REINVIGORATE WAR ON DRUGS

Two events Friday in Mexico should make Americans start 2011
determined to strangle the flow of illegal drug money that finances
violence south of the border.

In a positive development, federal police announced in Mexico City
that the once-fearsome La Familia drug cartel has been "completely
dismembered."

The organization has been thrown into disarray by the recent arrests
and deaths of its top members. Click here to find out more!

However, Mexico needs our help to continue such progress.

The easiest way to destroy the cartels is to cut their source of money
by reducing sales of illegal drugs in the United States. Otherwise,
cartels will have the resources to entice new members and rearm.

If that's not enough motivation for Americans to act, consider
Friday's more grisly reminder of ills that result in Mexico partially
because of failures to stop drug abuse here.

A woman's body was found hanging by the neck from an overpass in the
wealthy northern industrial city of Monterrey.There was no immediate
evidence of drug cartel involvement in the death, according to The
Associated Press, but Mexico's third-largest city has been rocked by
violent cartel turf battles in recent months.

Even more chilling is this statistic reported by AP: Drug-related
violence claimed the lives of 30,196 people in Mexico from December
2006, when that nation's government launched an offensive against drug
cartels, through November.

This situation should stir Americans from complacency about the use of
illegal drugs.

The same influences leading to violence in Mexico -- big paydays for
drug lords and bribes corrupting the legal system -- could take hold
here.

That's why it's urgent that the United States gets citizens to stop
abusing drugs.

There's no easy solution or we'd have found it decades ago. However,
we can reinvigorate our anti-drug tactics.

n Our national, state and local leaders should intensify their efforts
to ensure that all Americans have hope for better jobs and living
situations so that they don't turn to drugs out of despair.

n President Barack Obama and other respected government officials
should take stands publicly to make it clear that illegal drug use
isn't cool, that it defies American values and that it threatens our
nation as much as terrorism does.

n Everyday citizens such as residents of the Tennessee Valley should
speak out against entertainers and entertainment glorifying drug use.

n We also should give renewed support to drug abuse prevention
programs.

Mexican authorities consider themselves in a war against drugs. They
should not have to fight it alone in 2011.