#1408 - Ed Calderon

Joe Rogan (0:04)

Welcome back, Ed. Good to see you again, man.

Ed Calderon (0:07)

Thank you for having me back.

Joe Rogan (0:08)

Well, I'm happy you're back, but I'm not happy that there was a motivation to bring you back based on the violence, you know, the violence that is going on between the cartels, and it was the Mormons, and then there was, we were just talking about this other person that got shot because they ran, would you explain that again? They ran a cartel roadblock?

Ed Calderon (0:28)

Yeah, basically in Tamaulipas, a lot of the cartel groups actually make a, they build their roadblocks on the state and local roads.

And according to what I've heard from some of the people that I know there, this family ran one of those roadblocks. They didn't know if it was cops or not, and they apparently decided to run the roadblock, and the cartel guys shot them.

Joe Rogan (0:50)

What should someone do if they encounter a cartel roadblock?

Ed Calderon (0:54)

Slow down.

I mean, if anything, I would probably avoid traveling through those areas. That's the number one avoidance.

Usually, you know, and I've actually gone through some of those myself. Really? Yeah. And it's all about, they're looking out for rivals moving through their territory. They're looking for government personnel maybe spying on them. And usually, they'll just shake you down for some money, and they'll let you go on your way, unless you have a 4x4 truck that can use for their own purposes, which is...

Joe Rogan (1:29)

Oh, they might take your truck?

Ed Calderon (1:32)

Specifically, in Tamaulipas, 4x4 trucks are a commodity for them. They use them for their ongoing turf war.

Joe Rogan (1:38)

Oh, right. Especially someone else's. They don't mind getting shot up.

Ed Calderon (1:42)

Yeah. I mean, most of the trucks that you see that are up armored, or they have the rifles on top, are usually stolen vehicles.

All of them are stolen vehicles. And a lot of them are Americans crossing into Mexico. Some of them are Americans crossing into Mexico and just getting trucks stolen.

Joe Rogan (2:00)

Jesus Christ. That's a real common thing?

Ed Calderon (2:03)

It's starting to be pretty common. I recently saw a case of an apparent abduction in Tamaulipas. You see the video and the cartel guys come out of the car. They grab the owner of a pickup truck. They get him out of the car. They take his cell phone and leave it on the sidewalk because they're aware of all the SOS technology. And they take him inside of another car, and they take the truck.

And you would think it's because he did something or he's involved in something. They let him go a few blocks later and just took the truck. It was all about the truck.

It's resources. They're just acquiring resources for the war, basically.

Joe Rogan (2:46)

Nice of them to let him go.

Ed Calderon (2:48)

Nice of them to let him go.

It's not always the case. But it's pretty, yeah.

Joe Rogan (2:53)

I think most people in America are just now waking up to the chaos that's going on down there. I think that the Mormon assassination was a real wake-up call.

But I think people are paying much more attention now. I mean, we talked about this. When was the last time you were on? It was like five months, something like that?

Ed Calderon (3:12)

A lot of the stuff we talked about those five months ago, that's how things progressed. We actually did mention the Mormon communities down there, which was kind of eerie.

And we talked about the possible designation of cartels as terrorist groups.

Joe Rogan (3:31)

Yeah, you had an interesting take on that. So Trump was saying that they were going to designate them as terrorist groups and that they were going to have military action against them.

And then there was some sort of negotiation with the president of Mexico. What do you think went down there?

Ed Calderon (3:45)

So, I mean, this is just, you know, from what I see and from how things traditionally happen down there, Mexico currently has a leftist president down there. He's very to the left. So much to the left that he recently gave Evo Morales, the deposed leftist president of Bolivia, asylum in the country. And there's been a lot of pro-left political stuff going on in Mexico, basically.

As soon as the designation threat by the US came down, there was some sort of negotiation, and a lot of things happened after some US officials went down there and talked to the government. Among them, Evo Morales is out. He went to Cuba, apparently, and then went to Argentina, so he's not going to stay in Mexico.