"El Chapo" Rides Again...

Want to know how long it takes to build a state-of-the-art tunnel underneath a maximum security prison for the sole purpose of escape? About a year. Chapo Guzman, the notorious leader of the Sinaloa cartel, was arrested in February of 2014 by the Mexican equivalent of the US Navy Seals, and on Sunday, July 12th of 2015, he escaped yet again in what is arguably the most audacious and daring breakout this side of "The Shawshank Redemption". Except this time it wasn't a movie. We've seen this before-the recent escape of two highliy dangerous murderers from a prison in Upstate New York comes to mind, with a difference. Those two bozos took off with no one to help them on the outside and nowhere to run. In fact, their plan was botched from the very beginning, as they had to hoof it after their getaway car never appeared to wisk them away to parts unknown. This was not the case for "El Chapo", and now that he's back on the streets quite a number of people are in trouble. Big trouble. 

US authorities have been sweating the Mexican government to extradite Guzman to the states to no avail. He was being held in a maximum security prison where he had access to the same amenities that any self-respecting criminal mastermind would receive-booze, broads, and a cell phone to continue conducting business. The US was rightfully concerned about security measures taken by Mexican law enforcement that have seen traffickers escape justice either through the front or the back door of their federal courthouses. Imagine watching this charade play itself out for all the world to see. Mexico is officially the laughing stock of the international community, and even if they do catch him again, El Chapo has already cemented his legacy as the world's most powerful and mythical gangster. 

Mexico is not a failed state as some would suggest. What they are is a narco state. The fact that its beleagured citizens are subjected to macabre scenes of dead bodies hanging from highway overpasses, kidnappings, human traficking, and grotesque beheadings on a scale so obscene they have become social media fodder the world over has no bearing on the situation. The violence is the effect. The cause is the intermingling of government officials, law enforcement, and narco bribes in an Iron Triangle of corruption that has Mexico in a Taliban-like kung fu grip of chaos that dwarfs anything seen in any other country . The fall has been precipitous for Mexico, but they could not have done it alone. This downward spiral comes courtesy of the United States, with its unquenchable thirst to get high and law enforcement policies that make things worse.

More of "El Chapo" is going to get Mexico more of this-

Here is the problem with the US's handling of the drug war-everything they try is so wrong, that doubling down on stupid just seems like a natural extension. Take for example Los Zetas, the maniacs who popularized butchery as must-see tv. Their main enforcers were trained by the US in special weapons and tactics to fight the cartels. They went back home and were offered much better paying jobs by the very organizations they were trained to fight against, and next thing you know, we have decapitated heads being rolled out at bowling alleys and other scenes of family-oriented  lunacy-as-entertainment.

Then you have the NRA, whose lobbying efforts makes criminally-aided gun violence just another aspect of the capitalist system. Almost 80% of the weapons used in murders committed in Mexico originate from US-based retail stores, specifically Texas. How does the US look to curb this madness? By having individual states pass even more permissive gun laws to the extent that any sombrero-wearing bad guy can cross the border and shop for AK-47's to his heart's content. 

NAFTA was also a humongous debacle. El Chapo is known as the builder of tunnels par excellance, with around 75 of these rat holes utilized to bring drugs across the US-Mexico border to his credit, But the fact is 90% of the vehicles that come across the border into the US don't get inspected, both from a lack of manpower and the incredible traffic logjam it would create. So if you're moving product to the US, you can load a truck full of drugs without having to make even a half-assed attempt to hide the shit and you're pretty much home free. This is why all of the violence is (for the time being) on the other side of the border, the side that are fighting over control of these vital shipping lanes, the side Americans don't give a flying fuck about.

"Hanging out" in Sinaloa can be hazardous to one's health...

Here is another thing about the drug war that makes it the gift that keeps on giving-as long as it is Mexicans being propped up on plastic lounge chairs with their sawed-off heads on their laps, or young American black and Latinos incarcarated for drug offenses on such vast scale, no one in the US cares. And as long as these populations continue to be victimized by idiotic drug policies that offer plenty of promotions to the craven hacks who use the war on drugs to step over their deceased carcasses in search of promotions and political opportunities, no one will continue to give a fuck, And the bodies will keep piling up. 

But we here at "Busting Chops" digress. Let's get back to our boy El Chapo. Nowhere in the annals of recorded history has the most powerful nation on Earth been hoodwinked and bamboozled by the likes of a 5'6" semi-illiterate Mexican who by all accounts should have grown up to sell chimichangas on the LA Freeway. It's enough to make Donald Trump's wig do cartwheels. But this is where we are in the war on drugs-imagine a tunnel, more than a mile long, complete with electricity, air ventilation, and wood paneling, built with more structural integrity than anything the Army Corps of Engineers could muster when they put together the levees in New Orleans, being dug underneath Mexico's most secure maximum security prison. And not one prison official or guard heard anything. Not a fucking sound. 

Imagine this tunnel ending right underneath a toilet utilized by our esteemed bandito, in a prison where his every move is recorded via video camera, and no one noticed him removing said toilet and stepping down into the murky depths of the hole his peeps spent more than a year excavating. Imagine a 60-year old man being able to outrun (on a motorbike, no less) his much younger captors down said tunnel for over 1500 meters only to come out the other side and disappear into thin fucking air. I never thought something like this was possible, but if we've learned anything, it's that Mexico is the country where impossible happens, especially when someone like Guzman pays out a total of $50 million dollars in bribes to the requisite Mexican officials to facilitate his escape.

So far 18 prison officials have been taken into custody for "questioning", the prison warden has been summarily sacked, and the Mexican district attorney has taken the opportunity for a resoundingly cynical photo-op of herself staring into the exit of the tunnel in question, peering down as if to say "duh, how the fuck did THIS happen? We need a full investigation pronto!!! Round up the usual suspects!!!"

           "Se fue por aqui? Chinga tu madre, cabrón!!!"

Mexico is full of "investigations" of this nature. They all lead down the same hole Chapo Guzman used to hatch his escape. And now Guzman is back in Culiacan, Mexico, his native stomping grounds where he enjoys almost complete loyalty from the citizens. He's back having Viagra-fueled sex marathons with 18-year old beauty queens and orchestrating his drug empire from the safety of his home region that will see a violent purge of the disloyal "sapos" who had the temerity to think he was gone for good. I would not to be them right about now, because we all know how it's going to end for them and their families.

The worst part of this latest escape-more narco corridos!!!! Orale, Carnal!!!

All we are left with is a trail of dust and a new batch of obnoxious, hastily-written narco corridos that are inundating the airwaves of Mexico, extolling the feats of Chapo Guzman, who has gone from cultural icon to Mexican superhero for outsmarting (yet again) the Mexican government and those damn Yankis. Expect the people who ratted him out to pay dearly for their transgressions with a new wave of violence that will make the current state of narco violence look like stroll in the park.