AUSTIN, Texas – Texas Gov. Rick Perry says backing down in the face of threats from Mexican drug cartels and gangsters is "the worst thing we can do."

Perry made his comments after a Mexican police commander who had been investigating the reported shooting of an American tourist on a border lake was killed Tuesday, according to U.S. and Mexican officials.

Perry told The Associated Press that the response on both sides of the border should be to increase "the numbers of law enforcement and military."

Perry has been pressuring Mexico to step up the search for David Hartley. Hartley's wife, Tiffany, says she and her husband were attacked by pirates on the lake on Sept. 30, while they were returning to the U.S. from Mexico on Jet Skis. Hartley was shot and presumably fell into the lake.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101012/ap_ ... e_shooting