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Sniffing Out Billions In US Currency Smuggled Across the Border To Mexico
An anonymous reader writes "Criminals smuggle an estimated $30 billion in U.S. currency into Mexico each year from the United States, most of it laundered drug money. But researchers say help is on the way for border guards in the form of a portable device that identifies specific vapors given off by U.S. paper money. "We're developing a device that mimics the function of trained dogs 'sniffing' out concealed money, but without the drawbacks, such as expensive training, sophisticated operators, down time and communication limitations," says Suiqiong Li, Ph.D., a member of the research team behind the technology. When developing the device, the researchers first had to figure out which gases money emits and how fast that happens. It turned out that the gases are a set of trace chemicals, including aldehydes, furans and organic acids." What do bitcoins smell like?
Smells like... Victory
When the foot seeks the place of the head, the line is crossed. Know your place. Keep your place. Be a shoe.
Despair, irony, and a touch of vermouth.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
We already know the CIA is very much involved in the Mexican drug trade, and I don't mean in the trying-to-stop-it department. Are those billions still going to be allowed to pass through?
Ah, who am I kidding. Of course they are. Because corrupt government has decided that it can do as it pleases.
https://www.google.com/search?&q=banks+helping+drug+cartels
... the traces of cocaine that can be found on every single U.S. treasury note.
Presumably the cocaine traces are thanks to this exact smuggling operation; someone gets clean money from their bank, buys some coke, the bill gets handed up and up and up the drug hierarchy and ends up in Mexico to be used mostly to pay gun runners for premium US goods, which then ends up back in circulation in the US. I wonder if they could not only find the money but deduce what kind of drug ring is behind it...
They could also skip the dogs and just use out of work A&R execs.
Neck beard and a superiority complex
I only switched to carrying sacks of bills across the border in the dead of night because dealing with those assholes at HSBC when I needed money laundered was too much trouble. I'll be seriously upset if enhanced security means I have to re-open my account with them. They wouldn't even upgrade me to Narcoterrorist Platinum Checking unless I provided proof of having ordered at least 50 grisly killings personally, or qualified for MegaMule Rewards by transporting more than a metric ton of high quality cocaine per quarter...
Problem here is they are not looking for anything that is evidence of a crime. It is legal to carry money over the border up to a certain amount so, the smell of money doesn't actually indicate any crime, and isn't evidence of any crime.
Sounds like a bunch of bullshit to justify expenditures on cool new technology which will be quickly mothballed after its found to be useless or ruled by the courts to not be justification for extra scrutiny.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
The result of the puritanical and hypocritical war on drugs has been countless lives lost, Billions and Billions spent on fruitless efforts and a strengthening of criminal gangs and terrorist groups which aren't shy about using thuggery and corrupting law enforcement and the government in order to make money. People suffer and as long as nobody is committing fraud in what they are selling, then people should be able to buy whatever rat poison they want and do with it what they want. People have a right to their own bodies. When drug use gets out of hand then civil commitment and medical care are what is needed, not police, courts and jails.
There is not a lot of problems associated with drug money going to the Mexico.
30 billion a year going into the hands of violent drug cartels isn't a problem? I disagree.
On the other hand, waves of unskilled, poor, desperate people and who can't legally work here is a recipe for social problems that will last generations.
Are you American Indian? If not, from which wave of poor desperate immigrants did your family arrive?
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Perhaps he learned from the Indian experience and doesn't want to repeat that. Immigration can be a net win (skilled labor) or a net loss (unskilled labor), it's all in how you play the game. Unfortunately as the US tries its level best to self destruct we have chosen the worst of all worlds by allowing in *huge* amounts of unskilled while only keeping the skilled labor long enough to train them and send them back.
I'm far more concerned, whether the smell of my honestly-earned money is any different from that of the laundered drug proceeds. I suspect, the smell is exactly the same and, should I ever choose to cross the border with substantial cash, these devices will point me out. A major loophole in American (and English) legal system, allows seizure of "suspect" assets even if the person himself can not be arrested.
Now, why would an honest citizen need to carry his cash with him?.. Oh, well...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
But, I don't think this will happen as a billions of dollars of industry, on both sides of the law, has been built. You have the drug cartels used to the market price and then you have the DEA, etc. who are used to the funding provided by the USG. You legalize the drugs and *POOF* goes the market value of the drugs and the funding to the DEA and all the companies that are fed off via contracts. The majority of the money is now going to the local and state governments in the form of taxes like with cigarettes and alcohol.
The real solution, of course, is to legalize marijuana nationally, thus drying up demand for the cartels main cash crop.
But oh, we can't do that, because it would put so many DEA agents and overpaid government contractors out of work!
So, they come up with not-even-half-assed solutions that sound good in a press release, and end up being nothing more than yet another tool of citizen subjugation over the long run.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Why do you think that unskilled labor is a net loss? America was largely built on the cheap labor of immigrants who eventually became part of the culture.
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The can sniff out $41,000 in grandma's bra but they can't find pallets of cash going across the border.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Decriminalization isn't good enough; legalize them.
The drug cartels started using prepaid cards that you can put $10,000 on. A wallet can hold $100,000 and not draw any attention.
Knowledge = Power
P= W/t
t=Money
Money = Work/Knowledge so the less you know the more you make