One of the least discussed issues in the presidential campaign is the war on drugs. That's unfortunate, because that crusade has been an expensive catastrophe both domestically and internationally. During the decades since Richard Nixon declared a "war" on illegal drugs in 1971, the United States has spent nearly one trillion dollars trying to eradicate the drug trade, filled America's prisons with nonviolent drug offenders, ruined millions of lives and undermined the Bill of Rights -- especially the Fourth Amendment's protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.
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In short, a presidential candidate who is bold enough to advocate a reassessment of the war on drugs is likely to score both diplomatic points abroad and political points at home. Challenging the conventional wisdom would, of course, require political courage. But that is supposedly a quality we seek in a president. Governor Romney and President Obama have a prime opportunity to demonstrate that they possess that quality.

Left leaning website Democracy Now has run with a story linking the start-up money Mitt Romney used to found Bain Capital from Central American millionaires who have "extensive" ties to death squads that roamed El Salvador in the 1980s. Democracy Now says that as much as 40% of Bain's start-up money came from these Central American oligarchs who were looking for new investment vehicles in the states. They go even further to say that Romney knew of these connections, and had "misgivings" about accepting their money, but needed funding so, as all rich people seem to do, according to liberals, brushed morality aside to take the money.

The ridiculousness of this story will expose itself on its own. It is so outlandish Romney doesn't need to do much, defensively, to deal with it. However, it has opened up a perfect opportunity to bring up a certain bit of news that has faded over the last few weeks: Operation Fast and Furious.

Liberals don't like that Romney took money from Central American murderers? Well they probably hate it that Obama's administration sold Central American murderers thousands of working automatic weapons, and didn't bother to even track them! Last I checked, when you sell someone a gun, you are taking their money as well. So not only did Obama take their money, but he also gave them guns, so they could murder even more people, including at least one American citizen. At least Romney just took their money to help make other Americans rich. What did Obama's program accomplish, other than mass murder and assistance so the drug wars could expand even further in Mexico and into the American Southwest?

Barack Obama, US president, will send 1,200 National Guard troops to the US border with Mexico and ask Congress for an additional $500m for border protection, part of the administration’s efforts to stop the flow of illegal immigration.

WASHINGTON — National Guard troops that have helped beef up security along the southwestern border since last summer will leave as planned by the second week of June, the commander of the Arizona Guard told a House panel Tuesday.

Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney disagrees with his fellow GOP presidential candidate Texas Gov. Rick Perry on the possibility of sending U.S. troops to Mexico to help fight the drug cartels.

Perry ignited a debate this past weekend when he stated in New Hampshire that solving the escalating drug cartel problem “may require our military in Mexico working in concert with them to kill these drug cartels and to keep them off of [U.S.] border.” Perry compared the situation to Colombia, where the U.S. military acts as a support unit in combating the war on drugs.

Mexican drug cartels have infiltrated most major cities in the U.S.

The National Post used a Justice Department report to track the routes and goods of various cartels.

Northern Mexico’s population has more than doubled since the North American Free Trade Agreement was signed in 1994. The U.S. dollar is now a common unit of exchange as far south as Culiacán, halfway to Mexico City. Northern Mexico is responsible for 87 percent of all maquiladora (duty-free) manufacturing and 85 percent of all U.S.-Mexico trade. The northeastern Mexican city of Monterrey, one of the country’s largest, is intimately connected with the Texas banking, manufacturing, and energy industries. David Danelo, a former U.S. Marine now working for U.S. customs who has studied northern Mexico extensively and has traveled throughout all six Mexican border states, told me he has yet to meet a person there with more than one degree of separation from the United States. As he told me, “Northern Mexico retains a sense of cultural polarity; frontier norteños see themselves as the antithesis of Mexico City’s [city slicker] chilangos.”