The Power of the Dog

You don’t let them knock you out, you make them knock you out. You make them break their fucking hands knocking you out, you let them know that they’ve been in a fight, you give them something to remember you by every time they look in a mirror.

The Americans take a product that literally grows on trees and turn it into a valuable commodity. Without them, cocaine and marijuana would be like oranges, and instead of making billions smuggling it, I’d be making pennies doing stoop labor in some California field, picking it.

This is Tío’s genius—he knows that a man who would never have the weakness to set a great evil into motion doesn’t have the strength to stop it once it’s moving. That the hardest thing in the world isn’t to refrain from committing an evil, it’s to stand up and stop one.

And the most dangerous place on earth— Is where you’re safe.

Six bad hombres have tried to kill Ramos. Ramos went to all six funerals, just in case any of the bereaved wanted to take a shot at revenge. None of them did. He calls his Uzi “Mi Esposa”—my wife. He’s thirty-two years old. Within hours he has in custody the three policemen who picked up Ernie Hidalgo. One of them is the chief of the Jalisco State Police. Ramos tells Art, “We can do this the fast way or the slow way.” Ramos takes two cigars from his shirt pocket, offers one to Art and shrugs when he refuses it. He takes a long time to light the cigar, rolling it so that the tip lights evenly, then takes a long pull and raises his black eyebrows at Art. The theologians are right, Art thinks—we become what we hate. Then he says, “The fast way.” Ramos says. “Come back in a little while.” “No,” Art says. “I’ll do my part.” “That’s a man’s answer,” Ramos says. “But I don’t want a witness.

Deliver my soul from the sword. My love from the power of the dog.

It’s the Law of Unintended Consequences, Art thinks as he watches the federales. Operation Condor was intended to cut the Sinaloan cancer out of Mexico, but what it did instead was spread it through the entire body. And you have to give the Sinaloans credit—their response to their little diaspora was pure genius. Somewhere along the line they figured out that their real product isn’t drugs, it’s the two-thousand-mile border they share with the United States, and their ability to move contraband across it. Land can be burned, crops can be poisoned, people can be displaced, but that border—that border isn’t going anywhere. A product that might be worth a few cents one inch on their side of the border is worth thousands just one inch on the other side.

All this and the wine's coming in and out, and by the time the waiters set the espressos down Callan’s about half in the bag. He watches Calabrese take a long sip from an espresso cup. Then the boss says, “Tell me why I shouldn’t kill you.” One motherfuck of an essay question.

You know the word 'barbarian’ came from the Romans? It meant 'redheaded.’ They was talking about you people. I saw that on the—what do you call it?—the History Channel, last night.

What’s the problem?” Fuck it, Art thought. Too late now. So he answered, “That we look at 'these people’ like 'targets.

This train carries saints and sinners. This train carries losers and winners. This train carries whores and gamblers. This train carries lost souls… Canción popular

Not in San Salvador, he thinks, where the shanty slums press against gleaming high-rises like the thatched huts of medieval peasants pressed against castle walls. Except these castle walls are patrolled by private security guards wielding automatic rifles and machine pistols. And at night, the guards venture out from the castle walls and ride through the villages ...and slaughter the peasants, leaving their bodies at crossroads and in the middle of village squares, and rape and kill women and execute children in front of their parents. So the survivors will know their place. It’s a killing ground, Art thinks. El Salvador. The Savior, my ass.

All this and the wines coming in and out, and by the time the waiters set the espressos down Callan’s about half in the bag. He watches Calabrese take a long sip from an espresso cup. Then the boss says, 'Tell me why I shouldn’t kill you.' One motherfuck of an essay question.

All this and the wine's coming in and out, and by the time the waiters set the espressos down Callan’s about half in the bag. He watches Calabrese take a long sip from an espresso cup. Then the boss says, 'Tell me why I shouldn’t kill you.' One motherfuck of an essay question.

They got the absolute freedom to choose what we want them to.

Deliver my soul from the sword; my love from the power of the dog. Psalms 22:20

When you’re headin’ for the border lord, you’re bound to cross the line. KRIS KRISTOFFERSON, «Border Lord»

The lost, the lonely, the bicultural misfits with a foot in two worlds and a place in neither. And

Adán fell asleep to these stories and slept like the dead until the sun struck him in the eyes and the whole long, wonderful summer day started again with the smell of fresh tortillas, manchaca, chorizo, and fat, sweet oranges.

The lost, the lonely, the bicultural misfits with a foot in two worlds and a place in neither.

This is what Mexican cops appreciate that American cops don’t. We are partners, mi hermano Arturo, in the same enterprise. Comrades in the War on Drugs. We could not exist without each other.

Art can’t decide whether the War on Drugs is an obscene absurdity or an absurd obscenity. In either case, it’s a tragic, bloody farce.

In America, everything is about systems,” Barrera said. “In Mexico, everything is about personal relationships.

The reaction at Manhattan South is going to go something like Someone blanked Eddie Friel? Oh. Anyone want this last chocolate glazed?