Their mindset is: "Finally — finally! — we are making progress in the drug war!"

Why do I laugh when I see that? Because it is so dumb — so idiotic. How can anyone really buy into this nonsense? I figure it's a real testament to public schooling's ability to adversely affect people's minds.

How can these people not see that this nonsense has been going on for decades? How can they not see that this is just a racket — a decades-long, never-ending, ongoing, perpetual racket being perpetrated by U.S. officials?

The latest example of this idiocy is the Mexican government's killing of a drug lord named Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, also known as "El Mencho," who the New York Times describes today in a front-page article as "one of the world's most powerful drug lords." His killing, according to the Times, "dealt a major blow to the Jalisco New Generation Cartel."

Wow! A "major blow"! Imagine that! Does that mean that the drug war is finally over? Well, not exactly. Instead, it's just another reason why it will go on and on and on.

In fact, the killing has just unleashed a massive campaign of retaliatory violence in Puerto Vallarta and Guadalajara, which means that the Mexican government will now need to crack down on those angry drug-war gang members who are still part of the cartel that El Mencho headed up.

To the Times's credit, the article does point out the following truth:

Since the United States began its war on drugs nearly six decades ago, multiple drug lords have been arrested or killed and cartels have been dismantled. Yet more people around the world are using drugs than ever. An estimated 25 million people used cocaine worldwide in 2023 — up from 17 million a decade earlier, according to a United Nations report released last year.

One thing is for sure: No killing or capture of any drug lord ever means — or will ever mean — the end of the drug war. It will just keep going on and on.

Take a look at the photograph that accompanies this article. It is a photograph of the body of a drug kingpin named Pablo Escobar. He was the "El Mencho" of his day, which was back in the 1980s and 1990s. Notice the happy looks on the Columbian drug warriors who were responsible for killing Escobar. Those drug warriors were as happy as today's drug warriors are about killing "El Mencho."

If you have never seen Netflix's series Narcos, I highly recommend it. It revolves around the Pablo Escobar phenomenon. By the time you finish it, you will realize three important things: (1) That even though the drug warriors got Escobar, other drug gangs quickly moved in to take over his share of the drug trade; 2) the killing of Escobar led to even more drug-war violence; and (3) the drug war just kept going on and on.