Governor Luis Fortuno is finally waking up and paying attention to the murder rate in Puerto Rico. In 2009, the gang bangers beat their own 2008 record by 80 more souls taken.
FYI - one of my first blog articles ever here was about Puerto Rico's murder rate, surely one of the island's biggest black marks. I even speculated on how rising violent crime might eventually spark an uprising of vigilante justice. And I talked about how heavily armed these drug lord lead death squads really are. AK47 anyone?
Fortuno's act of calling in the National Guard demonstrates that it's finally on his radar. However, there is a very strong possibility that it is little more than a political move to distract from other issues threatening his reelection bid. Or perhaps his brain was finally shocked into focus on the guns/violence when he saw the pictures of Puerto Rico's doctors in Haiti playing with guns in between the hacksaw surgeries. Powerful imagery can have that effect.
Puerto Rico is well overdue for launching a big move to counteract the rampant murders. Unfortunately, Caribbean Business is reporting that the NG soldiers will be primarily assisting with "preventative patrols" and "repairing police patrol vehicles". That roughly translates to driving around with their blue lights on, and putting filler into AK47 holes, right?
Depending on how they want to define what's involved in those "preventative patrols", I would say we may not expect much impact if any with this move. It certainly has the characteristics of a PR (public relations) maneuver.
Check out Gil the Jenius' more in depth take on the political aspects of this move here.
The Insider
