11.06.07
History, Drugs, and American Gangster
Last night Brian and I went to see American Gangster starring Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe. Wow, what a story! I realize Hollywood must have embellished or Hollywood-ized the story, but it was based on a true story. True stories always catch my eye.
I’m assuming many people have already heard or read about the drug involvement with our military during the Vietnam war. Some go so far as to say that a lot of the Vietnam war was about drugs (the Golden Triangle stuff and all). But this American Gangster story puts in another angle to how big the drug business has been and likely still is right here in the United States. After all, anyone who has been exposed to world history is somewhat familiar with the Opium War between the British and the Chinese. Basically the story goes that the British wanted to do trade with China in the 1700s and China wasn’t interested. China felt that they had all they needed and did not care for the goods that the British wanted to trade. However, the British still wanted to trade with China and what opened the door for trade was opium. The British found that the Chinese wanted opium. According to some history books, the British started out in 1736 with exporting about 400 chests (which contained about 45 pounds or 100 kilograms of opium) into China, but eventually worked their way up to 30,000 chests by 1850. That’s a lot of opium! And I bet they were making mega bucks. I think that’s an amazing story in itself, but history tends to repeat itself and human nature appears to have remained the same through the centuries. Namely, many people were corrupt and corruptible.
As in the opium trades between Britain and China had corrupt officials, so did Americans and the southeast Asians. According to movie, Frank Lucas employed military personnel to transport his heroin from Southeast Asia into the United States. This article even states that, “the CIA knew all about his shipments and even made it possible for Lucas to bring the dope to America. Lucas was such an astute businessman that he even had the mob, the Sicilians and Mexicans as clients. Everybody wanted what Lucas was peddling.” Frank Lucas was in the business of selling pure heroin which became known on the streets as “blue magic.” He was eventually caught, but not without exposing many, many corrupt NY nacrotics police personel in the process. It is said that during his conviction, 3/4ths of the NYPD Narcotics division was found to be corrupt and involved with drug dealings. Wow! That’s more than half of their division! Just goes to show that people will succumb to temptations. If 3/4ths of the NYPD Narcotics division was corrupt back then in the 1960 and 1970s, what’s to stop them today? Even after a 100 years after the opium wars, it appears that human nature has not changed. Corruption and greed are likely still alive and well.
This movie made me think more about all these businesses I see one after the other as I drive around Los Angeles. I look inside and lots of them seem to have no customers inside. How do they stay in business like that? Are they all legit? Or are some of these businesses fronts for more clandestine dealings? Not long ago I was looking at these buildings in a different light when I was reading about “human body parts for transplantation.” What strange things are going on right in my neighborhood? Now I look at these buildings and wonder which ones are dealing in drugs, ha ha! I shouldn’t laugh at that, but I think it’s part of what my sons say about me, that at times I have dark humor. My take is that learning about some of these things makes me cynical. For instance, I know that there must be some legit businesses. Yet, the other side of me wonders every so often as I drive by some of the incredible mansions that are in Los Angeles and Beverly Hills, what business are these people in to have such opulence? Who are they stealing from or hurting? Or screwing? Ha! Normal comforts I can see are many times earned honestly, but I wonder what percentage of the ultra wealthy acquire their money through corruption and extortion?
Okay, so really quickly back to the movie, American Gangster, I think Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe did a great job. Who ever directed it or wrote the scripts also did well. The movie turned out not to be as violent as I was afraid it might have been, but just enough to give you an idea of what was going on (which I appreciate because while I don’t like to watch violence, I am also disturbed at times when terrible events are watered down. Catch 22, I know). Basically, it had a real story to tell, and it was told well.
Okay, I’m off to make myself useful.
Toodles!
Marlakins
