As outgoing CIA Director Hayden points out, Mexico poses a great threat to U.S. security, second only to Al Qaeda.  I’m glad at least SOMEONE is remembering our suffering neighbor who has been plagued with drug violence for decades, only to have it recently explode into unprecedented brutality and death in 2008.

Kristin Bricker, a correspondent for narcoshpere.com, writes that “Mexico’s daily El Universal, which began counting drug war executions four years ago, reports that 5,612 people were executed in Mexico’s drug war in 2008.  This year’s deaths more than doubled 2007′s total of over 2,700 executions.  By El Universal’s estimates, about 8,463 drug executions have occurred during the first two years of Mexican President Felipe Calderon’s six-year term in office.”

Saying Mexico has a “drug-problem” is a gross understatement.  Cuidad Juárez-a city with a population of approximately 1.5 million and just across the border from El Paso, Texas-saw more than 1,300 murders in drug-violence in 2008: (more…)