Positive effects aside, legalizing recreational drugs will not eliminate the cartels, but instead will reroute the distribution of their product through "legal" channels. The cartels have sufficient power that the only move left is their integration with established markets. They aren't just going to lie flat while "legitimate" corporations take their spot.

Legalizing has other benefits though, like increasing scrutiny into human- and arms-trafficking, a legitimized drug business will need to shed that part somehow and hide it.

>What you're suggesting is that all Mexicans suffer more because some money may somehow end up in the hands of the cartel.

It's not just Mexicans. Cartels don't respect borders.

You give your sister $100. You find out later that she uses $50 of that money to buy heroin and inject it in herself.

Do you keep giving her the $100?

Absolutely not! This isn't even a real question.

If you directly enable a person or group of people or country to harm themselves and others, you have a duty to stop doing it.

If US remittances are directly fueling the cartel which beats, rapes, murders and even engages in torture, then not only may the US cease that but it is plainly ethically bound to do so.

Yes, this will make it hard for Grandma to buy a car.

You can't fund the people who torture and rape random Mexican farmers so Grandma can buy a car.

> If you really want to eliminate the cartels make recreational drugs legal.

While murdering drug users with their own money may seem like a clever solution, you are in fact still doing murder just in long form.