, i had this idea, it sounds good until you try it. the idea is ayman write a miraculous book about neuroscience that exist on the shelves. but i'm gonna write it in a way that's accessible for everyone. and then i sat down to do that and i felt, this is really hard.

and, so i tried to instead of having introduction here are all the machines we used to study brains. i tried to introduce it at the times in. unit in a place in the story, so that somebody is motivated, hey, we're on the tube. we're staring at a screen because we're studying -- and i hope it works. but that was. michael and when i sat down to do what i thought, wow, that's really hard. >> it's interesting you say it's harder to write. you have things you want to dump out of your brain on to paper, and try to make it accessible. i struggled with that too. if you look at the misfit as. well i got my training, evolutionarily, and i worked as a physicist aost op, and now i'm doing couter science. there's links by the way we have time i'd like to get to that. i think all the computer scientist should be reading this book as well. >> watch the full program online anytime. at book tv dot org. just search chantal pratte,

where the title of our, the narrow signs of you. >> weekends on c-span two, are an analytical feast. every saturday, american history tv documents america story. and on sundays, book tv brings you the latest in nonfiction books and authors. funding for c-span two comes from these television companies and more. including buckeye broadband. ♪ ♪ ♪ >> buckeye broadband, along with these television companies support c-span two as a public service. >> well here's a quick look at some recently reviews and national publications. now the washington post world publishes every sunday. and they recently walked a

novelist paul oscar's new book, bloodbath nation, it's a nonfiction book that looks at gun violence in the u.s.. and it's described by reviewer, alex calculates, as a sobering impassioned plea to and the cycle of shootings, restrict the availability of guns, and as austa writes, conduct an honest, gut wrenching examination of who we are, and who we want to be as a people. timothy sandal vowels, new book is called freedom's fury. 's how isabelle patterson rose by the lane, -- found liberty in an age of darkness. and the national review magazine says that it quote, delves deeply into the intellectual, political, and economic currents that inform the three women's work. to revive individualism. fyi, william f but li described the three novelist has, the

three furious of libertarianism. the new york times book review, recently looked at freedoms dominion, by jefferson cow, a vanderbilt university. and according to the reviewer, jeff -- the books essential reading for anyone who hopes to understand the unholy union more than 200 years strong between racism and the rapid luttig of government. and also in the new york times, columnist carlos lizza, reviews mid america, the store -- take on the biggest legends and lies about our past. the editors of this book, our princeton historian, julian zelizer, and kevin cruz. carlos -- writes, that mid america quote, raises where the arguments about the use of history and the -- discourse. foremost among them, about the term revisionist history should not be a square. in a review in the wall street journal, of the hong kong

diaries, written by chris paton. who's the last british governor of that province. it was reviewed by former journal publisher, gordon covax. it's about -- details mister patents persistent but ultimately failed effort to secure the continuance of hong kong's freedom. governor t and writes that, quote, the school of diplomacy will be list to on china. this is going to be fine. this is a really going to be fun. i have some powerhouses that do macklemore said that had one general but i think we have generals that have on the platform today. david j. dennis junior is a senior writer at an escape known as the undefeated. his work has been featured in atlanta magazine the atlantic, washington post and the huffington post, among other publications. dennis is a recipient o