The Power and the Money

Secuestro express

  Via Matt Yglesias via the National Review, Graeme Wood wonders why secuestros express aren't more common in the United States.

An “express kidnapping” occurs when a criminal gang mugs you and takes you from ATM to ATM until your cards don't work anymore.  In all the first-hand accounts that I've heard the victim was let go within hours.  (I have reliable second hand accounts of ones that ended rather worse:  one lasted a few days; in the other the victim resisted, got shot with a small caliber handgun, and drove himself to a hospital.)  After nothing that this sort of thing doesn't happen in Cairo, Wood wonders why such a “high-reward and not more than medium-risk [crime] does not happen more in America.”  

Sometimes it seems that half my Canadian in-laws are in the Mounties, and my uncle Brent is a cop in Baltimore.  So I asked him why it doesn't happen.  His answer was fairly obvious:  express kidnappings are not medium-risk in the United States.  They are superlatively high-risk, in terms of being caught.  An express kidnapper needs accomplices, needs to travel with a victim in tow, needs to visit public spaces that are often under electronic surveillance, and leaves a very exact trail showing where they went and when.  If they don't want to commit murder, they also usually leave behind an eyewitness who has spent enough time with them for a positive ID.  You'd have to be nuts to try it anywhere in the United States outside New Orleans.  People do, of course, but they get caught, so it doesn't catch on.  The same applies to other countries with efficient police forces, like Chile or Spain.  There was a brief surge of express kidnappings in Spain in 2006, but the criminals were often caught.

Mexico City does not have an efficient police force.  Not only does it lack anything resembling an investigatory capacity, but response times are extremely slow, and the police are often involved in criminality themselves.  The mystery isn't why express kidnappings are rare in the U.S. and Canada.  It's why they don't happen in Cairo.   

Meanwhile, enjoy Method Man:

UPDATES:  Unexpected shout-out from Graeme Wood!  Also, in comments, a link to this book, which illustrates why secuestros express rarely happen in the United States.  It also looks like a good read. 

An idle thought from Pasig City

  Proposition:  As traditional written science fiction fades away as a popular genre, it becomes increasingly acceptable to cite it in intellectual and academic circles.

Proximate inspiration from Brad Delong, with secondary impetus from this event with Charlie Stross and Paul Krugman.  (What the hell did happen to my post about Charlie?  I swear, he has magically erased it from the internets.) 

I'm not sure this rises to the level of a great debate attempt.

Buy our book!

Go buy our book!  It is the best book.  Ever.  About anything.

 

Or not.  But is a very good book about Mexico since 1980.  Here are the chapters:

1. The second Mexican revolution: economic, political, and social change since 1980;
2. Mexico before 1982: the political economy of authoritarian rule;
3. The causes and consequences of free trade;
4. The Mexican banking system: the politics and economics of financial underdevelopment;
5. The transformation of Mexican politics;
6. Health, education, and welfare in Mexico since 1980;
7. Democracy and development in Mexico: future challenges and the legacy of authoritarian rule.

The book is a stand-alone, but it's really the second one in a planned trilogy.  You can buy the first part here.  Anyway, if you're interested in Mexico, economic development, or the importance of democracy, I'd recommend that you pick up a copy of Mexico Since 1980. 

Freakonomics on Obama

Normally I try to be witty in these plugs, but this time I'm going to skip it.  I am simply going to say that anyone who wants to know about Barack Obama's intellect and philosophy can simply pick up his second book, The Audacity of Hope.  It is very well-written, and rather substantive.

Steven Levitt, the economist behind Freakonomics, liked it quite a lot.  If you say that you have interest in the candidate, then it behooves you to read it.