The Coup as a business practice

Alternative Column: Last week was the 55th anni-versary of a possible coup of the United States government. I say possible because none of us really knows the truth, es-pecially in light of the fact that government documents regard-ing John F. Kennedy's death are still kept from us. A little over a year ago President Trump disregarded the law and withheld much of that infor-mation on supposed national security concerns (54 years later!). It appears Trump has drowned in the swamp he promised to drain. This is fur-ther evidence that national security should not be con-fused with the security of the nation's citizens. That coup possibly resulted in 10 more years of profitable war.
This column started out to be about the famous “migrant caravan.” But in researching the causes of the migrant cara-van, I kept running into the same theme. These people are fleeing Central America in order to survive. Imagine living in a place where the police routinely collaborate with the crimi-nals.
During the 1980s there was a crackdown on the drug gangs in Los Angeles. Many MS-13 and Barrio 18 depor-tees had become wise up north and easily formed criminal net-works when they arrived home. The insatiable appetite for rec-reational drugs in the U.S. was an irresistible business oppor-tunity. The illegality of their freight made it impossible to resolve disputes without vio-lence.
In 2004 George W. Bush supported Salvadoran Presi-dent Tony Saca because he sent some troops to Iraq and pretended to support the drug war. To the credit of the gov-ernment, he was soon convict-ed of embezzlement and money laundering. Obama continued U.S. backing of the FMLN, a party that surpassed the cor-ruption of Saca.
Crony capitalism boils down to being the real reason we have the migrant caravan. The protectionist trade policies of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras preserved a profit for their agriculture. U.S. com-panies broke those policies by force through coups and as-sassinations, resulting in pro-longed civil wars. War zones are not conducive to family life. Wouldn't you leave?
The war on drugs is also a form of crony capitalism. Any war has a lot of profit poten-tial. From the drug warriors to the corrupt politicians, inno-cent civilians pay.
Way before the caravan, U.S. immigration policy was a mess. I've been saying for years that what we really need is more emigration. We need the ones who idolize redistribu-tionist governments like Cuba to go there and people who want to work to come here.
The infrastructure we have for vetting immigrants is ridicu-lously inadequate. A wait of six years is common. Why is it this way when we have 170,000 troops protecting other parts of the world?
There are a couple ironies that have to be mentioned: First is that conservatives wor-ry about migrants coming here to get “our” benefits. It makes me wonder whatever happened to real conservatives. Sherrod Brown, an Ohio Senator is said to be in line for the Demo-cratic Party's nomination for president. On Public Radio they said that was in spite of his support for Trump's tariffs. So now protectionist trade policy is conservative? Tom Harkin must be amused.
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