The screen flickered to life.

Center screen, Chama and Tony (the DEA undercover) face each other across a table. Between them is a piece of hand luggage containing three hundred grand in hundreds and fifties.

Several problems are immediately apparent. First, Tony's Spanish is rudimentary at best, and Miguel speaks only a few words of English. Tony, for example, keeps referring to the 'percento,' until Miguel finally figures out he is trying to say 'purity'--a word anyone who did drug deals in Spanish would have known in his sleep.

Second, neither man knows his role. It is like Pee Wee Herman and Newt Gingrich playing dress-up and pretending to do a drug deal. Chama is dressed like the hotel maintenance man and Tony like an Elvis impersonator.

Neither knows the mechanics of a real Class One drug deal, or any real drug deal for that matter. There is no discussion of specific amounts, prices, weights, meeting places, delivery dates, provisions for testing the merchandise before delivery, methods of delivery, or prearranged trouble signals. Nothing happens that resembles a real drug deal, which is typically a paranoid event all about specifics. What the agents had on video wasn't authentic enough for a Stallone movie.

The only clear thing is that Tony is asking Miguel to promise that if Miguel is allowed to leave the room with the $300,000 he will deliver an unspecified amount of cocaine within 25 to 30 days to an unspecified location. Pretty good for a parking lot attendant.

Miguel eagerly assures his new benefactor that he will make the delivery. He is then allowed to examine the money, after which the undercover DEA agent asks him if he is happy with what he sees. Miguel, who must be thinking that America truly is a land of gold-paved streets guarded by idiots and that his friend Snakeface is a genius on a par with Einstein, assures Tony that he is very happy.

With all the elements of the crime of conspiracy recorded on videotape, Tony concludes by saying, 'Whew! Thank you very much and I'll wait for your call.'

'OK,' says Miguel, his eyes bugging out with disbelief as he gets to his feet holding the money.

'Hey, dude,' says Tony, 'I'll be here a little while. I have to make a few calls. Bye.'

Miguel's look as he starts to leave with the money says: Feet, don't fail me now. But they don't have far to go--about a half dozen steps before he is arrested.

I clicked off the video. If DEA stood for Dumb Enforcement Administration, Miguel undoubtedly was a Class One violator. But a drug dealer he definitely was not.

Had the agents responsible for this case been working for me at any time during the 17 years I was a supervisory agent, I would have jerked them into my office for a private conference. 'There are a million real drug dealers in this country,' I would have told them. 'There's probably a couple of hundred working within a square mile of the office. If you've gotta go 3,000 miles and spend a quarter of a million in taxpayer bucks to turn a fucking parking lot attendant into a Class One doper, you oughta be working for the CIA, or Congress, or wherever else you can convert bullshit to money.'