Augustine Roberto Salcedo, 33, was in the middle of his dissertation on educational leadership at UCLA. He also served on the El Monte elementary school board and worked as assistant principal at El Monte High School. His body, along with six others was found, dead, in Durango, Mexico on the last day of 2009. He'd been abducted the night before from a restaurant, where he was eating with family members. He was one of a few Americans that have been killed as a result of drug-related violence in Mexico, but let's face it, he's brown, so most of the nation will never learn of his murder, or of the staggering violence happening in Mexico as a result of America's demand for drugs, chiefly, cocaine. If Augustin had been a pretty, white American woman, maybe we'd all know about this tragic murder. But even then, even though her face would be plastered across every evening news broadcast for days, even though emotional relatives would plead for the madness to end, I doubt Americans could personalize this tragic situation and start conversing around the hard questions it raises.

Here are some stats I heard on NPR's morning edition this morning (for the full story, visit: http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=3; scroll to "Calif. School Board Member Slain in Mexico"):

* In 2007, Mexican President Philipe Calderon began his offensive against the nation's drug cartels and by year's end, 2,700 drug-related murders are logged (these include civilians and bystanders, police, military, and cartel members).
* In 2008, Mexico's War on Drugs intensifies, and drug related killings nearly double to 5,600. In Mexico, officials speak openly of the drug war peaking and confidence that this trend would not likely increase.
* Last year, 2009, nearly 8,000 people have been murdered in drug-related violence.
* In Ciudad Juarez, a border city infamous for cartel activity and violence, 320 lost their lives in 2007. Last year, the number hit 2,600.

"Staggering" barely registers the horror these numbers bring up for me. When I lived in Mexico a mere five years ago, the only talk of drug-related danger in I heard centered around a few areas in the capital and Ciudad Juarez. Now, there are hot spots all over the place. A low-level of fear has spread even into areas untouched by drug violence. I don't think a country can lose that many citizens and not impart a profound and unsettling sense of vulnerability to all who dwell there.


What happened? I'm no expert, but as far as I can tell, the government started a War on Drugs. And now around 16,300 Mexicans are no longer living. Can you imagine the outrage a number like that would provoke here? Or maybe it wouldn't. Maybe we'd still go about our days and lament privately the loss of life all these wars have on us collectively.

16,300 lives. Fathers, friends, lovers, mothers, teachers, service workers, children, even. Yes, some of the killed were knee-deep in getting drugs to users here in the US, but everyone of them was once an infant and child, full of potential and deserving of love and respect. Even the drug smugglers, every last one of the murdered didn't have to die, shouldn't have died.

16,300. We haven't lost that many Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan and as a nation, we are, on the whole, weary of these wars and want our troops home, out of harms way. How do Mexicans living along the smuggling routes cope? What can they do when the war is at their doors, in their restaurants and stores?

What can we do?


Over last decade, the Mexican drug cartels went from controlling about 50% of cocaine trade coming into the U.S. to now controlling about 90% of the cocaine headed for U.S. distribution. These smuggling routes are worth billions of dollars per year and as long as that is true, the Mexican government cannot win a war on the drug cartels. The war will only escalate the rate at which murders occur. The Mexican government is in a civil war with the drug cartels, essentially, and we are supplying the motivation, the market, for it to continue. Secretary Clinton got it right when she said that our part in solving the drug crisis in Mexico is addressing the demand for cocaine in the U.S. When will we do this? How?

I know that to a cocaine user these numbers, and this reality is so far from the lines in front of them, and I am under no illusion that my little blog post would inspire anyone to swear off cocaine, but this is my only tool.

This ability to consume without thought of consequence is endemic to our culture. Whether it be food, drugs, media, or any other product, we have been so well trained by capitalism, by imperialism, by privilege to not ask questions like: Where did this come from? Who made it? Under what conditions? What statement am I making by consuming this product? Was anyone hurt, made poorer, or killed in the production of this item?

It is a mark of enormous privilege that we do not need to ask these questions in order to survive. But I'm willing to bet our neighbors to the south are asking how it is possible we do not ask these questions, how we do not see what our national appetite for drugs is doing to them, and when will we stop? And if they aren't, its only because if we've dared ask the questions, we don't want to hear the answers, and if we are forced to, then we deny their validity, and they are too busy trying to make a decent life in what's quickly becoming a war-torn country.

Ask the questions. So what if you don't use cocaine: ask them about whatever it is you had for dinner. Ask them about the clothes you are wearing. I hardly ever ask these questions, and when I do, I feel overwhelmed by trying to figure out how to answer them. If my rice came from the bulk bin at Staff of Life, and the bin doesn't say where it was grown or how, then I can ignore the probable answer: it's probably grown in the central valley where annual crops like rice shouldn't be grown year round because the climate isn't good for rice cultivation and it destroys topsoil and makes deserts of fertile land. If the tag in my shirt tells me it was "Made in Cambodia" and I get online to google "garment industry working conditions Cambodia" will I make the time to read? Will I think about all the fossil fuels it took to get the garmet form there to here? I know what questions I should ask, but my life is going to have to change if I answer them honestly. And from this tall hill of privilege I sit on, it's an endeavor I fear undertaking.

But, still, I urge you (and me) to ask the questions. Ask them of yourself and of others, ask me. It starts with the asking, and if we care enough, eventually, I have to believe the care will transform into readiness and we will hear the truth in the answers. I have to believe that given enough time for reflection about what we want our lives to be about, we will act on what we know is best for us, our planet, and our fellow humans. So just ask the questions, please.

I send out a prayer to Mexico tonight, to all the tens of thousands of people snatched from this plane as a result of drug-related violence, to the family, friends, and school community of Augustin Roberto Salcedo, to all who struggle to be good in this world, to all who don't even try or know how to. May all of us rest in peace (whether in death or in living), reflect with genuine curiosity compassion, and act in love.