With an adult in the White House, maybe real border troubles will be addressed

The Drug War raging in Juarez is just the open manifestation of a low-level conflict border residents have lived with for years, said one panelist at a UTEP forum that was organized by the student newspaper "The Prospector" and the Sam Donaldson Center for Communication Studies earlier this week.

Calling the drug underworld a "parallel reality," Ruben Olague, former assignments editor for El Diario de El Paso, said journalists ought to do more work to understand the world that all border residents share -- for example, the common story of the guy who grew up next door, went to school with us, perhaps still attends our church or community center, and is part of the drug economy.