Our erstwhile and scarily possible next president has thoughtfully (to the degree that the homunculus of Mar-A-Lago thinks all that deeply) provided his roadmap to autocracy on his campaign website. It’s quite a long list, one that has been described by at least one journalist as “fascist” which I guess should come as no surprise given his general predilections for that type of thinking in the past.
When you go to the Agenda 47 tab on the site, you can peruse Trump on camera discussing each prescription, and if you click further you get bullet points, links and a transcript of the video. I’m one of those people who cannot listen to that chowderhead say anything, so thank the lord that he’s thoughtfully provided the text.
Numero uno on the list:
President Donald J. Trump Declares War on Cartels
There’s reams of journalism and data that suggest the decades-long War On Drugs has been a complete failure, and there’s no reason to believe that Trump’s efforts will bring about anything different. Americans like to get high-and so long as that situation exists, supply will meet demand. Stopping the supply has been a game of whack-a-mole. No leader or politician has been able to get hold of the drug problem.
I’m going to ignore some of his Biden-did-this, Biden-didn’t-do-that pronounciamentos because dollars to donuts they’re full of mistruths and exaggerations. In his words, what will be his initiatives?
When I am President, it will be the policy of the United States to take down the cartels just as we took down ISIS and the ISIS caliphate — and just as, unlike the situation we are in today, we had a very very strong border. The strongest border in fact in the history of our country. And drugs were at a low of 45 years. There’s been nothing like what we did just two years ago. We will show NO MERCY to the cartels.
Most sources say that we are only able to interdict around ten percent of the drugs coming over the Mexican border. That was true in the Trump administration just as it has been in others. Furthermore, the lion’s share of it comes though official points of entry, not over the unpatrolled or unfenced regions across the US-Mexico border. Seizures continue to increase-but that’s not because we’re getting better at catching it, but because demand is growing. Drug deaths went berserk during his presidency. Boasting about imaginary accomplishments is stock in trade for idiot boy. We already know that.
Every day, drug traffickers are using the waters of our region to ship their lethal poisons to America killing so many of our people and ruining families. In addition to restoring strong border security, I will deploy all necessary military assets, including the U.S. Navy, to impose the full naval embargo on the cartels. I did that before and it worked — what we did was incredible. We will guarantee that the waters of the western hemisphere are not used to traffic illicit drugs to our country.
Sorry, Donald, I am looking for evidence that you orchestrated a “full naval embargo” on anything or anyone during your regime. Even if it were true, traffickers are outfoxing the military time and time again.
Furthermore, I will order the Department of Defense to make appropriate use of special forces, cyber warfare, and other overt and covert actions to inflict maximum damage on cartel leadership, infrastructure, and operations.
Imagine for a minute what would happen if another country declared they were going to do this on our soil. They would probably respond as AMLO has. Mexicans remember well what intervention looks like, as does any country that we’ve tried to prosecute the drug war in. We end up destabilizing and weakening each one. It’s no secret he wanted to bomb Mexico. Does anyone in the name of drug policy want to start another war in this hemisphere? It’s a blatant violation of national sovereignty to say the least. There are no easy answers, but as per usual, Trump and his ilk brandish the hammer no matter how crooked the nail.
Finally, as I have said before, I will ask Congress to pass legislation ensuring that drug smugglers and human traffickers receive the Death Penalty.
This is already on the books, but let’s do a hard pause for a second and think about the company we are in when we dispatch the death penalty for drugs. China. Indonesia. Iran. Malaysia. North Korea. Saudi Arabia. Singapore. Vietnam. Not a liberal democracy in the bunch, all brutish nations with no scruples when it comes to punishment.
So, to recap: a reheating of the trillion dollar, pointless war on drugs involving invasion of our southern neighbors and more use of the unconstitutional death penalty. Gruesome and stupid would be apt words. I’m certainly not saying not to prosecute and locate traffickers here. Indeed, many drugs are scourges, and the fentanyl epidemic is definitely growing. Confronting it is important. But there aren’t any easy answers out there. Defunding the health bureaucracy and inhibiting it from studying it to produce multi-pronged solutions like conservatives want to do seems ill-advised right now, as does more terrorizing of other countries and draconian punishments. But it’s an election year, and strongman-type promises no matter their moral turpitude will be popular with the unwashed.
The Illogical Seminary 