DRUG MONEY: MUST STOP BOOTY GOING SOUTH

When it's said," follow the money," that shouldn't mean just until it
passes by on a southbound lane into Mexico.

Especially many billions of dollars from the illegal drug trade.

Our efforts to stop illegal drug shipments into the U.S., and illegal
arms into Mexico, are being negated because we stop so little of the
money that fuels it all.

The Associated Press reports that $99.75 of every $100 the drug
cartels ship south is getting through. That means confiscated drug
booty is negligible.

The money that gets through goes to Mexican farmers to grow more
marijuana and to smugglers who use Mexico to provide the U.S. with
cocaine from Colombia. It goes to strengthen cartel armies to the
point they are beating the Mexican government's army; cartels now
rule some Mexican cities. To do so, it's taken much bloodshed --
14,000 murders in the country in the last three years and more than
4,000 in Juarez in just the past two years.

Drug money also goes to bribe Mexican solders, law-enforcement
officers and U.S. border agents. It pays assassins and mercenaries to
kill associates of rival drug cartels and would-be prosecutors.

The money comes in bundles; it comes in a wad tucked under a
carrier's clothes. Because automobiles are not checked going to
Mexico as much as they are coming from Mexico, a lot of drug money is
easily driven over the border.

The answer is simple; the solution not so. How to stop the money?

We can try to get tougher. Follow the money -- and pounce on it.