Keynote Fox host Tucker Carlson has also tackled it, much to the chagrin of some of Carlson’s fans who view him as a restrainer in foreign policy. But the nation’s drug crisis is also deeply important to Carlson and many in his orbit, and the story appears to have struck a nerve. The Meyer report, along with research done by FDD and others, alleges a vast narcoterrorist operation commanded and controlled by Hezbollah in Latin America. Ottolenghi charges that Lebanon, Hezbollah’s home base, is on the verge of becoming a “narcostate.”

“I mean it’s one thing to say, look, we’re not going to hassle Iranian diplomats, or we’re going to look the other way, at nonsense going in Lebanon. But Hezbollah teaming up with the Zetas—the Mexican drug cartel—to import tons of cocaine into the United States in the middle of a drug epidemic? Seems like a pretty big thing to overlook,” Carlson said last week, while hosting neocon Bloomberg News columnist Eli Lake. But for those on the restrainer Right—and for those who think this story in mainly a Trojan horse for escalation of conflict with Iran, which Hezbollah has sworn loyalty to, Ottolenghi and others note—Carlson, who also founded and retains an ownership stake in The Daily Caller, seemed to assuage some concerns Wednesday by going after his old foil Max Boot for an article on “white privilege.” “Max Boot will say anything if they just let him invade Iran,” Carlson’s account tweeted. Earlier this year, I highlighted the brutal exchanges he had with both Boot and uber-hawkish commentator Ralph Peters, and concluded, that Carlson had essentially declared war on the neoconservatives.