The guy's a Berkeley humanities (now there's an oxymoron for you) professor, but he does bring up an interesting parallel:

"This spring in El Paso, after a talk I gave on the Indian raids and the U.S.-Mexican War, a man in the back row raised his hand. "Do you see any similarities between the borderland violence you've just described for the 1830s and 1840s and the current drug war?" The energy in the room changed immediately.

More than any other American city, El Paso has borne witness to the tragedy of Mexico's raging drug war...."

He has his own thoughts, and they're not as barking mad as you'd expect. But I suspect the wars also has lessons to teach that he hasn't considered.