On Courtesy

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I am not a member of their clubs and I will not dine with traitors and murderers. I dont know about Scalia, but I sure know about Trump and McConnell and Kavanaugh and Barr. I may not live in a democracy, I may live in a right wing and corrupt dictatorship but sadly, I will not be silent. Those of us who are disenfranchised are, by definition, not respected or listened to, we are not treated with the least courtesy but with contempt. We may be the despised lower orders but perhaps we can ruin their indigestion for at least one meal. You really dont need to lecture me about courtesy, Seth, because you know me well enough that you know I grew up in Virginia and if there is one thing a Virginian knows it is courtesy. But I was also taught that there are times when you do not throw your pearls before swine. I am not their humble and obedient servant and I know whose family estate they buried all the bodies on. They violated their oath, let them know the people hate them. In this situation, let them show courtesy to the American people by respecting and abiding by their oaths of office. That would be real courtesy.

 

Jewish Control of the White House?

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A friend of mine who like all true lefties hates Jews has pointed out that with Trump we have our highest ranking Jew in the history of the American Republic. (For those of you who are blissfully unaware, those on the far left who know all think that Jews invented racism and that all Israelis are murderers, and therefore all Jews are murderers. I have written about this elsewhere, see for example here.)

I just wish to point out that the “son in law”, Jared Kushner, was not elected. Now in the past, Presidents have used members of their family in diplomacy and government, perhaps the most famous being JFK who appointed RFK as his Attorney General. Admittedly, RFK had to be approved by Congress, for what that is worth.

I know very little about Jared Kushner. I know he is a conservative Jew, and I know that Ivanka converted when she married him. I am perhaps unfairly judging Mr. Kushner by association. I consider his father-in-law, Donald J., to be a bully, a malignant narcissist, and a danger to the republic. I have no reason to think that Mr. Kushner has any more knowledge about foreign affairs than his father-in-law, but at least I also have no reason to think he is particularly insane or malignant, either.

Its a little ironic, though. The far-right is always on the verge of calling for the death of all Jews. How odd that it is a right-wing wet dream, Trump, that should non-appoint-appoint his Jewish son-in-law to a position of incredible responsibility in this dysfunctional White House.

And on top of that, that Kushner should be in some sense responsible for negotiating peace in the Middle East is enough to make one's head spin.

I dont know where this is going, but it cant be good.

John Kerry and the American Values of Lies, Betrayal and Hypocrisy

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Warning.  It is required of all right-thinking people of the world to hate Israel, but I am guilty of the sin of not hating Israel. I dislike Netanyahu but I think he was legally elected. I disagree with the settlements in the so-called Occupied Territories, but I look forward to the day that the world addresses its settlements on occupied territories before beating up a little country like Israel.  Shall we all return the lands won in war? What if we were attacked in that war? The US, China, Russia, the UK, etc, builds settlements in lands they took in wars, wars in which they were the aggressor.  Shall we have a UN Resolution to demand that they return those lands? I am all for it.  But to criticize Israel for actions that other nations are guilty of is blatant hypocrisy. All in a days work at the UN, I suppose.  

John Kerry announced to the world that the US vote at the UN to condemn, isolate and ultimately destroy Israel was in accordance with the best values of the American People. Now, what values might he be referring to? I think those values are lies, betrayal, hypocrisy and maybe just a little irony.

We are told and we are expected to believe that the Obama Administration did not initiate, encourage and coordinate this UN Resolution. Well, I suppose that one thing that we have learned from the last few years and certainly this election season is that lies no longer have to be plausible, that Americans will believe pretty much any baseless lie if they want to. But not even a nitwit, not even a Trump supporter, could possibly believe this one. Sure, appropriate cutouts (1) had to be found. Yes, America had to have their hands clean when someone put in the knife. Now who would that someone be? England? France? And then one of the little guys, you know like Senegal would have to take the fall. Of course it is just coincidence that this happens in the last month of the Obama presidency and before four years of Trump about whom, whatever else you might say, is apparently not prepared to sell Israel down the river. Of course, coincidence! The Obama administration does not even have the guts to say what everyone knows, that this last minute arranged vote is a reversal of 60 years of American foreign policy. Liars..

Betrayal is also a core American value. In this case we have at least two beautiful examples of American betrayal at its finest. Of course the United States has just betrayed Israel, that goes without saying. But even more delicious is the lovely betrayal of those in this country who support Israel's right to self-defense who supported Obama through two presidential elections. Obama waited until he did not need their support anymore, and then stabbed these supporters in the back, knowing there was no way to undo the damage. And he did it in a way that he escapes the results, he does not have to run for election anymore. The poor Democrats in Congress though are going to reap the implications of this. Of course the old Democratic coalition has been dead for years, this is merely another shoe dropping. 

But the highest value exposed here is our value of hypocrisy. Hypocrisy is as American as mom and apple pie. Shall we review which of the countries on the security council have built settlements on the “occupied territories”? Well, lets see. Britain (N. Ireland), New Zealand (North and South Island), China (Tibet), Spain (Basque territory), Russia (so many places), and dont forget the good old US of A (Hawaii, N. Mexico, Ca, and frankly most of N. America depending on how you look at it).

Is there any irony in this episode? That would depend on how you interpret a topic in American history. That topic being to what extent Jewish Americans were involved with and important to the Civil Rights movement in this country. And even if Jews were important to the movement, did it really matter that they were Jewish, in some sense of that word? But to the extent that Jews were important to that movement that worked to achieve civil rights for all Americans, regardless of color, then some of the children of these activists will note that when the time came for the USA to condemn, isolate and attempt to destroy the Jewish state of Israel, that it was the first Black American president who did so. This seems like irony to me.

Is cowardice an American value?  Not that I am aware of. But one thing we can be very sure of here, this particular little betrayal by Obama was handled in a way that demonstrates that first and foremost, Obama is a coward.

But lets get real here.  Lies, betrayal and hypocrisy are three of the fundamentals of international diplomacy. There is nothing particularly new here when you look at the big picture.

_________________________________________________

1. A “cutout” is an intelligence term for a person or organizaton that is between the real perpetrator and the victim. It provides plausible deniability, at least under some circumstances.

tags: lies, hypocrisy, betrayal, greed and corruption 

Scientists Stunned as They Are Handed Supoenas as Part of DOJ Investigation

The World Economic Forum (21 Sept 2015) in Davos, Switzerland took an unexpected turn when US Marshalls from the Department of Justice issued supoenas to attending Computer Scientists as part of a larger investigation into alleged fraud at the very highest levels of Academia. The scientists had been attending the conference as part of an effort calling for a ban on the research and development of autonomous weapons.

Giddyup ya lazy war doggies !  Time to go kill !

A spokesman for the Department of Justice said that the government was finding it difficult to believe that scientists had been taking grants from the Department of Defense into Machine Intelligence and related fields without understanding what the research was for. “It seems to us that this is mighty late in the day to suddenly announce that they thought it was a bad idea to pursue this technology. What were they thinking when they took all that money for the last five decades?”

Scientists replied that they had no idea that when they did projects for the Department of Defense on Artificial Intelligence in the Combat Zone that it had anything to do with weapons.  "How could we possibly have guessed that was what on their mind?", asked one scientist.

Many scientists appeared stunned when supoenas were handed them as they left the session. One scientist was heard to mutter “Dont they know who we are?”

Shall We All Return The "Occupied Territories" ?

I have to concede to the far-left and academic politically correct pundits at least one thing.  I do not know any other group that combines totally sincere and heartfelt ignorance with absolute and unthinking arrogance. I am not sure if it qualifies as hypocrisy when one is so ignorant as to not even be aware of what they are saying and how it could easily apply to them, only more so, but whether it is true hypocrisy or just seeming hypocrisy, they have it in spades.

They say that Israel should "return the occupied territories" which, depending on who you are talking to can mean one of several things.  But it probably refers to territory that was occupied by Israel outside the 1967 borders when in 1973 various neighbors attacked Israel and tried to kill everyone.  But they failed and Israel ended up (very controversially) with a variety of contested territories.

I am not going to pass judgement on what Israel should or should not do without much more research and at least one site visit.  But I have no trouble observing just how self-serving and hypocritical those who tell Israel what to do here really are.

Let's review a few examples of "occupied territories".

1. Are you from Australia and you criticize Israel on this topic?  Please have the decency to first return the occupied territories to the indigenous people of Australia that you stole them from.

A review of the occupied territories of Australia and who they were stolen from

2. Are you from Great Britain?  How dare you criticize another nation given your amazing history and the current occupation of Northern Ireland?

3. Are you from or living in the United States?  We have occupied territories here on so many different levels, it might make one laugh if it were at all funny.  The USA was involved in a war with Mexico and claimed as a result Texas, Arizona and New Mexico.  Then of course there is the whole story of California. Puerto Rico?  Guantanamo?  Hawaii?  Guam?

4. Are you from Colorado? The Apache, Arapaho, Cheyenme, Ute, Shoshone and Pueblo people would like it back, if that is all right with you.

5. Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts, Virginia?  Return the occupied territories.

6. Perhaps the Japanese will want to return Hokkaido to the Ainu?

7. Perhaps the People's Republic of China would like to free Tibet or Uigher?

8. Perhaps the Turks would like to stop their war against the Kurds and allow a free Kurdistan to come into existence?

9. Perhaps Russia would like to return great chunks of Siberia to their indigenous people?

And on and on.

Whether Israel should or should not return the West Bank is debatable.  But before you go around telling other countries what to do, I think it would reasonable to expect you to clean up your own act first.

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Ainu People on Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ainu_people

Enola Gay Smithsonian Exhibit Disaster Part 2

In this post, I review the book that historians wrote about the issues involved in the disaster of the Enola Gay exhibition at the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum, a disaster that was very public and very embarrassing for the historians involved. You can find this book here.  You can read a synopsis I wrote about some of the issues here.

This post is likely to be only interesting to those of you who are interested in museums, or historiography, or possibly how the history of the cold war is interpreted for the public.  The rest of you should skip this and move on to more entertaining posts.

There are four questions I had in mind when I read this book. The first was whether the accusations that veterans made about the historians during this encounter were in any way validated by this book. The second was whether the historians were disingenuous in how they presented the issues here. The third was about whether the historians gave any serious credence to what people who had been involved in the event told them. And the fourth was whether the historians involved should have realized that they were about to cause a major controversy and whether they took reasonable steps to prevent it.

1. During and after the Enola Gay exhibit controversy, which you had to be deaf not to have heard about at the time it occurred, two accusations were made by the veteran associations about the historians writing the exhibit. The first was that the historians were adamant that they were going to present revisionist conclusions about this event whatever the veterans thought and the second was that the historians involved were incredibly, unbelievably arrogant. After reading this book from the historians point of view, I can tell you that without doubt the historians involved were adamant that they were going to present their revisionist point of view and that furthermore as far as they were concerned that was the only legitimate point of view, period. And the second impression I got, dripping from every page, was exactly how superior the historians thought they were to anyone else involved. Exactly like the veterans said. No misunderstanding there, whatsoever.

2. One of the things I look for in reading arguments from one side or another of a debate, is how well they present issues that I happen to know something about. If, let us say, there are 20 issues discussed and it just so happens that I know very well what is involved in two of them, I look with special interest at those two. It lets me judge to what extent those other 18 issues are presented in good faith. This is especially useful in the situation where one side admits honestly to something that does not help their argument, but they do so anyway in the interests of fairness. This may be a lot to ask, but I do it anyway.

At one point, the argument is made that the B-29 was an uninteresting airplane technically or aeronautically (is that a word?) and in and of itself had no particular justification for being in the Air & Space Museum. They even trot out an Air Force Officer to make that comment and then leave it there in the book as being decided. The B-29 was uninteresting.

This is an astonishing misrepresentation of the facts. It is so outrageous as to call into doubt anything else the authors of the book say. The B-29 was not only an incredible technological achievement, it was an achievement that had to be reached in order for the Army Air Corps to make their argument that they deserved to be a separate service and this is all intertwined with the history of aviation and the theory of strategic bombing. The B-29 was the technology that was going to prove this principle and it was the second most expensive R&D project of the war.  In other words, it was not only technologically interesting, it was of tremendous importance to the history of how we fought the war and how we planned the future of aviation. Without doubt, this plane and the effort to create it, deserves a place in the history of aviation.  The B-29 deserves to be at the Air & Space Museum.

 It makes me wonder just who they thought was going to read this book that they would make such an outrageous misstatement.  But this behavior fits the model that says that the historians of this period live in their own world and believe what they want to believe.  

Years after this disaster, the Smithsonian restored the Enola Gay, presumably over their dead body, and exhibited it at their secondary location outside Washington.  They still have not told the amazing story of the 509th Composite Group to the best of my knowledge.

The second issue is a bit more subtle but without doubt demonstrates bad faith on the part of the historians. At one point, they talk about how much money was spent to restore the Enola Gay with the implication of “there, are you happy now” referring to, in their opinion, the childish wishes of the veterans. What the book fails to tell you, but I happened to know, is that the Enola Gay had been treated like garbage by the Smithsonian, and left to rot and rust for decades in spite of the complaints of the veterans and the Air Force. The reason it cost so much to restore was because the Smithsonian had treated this artifact with contempt. But this was not mentioned.

In other words, the historians who wrote this book were completely ok with misrepresenting the facts to try and win their argument. Lying was not a problem for them. This is a bad way to get credibility, it seems to me.

3. If there is one thing that this book makes clear, the historians involved did not give a fuck what the veterans thought. As far as the historians were concerned, the veterans were unintelligent, ignorant children relative to a brilliant academic historian. They were given no credible voice in the dialog until the veterans and the Air Force forced the issue..

4. Should the historians have realized they were walking into a touchy situation and somehow avoided it? I think that they did know that what they were saying was controversial but they thought they would come out OK for one very good reason. They assumed that everyone understood going in that there was one truth, and only one truth. And that truth is what the historians said it was. Period. There could be no other truth, no other truth had any credibility. The veterans were just children, immature children who did not want to admit, naturally, that they had murdered all those innocent Japanese for no reason. That was the only conclusion, a historian conclusion, and that was that.

So, to ask the question, were the historians involved in this disaster arrogant?

No, not arrogant. Not merely arrogant. Unbelievably arrogant.

The book was a fabulous eye opener for me. It brought doubt on the credibility of the academic field of history and of historians, at least historians of the modern period. In that sense, the book was very successful beyond its goals.   It not only explained the disaster of the Smithsonian Enola Gay exhibit, it lowered the credibility of the field of academic history in general.

Good work, guys.

Corruption and Degradation in Orange County

“The law must be honest, just, reasonable and according to the ways of the people. It must meet their needs and speak plainly, so that all men may know and understand, what the law is. It is not to be made in any man's favor, but for the needs of all them who live in the land. No man shall judge contrary to the law, which the king has given and the country chosen. [...] neither shall he [the king] take it back without the will of the people.”

English translation of the Latin from the Danish code of Holmiensis from roughly 1291. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codex_Holmiensis

Why should we, as citizens, be concerned if it turns out that the District Attorney office of Orange County is a snake pit of unconstitutional illegalities?   I am of the opinion that nothing we do could possibly make a difference to our justice system.   Just publicly discussing the issues will probably result in some sort of action against the citizen who complains.  

I suppose that the reason we should care about the local insanity is that it puts us in a better position to accuse the rest of the world of being unjust and racist.  I mean how does it look for us to point the finger but not be aware of our own little, or not so little, corrupt cesspools?

So I want to bring to your attention two scandals closer to home.  The first is in Orange County and involves the District Attorney's office.  The second will be for another post and involve the LAPD.

To give you a feel for the magnitude of this gross violation of law, by those that we trust to enforce the law, consider the following paragraph chosen almost at random from the articles listed below:

In recent months, we've learned, over the objections of the Orange County Sheriff's Department (OCSD), that the agency created TRED, a computerized records system in which deputies store information about in-custody defendants, including informants. Some of the data is trivial; other pieces contain vital, exculpatory evidence. But for a quarter of a century, OCSD management deemed TRED beyond the reach of any outside authority. In Dekraai, deputies Ben Garcia and Seth Tunstall committed perjury to hide the mere existence of TRED. Those lies didn't originate from blind loyalty, however. The concealed records show how prosecution teams slyly trampled the constitutional rights of defendants by employing informants—and then keeping clueless judges, juries and defense lawyers.

from  http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/05/29/1388819/-Judge-disqualifies-all-250-prosecutors-in-Orange-County-CA-because-of-widespread-corruption#

The scandal in Orange County is pretty amazing. The news broke about 16 months ago, but I never heard a word of it until I stumbled on this about a month ago. Why not?   Why isnt our media discussing this, what should we call it, gross abuse of justice? A scandal that affects thousands and thousands of innocent citizens who have been victimized by a corrupt justice department in flagrant and egregious ways.

The thing to realize is that the corruption in Orange County is that it is so bad, that it may literally be the worst of its kind in American history.  True there has been a lot of corruption in American history, so that is quite a statement.  But it may be true because this is a particularly specific form of corruption. 

Its a complex story, a very large story, and I am sure I only know a few percent of the big picture. But let me tell you what I think I know and point you to some news articles. Then the both of us, you and I, can watch our justice system fail to punish the guilty and release and compensate the innocent. We can watch together as our system does what it has always done: support criminals as long as those criminals are in bed with the politicians. As it has always been in America.

What seems to have happened is that through a series of misadventures, a few judges demanded some information which revealed that the entire justice system of Orange County was completely corrupt. That they were keeping a database of evidence that proved the innocence of people which the County was prosecuting and getting convictions for. That the system was running an informant system in the jails that violated the rights of prisoners in an egregious and systematic fashion.

Check these out.  They are pretty terrific.

http://blogs.ocweekly.com/navelgazing/2015/06/national_review_calls_forepublicans_to_take_responsibility_in_orange_countys_informant_scandal.php

http://blogs.ocweekly.com/navelgazing/2015/03/seal_beach_salon_massacre.php

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/05/29/1388819/-Judge-disqualifies-all-250-prosecutors-in-Orange-County-CA-because-of-widespread-corruption#

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/03/orange-county-da_n_6993390.html

Excuse me? All 250 prosecutors for the county are disqualified? Excuse me, the entire office of the District Attorney of Orange County?

The problem is, you don't get to wash this shit under the rug forever you know. One day you wake up and find that citizens no longer believe that there is any justice, that all politicians are corrupt, and that the state exists purely to exalt the rich. Of course that is the case, now, all of these things are true: the politicians are corrupt, there is no justice except for the rich, and the state and the law and the economy only exists for the rich. But not everyone knows it. But when everyone does know it, then you have a bad situation. So you want to correct the problems before everyone figures it out. That would be the smart thing to do. Unfortunately, as proven over and over again, our leaders and their masters, the rich, are not smart. They are just greedy and corrupt.

Before we go beating up our friends in the South, I think we should clean up our own puddle of nastiness first.

Lets start with the Orange County DA office.

In another post, I will write up what I think I know about the LAPD and the jail that they run.   But that will be extra credit and later.

Lethal Autonomous Vehicles, Morality and Closing an Important Loophole that Allows Opportunity for the Poor

I was very impressed that Dr. Stuart Russell of the Univ of California called for scientists to boycott work on lethal autonomous weapons systems, e.g. autonomous vehicles that kill people.  But it also seems to me that it is mighty late in the day to raise this concern.  Why?

Because the Artificial Intelligence community was substantially, if not entirely, financed by the Department of Defense for the first 50 or so years of its life.  Yes, there has been some private financing, and NSF financing, probably more today than there has ever been.  But if you look at the history of the field, it is the DOD through DARPA and similar agencies that found the money to support the idea and stick by it through decades of early work, long before it had practical applications.

Now, it does not take a lot of imagination or even a PhD to realize that the DOD's interest in AI would include completely autonomous and lethal weapon systems.  There would be many obstacles on the way to that of course, but ultimately that would be one of the goals of financing this very early stage technology.   There were and will continue to be issues of what sorts of controls need to be on such systems, e.g. when they can be used to assist humans in these weapon systems and when they can be allowed to act "on their own" through rules and systems that are programmed into them.   The issue of validation of such systems and what it means on the battlefield when some of the players are not so conscientious about validation is a major concern.  And now is a good time to be concerned because while full autonomy may or may not be imminent, it is certainly much more imminent than it was 20 years ago.

Of course it needs discussion.

I find it intriguing that even unmanned drones are so controversial, they are far from autonomous but seem to raise strong opinions among the public.   I would not have particularly guessed that, given that each of these drones has a human or two at all times managing their progress.  But it is a concern and no doubt truly autonomous drones and vehicles will be as well.

Remember also that pretty much anything that moves can be lethal whether or not that is its primary purpose. Even the most docile and friendly autonomous vehicle could hurt someone by running into them at full speed, or dropping on them, even if they are only being affectionate and happy to see you.

But getting back to AI and its funding, is it really fair to rely for decades on a source of  funding, knowing full well why they were funding you, and then balking when you start to see results?   

Of course there is nothing unique in this situation to the field of AI.  Many technologies started out as DOD financed in their early stages only to move beyond that into other areas of financing and application.  Some scientists find the knowledge that they are being funded by the DOD morally objectionable and choose to avoid such financing, and that is certainly their right, even though some of us can be a little cynical about whether the NSF is really all that different from the DOD.  They are both financed after all by the same Congress, the same government, the same national will.  Nevertheless, if they prefer their filthy lucre laundered through the NSF that is OK with me. AI is only exceptional in that it is one area that has required more years of development to enter the practical zone of mere applications than many other advanced technologies.  It has required more nurturing and more faith on the part of the organizations that finance research.  And for decades that pretty much was only the DOD, at least to a large degree.

At this point, I would need to review the history of funding of AI and related technologies in order to make sure I am on firm ground.  What I am describing here is an impression from the late last century.  These impressions are almost certain to be out of date, at least partially.  AI has moved from blue sky research to practical applications in many areas.

But there is a good reason to oppose this work, this inhuman autonomy, although I am not sure that there are any AI researchers who are aware of it.

The reason is that throughout history, one of the very few avenues for advancement allowed to poor people in most countries is through the military. Certain civilizations were famous for this, including the Romans and our fair country.  Although officers were generally drawn almost exclusively from the upper classes, a capable young man without pedigree could often join the military and at the risk of his life and hardship, daring and luck,  find a way to advance himself and his family out of the grinding poverty they were condemned to by circumstances of their birth.   In the case of the Romans, there are various cities around the Mediterranean that are the direct descendants of some of these soldiers when they were given land at the end of their years of service.

I am not advocating anything about the military in this essay, for or against, but merely pointing out that historically the military has been a way for the poor and disenfranchised to advance themselves and have a better life in their otherwise corrupt and wealth-privileged society.  As part of that I think it is also fair to ask whether the use of autonomous vehicles, and autonomous robots of other kinds, will reduce this "demand for labor", one of the few channels of advancement available to the poor.  Of course it will.  In fact, that is probably one of the reasons for doing this development, people being so expensive to maintain.

As for the morality of computer scientists who choose to work on autonomous lethal weapons, I have mixed feelings.   Just because so much of the technology and computer industry was financed by the Dept of Defense does not mean that everyone should choose to stay on that path.  Of course not.  Perhaps it is sufficient to just acknowledge the past, thank those that had faith and move on.  There will presumably be enough people to develop the technologies that the DOD and Congress, who funds all these things, desires while the University spits on their benefactors and the academics within hold themselves so preciously aloof.

You may read an article about this call here:

http://phys.org/news/2015-05-ai-expert-colleagues-autonomous-killer.html

The Plausibility of Getting Medication in Mexico

In order to clear up a misunderstanding... the interest in getting medication in Mexico is not predicated on a desire to save money nor it is to avoid getting proper prescriptions.  It is because DEA and Ca. restrictions on certain medications make it impossible to get these medications under various circumstances (e.g. the pharmacy will not sell them to you) even with legitimate prescriptions.   

One function of the Internet which can be said to be socially neutral is to share information among people who have a common interest, whether that interest is sailing, jihadist terrorism or getting legitimate medical help in a region of the world. This feature is certainly of positive value some of the time, but it is also of (culturally dependent) negative value other times. Clearly we do not see advice on blowing people up as positive, but those who seek to right what they see as wrongs do.

In that spirit I am going to discuss what I think I know about getting the medications I need to treat ADHD in Mexico. One of the few advantages of living in Hell is that I am near the border of Mexico. Its an hour away.

This note is not intended to aid people figure out how to get recreational drugs or anything of the sort. It is intended to be a personal journal of my attempts to get legitimately prescribed medications for a disorder that for reasons known to the DEA are difficult to get in this country.

I also happen to believe that American adult citizens of good standing should be permitted to be able to choose what they take in their bodies without the consent of doctors or government as long as they are of proper age, and do not do stupid things like drive motor vehicles under the influence. Which of course they do every day of the week under the influence of the most dangerous drug of them all: alcohol. But that opinion of mine is not relevant to this and related posts. This post is solely about getting properly prescribed medications that are not disbursed in this country for a variety of regulatory stupidities.

There is a lot of misinformation about getting meds in Mexico on the Internet and I am probably adding to it. As time goes by I will add links to the useful sources I have found. So far, I have not tried any of this and I have not been to Mexico for years. This information comes entirely from reading dozens or hundreds of posts on the Internet and forming my own judgement. No doubt I will try some of what I discuss here if for no other reason to satisfy my curiosity. Repeat, none of the following is personal experience.  And I despise giving what appears as advice without direct personal experience, but here we are.  Any numbers quoted are numbers found on the Internet and are likely to be “internet numbers” which is to say not true, or only somewhat true.

First notes, and then tentative conclusions.

Americans going to Mexico to get medication is a vast business. There are numbers like 40 million visitors per year just for this purpose. There are numbers such as $200M a year in pharmaceuticals bought by Americans and carried back across the border. Remember, these are internet numbers, taken with a grain of salt.

There are at least a thousand pharmacies in Tijuana that exist to service this business. These pharmacies fall into two classes. Only the much more rare first class handles what we would call controlled substances. The more common second class of pharmacies handles the more common and uncontrolled substances.

The vast majority of purchases fall into a few classes: older people seeking to save money on the medications they need to survive or not be in pain and who are looking to ease the appalling costs added to medications in American in order to extract more money from innocent victims. As you might imagine our government is outraged that sick and poor people would try to get the same deal that large corporations get by going offshore, and do anything to stop it. But for some reason the border guards will permit these prescription, but non-controlled or scheduled substances back across the border if they are carried by the person they are for and are for personal use. I know very little else about what is involved in getting these medications and they are of no interest to me, at least not yet. The other major group of purchasers are young men looking for Viagra at a discount or other appalling date rape drugs which are apparently easily available. There is also a big business in self medicated antibiotics and people stock up on these. This is the sort of behavior that makes doctors in this country and their paid servants, the politicians, mad with rage and they do whatever they can to stop it. There is another category of people who are seeking medications not yet available in this country but are available in Europe. Mexico seems to follow the European approvals.

Many of these medications are made directly in Mexico in factories run by the major pharmaceutical companies. There is a lot of discussion about what is and what is not of adequate quality. My feeling is that this should not be a major concern unless you are doing things like cancer drugs or heart disease drugs. In my case it is not a concern. The medication will work in the manner that I expect or I will not repeat the experience. If it doesnt work I am no worse off than I was before.

Generally speaking your American prescriptions are not good over there. Mexico has their own system of prescribing medications and if you are interested in so-called controlled substances you will need a Mexican doctor to write you one. This is apocryphally not too difficult it is said. See notes below. A photocopy of an American prescription or empty prescription bottles *may* be of use in demonstrating that you are of good will and it *may* be useful in talking to a licensed Mexican doctor in getting a prescription for what you need. On a personal note I plan to take with me photocopies of a relevant prescription and an empty bottle or two just in case they turn out to be useful.

It is apparently common for a person to go to a pharmacy, be directed to a doctor, and get a prescription for what they need for what we would consider a nominal sum, e.g. $20 or $30 US. Again take this all with a grain of salt.

The doctor may wish to break the prescription down to small amounts and suggest you go to separate pharmacies.

Coming back across the border seems to be the following. You are supposed to declare anything you buy of this type. If you do not, and they find them, you are guilty of a misdemeanor and what you bought are likely to be confiscated. If you do declare and they are for personal use, generally they let you through. If you are carrying so much that they think that you are going to resell them, then they will confiscate. It is not so clear to me that any of this applies to controlled substances, but if they are small amounts for personal use, and you have copies of legitimate prescriptions or American bottles, then it is believed they let you through. I consider this a major flaw in the whole scheme because it is very likely that the behavior may depend on who is manning the station and what the enforcement flavor of the month is.

You will need a passport.

Tentative conclusions:

For non-controlled substances that are not health critical, such as heart disease, this is likely to be a way to save substantial money and has no apparent risks.

Those who use medications that are health critical need to be more careful and you can find discussions on the internet of how to do so.

Carrying an American prescription and or empty bottles may be helpful in getting the medication or coming back across the border, or it may be totally a waste of time.

You will need a Mexican prescription for anything that is controlled in Mexico. This includes most but not all of the controlled substances in this country. For ADHD, anything useful is controlled in both countries.

Coming back across the border is a dubious activity that may be helped by the medication being for your personal use, and having proof of legitimate American and Mexican prescriptions. It is critical that this medication be for your own use and not for resale. Failing to declare these things is a crime, do not do it, it will get you into trouble.

You will need an American passport.

Plan to spend all day on this activity, at least the first time you try it.

In conclusion, I am leery of the whole process. It is an ambiguous venture, not quite tantamount to drug smuggling but perhaps one of those odd holes in the control of trade materials across the border. But we are told we live in a world of globalization and that it is ethical to destroy American livelihoods by using slave labor in China, a vicious dictatorship, so why shouldn't Americans try to get a little savings by going to Mexico.

The hypocrisy of our system is rampant, overt, and starting to get annoying.

Politics Is a Continuation of War by Other Means

The following is an editorial about recent politics in Washington involving the Petraeus resignation.   In this editorial, I express my real opinion about the Republicans and if that is upsetting to you, you may wish to stop reading.   

When I started this blog, I made the conscious decision that one thing I was going to do here was to express myself honestly about some of the politics and hypocrisy I have observed in my so-called life.   This is the second such editorial in a series, the first is here.

One more time we have a situation where the Republicans demonstrate amazing hypocrisy and a willingness to damage America in any way they can as part of their pursuit of power.   In an attempt to damage a member of the the Obama Administration they have slandered and probably succeeded in destroying the career of a loyal and competent soldier.  

The situation as I understand it is this.   The FBI failed to notify Congress that they were investigating a senior administration official.  Presumably the investigation itself was initiated by right wing Republicans looking to generate dirt to manipulate the Presidential election.  The investigation failed to find any wrongdoing and the investigation was dropped.  Some right wing FBI agents decided to disclose confidential personal information collected during the investigation to their allies in the Republican party in congress, who used this information to attack and slander a person who was innocent of all wrongdoing.

Having an affair is not a crime in this country.   If it were, there would be a lot of criminals walking around.  And Republicans of all people should be the last people to point fingers.

This post has been rewritten to be a little less negative.  Are we so powerless that we can not even control our own FBI ?   Are we so stupid that Republicans can not see how evil their elected representatives are?

Maybe its just that the Republicans are desperate men.   I dont know, I am not going to worry about it here on this Blog, I have better things to do with my time.