The U.S. is no longer happy with just being the world police, we now must be the world police, judge, jury, and executioner.
According to the Los Angeles Times, November 30, 2008 Sunday Home Edition, Mexico is now extraditing suspected drug smugglers at a record rate to the United States, for prosecution here.
While the U.S. does send suspected criminals to Mexico for prosecution, it is not nearly at the same rate. From the Times story:
"Mexico extradited 83 suspects to the United States last year and has handed over about 70 so far this year, according to U.S. figures. Fifty-one more cases await approval by Mexican judges. In return, U.S. authorities say that they have sent 26 wanted suspects to Mexico this year, a record."
Clearly, our ratio is worse than the Thunderdome in the Mad Max movie: there two men entered, and one man left. For the U.S.? It's closer to three suspects enter (and might even reach five) for every suspect that leaves.
While the numbers are relatively small, somehow I doubt this practice will help change the fact that the U.S. imprisons more people, at a higher ratio, than anyone else in the world. Not to mention that our conviction rates at the federal level are larger than accepted margins for human error - meaning that we have to accept at this point that we lock up innocent people in pursuit of our prohibition policies for some drugs.
All of this comes on the heels of another study by a Washington D.C. think-tank, this time the Brooking's Institute, stating that our policies are an absolute failure. Why are we so hell-bent on exporting this failure? Probably because it's easier to justify a failed policy, so long as "everyone else is doing it too."
And yes, that was tongue-in-cheek. I am, after all, a child of the 80's, growing up with ludicrous anti-drug ads.
Posted by Malakkar Vohryzek