Mexican - U.S. Alliance needed

Drugs filtered through Central America into Mexico and eventually into the U.S. are a problem of immense proportion. Mexico’s drug addictions have doubled in the past few years and the numbers of murders and kidnappings has taken off like a rocket. People are no longer fleeing Mexico to escape poverty but are fleeing for their very lives. The current President of the U.S. has dropped the War on Drugs designation. The problem is that the threat from the southern boarder of the U.S. is as real and deadly as any threat in Iraq or Afghanistan. Border towns on both sides of the border have become high crime rate locations with narcotics as the major common denominator. Since the new administration in Washington D.C. has decided not to consider this a war any longer the presumption must be it is a local police problem if not in finances than at least in psychological terms. Does this mean we will abandon our neighbors to the south and in the process only exacerbate the problem along the boarder? I believe our efforts along the southern border of the U.S. should not only retain its War on Drugs nomenclature but should increase the budget by billions of U.S. dollars. The U.S. Congress and the Mexican Government must declare the Mexican and U.S. alliance against narcotics traffickers a true war in every sense of the word. The threat to the U.S. and Mexico is real and not a second rate annoyance that can be dealt with in time. The threat to stability in the Mexican and U.S. border area is real with long-term consequences.