Wayne Gilchrest: “I would like to strongly emphasize that all of us in this Chamber take the responsibility to listen to this debate, to…”

“I would like to strongly emphasize that all of us in this Chamber take the responsibility to listen to this debate, to come to some resolution. We are missing the mark, and I think to a large extent overpoliticizing this statement about certifying or decertifying. We have got to get together, decent, honest Americans, must get together with decent, honest Mexicans. It is as simple as that. There are drug profiteers in Mexico; there are drug profiteers in the United States. It is an external problem; it is an internal problem. Let us be clear on just a couple of points. The United States is responsible for 60 to 70 percent of the world's consumption of drugs. It is a lucrative, lucrative business. The Mexican Government is spending billions of dollars trying to fight this. They are confronted with tens of billions of dollars on the other side which we, the American consumers of drugs, are supplying to Mexico. As has been documented, Mexico's problems arise because the shift in the drugs from the Caribbean up from Colombia through Mexico has taken place in dramatic proportions in the last few years. Amazingly, we are now discussing at a point when Mexico is moving into an arena where they can begin, however small, in a very small way, to begin to resist the drug cartels. We are talking about decertifying Mexico as though it was somehow Mexico's problem, Mexico's problem, to save us from ourselves.”