Slashdot Mirror
Spy Satellite Photos Used To Fight Drug Smugglers
Hugh Pickens writes "The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, part of the Department of Defense, is using satellites to track the activities of drug cartels operating along the US-Mexican border. The agency is supplying photos to pinpoint Mexican narcotics operations and anticipate smuggling attempts into the United States. During a conference on border security held in Phoenix last week, Scott Zikmanis said his agency already has supplied some data to the El Paso Intelligence Center, a federal clearinghouse for investigating drug cartels. Any border-security surveillance will be done over Mexico, not the US says Zikmanis because a federal law, the Posse Comitatus Act, strictly limits US military operations on American soil unless such operations are authorized by Congress. Civil rights attorneys question the use of satellite technology in law enforcement. 'We are in the midst of a really dangerous time in terms of technology,' said Chris Calabrese, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union. 'The idea that such a powerful tool might be turned on US citizens is really troubling.'"
Is drug smuggling really such a big problem to require the use of military resources? It seems like something like this falls much more into the realm of law enforcement than something the military should get involved in.
I know that it is sometimes called the war on drugs, but is it really so bad that it deserves to be called a war?
Enough said.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
To those that don't know.. phoenix/tucson are seeing record kidnappings and murders. These are being primarily carried out by drug cartels. CNN and Fox have been talking about it, which makes this a political move to calm the masses.
So basically, -1 troll/offtopic is really slashdots way of saying "I hate that you thought of something before me."
So, does anyone think the US is interested in, say, chinese or russian sattelite images of the US for this purpose?
Anyway, I find it hard to believe that law enforcement is not following the letter of the law and saying "It's not on soil! It's in SPACE!"
Did we check to see that US military flights over another sovereign nation would be OK with them?
Don't tell me to get a life. I'm a gamer; I have LOTS of lives!
I knew we shouldn't have run the whole drug-smuggling operation on the roof.
At least all of our communications were done inside, on the phone. Those should be safe.
Seriously? Seriously?
"Drug smugglers" aren't a problem exclusive to brown people outside the border(if they were, your position would be merely jingoistic). They are also a problem inside, and among various other groups(not much of a market among people a few inches from the border).
"As much military intervention as it takes" will mean domestic surveillance, domestic military actions, search and seizure, all kinds of forced entry, and so forth against American citizens. That is an outrageously authoritarian position.
OMG like meth could someday come to Philly?
The collective amnesia that goes on with the drug war is so sad.
Decades ago, before pseudo was the precursor and little old ladies and everyone else had to sign books to get allergy medicine, the meth precusor was p2p. There was a decades old movie where Harrison Ford lived amongst them Amish because of police conspiracy involving p2p.
I keep hearing how the meth menace will spread from the mid west to the east coast. I just laugh because the only thing that has changed in the epic waste of decades of the drug war is that meth quality and availibility has gone up. And it is not like some mythical heartland that can be "destroyed" by meth can't be destroyed by Alcohol.
Tax it and regulate it or suffer enternal hell and epic waste of lives and money that makes the waste of addiction look tame. And you still suffer all the waste of addiction under this stupid war we got going.
And don't think the domestic police forces won't end up like the Mexicales. Ask some Philly bodega operators, and they will tell you it has already happened.
Isn't protecting the borders exactly what the military are supposed to do?
Don't sugar coat it. Tell him how you really feel.
PCP is a disassociative and is not habit forming. The only folks who claim it is claim MJ is addictive.
That you cannot use some drugs and walk away is again bullshit. No one gets addicted in one use, that takes time and effort. You have been believing to much propaganda.
If you do not have the freedom to decide what chemicals you can consume you are not very free.
Really, electronic fencing with video based surveillance is all you really need with camps every few miles or so.
No, what's really needed is to get rid of stupid, liberty denying, racist laws.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
I agree with you in principle, but this description of how it would play out borders on the hilarious.
I mean, what do you do with the hundreds of thousands of people who are currently in prison on drug charges?
Set them free. More people are in prison in the US, and the US has the highest highest prison population in the world, because of drugs than any other reason. And many of them are non violent.
Right now people in prison now for drug offenses are a drain on taxpayers when they could be taxpayers themselves.
Do you just let them out, or do you go further than that?
You apologize for falsely imprisoning them.
What do you do about the thousands of socially marginal people who just lost their jobs (yes, if you are willing to risk prison to distribute drugs, you are likely socially marginal; sorry.)? And so on.
Citation NEEDED!!! I dare you to find science studies that reach that conclusion.
I don't any now but I knew many people who bought, sold, and used illegal drugs and not one was worse than alcoholics I also knew. Those addicted to a legal drug are worse than those who use illegal drugs.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
But Mexico has/had soldiers on their southern border to prevent people from coming in.
Plus they have draconian immigration laws relative to the USA.
Their hypocrisy vis a vis their complaints about crackdowns on illegal immigration against their citizens is ignored.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
That said, yes, pot heads shouldn't be in jail. But... Get to drugs much harder than that and they should be. Harder, more addictive, drugs add to crime, and not just drug crimes. Hard drug users are a deeper social problem than the mere moral crime of marijuana use.
Where is the evidence from peer reviewed scientific studies that shows drugs cause deep social problems? Oh and don't forget to include alcohol, I bet it causes a lot of problems.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Rational_scale_to_assess_the_harm_of_drugs_(mean_physical_harm_and_mean_dependence).svg
moron:
alcohol isn't nearly addictive as meth
its a simple pharmacological fact
so there's a legal difference
does that radical concept have any meaning to you?
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Interesting that while US is trying to do something about Mexican drug smuggling (probably because it borders with US), they turn the blind eye (or even worse) to the Afghanistan drug production, which floods the Europe with locally-produced opium. It is estimated that Afghanistan is accountable for more than 90% of world's opium production, and most of it goes to the Europe.
It is also worth to note that before the US invasion of Afghanistan, Taliban was able to contain the problem - the drug production declined some 94% during its reign.
But ever since the fall of Taliban regime, opium production has continued to rise each year at an alarming rate:
"The increase in opium production in Afghanistan was from 185 metric tons in 2001 to 6,100 metric tons in 2006." http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/afghanistan/drugs-market.htm
One has to wonder about the US involvement in this:
"Who benefits from the Afghan Opium Trade?" http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=3294