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4 US Citizens Kidnapped in Matamoros


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2 hours ago, Nueces River Rat said:

It's common in Mexico.    You have the white Europeans influenced Mexicans for which many of them have no Spanish  surnames for which many of them live in Northern Mexico in cities like Monterrey and Mexico City.     The further south you get to where many of the ancient Indian tribes dominated, you find the darker folks which the poverty rate is much higher than the north.    They have a type a caste system in that nation hence the drug dealers who some are part of the European influenced Mexicans easily exploit the lower class Mexicans to do their dirty work.   And of course you have lower class Mexicans  who strikes gold and becomes a Cartel boss himself.... This is one reason you have the turf wars down there.  

Yep. My girlfriend stays out of the sun down here because she doesn't want to look dark, i.e. poor.

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On 3/6/2023 at 6:04 PM, tejas60 said:

you should go to Boquillas. it's cool as shit with a great restaurant. but you have to pay THEM to row you across:

crossing-the-rio-grande.jpg

Was Captain Pablo your guide?

 

Dammit, didn't read far enough down the page before I posted

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1 hour ago, Nueces River Rat said:

It's not cartel like for sure with bodies hanging from the 281/US 83 interchange in Pharr.    But there is violence (IE murders, home invasions) going on that is drug related, just not on the scale as it does across the river.   And you can bet your bottom dollar some of the home invasion and other stuff goes unreported.  

Do you actually know anyone from the valley?

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4 hours ago, TejanoAtUT said:

Didn't see this mentioned before, but a bit of a thought about the name of the city, Matamoros. I grew up in the RGV and never thought about it, but unless I'm wrong, doesn't Matamoros literally mean:
Mata = kill
moros = moors

So Matamoros is a surname from way back Spain, and used by some old badass known for "kill (er)" of "moors"?

That's metal AF.

Matagorda = No fat chicks,  putting it mildly. 

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5 hours ago, closetohumping said:

Dude that term was used well past the 80s unfortunately.  A lot of Mexican-Americans loathe the illegals coming over.

It is amazing how many people are surprised that Mexican-Americans don’t have an innate feeling of kinship and empathy with immigrants from Central and South America. 
 
It’s like expecting 19th century immigrants from Ireland and Italy to have a kinship because they were all Catholic. 

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21 minutes ago, statsman said:

It is amazing how many people are surprised that Mexican-Americans don’t have an innate feeling of kinship and empathy with immigrants from Central and South America. 
 
It’s like expecting 19th century immigrants from Ireland and Italy to have a kinship because they were all Catholic. 

i'm not even sure what this means.  In other words, everyone is racist.   And a lot of the "illegals" are Mexicans.  

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57 minutes ago, statsman said:

It is amazing how many people are surprised that Mexican-Americans don’t have an innate feeling of kinship and empathy with immigrants from Central and South America. 
 
It’s like expecting 19th century immigrants from Ireland and Italy to have a kinship because they were all Catholic. 

It’s been beat here to death, but even many Mexican Americans will shit talk the Mexican immigrants.  The slurs, everything.  I hear it at least once from our ranch manager every time I’m down there. 

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23 minutes ago, Nueces River Rat said:

I spent my first two decades of my life there and still have family and friends down there.

So yea.   I guess I know someone from the Valley.

So then you are just cool with straight up lying about it? because if you knew anyone in or anything about the valley you'd know that "unreported" home invasions don't happen there. Like I said, as long as you aren't personally involved in organized crime, you aren't going to be a victim of a violent crime committed by them on the US side. It's much likelier that some unhinged racist will travel El Paso/Buffalo shooter style.

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2 hours ago, Nueces River Rat said:

Laredo is not part of the RGV.... It's Laredo.    

Thanks for the correction, dude.  Had no idea.  In case you couldn't tell from the post, it was hyperbole for effect.  I got blood relatives from every inch from Rio Grande City to Boca Chica.  there isn't a dive bar L&F Distributors didn't service that I also haven't been kicked out of.  

Over Macho Grande?  Those wounds run...pretty deep.

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9 hours ago, Nueces River Rat said:

It's common in Mexico.    You have the white Europeans influenced Mexicans for which many of them have no Spanish  surnames for which many of them live in Northern Mexico in cities like Monterrey and Mexico City.     The further south you get to where many of the ancient Indian tribes dominated, you find the darker folks which the poverty rate is much higher than the north.    They have a type a caste system in that nation hence the drug dealers who some are part of the European influenced Mexicans easily exploit the lower class Mexicans to do their dirty work.   And of course you have lower class Mexicans  who strikes gold and becomes a Cartel boss himself.... This is one reason you have the turf wars down there.  

They had a great version of this at the San Antonio Museum of Art a few years back for their San Antonio 1719 exhibit. 

 

The Paintings That Tried (and Failed) to Codify Race - JSTOR Daily

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4 hours ago, statsman said:

It is amazing how many people are surprised that Mexican-Americans don’t have an innate feeling of kinship and empathy with immigrants from Central and South America. 
 
It’s like expecting 19th century immigrants from Ireland and Italy to have a kinship because they were all Catholic. 

My Mexican American MIL (no habla ingles) was banging some dude from El Salvador (no tiene papels) and let him stay in their shed in the backyard for a while. I got along great with the dude as we talked about his experience in the military in El Salvador and he made the family papusas a couple times which were great. He told me I was the first white person he'd really talked to in the States as not many of us speak  any Spanish and being undocumented he was usually scared of us. Well after he moved on the rest of the family told her she was dumb for allowing a Salvadoran in her house. They do have plenty of love for Mexicans looking to come over either legally or illegally though.

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5 hours ago, statsman said:

It is amazing how many people are surprised that Mexican-Americans don’t have an innate feeling of kinship and empathy with immigrants from Central and South America. 
 
 

There is a Mexican meat market within walking distance from my office.  In the back corner, there is a taqueria that has the best gorditas I have ever tasted.  Delicious homemade crema with countless meats and flavors.  I have to limit my visits or else I would weigh the same as a bus.  Anyway, I was talking to a couple of employees about the taqueria.  One employee's parents immigrated with her as a child in the early 90's, the others parents immigrated to Texas before she was born.  Both said that they will buy groceries at the meat market, but they will not eat at the taqueria.  The cooks are Guatamalan.  Central American racism is definitely alive and well.  

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9 hours ago, Nueces River Rat said:

It's not cartel like for sure with bodies hanging from the 281/US 83 interchange in Pharr.    But there is violence (IE murders, home invasions) going on that is drug related, just not on the scale as it does across the river.   And you can bet your bottom dollar some of the home invasion and other stuff goes unreported.  

Cedric Benson would have nodded knowingly.

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12 hours ago, Nueces River Rat said:

Yep.    One of the things about being a white kid growing up in the RGV and knowing the language/culture,  is  I got a quick lesson about ethnic tensions when some of my friends or  their families let their guards down about how they felt about some black folks.   Yikes as a white guy if I had said what some of them said and it was made public,  I'd be on whatever shit list of the day.  I guess some of them thought as an anglo kid I'd understand  their views on blacks, but no I couldn't.

   This was back in the 80's when things weren't as politically correct as they are now, but still.   Same folks used to call illegal aliens "wet backs" back then.   Go figure

A lot of individual racism is based on inferiority.  Someone with a feeling of inferiority loves to find some other group to look down upon.  It's a huge driver of latter-day white supremacy.

 

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6 hours ago, YGIFS said:

I like Mexicans.  I guess because I'm born from one.  But yeah, if there's a plan to get rid of Italians.....I'm all in.  

Wait, weren't we talking about spring break in Reynosa or some shit?  

Jimmy Fallon Shock GIF by The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon

Funny though how when I speak Spanish to Latin Americans they're always trying to figure out my accent and then we get along because I'm from Italy 

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7 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

A lot of individual racism is based on inferiority.  Someone with a feeling of inferiority loves to find some other group to look down upon.  It's a huge driver of latter-day white supremacy.

 

Kind of. 

It's more like it's a critical part of how we're hardwired from an evolutionary perspective. Being able to point out a person or a group of people who are different can be an extremely effective bonding mechanism for those who view things similarly. It's natural to us. We do it for a ridiculous array of topics. Of course we're going to do it for things like how a person speaks, how a person looks, and where they're from. 

The good news is our brains are remarkable things and we can consciously choose to override our hardwiring. But it's not easy and takes a lot of conscious effort. If someone doesn't put in that effort they're going to be prejudiced. No doubt about it. Also, depending on our tribal affiliations, many affiliations end up taking a priority for us over race. My favorite example of this is Dave Chappelle talking about seeing one white guy in a gang, and saying that's the guy you have to really worry about, because no telling what he's done to be a part of their group. 

Then on the other side you have people of color who adopt every talking point of a preponderantly white group, who are then at least ostensibly accepted as "one of us."

I have a Costa Rican friend who looks down upon Mexican Americans in brutal ways. "They come here and make their neighborhoods look like Little Mexico. If they want to do that so bad, why don't they stay in Mexico?" Uh...okay? 

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1 hour ago, Gengs1 said:

We need to start droning the cartel in Mexico, when has it been ok to kidnap and shoot Americans anywhere? We need to flex again to show we mean business, fuck what Mexico has to say 

Yeah, this isn't one of those instances where "'Murica ain't respected around the world no more" is the issue.  Cartel violence goes back to the Nixon administration.  Even in our carefree youth, there was always isolated incidents of targeting Americans as a show of force between cartels.  We just didn't hear about them because we normally didn't read newspapers on Spring Break.  I'm racking my brain trying to remember if I checked any State Dept. memos while trying to score ass or grass.  

Most of this goes away with tide-shifting legalization of most drugs.  However, the intra-Mexico violence will get worse as they are forced to fight over a smaller pie of cash.  That's when you really won't want to travel to their shadier cities, because Secuestro Express will have a much higher price tag.  

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1 hour ago, cabowabo said:

FAFO.

This looks like some bad hombres mixed up in the drug trade. 

This type of violence is targeted in Mexico. The likelihood of anyone here vacationing in Mexico and getting mowed down like this is so is next to 0.

After living in Mexico for 2 years in one of the increasingly hotter zones, you learn a couple of things:

The cartels are everywhere yet nowhere. 

If you own a business that’s publicly accessible, you’re paying their bribe or your dead.

People that are murdered are either involved in the drug trade or refuse to pay the bribe.

If a tourist gets murdered as a result of a targeted assassination it’s bad for business and the assassins pay with their lives. They don’t want that. 

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22 hours ago, 956 Worldwide said:

This is a big part of the reason that the communities themselves are safe. Nothing brings down the feds like gun battles in the streets and nothing gives the FBI a hardon like a corrupt cop or DA.  Those corrupt local officials can stay in place only as long as shit doesn’t get stirred up. 
 
So it’s in everyone’s interests to keep shit quiet in El Norte, unlike Mexico you can’t bribe enough U.S. attorneys to allow you to run wild

Except in South Carolina…

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2 hours ago, cabowabo said:

I kind of figured their might be more to this than just a tummy tuck.    The border cities are not known a cosmetic surgery destinations save for ortho type of work at the dozens of Dentist offices that are located close  the ports of entry from California to Brownsville.  

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7 minutes ago, Nueces River Rat said:

I kind of figured their might be more to this than just a tummy tuck.    The border cities are not known a cosmetic surgery destinations save for ortho type of work at the dozens of Dentist offices that are located close  the ports of entry from California to Brownsville.  

Ha, who was getting that tummy tuck? I don't know where that info came from but I don't think it was from the 4 "tourists". Someone was helping them with the cover story.

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1 hour ago, YGIFS said:

Yeah, this isn't one of those instances where "'Murica ain't respected around the world no more" is the issue.  Cartel violence goes back to the Nixon administration.  Even in our carefree youth, there was always isolated incidents of targeting Americans as a show of force between cartels.  We just didn't hear about them because we normally didn't read newspapers on Spring Break.  I'm racking my brain trying to remember if I checked any State Dept. memos while trying to score ass or grass.  

Most of this goes away with tide-shifting legalization of most drugs.  However, the intra-Mexico violence will get worse as they are forced to fight over a smaller pie of cash.  That's when you really won't want to travel to their shadier cities, because Secuestro Express will have a much higher price tag.  

Correct.  The drug trade and the cartels have been in Mexico for a long time.   I never recall being concerned about things in the border towns until the Kilroy killing in 1989.   But most of us on the border kind of wrote if off too as a unaware Gringo college student thinking he was invincible not being aware of his surroundings and just a case of being at the wrong place and the wrong time.  

 

They didn't become the animal they are today with their fingers in things you wouldn't associated with the drug trade like shell companies to launder their money and of course the human trafficking component until the Columbia cartels suffered defeats and their leadership went down starting with Pablo Escobar.    That did take American money and man power and covert stuff we will probably never know about until files are opened 50 years from now or so.   The Mexican government needs to do the same where they put a face in the public they hate the Gringos and their Army of the North to satisfy their national pride, but then take the bitter medicine that if they want a country that is somewhat safe compared to the last three decades or so, they can't do it alone.  Columbia still has a drug trade and network, but it's not the same as it was and that's where Mexico needs to go.  

I'm not sure the cartels are all that concerned about legalization either way now as they shifted their business model as noted above.   Sure they still want to control the cocaine, heroin, etc. stuff.   But they've shifted hard in the Fentanyl and no telling what else is being cooked up in labs down there or in China which will become the next lethal powder.  

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14 minutes ago, Bevo said:

Ha, who was getting that tummy tuck? I don't know where that info came from but I don't think it was from the 4 "tourists". Someone was helping them with the cover story.

Whoever at the AP said they were "seeking healthcare" couldn't be fuller of shit. Anything passes as journalism these days. 

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3 hours ago, SL Xpress said:

I have a Costa Rican friend who looks down upon Mexican Americans in brutal ways. "They come here and make their neighborhoods look like Little Mexico. If they want to do that so bad, why don't they stay in Mexico?" Uh...okay? 

Growing up in Florida I was aware that the Cuban community did not view Mexicans in a favorable manner - and would take great offense if you suggested that a Cuban was a Mexican. 

Odd isn’t it? I mean, I can understand being pissed if someone learned about my Nordic heritage and accused me of being Norwegian. Some things are just insulting.

 

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1 minute ago, ztejas said:

Whoever at the AP said they were "seeking healthcare" couldn't be fuller of shit. Anything passes as journalism these days. 

I looked it up: It came from Latavia "Tay" McGee's mom:

 

The South Carolina native captioned the image “Barbara told me,” seemingly referring to her mother, Barbara Burgess.

Burgess, 54, told ABC earlier this week that McGee traveled to Mexico to undergo a tummy tuck procedure.

The older woman worried about her daughter’s safety, but told the outlet that McGee reassured her, “‘Ma, I’ll be fine.’”

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13 minutes ago, Bevo said:

Ha, who was getting that tummy tuck? I don't know where that info came from but I don't think it was from the 4 "tourists". Someone was helping them with the cover story.

The cartels are soulless bastards, but not stupid.    The last thing the cartels want to do is get a bunch of innocent American caught in the crossfire so close to the USA.   Imagine the heck that would come down if a group of Winter Texans on a Saturday strolling on the main street of Nuevo Progresso got caught in a crossfire and 10 or 20 of them were killed.   The cartels know that would almost require the full force of the American government to come down on Mexico and I think even the most hands off American President would have to do something and thus the most hands off Mexican government would be forced to the do the same.  That's why when I first heard of this I was like this doesn't add up.   They just don't do these things that close to a port of entry in the border towns. 

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Nothing in any of those rap sheets screams “let’s drive 2000 miles to buy drugs from a cartel” to me. Seems like small time stuff. The family did say that McGee had been to Matamoros before apparently. If they had done something to piss off a cartel there’s just no way any of them would’ve survived.

I think it really was mistaken identity. I imagine whoever gave the go ahead for the attack is missing their head right now, as it did bring some unnecessary heat down.

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