The Mex Files

La ultima vez...

2006-11-23T21:05:00.000-06:00

I'm STILL updating the version at http://mexfiles.wordpress.com but I have all the posts carried over to that site. We'll still be dropping in to recover photos and see how this site is going, but I don't think I'll be adding new posts in here. WOW ... 9000 + posts since I added a counter at the end of May. I know some of you, but to the many, many strangers who've found this site useful... please vist us at the NEW(er), IMPROVED(er) Mex Files... I don't know who these 9000 posters are (I have some clues, thanks to blogflux.com where you come from... we have regular readers among other places in Columbia, New Delhi, British Columbia, Clarksville MD, and Arkansas. Thanks, y'all. So... how to go out? I don't know everyone's tastes, so here's a "traditional" version of Besame Mucho sung by Thalia, and "Blue Dreams, La Ultima Vez" by Monterrey garage band, "PunkPop de Monterrey". Besame Mucho (En vivo) Blue Dream - La Ultima Vez Blue Dream - La Ultima Vez de "PunkPop de Monterrey"

2006-11-22T23:58:00.000-06:00

Mariachi Juvenil Aguila Azteca

As we slowly fade away...

2006-11-22T05:26:00.000-06:00

... I've started deleting some old posts... thought I'm not sure everything here has carried over to over here. So, some older posts (which probably not too many people would look for anyway) aren't here. But the cool thing is I can set up those tags -- and subtags -- and sometimes sub-sub tags, under categories that make sense to me. So, folks, what do you think... "Cannibals"... should they be a subset of Pre-columbian Religion? Maybe under "crime" or under "Food and Drink"?

Oaxaca and AMLO -- two new posts

2006-11-21T16:58:00.000-06:00

While trying to migrate these files over the the NEW, IMPROVED http://mexfiles.wordpress.com, I've written two new posts that are "over there"

Life (sorta) under seige in Oaxaca

(From a post on the Mexico Branch of Lonely Planet’s “Thorn Tree Message Board” from a Oaxaca resident) My own take on Oaxaca right now is that it resembles the story of the blind men and the elephant. Today was a perfect example of that.

I’d arranged to meet a friend inside the big doorway to Amate Books. I came up Calle Victoria from the Abastos Market, seeing nothing untoward until I got closer to the zocalo, where the PFP were much in evidence. I proceded north on Porfirio Diaz, cutting east on Matamoros & turning onto Alcala. Whoops — a barricade was under construction just in front of Amate. I stepped over it, along with several other people, finally sighting my friend on the steps in ...

AMLO sashes the opposition… November 20th, 2006

… or is he the opposition?

By just not fading away quietly, AMLO remains a force to be reckoned with in Mexico. I don’t think he really expects to support an “alternative governement” through donations… what he’s done is very creatively set up a relevant “think tank” that will pester the incoming conservative administration , and keep them — not to the “straight and narrow” but force them to deal with the 66% of the voters that did not chose Calderón. This should be… um… interesting.

MEXICO CITY (AFP) - Defeated leftist presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador donned a “presidential sash” before a crowd of thousands, calling himself Mexico’s legitimate leader....

See 'ya there!

The Vortex of Evil... José Manuel Nava murdered

2006-11-18T18:14:00.000-06:00

This is not a good photo of my friend José Manuel Nava, who was found stabbed to death in his Zona Rosa apartment earlier this week.

The photo appears to have been taken at some conference or another. While I knew Nava moved in the higher circles of Mexican politics and business, my contact with the "captains of industry" was in an English classroom at most. The José Manuel Nava I was acquainted with could adapt the gravitas required of Excelsior's Director when necessary, but I knew him as a good-looking, charming, witty and articulate denizem of the same Zona Rosa cafe I frequented.

It appears his charm, wit and good looks were not enough to protect him. While he knew he was an attractive man and comfortable with his age and ocial gifts -- he wasn't immune to the charms of youth. While he had little use for the street hustlers who'd come around those cafes looking for a papí, he wouldn't be the first person to make a horrible mistake, or the first to let down our guard around some charmer.

I don't know, and can't speculate. Any time a journalist is murdered, especially in Mexico, we always look at what they've written, and who might be offended. Nava had just published a book blaming the Fox administration and Presidnet Fox himself, among others , for the downfall of the cooperative that owned Excelsior from 1917 until the Nava was appointed to oversee the forced sale to private interests. No one blames him personally for overseeing that thankless task, though some bitterness and resentment still surface. Last week, in El Sol, he had obliquely criticized everyone, warning of the dangers if the left interferes with Felipe Calderón's inaguration, and if the Calderón administration does not heed the left's calls for change:

Cuando se llega a la violencia es porque la política ha sido rebasada y a pesar de las claras indicaciones que tenemos esperamos que ése no sea el caso de nuestro país.

And, there was his run-in with the C.I.A.

Back at the start of the War Against Iraq, I'd see José Manuel in the cafe, playing hooky, or taking a long Mexican lunch-hour, editing a series of articles he'd written, in which he referred to the Bush Administration as "The Vortex of Evil", into a book. He was under deadline, and under the pressure of managing a sinking newspaper, and when he was working... he was working. "Polite as a Mexican," he could let you know he was very busy, and even the charms of Banzar would not distract him.

I liked that cafe because it had outdoor seating on calle Genova and offered great people-watching opportunities. And good coffee. And Banzar the waiter. Banzar service was one of the attractions of the place. He remembered my order (being one of the few people who put cream in their coffee, it was a running joke that I'd have to send the other waiters back every time... all us gringos looked alike, I guess). An "exotic" (he's a black Ecuadorian), tall, althletic and extremely handsome -- his barista skills maybe weren't appreciated by the other foreign clientele. If Banzar understood English, he never let on... a good thing considering his opinion (and one I shared) of the creepy foreigners who hung out in that cafe, and who would invite the street hustlers to join them. Or flirt with Banzar, who would good humoredly accept their attentions... even if they never left a tip.

I understand English quite well, thank you. I was offended -- and appalled -- by those foreigners. Having told a 70-something Australian who wanted to know if I liked "that boy" (um... "no, I work in adult education" wasn't what he had in mind -- and I'm sure my lack of interests in his interests gave him some rather dull fiction to spin to his cronies, who seemed to dislike him even more than I did, though they met him every day in the same seats, and woe betide you if you took their seats. That cafe eventually went under, probably because that bunch hogged tables, yakked all day and never semed to spend much more than the price of a bottle of water. And welcomed in those street hustlers).

Gender preference is irrelevent, though I can't help speculating that being a "known associate" of those aging expats could have marked Nava as easy prey for whomever he ran into. I once was propositioned in Parque Alameda by a youngster I'd briefly met, and promptly forgot about at that cafe. An American alcoholic who at least was entertaining when he ranted about George W. Bush, whiled away the hours between his early afternoon teaching assignments and the various bars happy hours by waiting for "students" who sometimes showed up. This kid did, and wasn't understaning some point that the American didn't seem to know how to put across... as if that was the point of the exercize. It happened a Mexican teacher had showed me a way of making that particular point clear to Spanish-speakers, and I shared it with the boy. Resolving the problem, was not the point. I'm sure that kid was innocuous, but who knows about the others?

The Australian and his cronies are how I came to know José Manuel and his run-in with the C.I.A. I figured out fairly quickly that the foreigners in that cafe weren't people I really liked, or wanted to be around... but my Spanish was spotty, and I would be starved for English conversation, and so I was forced to venture out. By not taking a table with the foreigners (and in Mexico, one usually does end up sharing a table), broadened my horizons and kept my sanity (and improved my Spanish).

The jolly Cuban "double-exile" (he was a kid when his family fled to Miami in 1960, but Miami's Cuban community is a pretty unforgiving and cold place for an adult with no taste for right-wing terrorists or reactionary attitudes frozen in the 60s) was fun, but his main interst was cuisine (he ran a Cuban restaurant in Mexico City) and his fellow Cubans would drop by... making me feel like Lucy when Ricky's family showed up (Cubans are great fun, but they live and speak at 78 rpms in 33 1/3 rpm Mexico).

So, one dull afternoon, for lack of any alternative, I was talking to the Cuban, and the one creepy foreigner I could put up with for more than 15 minutes(at least his politics -- regarding the U.S. -- wasn't reactionary. About Mexico, he was a racist pig, talking about "brownies" and "whities" and insulting the "Indian noses". And he was an alcoholic, obsessed with both the street boys and the bar opening times), when I met José Manuel. Nata -- who came from a privileged backround -- was familiar enough with gringos to use the same words, but he'd never use them unless he was speaking with their regular users, and he used them ironically against the speaker, who was usually too stupid to realize he was the butt of Mexican contempt. I have no idea what party he voted for (and would never ask) but in the course of his career he'd critized the failings of all of them, and -- in what outsiders found unusual, spoke of the Revolution not as destroying the upper classes, but as a relative success for Mexicans... including the "brownies" and the ones with "Aztec noses". He was a Mexican patriot.

Nava had been a Excelsior's Washington corresponent for 18 years. His English was perfect. And so... besides meeting someone worth talking to, I found out about "Hazley Maxwell" and the C.I.A.

As a Washington expert, Nava of course had friends in the Embassy. One of his friends, who'd been assigned to Mexico City, was back living with his mother outside Washington, and José Manuel called him. He wasn't home, and Nava left a message. The mother couldn't comprehend that a former diplomatic officer in Mexico might know people with Spanish names. She wrote down "José Manuel" as "Hazley Maxwell". It was a running joke in Washington journalistic circles for years, and a few small articles in obscure publications have appeared under Hazley's by-line. José Manuel wondered if "Hazley Maxwell" was also being investigated by the C.I.A., or if his "alias" might throw off people he found more amusing than threatening.

When the "Vortex of Evil" articles first appeared, the C.I.A. Station Chief in Mexico City called Excelsior, and got as far as José Manuel's secretary, who has been around newsmen too long to suffer fools gladly. A mere C.I.A. Station Chief is no match for a tought secretary. There was no way she was going to give out any information on her boss. Even when the Ambassador called, demanding to speak to Nava, no way.

José Manuel's only reaction to the whole dust-up was typical. He admitted being flattere by the attention the U.S. Government was giving to his strugging paper, but "disappointed" when, after a lot of work by attornies in Washington, the Mexican Embassy and a Freedom of Information Act request, finally discovered the C.I.A. only considered his paper "less influential than it formerly was".

At the time, I was writing a short guidebook on Mexico City. Much of what I said about the media, I got from José Manuel. He was more than willing to share his thoughts on Mexican media, and on "Chilangolandia" in general. It surprised me that he enjoyed my crack that his paper, on slow news days "made news". The paper, then owned by the employees, has had problems since the Echiverria adminstration engineered a coup of the editorial staff. When José Manuel took control, the paper was in the middle of a bitter strike that denegrated into a brawl between the pressmen and the reporters in the paper's offices (talk about your "on the scene coverage -- Nava joked it was the first "scoop" Excelsior had enjoyed in years)and he had the delicate, impossible task of trying to keep the paper afloat, moderize it (it didn't help that one of the cafe-queens thought it was his task to tell the editor how to run the on-line edition, though he politely thanked the fellow for his suggestions and even took a few notes) and -- if all else failed -- find a buyer.

José Manuel Nava will be remembered for his good manners and willingness to deflect fools no one would suffer gladly. you could tell he was NOT HAPPY with the foreigner who insisted Mexico had to sell Pemex to American oil companies. I don't think the American knew who he was talking to -- or it would have dawned on him that the opinion of an Odessa Texas antiques broker wasn't the one shared by the Mexican intellegencia. He appreciated that I was looking at the Mexican perspective, knew something about the country, and was more than generous with his time he'd stolen away from his impossible job to relax, have coffee and watch the world.

And I appreciated him for that and will miss him.

Mariachis of the world unite! (Oaxaca)

2006-11-18T18:04:00.000-06:00

From today's Mexico City Herald:

BY ALEJANDRO TORRES AND JORGE OCTAVIO OCHOA
OAXACA CITY - The Oaxaca People´s Assembly (APPO) on Friday outlined a change in strategy as a first step to transform themselves into a formal political force.
The idea is to reduce tensions and to focus their energies on positive propaganda, the APPO leadership told reporters.
The plan is still taking shape, so APPO members would only speak off-the-record, preferring to wait until the strategy is approved.
Among the measures the APPO is considering is the abandonment of the Benito Juárez Autonomous University and the removal of barricades near the campus. They may also try to "kill the enemy with kindness."
This would entail offering cleansing rituals to the Federal Preventative Police (PFP) troops stationed in the Historic Center of Oaxaca City, preparing food for them and even serenading them with mariachis.
APPO members guarding the university campus and operating the radio station may also be withdrawn and all future marches and demonstrations would be organized so as not to disturb non-participants.
Students manning the so- called "Soriana" barricade near the university are expected to dismantle the barrier by Tuesday.
The youth stationed at these barricades are already being organized into groups whose efforts will be focused on giving attention to street kids and youngsters living on the margins of society.
The APPO leaders also expressed hope that they can begin talks with the transition team of President-elect Felipe Calderón as early as next week.

The Mexican car that never was

2006-11-17T14:46:00.000-06:00

Ford 1922 Anhuac... this car was designed to be built in Mexico at the Ford plant near the Basilica, but never went in production. I have no information on it, but any motor heads out there are welcome to contribute.

Who's in your wallet?

2006-11-17T01:27:00.000-06:00

You go through a gringo's wallet (um... preferably not one you "found"... handing out of some distracted backpacker's hip pocket on the Mexico City Metro during rush hour) and who do you find? Mostly dead presidents, and mostly generals -- Washingon on the one; Jackson on the 20; and Grant on the 50-dollar bill. There's the first Secretary of the treasury on the ten and Lincoln (another president) on the five, but not until you get to the 100, do you find someone known for something other than warfare and politics. And Benjamin Franklin os better remembered for his witty reworkings of commonplace sayings, or home-improvement inventions than for any philospophical or artistic breakthoughs.

Mexico, too has their "dead presidents" (well, PRESIDENT ... but you can't get around Benito Juarez) and military heros (Morelos on the 50-peso note. But then, Morelos was the very model of a modern guerilla leader -- Che Guevarra as country priest. Padre Hidalgo, another cura/revolutionary is on the 1000, but you seldom see a grand), but they also have:

Nezahuacoatl on the 100. Where are our poet-statesmen? Not that I can think of any (Lincoln's rhetoric, good as it is, doesn't rise to the level of poetry). But with Sor Juana Inez de la Cruz -- poet, philosopher, educational reformer and scientist -- on the 200, Mexico is saying something about THEIR values that we're not.

With the currency changes in Mexico, the worthies are getting a make-over. Mexican bills, like the U.S. bills are modernizing, and coming out with new safety features. There's some grumbling, but the one professional miliary man on Mexican currency -- Ignacio Zaragoza (who was born near Matagorda Bay, Texas, by the way) is retreating before another cultural hero. Zaragoza won the Battle of Puebla, the glorious Cinco de Mayo, and he's a genuine hero. But... what does Mexico want to say about itself? That it once beat the French against all odds? Nah... they want to say "we're a nation of high culture and great artists".

PRESENTING ... the NEW 500-peso note!

Alas, Diego Rivera was an ugly man (and Zaragosa, while he looked more like a grad student in literature than a general, looks conventionally heroic) and the reverse includes Rivera's over-rated wife, Frida Kahlo. And, there has been a lot of criticism that the Banco de Mexico is turning its back on a worthy hero in favor of "political correctness." So be it. But, it's what we like about Mexico. The slight irony of a country with the National Bank controlled by foreign capitalists putting two Communists on their currency is wonderful.

Even better, it says to the world -- no, we're not a military power, and we do have money to spend... but we know what's really important... poetry, science, art. So, when do we put Walt Whitman or Emily Dickinson on our bills?

Where was the Romanticism?

2006-11-16T18:47:00.000-06:00

Women who followed the armies during Mexico's Revolutionary War didn't look like the women in this scene. They didn't walk along side their men. They didn't take long walks down the streets of Chihuahua wearing their finest (clean) colorful dresses. The women were hungry, filthy, tired, overworked, neglected, generally unappreciated, and often suffering from illnesses. That doesn't take away from the fact that they were devoted, supportive, and played a very valuable role in the fighting forces they "served" in.

There hasn't been a lot of detail written about the role of women in the Mexican Revolution, but among the lower class, many women became soldaderas, fighting soldiers, or victims. Some women actively opposed the revolution because they were strong supporters of Catholicism and the Church held views that strongly contrasted with the goals of the revolution. There were some women from middle/upper classes who lent support to various sides of the war through their intellectual endeavors. These women were often teachers/ journalists, etc. Many of this group were early feminists. The fact that they served as advisors, strategists, reformists led to many of them being beaten, harassed, imprisoned and even murdered.

The following description comes from an excellent article I found at this link:

http://www.actlab.utexas.edu/~geneve/zapwomen/goetze/paper.html

The soldadera was the most typical role women played in contribution to the Mexican Revolution. It was typical in that it involved a large number of women and that it followed the most accepted gender-based roles for women as caregivers. Although they occasionally fought in battle, these women generally traveled with the revolutionary armies to forage for food, cook meals, nurse the wounded, wash clothes, and other services not provided by the military . Although some authors do not distinguish between the Soldaderas and the female fighters, Andrés Reséndez Fuentes makes a clear distinction between those women who served as a vital support system to the combatants, and those who actually participated in the fighting. Soldaderas endured miserable living conditions, malnutrition, and even childbearing under inhospitable surroundings . Soldaderas whose husbands died in battle often continued in their roles as the soldadera of another soldier . While "no army of the revolution fought without women but each organized female participation in a distinct manner," . Soldaderas generally remained anonymous and were never recognized for their indispensable contribution to the revolution.

Female fighting soldiers often joined on as soldaderas and moved from that role to one of a full time gun-toting revolutionary. They usually took on masculine roles in their dress, swearing, drinking, and became all around toughs. Female soldiers who showed a lot of skills and had leadership qualities actually did become officers of men and raised in the ranks of the Revolutionary Army.

Victims were usually women who stayed home to tend to their children and to protect their homes. Once the armies ran low on rations, the soldiers would raid their homes for food and supplies. The girls/women who lived in those homes were often raped and if the soldiers suspected them of being connected with the enemy, they were murdered. Zapata's men were especially famous for raping women throughout their territory.

The woman in the photo was a Yaqui scout named Hermilianda Wong Chew who served under Obregon. She was thought to be a fighting soldier/officer because of her pearl handled pistol and her binoculars. (Thanks Rich!)

Soldaderas walked behind their soldiers because officers would not give a horse to a woman. He would give it to a fighting soldier first and the women would have to carry their children and their personal supplies while their traveled by foot. When an army traveled by train, the women often rode atop or outside (the cars) the train as the cars were reserved for the soldiers. Female fighting soldiers usually provided their own horse.

The role of women differed depending on who's army they served with.... Villa, Zapata, Carranza, etc. Villa tended to resent the fact that the soldaderas slowed his men down. He liked the ability to move quickly. Zapata admired/appreciated the support offered by the women, whereas Villa was cool to the idea. Villa reportedly had one of his female soldiers shot because she accidently shot one of his men. Ironically, he had her buried with military honors. On another occasion, Villa executed 80 to 90 enemy soldaderas (including thier children) because one of them took a shot at him.

The early Maderistas and Orozquistas of the north did not bring camp followers to the battlefield because the troops generally remained close to home. Also, the Soldaderas tended to be slow moving and deprived the cavalry units of their much valued swiftness. However, this lack of Soldaderas caused logistical problems when it came to medical needs and obtaining food and ammunition. Provisional support units were often set up by only a few women and some men, to provide nursing, food and other services, but were often insufficient and diverted soldiers from fighting.

A few of the remarkable women of the Revolution:

Petra Herrera became an officer or "coronela," commanding 200 men, according to a report in The Mexican Herald on January 7, 1914. Historian Elizabeth Salas tells us that Herrera, along with 400 other women, took part in the second battle of Torreón as part of Villa's vanguard. A villista by the name of Cosme Mendoza said, "Herrera was the one who took Torreón on May 30,1914."

Angela Jimenez, who at 15 witnessed her sister's attempted rape by a soldier. Her sister grabbed the officer's gun and killed him and then killed herself. Jimenez joined her father in the army, promising herself to kill the federales. Jimenez became a spy, soldier and explosives expert. Elisa Grienssen Zambrano of Parral, Chihuahua was a 13 yr. old teacher who commanded men and women of Parral to repel and expel a "punitive expedition" from the American army in April 1916. The American soldiers were on a mission to apprehend Gen. Francisco Villa. Elisa was so indignant that Americans would invade Mexico's sovereign territory that she organized women and school children to surround the North American commander, Frank Tompkins. Shortly, men in the town joined her and armed only with rocks, tomatoes, and shouts of "Viva Mexico, Viva Villa", they succeeded in forcing him and his men to retreat. When Villa asked Elisa "how did you do it?" She answered him, "We did it for Mexico".

*** A faded oil painting of Elisa Grienssen Zambrano is still on the wall of Villa's museum.

In 1911, Profesora Delores Jiménez y Muro founded the group Regeneración y Concordia from her prison cell. The group's purpose was to "improve the lot of indigenous races, campesinos, obreros, unify revolutionary forces, and elevate women economically, morally and intellectually,". In March 1911, Jiménez put together the Political and Social Plan, which was a conspiracy to bring Madero to power by a rebellion near Mexico City. Her Plan was unusual because it outlined the need for extensive social and economic reforms, rather than simply the desire for political change at the top. She specifically recognized in the Plan that the daily wages of both men and women in urban and rural areas needed to be increased, as women made up more of the "economically active" population than was acknowledged by the official census. Emiliano Zapata was very enthusiastic about Jiménez's Plan, particularly the part calling for the restitution of usurped village lands, and invited her to join his cause in Morelos. She did so after the death of Madero in 1913, and remained there until Zapata's assassination in 1919, well after her seventieth birthday. Although Dolores Jiménez y Muro was an active revolutionary for almost twenty years and provided significant contributions to history, she has received little attention from academics.

One of the most famous female soldiers was Margarita Neri, who became a legendary Zapatista commander. "So many legends surround Neri that she is portrayed as both commanding Zapatistas in Morelos and as cutting off the ears of Zapatistas sent to recruit her. Despite the mass of contradictory accounts, it seems that Margarita Neri was a capable and respected guerrilla commander.

additional links:

http://epcc.edu/nwlibrary/borderlands/21_soldaderas.htm http://www.sibleynaturecenter.org/essays/moseying/history/060301_liberatedwomen.html

Protests now in aisle 12...

2006-11-14T23:04:00.000-06:00

Last week it was McDonald's this week it's WalMart. Ah, Mexico... the past is always with us. The McDonald's protests go back a few years, and The Evil Empire has attracted my attention more than once

By KATHLEEN MILLER, Associated Press MEXICO CITY - About 250 protesters chanted "Out! Out!" in front of Wal-Mart's corporate headquarters before entering the adjacent store, where they blocked aisles for about 30 minutes before leaving. There were no immediate reports of arrests, injuries or damage.
Ruben Garcia, a Mexican citizen who works with San Francisco-based activist group Global Exchange, said the discount chain's low prices take business away from the country's traditional public markets and depress wages for workers and farmers.
"If a cantaloupe costs 20 cents at a Wal-Mart, imagine how much the rural farmers are getting for this cantaloupe," Garcia said. "There is a high cost for the low prices."
The company denied the accusations.
"Wal-Mart of Mexico generates very positive benefits for the country," it said in a statement. With more than 140,000 workers, Wal-Mart is the largest private sector employer in Mexico.
Some protesters carried signs bearing pictures of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, the leftist presidential candidate who claims he was robbed of victory in July elections and plans to be inaugurated as the "legitimate president" of an alternative government on Monday.
Lopez Obrador aides have accused Wal-Mart of supporting his conservative rival and the current president-elect, Felipe Calderon. The company denies the allegation.
The Arkansas-based company has been targeted by Mexican protesters before.
In 2004, a Wal-Mart-owned discount store opened less than a mile from the ancient temples of Teotihuacan, just north of Mexico City, despite months of protests by some residents who claimed the sprawling complex was an insult to Mexican culture.
Last month, Wal-Mart won preliminary approval over opposition from some residents to build a store in Cabo San Lucas, in Baja California Sur — the only one of Mexico's 31 states where it currently does not have an outlet.

Mr Bean -- pirate, scoundrel, Mexican hero

2006-11-14T01:49:00.000-06:00

Texans always have had a soft spot for pirates of one sort or another. The state that brought us Lyndon Baines Johnson, Halliburton, George Bush (I and II), Anna Nichole Smith and cheerleader mom Wanda Holloway, even under the relative sanity of Spanish and Mexican control attracted its share of ethically-challenged swashbucklers.

Look at the founding fathers. A dead-beat dad skipping out on alimony payments back in Tennesee -- Sam Houston -- gets a city named for him (and a 50 foot statue up by the Huntsville State Penitentary). Galveston forgets it was named FOR a fearsome Mexican lawman (Juan Galvez) and remembers it was named BY a gay pirate, with a peculiar sense of humor.

Jean Lafitte needed someplace quiet between New Orleans and Veracruz -- in both cities he was a "respectable" businessman... well, it was the "don't ask, don't tell" era of merchandizing. Naming his hideout for the chief lawman of the era was high camp -- and deliciously ironic. Just the thing for a witty jeu d'esprit to liven up those FABULOUS dinner parties Jean and his cher ami, Pierre, threw for the rogues, scoundrels and fellow merchandizers. Galveston, to it's credit, has never turned respectable... it still celebrates its scoundrels, and -- in the spirit of Jean and Pierre -- it's always been a gay-tolerant place.

During the War of 1812, Lafitte and Pierre provided material assistance and contract labor to the United States Navy -- in his day it was called a "letter of marque." It wasn't much, but it did start a tradition in Texas roguery -- the spiritual descendents of Jean and Pierre are today's unindicted Halliburton and Enron executives.

Not nearly as colorful as Lafitte, as ornery as LBJ or as rapacious as Enron or Halliburton ... and only a run-of-the-mill heterosexual bigamist, Peter Ellis Bean is almost bland... and, consequently, forgotten. There's no Bean County, no Beanville... no 50-foot statue to Mr. Bean.

It's a shame. He was as throughly disreputable as many a better-known Texas pioneer, and he managed to accidentally become a heroic figure in the Mexican War of Independence.

Bean traveled widely throughout Texas and what's now northern Chihuahua. The short biography in the Handbook of Texas On-line tells us little. He was born in Tennessee in 1783 (though 1778 seems more likely, as other records suggest) and in 1800 was part of the "ill-fated Philip Nolan expedition". He was only a teenager at the time, but he knew Nolan from his "horse-trading" (involving stolen horses -- or perhaps stealing horses -- from the Indians) expeditions.

Philip Nolan's name may ring a bell if you remember your Junior High School English. Edward Everett Hale mixed up Nolan's ill-fated attempt to invade Mexico with Aaron Burr's attempts to grab Texas the next year. Philip Nolan became "The Man Without a Country" in the 1917 short story, who is condemned to never to hear of the United States as long as he lived.

The real Nolan had some hare-brained idea that the Spanish wouldn't notice if he grabbed a himself a big o' hunk of Texas. They noticed. They shot Nolan. The filibustros were dragged off to Chihuahua to stand trial, but no one was in any hurry.

Mexican justice was even less efficient then than it is now -- it wasn't until 1807 that the survivors even came to trial. In the meantime, Bean (now often called Pedro Elías Beán) acccording to an online bigoraphy compiled from several 19th century sources:

"... became a shoemaker and at Chihuahua he established a hat manufacturing enterprise. He reputation spread for manufacture of hats of such quality that he soon obtained a monopoly on the local hat trade, had several employees and gained the respect of residents of the region. After four years, discovery of plans for escape, betrayal by fellow prisoners on the Nolan Expedition and attempts to escape temporarily abrogated his success and privileges. He survived execution by a throw of the dice with one point lower than the unlucky member of the group."

Bean and another "lucky" survivor, David Faro, were eventually given a prison sentence. They were packed off to Acapulco (believe it or not, that was punishment... ok, they were locked in the dungeon, but it was a nice sea-side dungeon) in 1811. They were just in time for Padre Morelos' seige of the city. With the Spanish distracted by the Insurgentes, Bean and Faro dug their way out of the prison, ending up with Morelos' army. Although he was convenionally pious, and was considered a dedicated and honest village cura, Morelos was as tough a customer as any frontier horse-trader. He'd been a muleskinner and cowboy before entering the priesthood, and having served in rough, unsettled back country churches not only gave him the toughness to become the great guerilla leader that he was, he had an uncanny ability to pick subordinates for their qualities, overlooking their spiritiual shortcomings.

Morelos knew he was working with scoundrels, but one of those scoundrels ... our anti-hero, Mr. Bean, had somewhere acquired a more usable skill than making hats and shoes ... he knew how to make cannon-balls and explosives.

Wilbert H. Timmons, who wrote what I think is the only English-language biography of Morelos ("Morelos of Mexico: Priest, Soldier, Stateman. El Paso, Texas Press Western Press. 1963, rep. 1970) has this to say about the remarkable Mr. Bean:

One Anglo-American, Perter Ellis Bean, should be included among those who joined the Morelos movement during its first year of military operations and who contributed significantly to the cause.
... Bean escaped as Morelos entered the Acapulco area, joined his insurgent army, and aidend the revolutionaries immeasuably through his knowledge of the manufacture of gunpowder. "As there were large quantities of salpeter in the country," wrote Bean, "and I was the only one who understood the manufacture of powder, I set up a powder mill. We obtained sulpher from a mine near Chilpancingo and while the Indian women ground the material on their metates, I msade the powder." Bean remained with Morelos until 1814, when he was sent to the United States to obrain aid for the insurgent cause.

The official on-line biographer (partially based on Bean's self-serving 1816 autobiography) write of his activities:

Bean distinguished himself by engineering large scale defections from the Royal Forces to the Republicans and exhibited leadership in action that brought him the rank of Colonel. He was in command of the troops that captured the city of Acapulco including his former captors. In contrast to the Mexican Indian insurgents under his command, Bean insisted on humane treatment of prisoners and was admired for the trait by both sides. Bean met and became acquainted with most of the important chieftains of the Mexican independence movement including Gen. Manuel Mier y Terán and Felíx Fernández (Guadalupe Victoria).

Those 19th century biographers decorously mention that he "met" a "Spanish lady" at this time. They neglect to mention her name, Doña Magdalena Falfan de los Godos, or the possibly important detail that he married her. Why becomes obvious later.

Morelos was no fool, but he had very little knowlege of the wider world. And even less maneuverablity when it came to seeking foreign aid. When the fledgling United States revolted against their British colonial masters, they could appeal to the other two European superpowers... France and Spain.

But, Morelos' revolt was against the "French atheists" (i.e, Napoleon Bonaparte) who had occupied Spain and put Napoleon's brother on the throne in Madrid. The army they were fighting answered to the Viceroy, who was loyal to either Carlos IV or his son Ferdinand VII, depending on which Spanish "loyalist" junta he happened to answer to that particular day. It didn't matter -- both the Carlists and the Fernandists were supplied by the British. The superpowers were fighting each other, but both were trying to hang on to the American colonies. Holland, traditionally an English business rival had provided George Washington's rebel army with money... but Napoleon had put yet another brother on the Dutch throne... which only left Morelos with the upstart United States. The U.S. was no superpower, but at least it had a navy, which Morelos did not. And, there was money and radical revolutionaries to the north. It seemed a natural ally.

Morelos recognized that Bean was less than the ideal diplomat. But, not having a Mexican Benjamin Franklin or Thomas Jefferson around (who at least spoke the ally's language), he had no choice but to send Bean and two other adventurers -- one of whom ended up, after sending a letter to President Madison, drifiting down into Columbia, where he attempted to borrow money using a forged letter by somebody named "Joaquin José Morelos"). Bean never got to Washington etiher.

Advanced several thousand pesos in gold, Bean set off on his adventures. Again, our 19th century friends:

...Bean was sent in the fall of 1814 by Morelos as an agent to promote the Mexican Republican cause in the United States, "to bring on a campaign against the province of Texas, and ...to make some provision for a supply of arms." He found at Nautla on the coast north Vera Cruz, one of Lafitte's vessels {you just knew our gay pirate would show up eventually, didn't you?}, the Tigre("Tiger"), under the command of Captain Dominic You, which had just defeated a British brig offshore. The Tigre was beached after a drunken celebration of the crew over the victory. From the crew, Bean first heard of the war between the United States and Great Britain, He rigged his own schooner and sailed to New Orleans with the Napoleonic veteran and pirate, Joseph Amable Humbert on board, as well as part of the crew of the Tigre. At Barrateria, he met Lafitte and necessarily postponed attempts to get support for the Mexican insurgent movement because of pre-occupation of the area with the war against the British. With Lafitte, Bean contacted General Jackson and offered their services at New Orleans. As the British guarded the coast, the two threaded their way through the swamps and bayous to that city. Bean was well known to Jackson, and was at once placed in charge of a battery. Lafitte, also, was given a command; and both did heroic service in the great battle.

Bean's (or Beán's) actions back in the U.S. are a little less heroic to later biographers. According to Timmons (page 146), Bean was seeking help from a British ship after Captial You's drunken mishap. Discovering the British were at war with the United States -- and besides, they were hunting for pirates -- plans changed. Bean and a few of the soberer sailors stole a boat and hightailed it to New Orleans, where he met up with Lafitte. Joining up with Andy Jackson was apparently Lafitte's idea... and a good way of legitimizing his own rather dubious business activities... and, incidentally, Bean's

Bean never made it anywhere near Washington. He never bothered sending a letter to Madison, though he did try recruiting some pirates and ne-er do wells around New Orleans, for a incursion into Texas. Eventually, Bean himself, once there was an independent Mexico, drifted back into Texas, where -- trading on his services to the Insurgentes, and his revolutionary connections, he was given a military commission. To his credit, he served with some distinction keeping peace between the local indian tribes and the settlers. He apparently forgot he'd acquired a Mexican wife and married (or didn't -- the record is unclear) a "Texian settler" from Tennesee, and -- in violation of Mexican law, bought several slaves to work his plantation outside Nachadoches.

When the Texians (the U.S. settlers in Texas) rebelled against Mexico in 1836, Bean -- as a Mexican officer -- was locked up (again! -- though this time for NOT rebelling) but as a personal friend of fellow rascal, Sam Houston (they knew each other from their dealings with the Kiowa and Comanches) he didn't stay in jail very long. Out on parole, he sat out the Texas revolt, taking no real part in public affairs, and living quietly with his American wife, Canadice

In 1842, he began liquidating his assets. By this time it was obvious that the United States was going to annex Texas. It also appeared, slightly later, when Beans's will was probated, that the property was ... shall we say... overvalued, and had an unclear title? It wasn't completely clear that Bean owned the assets that had been liquidated.

Canadice was still alive, but so was Magdalena back in Veracruz State. The old rogue wrote his will, swearing he was a widower and rode out of town. He rejoined Magdalena at her hacienda outside Xalapa. With perhaps better timing than ever before, he managed to escape the law and avoid embarrasing questions about his finances (and returning to the country he'd originally fled as a teenager, worked as a diplomat to make an ally, fought for, then fought to prevent becoming an ally, then was invaded by).... by dying on October 13, 1846.

Pay no attention to that giant sucking sound... it's just Homeland Security moving to Guadalajara!

2006-11-13T21:27:00.000-06:00

New York Times (November 13, 2006) By Elisabeth Malkin MEXICO CITY, Nov. 12 — Ross Perot once spoke of a “giant sucking sound” of jobs leaving. The Texas billionaire and onetime presidential candidate railed against the North American Free Trade Agreement in the early 1990s, arguing that it would create a “giant sucking sound” of good American jobs pulled to low-wage Mexico. But things change. Last week, Mr. Perot’s Texas company announced that it was hiring — in Mexico. The Perot Systems Corporation, which manages information technology for companies, is setting up a technology center in Guadalajara where it expects to employ 270 engineers by the middle of next year. Neither Mr. Perot, who is now chairman emeritus of the company he founded in 1988, nor his son, Ross Perot Jr., the company’s chairman, was on hand for the announcement in Guadalajara Thursday. But a company spokesman, Joe McNamara, said that lower pay for engineers was only one of several reasons Perot Systems decided to set up in Mexico. “Guadalajara is a fast-developing technology center in Mexico,” he said. “There’s room to grow.” The company is also looking at other places in Mexico to set up new operations, he said. “Mexico is a very important strategic location for us,” he said. The Perots are hardly bucking the trend as the information technology industry has grown steadily offshore. Perot Systems, based in Plano, Tex., had sales of $2 billion last year and employs 20,000 people in more than 20 countries, 6,000 of them in India alone. The company will also announce a new operation in the Philippines and one in Kentucky soon. At Thursday’s announcement in Guadalajara, Mike McClaskey, the vice president for infrastructure solutions, was there to invite job seekers to the company’s recruiting events, describing a “meaningful career opportunity” at a center that will be part of the company’s global network. The Mexican employees will be providing desk and engineering support to Perot Systems clients in the United States and Europe. The clients include companies in the health care and finance industries along with United States government agencies like the Department of Homeland Security. The company does not plan to use Mexico as a base to drum up new business from Latin America, Mr. McNamara said. The arrival of Perot Systems in Guadalajara, which bills itself as Mexico’s Silicon Valley, is a small success story for the government and the local technology industry. For several years now, Mexico has tried to carve out a niche as a low-cost software developer in an effort to win a fraction of the business that now goes to India. But so far Mexico has failed to catch on, despite its growing pool of bilingual engineers and the advantage of being in the same time zones as the United States. The new technology center in Guadalajara offers a stamp of approval, particularly because it comes from such an unexpected source. Back in 1992 and 1993, Mr. Perot’s anti-Nafta harangues made him highly unpopular in Mexico, where many had high hopes for the agreement. But a dozen years into Nafta, Mexicans are willing to let bygones be bygones. And so, it seems, is Mr. Perot. “The whole world has changed a lot in the past 14 years,” Mr. McNamara said.

The Sounds of Silence

2006-11-13T14:53:00.000-06:00

Is the general population of Mexico City aging or what? Some politicos have gotten so cranky about the noise levels in d.f. that they passed a new ordinance to turn down the volume. Antonio Olivio of the Chicago Tribune: http://www.montereyherald.com/mld/montereyherald/news/world/15999753.htm Several wondered: Is it even possible to harness Mexico City's carnival of sound? To quiet the roving mariachi bands-for-hire that sing about lost love until dawn? To silence the sidewalk barkers promoting the latest trendy bars? Or, in a 24-hour society that loves a good party, to undo the fact that one's stature is often measured by the strength of his stereo speakers? Government response is the new Environmental Standard for the Federal District, adopted in September, which cracks down on loud factories, bars, markets and other places of business in the capital. To show the government means business, higher fines associated with the new ordinance start around $90 and can climb to $900, Trujillo said. Sergio Beristain ascribed the problem to a mixture of erratic urban planning and a culture that loves to be heard. "The people, they're used to noise," he said with some resignation, calling the new law too limited in scope. "I'm not sure they have the resources they would need to enforce this ordinance. It would require a massive education campaign. When people write into Thorntree asking for suggestions of quiet places to stay (in Mexico) where they can relax and write a book, I just roll my eyes. There are no so such places. Mexico is all about noises! I thought I found a quiet place to stay in Piste. It was a nah off on a dirt road. I had a thatched roof, a bed surrounded with mosquito netting, and a mirror... that was it. The only lightbulb in the room was burned out and no tv/radio or anything. I hadn't taken into account the critter population. Dogs prowled around the nah all night and barked in unison. A rooster greeted the sun with his friendly call which woke up the mamma pig and her 5 offspring.... oink, oink. At about 6am, the church bells rang and at 6:30am, a big ol' truck drove past with an impassioned man's voice booming through a loudspeaker as he was trying to sell a load of mattresses (of all things). When you're in a Mexican city (anywhere in Mexico), your ears will be assaulted by belching buses, barking dogs (roaming gangs), honking horns, sirens, noisy vendors, jack-hammers, etc. It's not uncommon to be eating a meal in a local restaurant with two tv's going, a mariachi band playing songs at the next table, a waiter trying to take your order and a cd vendor (with a sound system to rival 'Twisted Sister's) blasting away just outside the open doorway. I'm ok with all of it with one big exception.... the obnoxious ORGAN GRINDER! That sound (noise) grates on my last nerve. It's right up there with nails going down a chalk board or the sound of bagpipes. One afternoon, I bought a phone card, and walked over to a payphone to make a long distance call. Right after I heard my sister say, "Hello...." an organ grinder walked up and started playing. I looked over at him (thinking he would take a hint), and he just smiled at me and kept on turning the crank. Teaches me to call home from calle de Cinco de Mayo. The mariachi's, the barking dogs, the jack-hammers... they're noises of a bustling society. Coupled with the aromas of grilled onions and cooking tacos, the burning mesquite, the perfume of incense wafting through the churches, and of fields of pointsetias growing in Xolchimilco, the noises in the streets, give Mexico it's vitality/energy. The only instance of long silence I experienced in Mexico was when I joined a group of about 100 onlookers (on a Puerto Vallarta beach) as we watched a large sea turtle lay her eggs in the sand. For about an hour, you could hear a whisper. Babies and working men on the buses have learned to sleep right through the daily commotion. Only old men in suits, who are trying to distance themselves from their roots, want to muffle the noise. Noise is the music of the young. Meanwhile, let's have a little fireworks with that marimba band! photo by: ogal

Big Mac... attacked... again!

2006-11-13T00:47:00.000-06:00

The teachers' strikes have been going on for 20 plus years. Ulises Ruiz wasn't the first Governor to steal an election, and AMLO's loss wasn't the first shady presidential election in Mexico. But, what convinced the Oaxacaños they could take on the powers that be? Juchitan famously resisted the State back in the early 90s and installed a PRD-led municipal council... but that was put down. The first successful modern people-power movement in Oaxaca was back in 2002 -- and the fight was the Golden Arches v the golden-hued historical arches of Oaxaca... or Big Macs v. Crickets. The crickets won... and the rest is history. TODAY:

OAXACA, Mexico (AP) -- In the conflict-torn Mexican city of Oaxaca , police say four youths wearing masks tossed gasoline bombs at a McDonald's restaurant, damaging the windows, seats and play area. Security personnel at the shopping center where the McDonald's is located put out the blaze. The restaurant was closed during the pre-dawn attack, and nobody was hurt. The shopping mall is near a university where leftist protesters set up their headquarters last month after police drove them out of the city's main plaza. Those activists attacked a Burger King restaurant in the same mall with gasoline bombs last week. However, leaders of the movement deny their members were responsible for today's attack...

This is round two of the Great Oaxaca Burger Wars... Back to round one... published in the NY Times, the last time a Oaxacan uprising made the news... and incidentally, the people won. The store bombed last night is the one mentioned as being "near a Mercedes dealership."

Mexicans resisting McDonalds Fast Food Invasion McTaco vs. Fried Crickets: a Duel in the Oaxaca Sun August 24, 2002 By TIM WEINER NY Times OAXACA, Mexico, Aug. 22 - The town square in this old city is a kind of sacred space. Beside a cathedral, under ancient shade trees, people sit for hours on cast-iron benches, passing time slowly, framed by stone arches glowing golden in the afternoon light. Two new golden arches may be rising soon. A certain corporation known throughout the world for its hamburgers - and as a symbol of American culture - plans to open an outlet on the southeastern corner of the square. The proposal has set off a lively debate about food, money and power in Oaxaca (wa-HA-ka), where the favorite snack is fried crickets, not french fries. "This is the center of our city, a place where people meet, talk politics, shop and spend time," said Francisco Toledo, 61, a native Oaxacan and perhaps Mexico's best-known living artist. "It's a big influence on art and creativity. And we are drawing the line here against what the arches symbolize." McDonald's, which sold $40 billion of food last year, has faced down opposition all over the world, including American communities from Ft. Bragg, Calif., to the Bronx. The protests have sometimes turned to political theater, most famously in 1999, when a French farmer, José Bové, dismantled a new McDonald's in Millau, a citadel of cheese in southwestern France. But McDonald's marches on: more than half its 30,000 branches are outside the United States. Since 1985, it has opened 235 outlets in Mexico, including one on the outskirts of Oaxaca, across the highway from a Mercedes-Benz dealership. Though Mexicans ometimes have a hard time pronouncing the name - it usually comes out as "Madonna's" - many have no trouble downing McBurritos and jalapeño-topped McMuffins. The fast-food giant says it will respect the cultural identity and architectural traditions of Oaxaca's old square. But Oaxaca is a world capital of slow food, based on recipes that go far, far back in time. It is famous for its seven varieties of mole, a painstaking sauce that can take three days to make; tamales baked slowly in a banana leaf, and those crickets, which take a long time to catch but have far more protein, fewer calories and less fat than ground beef. (They taste like grass-fed shrimp - an acquired taste, perhaps, but a very popular one.) Public opinion in Oaxaca's zócalo, the town square, favors those old tastes. "The zócalo's a place with colonial arches and a colonial rhythm - not the place for McDonald's," said Sara Carre~o, 39, who runs the ancient wooden telephone switchboard at the Hotel Señorial. "The difference between fast food and Oaxacan food is too great." Mr. Toledo led hundreds of marchers to the zócalo, where they feasted on tamales, but the protests have not struck a universal chord. The State of Oaxaca may be the poorest in Mexico, and some people wonder whether they can afford to reject any form of foreign investment. "Oaxaca was so isolated from the world for so long that any change feels like an onslaught," said Iliana de la Vega, 42, who runs El Naranjo, an acclaimed restaurant off the zócalo. "Now, I'm not in favor of McDonald's. But there are people who want their business. And if they follow the rules, pay taxes, give people jobs - you can't outlaw that, can you?" The argument now lies in the hands of the city government. But this may be less an issue of politics and power than of taste and time. Can a company that prides itself on speed and uniformity fit in a place where people value taking their time and making food by hand? "Real food is not frozen meat," said Jacqueline García, 24, who runs Toñita's, a food stand in Oaxaca's old market. "It's fresh cheese and crickets. Fast food's unnatural. The people who make it are incompetent. And McDonald's belongs in the United States, not our zócalo."

Eaters of the world unite... we have nothing to lose but our mole!

Worrisome news from Oaxaca... not from an anarchist

2006-11-12T16:58:00.000-06:00

A crazy on the "Thorn Tree Mexico Message Board" always claims I'm an anarchist. Moi? He claimed this guy was too, so I figured he must have something worth saying. The Rev. George Salzmann, OSFS (the "Salesians -- a rather conservative teaching order founded to counter the heresies of the French Revolution) is a Catholic chaplain at Harvard, and emeritus professor of Physics at U. of Mass, Boston. He wrote a quick article for the Canadian anti-globalization and alternative media site, Global Reseach. Father Salzmann apologized for not footnoting as carefully as he normally does in academic articles, wanting to get the material out as soon as poossible. Revving up the dirty war in Oaxaca

Under PFP ‘protection’, and with PFP participation, the combined level of the dirty war by the Oaxaca PRI contingent of Ulises Ruiz and the PFP mushroomed — so intolerably in fact that the church offered asylum to members of the popular movement because of the threats and the jump in the numbers of dead, arrested, and disappeared. Unfortunately (and predictably), it's not ‘just’ the state agents and allied paramilitaries who are doing the really dirty work. There are people who were snatched by the PFP who haven’t even been identified, some of them seized at the most active large conflict area — the university campus,[3] where the radio station is located — on helicopters and not accounted for (according to some of the material I've read).[4] Most assuredly the PFP, or at least some of its ‘special forces’, is itself a terrorist organization. I’m certain the so-called ‘counter terrorism’ operations discussed in the Narco News article by Diego Enrique Osorno [5] are being actively implemented by both Ulises Ruíz’s state and paramilitary agents, and by the highly-trained hit teams of the PFP, the latter undoubtedly led by officers trained at the School of the Americas. Terrorism against popular social movements is serious business for repressive governments, whether in Central America, Mexico, Iraq, Palestine, Colombia, or wherever.

DOH!

2006-11-11T00:34:00.000-06:00

There's a dust-up between Spanish news agecy EFE and U.S. Spanish-language Televison network, Telemundo over who is responsible for leaving the microphones on ... and recording... and broadcasting Vincente Fox being, well... honest. The story is here, on Terra. Youtube took down the clip, for legal reasons, and I can't find another one anywhere. Fox's presidency ends Decebmer first. EFE was asking him "Hey, Vincente, now that you've been President of Mexico, what do you plan to do (besides try and save your reputation as everything seems to be falling apart around you... the questionable election of your successor, the situation in Oaxaca, in Tabasco, the never resolved issues in Chiapas, etc. etc. etc.). Said el Prsidente:

"Ya hoy hablo libre, ya digo cualquier tontería, ya no importa: ya total, yo ya me voy" I'm can say whatever I want now, and I can say any stupid thing I feel like. Who cares.... it's over and I'm outta here!

Aaaaawwwwwwww!

2006-11-10T18:30:00.000-06:00

Friday night cat blogging. Our kitties are cuter than americablog's and dailykos' kitties any day. These jaguar cubs were born at the Leon, Gto. zoo. (Photo, Notimex).

Mexico City passes (Gay) Civil Unions law!

2006-11-09T16:23:00.000-06:00

This is HUGE! Mexico City Legislature (ALDF) passed the "Ley de Sociedades en Convivencia" or "Civil Unions" bill which will allow couples who are of legal age, of the same or different genders, to register their unions at Delegation offices, the same as marriages are registered now. Registration confers inheritance and pension rights as well as the social benefits available to married couples. The bill passed 43 to 17, with 5 absentions. PRD, PRI, PT, Convergencia, Alternativa y two Nueva Alianza deputies voted in favor. One PRD deputy and the three Green representatives abstained. PAN and one Nueva Alianza deputry voted "no." Based on French law, "Sociedades de Conviviencia" provide property, pension, inheritance and even co-parenting rights. They say nothing about adoption, and specifically exclude relationships between close blood relatives. One specific feature of the bill is that couples who are turned away by a delegation official can appeal to the Federal District's Adminstrative Law Court, which can sanction or fine civil servants who -- by action, negligence or omission -- discriminate against citizens on the basis of, among other things, sexual orientation. Alberto Cuenca, in El Universal wrote in this morning's edition (before the vote was taken) that the bill is "designed to give legal recognition to a social reality, and in no way affects existing forms of marriage. An estimated 2.1 of the 26 million households in Mexico are formed by unrelated and unmarried persons. Reuters reports that the Coahuila State legislature is debating a similar law this week.

"These reforms are going to cause a snowball effect that no one will be able to stop," said David Sanchez of the left-wing Party of the Democratic Revolution, one of the few openly gay national congressmen.

The Sociedad Mexicana de Sexología Humanista Integral estimates that 20 percent of Mexicans have had -- or will have -- same sex relations during their lifetime. According to the 2005 "Primera Encuesta Nacional sobre la Discriminación", 94 percent of gays and lesbians said they had been discrimated against because of their sexual orientation. The bill has been languishing for the last five years, until today. Ironically, the bill's author, lesbian activist and then ALDF deputy, Enoé Uranga, blamed the delay in passage on "old socialists," specifically Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who besides being much less a fire-breating radical and more an old fashioned middle-class social worker than outsiders realize, also could not, during his tenure as Jefe de Gobernacion in DF, nor when running for President, could afford to alienate "traditional values voters" or the Church. From this morning's El Universal (my translation):

Alberto Cuenca El Universal Ciudad de México Thursday, 9 November 2006 Enoé Uranga, who during her tenure as a Federal District Deputy first introduced a Civil Unions bill ("Ley de Sociedades en Convivencia") said that the imminent approval of this proposal, expected as early as today by the Federal District Assembly (ALDF, "Asamblea Legislativa del Distrito Federal" in Spanish) showed that the "modern left" has supplanted the "conservative left". Uranga added that the present PRD legislators "have rectified the effors" of previous PRD legislatures, dominated by those opposed to the law. However, Ms. Uranga said that Andrés Manuel López Obrador, when he was Chief of Government for the Federal District, was the main impediment to passing a Civil Unions bill, and his objections were the main reason no vote held on the matter until now. In April 2001, Uranga, then a local deputy, presented to the ALDF tribunal the first iniative for a civil unions bill, with only minor differences than the one presently before the Assembly. Five years later, the former assemblywoman, active in the gay-lebian comunity, said he has never lost confidence that the original proposal would eventually be approved. However, the Green Party has said they will vote against the measure [my note: the Greens abstained]. The gay-lesbian community is seeking the expulsion of the PVEM (Mexican Green Party) from the Green Party International, on the grounds that support for Civil Unions is an intergral part of the Green platform at the interntional level.

Mexico City bombings... maybe not so serious

2006-11-07T14:55:00.000-06:00

Last night, I was speculating that the bombings COULD be the work of agentes provacateurs... there were similar bombing incidents (late at night, designed to do minimal property damage, and ... more importantly, done with the idea of blaming "leftist radicals" for the result) before, like the one in Tlanapantla, Morelos when that municipio's people rose up to throw out a corrput PRI presidented, who had been fraudulently elected, but was defended by the state's PAN governor (himself having barely survived impeachment through open bribery of the legislators). There COULD be a few guerilla groups working to destabilize .... well, any number of situations, but the APPO and the Lopez Obrador folks are denying any connection to these guys. The only guerilla group with a conection to the APPO, the ERP also denies any connection... and they normally do take credit for actions when they can. These other groups may be "fronts" for PRI -- or PRI dissident -- factions. Still too soon to tell. Kelly Arthur Garrett, as always, has the clearest, best reporting on the bizarro-world of Mexican politics. I'm not likely to post today... I've got to make a living, and am busy reporting on the muy bizarrolandia of Texas politics. It's election day in the U.S., and this is the strangest election I've ever seen, even compared to Mexican ones.

After blasts, tense calm in the capital
By Kelly Arthur Garrett The Herald Mexico/El Universal Martes 07 de noviembre de 2006 Despite three pre-dawn bomb blasts in strategically targeted buildings, Mexico City stayed calm Monday and business proceeded as usual - or at least what passes for usual in these times of daily street-blocking protests, occupied monuments, graffiti-marred historic buildings and competing "legitimate" presidents-elect. Security at the international airport was heightened Monday, but the alert level stayed at the same phase ("2") that it´s been at since September 11, 2001. The Foreign Relations Secretariat building was briefly evacuated at mid-morning, but officials insisted that action was a "drill." Still, the concern level notched up as evidence emerged late in the day that the three explosions at the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) headquarters, the federal Electoral Tribunal building and a Scotiabank branch are not all of what had been planned. The armed revolutionary organizations that took credit for the blasts said another bomb had been planted at the PRI building and one at a Sanborns across the street from it. Two bombs were planted at the tribunal site and two at the Scotiabank, as well as one other at another bank branch. Mexico City´s police chief, Joel Ortega, said Monday evening that it was entirely possible that eight explosive devices were set to go off. Thus it was likely that the three explosions were from two bombs each, while the Sanborns and second Scotiabank devices were discovered by police before they detonated. Ortega also said that the claim by five armed groups that they were responsible for the violence was credible. "We think there is one more group involved in these acts as well," he said during a radio interview. Ortega did not name the sixth possible group, but he could have been referring to the Popular Revolutionary Army (EPR) that has been closely identified with the Oaxaca movement. On Friday, the EPR released a communiqué congratulating demonstrators from the Oaxaca People´s Assembly (APPO) for preventing the Federal Preventive Police (PFP) from entering the Benito Juárez University in Oaxaca. But the EPR did not sign on to the message sent to the media Monday afternoon claiming credit for the bombings, which caused no injuries. Two of the clandestine organizations taking credit for the bombings had previously threatened violence if the Fox administration sent police or military troops into Oaxaca. In a communiqué dated September 24, the Democratic Revolutionary Tendency-Army of the People (TDR-EP) and the Lucio Cabañas Barriento Revolutionary Movement (MRLCB) said, "If the Mexican army and the various police bodies enter Oaxaca to remove the teachers and citizens," the armed groups would "enter into action." The PFP entered Oaxaca on Oct. 29 and the bombs went off in Mexico City just after midnight on Nov. 6. APPO was quick to distance itself from the bombings Monday, although they were carried out, according to the armed groups´ statement, with the same aims that APPO has expressed - the ouster of Gov. Ulises Ruiz from office, the removal of federal forces from Oaxaca, and a radical political reform in the state. "We don´t have anything to do with those bombings," said APPO spokesman Flavio Sosa. "Our compañeros (in Mexico City) are encamped peacefully in front of the Senate." Before the five clandestine groups made their statement, representatives for the Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) said they suspected that the bombings were the doing of right-wing forces seeking to discredit the Oaxaca popular movement. The PRI, the one party directly victimized by the violence, demanded a full investigation. Emilo Gamboa Patrón, coordinator of PRI deputies in the lower house of congress, called on President Fox to cancel his upcoming trip abroad in the final weeks of his presidency to focus on the inquiry.

Wagging our weenies across the Rio Grande?

2006-11-07T01:13:00.000-06:00

Texas political writers sometimes have it too easy... even if our politicans are fools and crooks, they're always first-rate entertainment. Everyone is familiar with Molly Ivins. Less well known are "Juanita Jean Herownself" who has plenty of comedy material just in Fort Bend County (home of Tom DeLay) and the Fort Worth Star-Telegram's Bud Kennedy. Kennedy has lately been amused -- or bemused -- by our anti-immigration folks. We don't have to import our wackos from California or Arizona. We are perfectly capable of making fools of ourselves all on our own. Sometimes, we even use our tax dollars to do it. Alien Typo

Texas' border video webcams were unveiled Friday, and so far, all they've caught is one spelling violator. According to our state Homeland Security office, we are supposed to sit at home in our Bermuda shorts and watch eight test cameras, then e-mail if we see any felons or terrorists with dirty bombs sneaking across the Rio Grande. Sure, dude. I'll crank up the computer and tune in today during the football games. Come to think of it, it'd be easier to find the TCU Horned Frogs on TV if they would play in front of the border cams. From what I could tell Friday afternoon from www.texasborderwatch.com, Texas' border is already far more secure. Absolutely no immigration violators will sneak past what appears to be a line of moving cars, the scene from Camera No. 1. Other cameras seemed to show a parking lot and a lake dam near McAllen, all apparently innocent scenes but obviously sensitive locations in the war on terror. I didn't see any intruders on the Web site Friday. But I did call Austin to report one alien speller. For most of the day, the page promised eight webcams and complete "public access." Well -- not exactly. The original Web site dropped a strategic letter from public. Either somebody made a mistake, or Texas was going into the peekaboo video industry. When I called to report this incursion against the English language, nobody in Austin seemed to know how to fix the Web page, much less how to fix the border. "That's not our Web site," said Bryan Bradsby of the state Information Resources Department, the registered source of state government Web pages. With a groan, he added, "I have no power to edit anything on that page." I tried the Texas Department of Public Safety. After all, the Web site bears the state seal and declares that its purpose is "Securing the Border for the People of Texas." I figured the DPS would want to know about a -- er -- public mistake that was borderline embarrassing. "We don't deal with that," said DPS spokeswoman Tela Mange. "You'll have to call the Homeland Security office." The receptionist took a message. I guess it's a good thing I wasn't reporting a terrorist. Finally, I called the Plano company that designed the cameras and Web site. According to a San Antonio Express-News report Friday, TRGear was paid $100,000 for the Web test. It's one of seven companies trying out for a contract to build the state's proposed $5 million "virtual wall" of border webcams, officially the Texas Virtual Neighborhood Border Watch Program. "Can't talk about it," said Jack Woodmansee, a retired Army lieutenant general and president of TRGear, which sells tactical and rescue equipment and operates security services. Not even about bad spelling? "Can't talk about it," Woodmansee said. "You'll have to call Austin." By this time, the entire Web site was overloaded under the weight of 35,000 viewers, all keeping a sharp eye out in case any dope smugglers or terrorists tried to crawl past that line of cars. Eventually, Kathy Walt of the governor's office called back. "This is a stress test," she said. This isn't the final version, she said, "but it's working and people are accessing it." Some of the cameras are focused on fixed landmarks to test the clarity of the webcams, Walt said. Eventually, she said, the cameras will be aimed at locations where law officers find "significant criminal activity," such as drug-running. If we see anything on camera -- after giving an e-mail address and downloading video software -- we're supposed to click an e-mail link marked "Report Suspicious Activity Here." The e-mail will go to a state command post in Austin and also to local authorities. State officers will replay the video and decide whether to respond, Walt said. She didn't know about the misspelling. The embarrassing typo was finally fixed at midafternoon Friday. By then, thousands of CNN viewers had logged in to see the border cameras and giggled at those dumb Texans. Apparently, nobody noticed the mistake for 16 hours. Hope we're better at catching crooks.

The eyes of Tezas are upon yew...

Ulises Ruiz... in the total spin zone

2006-11-05T20:06:00.000-06:00

You can tell a politician is lying when his lips move... but Ulises Ruiz Ortiz isn't even slick with his lies. I thought it was just Republican congress-varmits who were clueless when they were caught. (My translation, from a 4 November Proceso article, "Responde Ulises Ruiz: No pediré licencia ni renunciaré, reitera" by Rosalía Vergara, José Gil Olmos and Pedro Matías. Photo of Ruiz, courtesy Proceso)

Oaxaca, Oax., November 3 (APRO). - Governor Ulises Ruiz Ortiz (PRI) questioned the the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN) ruling that his response to a Congressional vote that he should leave office was inadmissible on constitutional grounds. "They did not enter the bottom of the subject", he said, reiterating that "I am not going to request license (permission to retire); I am not going to resign; I have a commitment to the people of Oaxaca". Earlier today, around the seven in the morning, a paramilitary group, presumably composed of ministerial police, used AK-47 and M1s to fire on the antennas of Radio Univeridad, in an attempt to knock the station off the air. The station has been broadcasting information that the Governor's forces claim “spread the activities” of the social-political protest movement. Also today, municipal authorities in Sierra Juarez sent a letter to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, asking the Commissioner to intervene with President Vincente Fox, and urge him to “take necessary measures to restore respect for human rights, and to withdraw the Army and Federal Police (PFP) from Oaxaca, and to require the resignation of Ulises Ruiz Ortiz, since his stay in office damages the rule of law. In further news today, COCEI (the Isthmus [of Tehuanatepec] Workers, Farmers and Students Coalition) announced they will be expanding actions on Sunday, to include blocking highways connecting Oaxaca with Chiapas and Veracruz, as well as roads leading into the State Capital. The blockades, according to the COCEI leader Roberto Rosas Lopez, will continue until Ulises Ruiz Ortiz resigns as Governor. The ex-rector of the Benito Juarez Autonomous University of Oaxaca, Alava Martinez, was quoted as saying that the teachers' strikes and popular uprising have shown that there is a crisis of legitimacy in the teachers' organization in particular, and throughout the state in general. He added that he was dishearted by the “dirty game played by special interests” and that PRI and PAN leaders are using the conflict as an excuse to “punish” Oaxaca for the state's votes against the two parties in the 2 July national elections. This evening, the governor was forced to meet with the national media, who earlier had complained about the discrimination shown by the State authorities in granting access to foreign press representatives. After clarifying that he was not the one making the decision to send in the Federal Preventative Police (PFP, for their initials in Spanish), Ruiz went on to say that the conflict in the streets had been reduced to a single avenue. He said that he did not consider the failure to clear the Cinco Señores barricade a failure, since there were other access routes to the city that were opened. The Governor added that the talks sponsored by the Interior Ministry were advancing towards a solution to the crisis. Ruiz claimed that the majority of people backed his government, with only a few leftists and members of the APPO holding out. Ruiz emphasized that he is not "governing with the PFP", and said he continues to make work-related tours throughout the Capital, though he avoids conflicted areas, claiming that his presence would be a pretext for “provocative acts”. At his time he said his expects the capital to return to normalicy shortly, and that once normality returns, the PFP can be withdrawn. However, he did admit that the Federal Prosecutor's office, and the local Federal District Attorney has issued 52 arrest warrants that still have to be served by the Federal Police. The Governor insists that those responsible for the conflict are not from Oaxaca, but "that there are outside agitators, Panchos Villas [presumably meaning members of the leftist Pancho Villa Revolutionary Front], Atencos [the ejito and municipio libre in the State of Mexico, that has been in conflict with both the State and Federal government over proposals to sitiuate a new Mexico City airport on ejito land] and some foreigners. Those who are in charge of the investigations will realize that there is evidence of outside involvement.” Finally, the Governor claimed that investigations of the conflict will not lead to an “adjustment of accounts” because “we are already creating a new relationship with the people, who have respect for the transparency of our budgetary and operational activities.”

And today's response from the citizens, courtesy of Reuters...

Oaxaca... it's gonna get stranger before it gets better

2006-11-04T19:25:00.000-06:00

An astute European, with family and business ties to Oaxaca, made the following observations about the Oaxaca situation on one of the tourism websites:

‘Si los que dispararon (a Brad Will) son militantes del PRI, tendrán nuestro apoyo jurídico’. ("If the ones that shot at (Brad Will) are PRI activists we will help them with their legal defense").Héctor Pablo Ramírez Puga Leyva, Leader of the PRI in Oaxaca. (Quoted by Ciro Gómez Leyva in Vanguardia. Gomez Leyva is a Mexican journalist and newsreader of international reputation). The PRI leader in Oaxaca has offered to "help" the feds to "clean up" Oaxaca. He is saying that he could mobilize 20000 armed men and have them answer any "agressions" by the APPO. (reported in both El Universal and el Diario de Yucatan.

He adds this warning: If it comes to confrontations between PRI and APPO we will surely see what happened on Friday (the killings at the barricade where Brad Will was shot) repeated many times. The PRI leadership and militants have nothing to loose in Oaxaca. I am afraid that they will try to cling to power for as long as they can, using the methods they have learned - fraud, murder, repression. One thing to note about Governor Ruiz. The number of votes he received (or, rather were counted) that give him his victory over Gabino Cué, the Convergencia politican supported by both PAN and PRD, was exactly the same as the number of votes received by an minor party candidate that jumped into the election at the last minute. What were the odds on that? Probably about the same as Calderón's margin of victory over AMLO. And Mexicans are good mathematicians... More Oaxacan news of the weird: All Mexican papers are reporting on the two interlopers found on Benito Juarez Autonomous University campus today. An Army intellegence officer, and a Oaxaca State Police officer in plainclothes have been held by the students. Photo courtesy EFE printed in Vanguardia. The APPO is threatening to widen the rebellion, taking municipal headquarters (ayuntementos) throughout the state. Ulises Ruiz is trying to hang on, with PRI support, but the APPO STILL will not negotiate with him. The APPO, Congress, the Supreme Court, the Catholic Church... besides PRI, who wants Ulises... oh, yeah... Esther Elba. SNTE says the teachers strike is settled. Section 22 (which started the whole thing) begs to differ. No classes Monday, kids.

Todos somos Oaxaca (again!)

2006-11-04T18:45:00.000-06:00

If I can't dance, what was the point of the Revolution? (Emma Goldman) BASTA A LA REPRESIÓN FOXISTA, ALTO A LA INTOLERANCIA, LA INJUSTICIA Y OPRESIÓN A LOS PUEBLOS DE MÉXICO. I HOPE THIS TIME, THIS STAYS POSTED. It's a mystery to me, but this was up and running... under an "html" extension. If anybody can figure out what I did to screw up, let me know.

He's baaaak... AMLO

2006-11-04T16:11:00.000-06:00

I was tickled by the idea of a "Department of Honesty and Thrift"... imagine a whole bureacracy dedicated to saving money! Good luck, Sr. Romero Oropeza! (my translation is from today's Jornada, "Presenta López Obrador su gabinete" by Jaime Avila) Reverting to the combative language that marked the long sit-in on the Zocalo - eliminating the dominant "neofascist" class, attacking the "the media of the worse" and, in obvious reference to Cuauhtémoc Cardenas, "political leaders that in other times defended popular causes but are tired and think in the past" -- Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador presented his alternative cabinet, one that will not be "a shadow cabinet", but one in the "total light of day". The team of six men and six women have experience in public administration or academia, and will head the 12 offices corresponding to the present cabinet positions, but with different names: instead of "Governacion" ("Home Secretary" or "Interior Ministry"), "Public Relations", for example. The presented members would be called Secretaries of International Relations, Public Property, and Justice and Security, instead of the "official" Foreign Relations, Hacienda and Public Credit and State Prosecutor. There are also conceptual innovations, like the title given to Luis Linares Zapata, who will head the office of "Economic Development and Ecology, an office designed, in AMLO's words, "to establish balances between the one and the other" and the office of "Honesty and Thrift", which is not the public comproller of "Pejelandia" but will be charged with overseeing the Calderon Government's spending. Octavio Romero Oropeza has taken this position. Raquel Sosa will head the Department of "Education, Science and Culture", and Marta Elvia Perez Bejarano, "State of Well-being" (Public Benefits might be a better translation). A few positions are the same in both the "offical" and "alternative" cabinets: Secretary of Labor (Berta Luján Uranga), Secretary of Health (Asa Cristina Laurel), Public Housing (Laura Itzel Castillo) and National Patrimony (Claudia Sheimbaun). The "legitimate president" has entrusted portfolios to people who will be in the eye of the hurricane, as is already apparent. The ceremony was one of Juarista-style austerity, in contrast to the Porfiriana-style elegance of the restored (during Lopez Obrador's Mayorality) Teatro de la Cuidad on Virginia Fábregas street. The ceremony started just after five in the afteroon, with writer Laura Esquivel, dressed in traditional Chiapas highlander clothing, reading a brief and moving speech. Esquivel spoke of the difference between the two worlds of the legitimate and the spurious. The legitimate, she said, is genuine, allowed, true, and certain thing; the spurious is the opposite: false things, uncertain things, illicit things. As an example of the spurious, she mentioned the "so-called legal president who will assume a government that is fruit of a conspiracy between the the uncertain, and the illicit," a paragraph that received an enthuastic ovation. The novelist introduced Caesar Yáñez, who will be the alternative government's Director of Social Communication, who put an end to the speculation of who the six men and six women were who were defying the "legal government" by joining this cabinet. Lopez Obrador was then introduced, wearing a gray business suit with a light tri-color on his lapel, radiating more energy than he displayed last Tuesday at the Juarez Hemiciclo, where he will also speak this coming Tuesday. He began reading a fluid, precise speech peppered withstrong adjectives that was neither applauded nor rejected by the audience. What was new was AMLO's references to "the media of the worst" and to writers and intellectuals "bitter and dried up" by those in power. It said nothing new, though the language was. In a change from the verbal fireworks, Lopez Obrador did make an announcement that didn't seem to excite the party leaders. He will personally visit each and every one of the 2,500 municipalities in the country, to construct a "a new political organization" giving form to the "travelling government" and "impregnating democracy" in every town, calling for mobilizations when the spurious president tries to roll back the gains made by the 1910 Revolution. Nothing was said about preventing the "other" President from taking office on 1 December. The ceremony lasted just under an hour. Before, during and after, 5000 people were outside the theater, continuously shouting "It is an honor to be with Obrador," even after the "legitimate president" had left the building by private automobile.

WTF???

2006-11-04T15:04:00.000-06:00

Two posts... on AMLO's shadow cabinet and a Youtube video of an English-language hip-hop Oaxaca-protest number have gone missing in cyberspace. I'll try to find them, but it's gonna be a while. And, the AMLO piece was a translation, so it'll take some time. DAMN!

PFP attack Benito Juarez Autonomous University?

2006-11-03T13:58:00.000-06:00

I've been getting conflicting reports on this... mostly from people who don't have a clue, or who have an obvious agenda -- Narco News and Mark in Mexico (yeah, I'm more sympathetic to Narco News, but that doesn't mean I accept their reports on face value). Just a word of explanation. AUTONOMOUS Universities are just that -- autonomous. Under the constitution, the universities MUST receive funding (there's a percentage level in the national budget which is automatically reserved to the Universities) and they are self-governing entities. Only the Rector can approve of other governmental agencies coming onto his (or her) turf. There have been clashes before, when police have entered universities (notably in 1980, when the police did a room to room sweep at UNAM) and they've usually ended badly for the Government. Given their shameful role in 1968-72, the Mexican Army itself does not want to be involved in civil conflicts, thus the presence of the PFP. They are not the old "Federales" (though a lot of U.S. reporters don't understand that -- the Federales were disbanded some years ago). These are paramilitary troops... their officers are recruited not from police academies, but from the military schools. They generally have a reputation for professionalism. They're bad-asses, but not necessarily bad guys. My sense is that their officers, like other military officers, are not keen to take sides in political issues. My sense is they want to "bottle up" the APPO and striking students at the University, rather than lay seige to the campus. A report this morning from Oaxaca has the Catholic Church offering to host negotiations, and the Supreme Court is considering the call from both the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate for Governor Ruiz to resign. I've quoted, in its entirety, a report from the English-language Mexico City Herald.

By John Gibler/Special to The Herald Mexico El Universal Viernes 03 de noviembre de 2006 OAXACA CITY - The disparities were enormous. At 10 a.m., several hundred fully equipped riot and special operations officers from the Federal Preventative Police (PFP) supported by armored riot tanks and military helicopters flying overhead stood face-to-face with a small crowd of university students and local residents with nothing in their hands. But from this disparity grew a pitched battle that lasted over six hours, left dozens injured, and ended with the PFP in retreat and the streets filled with thousands of protesters. The PFP reported 10 of their officers were injured and at least three journalists suffered injuries, including EL UNIVERSAL photographer David Jaramillo. The Oaxaca People´s Assembly (APPO), the grassroots organization leading the protests the past four months, said afterward that 200 protesters were treated for injuries by university medical personnel. After the initial skirmish at 8 a.m., the tension rose two hours later as more students climbed over the walls surrounding the Autonomous University of Oaxaca to join the ranks of those shouting at the police, bringing with them rocks, Molotov cocktails, and homemade bottle rocket launchers. On both sides of the university grounds, PFP officers shut off roads to clear away barricades, which they said was their sole objective. "This is the last intersection we need to recover," said the coordinator of the federal support troops, who declined to give his name. Students burned tires, carried the scorched remains of cars, fallen telephone poles and piles of trash to build makeshift barricades in front of the police lines. The police commander insisted the PFP did not plan to confront the protesters or enter the campus. "The university is occupied by students," he said. "They are in their house, and we did not come to kick them out." But 200 yards away, police fired tear gas into the campus grounds and the students responded with a furious volley of rocks and Molotov cocktails. The line of about 50 riot police attempted to advance on the protesters, firing tear gas and returning the rocks thrown at them. The PFP later issued a news release insisting the conflict began after the university radio station - controlled by APPO - announced that the authorities were trying to enter the campus and people flocked to the area and attacked the troops. Along the avenue, opposite the campus, a mid-day soccer game in progress came to a grinding halt, but the players paused only for a moment before they scurried to find rocks and join the protesters in throwing them at the police from the field. Men and women pushed shopping carts filled with rocks up toward the front line. They shouted to those coming from surrounding streets to bring rocks. An elderly woman advanced into the clouds of tear gas offering water that had been blessed by a local priest to the students. The police were forced back, but only to open the way for a coordinated attack by riot tanks and their water cannons - with water laced with pepper spray. Inside the university grounds, protesters coordinated brigades to rush Coca-Cola and vinegar, their remedy for the immediate burn of tear gas, out to the protesters. Announcers inside the university radio station called for supporters to bring food, water, and Coke to the university. The battle then turned into chaos. The PFP drove their tanks up and down to disperse the crowd; three military helicopters flew overhead firing tear gas grenades. The protesters rushed the police and the tanks with thick volleys of rocks and then ran back to take cover and wash their burning faces in Coke. By late afternoon hundreds more had joined the protesters, pushing the police back from the university, capturing a riot tank and setting it aflame. Two helicopters flew over, dropping tear gas grenades, but too late: at 3 p.m. the PFP were in full retreat. Late Thursday night, APPO spokesman Florentino López said 55 protesters had been detained by the PFP. "Since the authorities have routinely tortured our supporters when detained, we now declare that there are no longer conditions to continue entertaining dialogue with the federal government," he said. "However, we would like to make a direct call to President Fox to sit in personally on our dialogue with the Interior Secretariat" and this might convince APPO to return to the negotiating table, he said. López also said the protesters had rebuilt several more barricades to replace the three that had been dismantled by the PFP during Thursday´s operation.

Reliable report from Oaxaca -- On the Bradley Will murder, etc.

2006-11-01T16:47:00.000-06:00

Predictably, right-wingers in the U.S. (and some in Mexico) have been trying to spin it as APPO's fault. A trained journalist, and Oaxaca resident has been posting from Oaxaca on a tourism website. She also analyzed the videos Will ...

I still maintain, in the face of many counter-arguments, that the protest in Oaxaca has been a peaceful one. There has been much damage to property, i.e. buses, and other vehicles, and much graffiti on buildings, but I think the death toll is still only about 10, in more than five months. I feel sad for the victims, but I think the low number is a credit to how this protest has been conducted and to the behavior of the policing officials. Oaxacquenos are not being given enough credit in the press, which naturally likes to sensationalize EVERY death. I have not felt in danger, using common sense. I just had to do an errand near where I THINK the next police/protest confrontation might occur so I stuffed a vinegar-soaked face cloth in mi bolsa. (Good against teargas, I learned). I DO NOT have inside information re the corruption by the governor, but something tells me he's gone over the edge. This is a HUGE (in numbers) protest and BIG (in longevity). There has to be a reason that so many people are pissed for so long at such a high economic cost to all. The Federal Police are armed, but not using their fire power...yet...as far as I know...2:20 p.m. Monday. This protest has been about getting the attention of the Federal government about political wrongs....I guess I should say perceived political wrongs...in Oaxaca. I was only 50 percent right in my prediction last week: Right: teachers won't go back to class on Monday. Wrong: the Feds won't come. ... I almost didn't go out tonight after reading the horrific news reports. I guess I just don't go into the right parts of town to feel in danger. I find people being ultra friendly. Because city buses aren't running, those with pickups and vans are filling the gap. They paint their destination on the windshield and people flag them down. You gotta love the ingenuity of the Mexican people. I wish people would keep in mind that given the duration and size of thi protest, less than 10 people have been killed. It's not like there are big shootouts going on all the time at every barricade! It didn't get much press coverage in the U.S. because not enough people were getting killed, I think. Violence sells newspapers. ... I understand that two or three local police have been arrested in that killing. If you listen carefully to Brad's video, you can here the protestors yelling, "porro, camissa blanca, camissa blanca, porro." They spotted a porro (goon/hoodlum/infiltrator, not one of their own) and they ALL ran. "Vamanos. Vamanos," they yelled. The even hollared, "Vamos guero," a warning to Brad, I assume. Their running, their fear at the shout of "porro" is clear on Brad's video. (Of course there were a lot of men in camissas blancas, so it's hard, at least for me to spot the porros.) The feeling here is that it was local police in street clothes who did the shooting. They infiltrate the protestors to provoke them into violence. At least that is on-the-street talk here. They would naturally target Brad, since he was photographing them and they didn't want to be identified.

Season of the Spirits....

2006-10-31T14:10:00.000-06:00

The following article isn't meant to creep anyone out. It's a description of a serious annual celebration in Mexico. Though it's called a "celebration", it's not a fun celebration along the lines of Carnaval. It's a highly ritualized tradition which reinforces the ties that bind generations together. Some of the practices may seem very strange to those of us who have completely differing views of death than most Mexicans. Try to keep an open mind as you read on.

The Day of the Dead is being celebrated by the people in Mexico. Nov 1 and Nov 2 are the days when Mexicans pay tribute to their relatives and friends who are no longer living. Traditions vary from region to region, but in general, it's a time when the living make visits to the graves in honor of their dead family members. Some make altars in their homes and some take their elaborate altars directly to the panteons (cemeteries) . Arches are decorated with marigold pedals and ofrendas of homemade breads, candies (skull shaped), tamales, fruits, photographs of the dead, and calaveras (skeletons/skulls) etc. are displayed on makeshift altars under the arches. Candles or resin lamps are lit to guide the spirits along the path to the altar. The first night is celebrated for the spirits of the dead children and the second night for the spirits of the departed adults. It is believed that once or twice a year, the spirits are allowed to travel back to their families for an evening of eating, singing and drinking. It is a religious and spiritual ritual that dates back to the pre-Hispanic era.

Poet laureate Octavio Paz wrote that the Mexican does not fear death but "chases after it, mocks it, courts it, hugs it, sleeps with it; it is his favorite plaything and his most lasting love."

In some parts of Mexico (Michoacan for instance), family members spend the whole night in the cemetery whereas in other regions, the rituals are practiced more privately in the home. There is a town in the Yucatan called Pomuch which goes much further in their rituals. Pomuch is a Mayan town (7,800 pop.) which is about 7 miles outside the town of Tenabo in the state of Campeche. In this town and a few others through the area, Mayans exhume the bones of their loved-ones and ritualistically cleanse their bones with soft cloths or small brushes in preparation for the Day of the Dead celebration. It is not macabe or ghoulish. Family members carry out the tasks with love and respect. Here is The tale of the Pomuch Mayan ritual as reported by Greg Brosnan (Reuters)

POMUCH, Mexico (Reuters) - Eighty-three-year-old Maya Indian Cenorio Colli gazed lovingly at his wife's long brown hair and recalled how carefully she combed it when she was still alive. Then he went back to cleaning her skull and every bone she left behind. Grieving Maya Indians in a sweltering village deep in the limestone flatlands of Mexico's Yucatan peninsula painstakingly cleaned the remains of their late loved ones on Monday during a unique annual family reunion with the dead. In a tradition dating back centuries, families in Pomuch exhume their dead after three years in the grave and transfer their dried bones and skulls -- often with hair attached -- to wooden crates on permanent display in open funeral niches. Every subsequent year in a two-day ritual preceding the November 1 and November 2 Day of the Dead festival, families gather at the brightly painted tombs to replace the boxes' embroidered cloth linings and give the remains themselves a spruce up. The festival brings back floods of painful memories for mourning kin struggling with the loss of life companions. "I was talking to her," Colli, a widower of nine years, recalled as he lifted his dead wife Concepcion's brittle pelvis from a large pile of bones and dusted it off with a cloth. "She lowered her head and that was it." But the retired farm hand said he took solace from knowing she was at peace. "I feel happy because she died happy." THE NEXT WORLD According to Mayan beliefs, death is a stage in life in which the deceased evolve into higher, more spiritual beings. In Pomuch, the dead are believed to be "purified" during the first three years after their death. They are then exhumed and welcomed back as highly respected members of extended families in which past and present generations merge. Old women in colourfully patterned traditional dresses chattered in the Mayan language on Monday as they fussed over the bones of long lost mothers and the skulls of babies who barely lived a day. Marta Helena Chipool, 35, lovingly cleaned the remains of a mother-in-law she never met and the twin girls who died with her 40 years ago in childbirth. "You go to the cemetery and you can see your dead sister, mother and father and talk to them," said Lazaro Tuz, an anthropologist from Pomuch who has spent years documenting the ritual. "This keeps the family together." "The dead person is no longer dead because you can touch him," he said. "She is not dead to me, she lives in my heart," Maria Euan, a 52-year-old woman with braids and bright cross-stich flowers spread across her white blouse, as she and her husband arranged her dead mother's bone. "This is her party." The origins of the ritual, which is celebrated almost exclusively in Pomuch, are murky, and it is unclear whether the practice predates the Spanish conquest of Latin America. One theory suggests that villagers, faced with an overflowing cemetery, may have begun digging up their dead for sanitary reasons. Some fear the tradition is dying out as Pomuch's youth, increasingly hooked on video games, action films and racy reggaeton music, embrace modern culture. According to village folklore, the spirit of a Pomuch native can become angry and wonder lost through the streets if proper care is not taken of his or her remains. Martin de Porras cleaned his dead father's thigh bone, still bearing the shiny metal prosthetic ball joint that made his last months after a road accident misery, and wondered whether his children would do the same for him. "I can't make them do it," he said. "But if they don't, I don't know where I'm going to end up." Another link to a story about the Pomuch D.O.D. ritual : Mayans celebrate Day of the Dead

Oaxaca... from the web, not from me

2006-10-31T00:53:00.000-06:00

Newscaster Ana Maria Salazar (writing in English) gives a recap of the Oaxaca news in Mexico Today. Diego Enrique Orsino, in the English-language Narco News, manages to quote a local Oaxacan mayor DEFENDING the killers in Oaxaca as " police acting in legitimate defense against the threat of an occupation of City Hall"... confirming my belief that vilence in Oaxaca has been orchestrated by the State, not by the APPO. Jornada reports that the Senate has unanamously voted to recommend that Ulises Ruiz "separate himself" from the State Governorship... and other words, quit before he's fired. This was the key demand of the protests all along. Strange at it may sound.. it looks like the protesters have won. Still... there are other demands to be met, and Ruiz has yet to formally step aside... Loureds Garcia Novarro reports for *English language) National Public Radio that more protests are expected today. Alfredo Narváez Lozano, in his Spanish-language blog, "citrius64", posts a letter today asking more unanswered (and perhaps unanswerable questions about Oaxaca. (AP photo from Jornada)

"Mark in Mexico" and the shooting...

2006-10-28T01:47:00.000-05:00

"Mark in Mexico," despite his extreme rightist views (his links are to U.S. websites concerned with the more reactionary wing of the Republican Party, and have little, or nothing, to do with Mexico... other than maybe those to various anti-immigration writers, like Michelle Malkin or the odious racist Vox Day) does get some good photos from Oaxaca. He claims he has a "source" who slips him the photos before they get to Notimex... which may be true... but, if so, then they were intended for public distribution. That secret source would also SEEM to work against Mark's claim that these photos were taken by Will Bradley Roland (opr "Bradly Will")... unless Mark is claiming to be in possession of evidence in a criminal case with international reprecussions. Which I don't think he is. Both photos from "Mark in Mexico" (UPDATE: 3:30 AM -- yeah, I'm up too late)... the photos are by Raúl Estrella of El Universal, and I've changed the links from Mark's page to those in El Universal. Make of it what you will.) Mark tries, valiantly, to claim that the APPO is responsible for the shooting ... and, he darkly hints, there was something behind the fact that the media was there The possibility that the media were the target of the shooters hasn't crossed his mind, I guess. Mark undercuts his own suggestions... and opens up new lines of inquiry (and a real suspicion that the shooters were indeed, either PRI operatives or police) when he writes (at 10:48 Friday)

Then an APPO operative begins backing a large dumptruck down the street towards the shooters with a contingent of about 20 using the truck for cover. However, the shooters continue moving forward and the dump truck driver gets cold feet, throws the truck into a forward gear and accelerates back towards his own people. At this point everybody started running like hell to both avoid getting shot and run over by the dumptruck...

The newsman on Televisa said that the Oaxacan authorities had not been able to identify the shooters. That would mean that they are not holed up in the Municipal Palace as was being reported earlier.

[Or, it could mean the Oaxacan authorities are lying... what a shocking concept]

The Televisa newscaster showed his film several times and pointed out that the shooters appeared to have arrived and then waited some distance away. Televisa had cameras both behind and in front of the shooters. They are shown looking back over their shoulders several times and then suddenly moving forward in concert. The newscaster said that this indicated that they were awaiting a command from someone. He may or may not be right about that. It is apparent that two of the shooters move forward simultaneously as though on command.

[Mark refers again and again to the APPO as a "mob" or "neanderthals"... if he's right, they wouldn't show this kind of discipline. I still say police]

The TV Azteca newscaster has just interviewed Governor Ruiz Ortiz live on the air. He pointedly asked the governor, "Were those your men who did the shooting?" The governor replied that no, all of the state's policemen are confined to their barracks and have been for a month to avoid just such a confrontation and subsequent result. He blamed the shooting on pro APPO forces vs con APPO forces and said that it was a result of the environment of general lawlessness that exists today in Oaxaca. He clearly blames APPO for all of the violence just as APPO blames the governor for it all.

Mark in Mexico often performs a valuable service, and some of his reporage has been surpurb. I've recommended it before. I may recommend it again (and I always have rcommended his photos -- whatever the source). But, something is off -- beyond the usual WND or FOX NEWS style spin about this story.

U.S. journalist killed in Oaxaca... state police believed responsible.

2006-10-27T21:07:00.000-05:00

The Reuters-AP post below does not make this clear:

OAXACA, Mexico (Reuters) - Gunmen opened fire on protesters in Mexico's colonial city of Oaxaca on Friday, killing a U.S. journalist and wounding several people at road blocks set up by leftists pushing to topple a state governor. Will Bradley Roland, a cameraman working with Indymedia New York, was shot in the chest and died before reaching the hospital, the independent news group said on its Web site. Emergency services said the journalist died after being shot in the torso in one of two shootouts in the city. Nine people, mostly protesters, have been killed in a conflict that began in Oaxaca state five months ago, when striking teachers and leftist activists occupied much of the state capital, a popular tourist destination. Red Cross officials said several people were wounded in the shootings on Friday. A Reuters photographer said protesters came under fire near barricades on the edge of the city, famous for its colonial architecture, thriving arts scene and indigenous culture. This week, striking teachers voted to return to classes but many protesters say they will not back down until state Gov. Ulises Ruiz is ousted. Critics accuse Ruiz of corruption and repressive tactics against dissenters, whose roadblocks have driven tourism from the city and hurt business. President Vicente Fox has vowed to end the conflict before he leaves office on December 1. but negotiations to find a peaceful way out have so far failed.

A Milenio reporter, Oswaldo Ramírez, was also wounded. Milenio is NOT a leftist paper... if anything, it's considered independent conservative. Milenio reports that the shots came from supporters of Ulises Ruiz, or from the State Police. Jornada quotes APPO spokesman Flavio Sosa, as calling for immediate Federal intervention after the attack. The reporters were filming APPO barricades in the City, and were allegedly attacked by gunmen working for the PRI-ista alcade. "We only have stones against their firearms," Sosa was quoted as saying. While the "usual suspects" on the right are trying to spin this as more evidence of "anarchy," a sensible Oxacan resident points out that in the last 5 months, with no functional police department, there have been very few deaths. The AP shows the death toll at 9, but by my count, there have been only 4 (including Will Roland) tied to the protests -- and only one death can be possibly laid to APPO supporters. Another Oaxacan points out that "porros" (not football fan clubs, but bands of either plainclothes police or hired thugs in the pay of the authorities) have been active, and are acting as "agentes provacateurs." Most Oaxacans remain calm, and ... as everyone who lives there has told me... this was no where near any tourist activities. And, this is terrible to say, but I though of "Under Fire," the 1983 Hollywood film about foreign jorunalists in the Nicaraguan Civil War. The film gives the impression that the murder of a U.S. journalist by government forces, witnessed -- and photographed by a U.S. journalist, is what ended the Somoza dictatorship. As the foreign reporters are watching the newscast about the shooting... and the collapse of the dictatorship, a Nicaraguan woman says, "Thirty years of civil war for what? Maybe we should have shot a gringo years ago." I don't know. Oaxaca was Benito Juarez' hometown... and Benito's great contribution to world affairs was the very simple idea that countries should stay out of each other's business, unless they are asked. The U.S. has no reason, or rationale, to be involved here. On the other hand, we are supposedly supporting democracy in places like Ukraine or Lebanon... or -- according to some -- Iraq. But, when our next-door neighbors are demanding democracy, we ignore it, preferring to see it as an affront to our right to be tourists, to see a colorful, dirt-poor state. I happen to think democracy is important... and we should pay attention when the people rebel against incompetent, corrupt, and dubiously elected leaders, such as Ulises Ruiz... Perhaps that's too close to home. I just wish it wasn't necessary to have "one of ours" die before we get the message.

The Mennonites in Mexico

2006-10-27T12:42:00.000-05:00

Someone on Lonely Planet brought up the subject of the Mennonites living in Mexico. Since one of my favorite uncles used to be a practicing Mennonite in Northern Indiana, and since I'm always interested in the subcultures who have settled in Mex, I've decided to write a bit about them. Menonas (Mennonites) are a conservative Christian religious group which originally chose to live in communities which shun secular life. After being pushed out of Europe and Russia, they scattered to Northern Africa, U.S., Canada, Brazil, Paraguay, Mexico, and to Belize, etc. seeking religious freedom. The Mennonites pledge their allegiance to a higher power (God) and steadfastly refuse to pledge allegiance to a nation. They are pacifists and will not fight in wars. They still speak in low German (Plautdeitsch), which is an old unwritten language. It is the issue of refusal to join the military that often causes the most friction in the countries they reside in. Migration map from 1500's to present When Canadian laws changed, Mennonites, who refused to send their children to government schools, faced imprisonment. Mononas insist on educating the children in their own private schools. The strict rules of the Mennonite community prohibited conscription into the Canadian armies and the teaching of English. The believers didn't want to interact with "outsiders" and rejected modern technology (electricity, automobiles, telephones, etc). So in 1921, six elders left Manitoba and Saskatchewan, Canada for Mexico. Long story short, the exodus began in 1922 for many Mennonites to found two main communities near Chihuahua, Mexico. The government of Mexico signed an agreement with them allowing for religious freedom that complied with the groups needs. Today, there are approximately 65,000 Menonas residing in these two communities. They dress in stark contrast to their fellow Mexicans. The men wear denim overalls or jeans with suspenders and flannel shirts, and straw hats with brims. Some of the women wear white mesh bonnets, full, modest blouses, and full pleated skirts. Inter-marriages are rare, so the Mennonites still retain their European appearance. Women spend most of their time inside the community, and most do not even speak Spanish.... men have more interaction with "outsiders", and most do speak some Spanish... but little or no English. It's a patriarchal society with work duties divided along gender lines. Bet I can guess who has diaper duty. Today, you can spot differences between the two Mennonite communities which are a mere 40 miles apart near the town of Cuauhtemoc (west of Chihuahua). Both are located in the vast arid desert. El Sabinal maintains strict and pious lives in accordance with Biblical teachings. Radio, television, music, autos and electricity are taboo. In the eyes of these Mennonites, they represent the worldly consumer society. Tractors may be used to plow the fields, but they may not use rubber tires on them as they aren't allowed for transportation. The second community of El Capulin has recently opened itself up to the outside world and has begun to embrace technical innovations. Teenaged boys wear baseball caps and Levis. The group may use cars, listen to the radio, ect. The use/abuse of alcohol is creeping into community and has caused a rise in crime and is of great concern to members. When I've spent time in Juarez, Mexico, I've seen groups of these Cuauhtemoc Mennonites selling their popular cheese to restaurants and to the public. That didn't surprise me, but what did, was that I witnessed them being picked up around 4:00pm by 'brothers' driving shiny new passenger vans. No more horse and buggy for the more "opened ones". The Cuauhtemoc based Mennonites still stay connected with their Canadian groups and often make treks back to their origins. Although some men take menial jobs outside their communities, most families support themselves by farming the land. During periods of droughts, the Canadian brethren give their Mexican brothers financial help to get their families through the rough periods. It seems that the people are getting more exposure to the outside in the larger Mexican cities and it's bringing in problems that the Mennonites have not faced in the past. For US police forces, the entry point into the labyrinth of today's Mennonite drug network came via a grandfather named Cornelius Banman. It was November 23, 1989, and the Old Colony Mennonite sat in an aging pickup truck that inched towards a busy US border crossing in El Paso, Texas. Banman had pocketed several thousand dollars to deliver a load of Mennonite-made furniture from Cuauhtemoc to Winkler, Man. He had made the long, monotonous journey often. This time, however, he was in for a surprise. A drug-sniffing dog was in another lineup when it suddenly charged towards Banman's vehicle, barking hysterically and furiously pawing the ground beneath his truck. When startled agents tore into the furniture, they discovered over 100 kilograms of marijuana 'bricks' hidden in the false bottoms of a few couches. The estimated street value of the haul was $1.5 million. A 52-year old farmer who attended church regularly with his wife and children in Winkler, Banman was a 'mule' paid to courier drugs. Soon, a trickle of Mennonite mules holding dual Canadian-Mexican citizenship would be detained by US border agents who realized they were encountering an unlikely new breed of drug smuggler. By the late 1990's, a fifth of the marijuana sold on the streets of Canada could be traced back to Mennonite drug kingpins holed up in Mexico. The slew of arrests did little to deter a steady strean of willing new recruits from teenagers to the elderly. And as confidence in the smuggling apparatus grew, so did the quantity and size of shipments. Source: Mexico Symposium What can I say??? There are other Mennonite communities established near the town of Hopelchen in the state of Campeche, some outside Merida, in Chiapas, and in the suburbs of Mexico, City. As far as I know the group in Hopelchen is just farming. I drove down the dirt roads to their community a few years ago while on my way to the city of Campeche. The farmhouses and barns looked just like the ones I'd seen in Northern Indiana.... white, large and well-kempt. It's saddens me to think that some of the groups are breaking down because of the same addictions and greed that afflict the rest of society, but it's probably inevitable. I don't know where these other communities came from before settling in Mexico or when they arrived. I do know that each has their own rules regarding acceptance of the things in the secular world. Some groups are stricter/ more traditional than others. I have seen some Mennonite "tourists" in Merida who were taking in the city sites with their families. They did dress in their Prussian-influenced duds and were speaking in low-German, but I didn't follow them around to see if they rode back home in a horse drawn wagon or in a Ford stationwagon. I've spoken with indigenous Mayan mothers in the Yucatan who have lamented to me that their young teens insist on dressing in trendy clothes rather than traditional clothing and that they are concerned about losing their kids to big city ways, too. With the constant blurring of cultural boundaries happening at such a rapid pace, it's nearly impossible to hold onto old traditional ways of living. Once the people, who maintained an isolated existance, began interacting with the "outsiders" their lifestyles are at risk of being forever altered in positive and negative ways. This is why one Mennonite community has sequestered itself deep into the jungle in Brazil.

Don't fence me in!

2006-10-26T19:44:00.000-05:00

From "Think Progress": Bowing to anti-immigration hardliners in the House, President Bush today held a White House ceremony celebrating the signing of the “Secure Fence Act.” Bush told reporters, “The bill authorizes the construction of hundreds of miles of additional fencing along our southern border.” Bush is right, the bill does “authorize” the constrution of a new fence. But that doesn’t mean the bill pays for it. Bender's Immigration Daily has several articles on the (not so) Great Wall of Texas... from American Jurist, the Houston Chronicle and elsewhere.

I had hoped that the President’s time in Texas and experience with Mexicans would lead to more meaningful and comprehensive immigration reform, not just the jingoistic resort to this bandaid. When permanent residents have more than a decade-long wait to reunite with their families, as Mexicans, Filipinos, and others do (due to the per-country limitations and the backlogs), and when federal laws have squeezed out virtually all the ways that Mexicans can legally come to the US, it is little wonder that so many enter without inspection. Reinstating the hated bracero “guest-worker” program will hardly scratch the surface, and such initiatives could only work if they were coupled fairly with more nuanced naturalization and legalization efforts.

Don Quixote: Mexican crime fighter... for real!

2006-10-23T17:16:00.000-05:00

The ingenious hidalgo fought giants, demons and Moors in 17th century Spain without much success, but the Man of La Mancha is back ... and enjoying more success fighting car thieves, narcos and public attitudes in Mexico. No Mexican policeman's lot is a happy one -- a garbage man gets more respect. During the Revolution Day Parade in Mexico City, the crowd claps and cheers for the garbage trucks. The police cars sailed past with sirens blaring... to drown out the boos from the crowd. They couldn't do anything about the propensity of parade-watchers to give them the finger... or "moon" them. Mexican cops are low paid, seen as a necessary evil at best. Where the Mexican solider at least gets three hots and a cot (and a uniform, and some education) in return for taking on a thankless job, "los Esmurfs" (as Mexico City cops were called behind their back, in honor of their blue uniforms) received a salary too low to appeal to anyone capable of better work, and not enough to support a family. What you got were either the "ethically challenged" who could supplement their income, people without families, or alienated from social norms (I've always half-suspected that William S. Burroughs' claims in the 40s of seducing Mexican cops with drugs and sex he talked about in Queer were based in Borroughs' ignorance of Mexico -- gay cops and drug-suing cops were the norm... and they were taking advantage of him, not the other way around). Or, you got bullies who wanted an excuse to carry a gun and exercize some power. Naturally, no one trusts the cops. Mexicans often say, "don't call the police, or the real theives will show up," after a robbery. The situtation has started to change. Mexico City started providing arms and uniforms to the officers, paying them a livable wage and giving them training. And raising the standards. I used to see the results around the the old 1968 Olympics Veleodromo where I used to teach a few mornings a week. The "NEW" cops were younger, healthier and ... wonder of wonders ... were doing their morning workout in the parking lot. Coupled with higher entry requirments, various attempts to foster "esprit de corps" (decent uniforms made a difference... a well-dressed officer isn't going to be sitting around with taco fixin's dripping down his big belly) and some changes making it harder to offer bribes (traffic citations are bank deposit slips and the fines were lowered to reduce the incentive to offer a bribe) were genuine accomplishments during the Lopez Obrador years. The biggest change I saw in Mexico City's police was that the cops got younger and buffer... and it wasn't rare to see well-dressed pretty girls flirt with policemen. Nezahualcóyotl, across the state line from the Federal District (If Mexico is Manhattan, Neza is Jersey City) always had the worst of Metro Mexico. That included city services and, por supuesto, city cops. They had a police chief sentenced to 25 years for narcotics violations, and a random drug test of their department turned up more drug users than upstanding citizens. The city could only do so much to raise salaries and buy uniforms. They were still faced with the lower-qualified police officers. And no respect. In a fascinating experiment, Neza has been creating better cops. Low eduction (many officers don't have more than a secondary school education, and a spotty one at that) suggested sending the officers to school. Besides just giving the officers the equivalent of a GED, the idea is that a better citizen is a better cop. And a better cop will be treated as a citizen. So... besides basic schooling, the officers in Neza are ... reading Quixote as part of their regular shift. Every Spanish speaking person of any accomplishment has read Quixote at least once. Of course they also read Agatha Christie and Ignacio Taibo II (Mexicos one and only socialist detective novelist) and... a lot of things. The Neza cops are reading a book a month on city time. And writing poetry in creative writing classes. And attending art appreciation lectures. And, once in a while, some dance lessons. It sounds bizarre, but apparently it works According to the Herald measurable crime is down. Sociolgists studying the Neza experiment are using auto theft records (something people report, just because their insurance agent requires a police report) show a drop and calls to the police are up. Anecodotal evidence suggests people call the cops because they expect them to respond -- and not steal something. Not an impossible dream ...

Tlatelolco -- yes, it was the CIA

2006-10-23T01:28:00.000-05:00

This has always been known -- two and a half years ago, I bought a CD from an ambulante on the Mexcio City Metro for five pesos detailing much of what's just "officially" coming to light now. The Jornada program didn't quite say the CIA had suborned President Diaz Ordaz, but hinted at it. The semi-official line was that Luis Echiverria was responsible for the massacre, but when Diaz Ordaz left office, he took the blame himself, shortly afterwards leaving the country as Ambassador to Spain. I don't know how this is going to pan out. Some older Mexican I know fondly remember Diaz Ordaz as the last "good" PRI president. They overlooked the authoritarian facets of his presidency, noting the economic successes and stability of the country. Echiverria, who had a schitzophrenic policy of repressing the left while trying to build a populist image (and rewarding leftists who worked with the administration) destabilized the entire economic and political structure -- leading to the "12 years of misery" that followed. It was only with Cuauhtemoc Cardenas' stolen victory in 1988 (engineered by the CIA?) that the system began to change. The 1994 murder of Luis Donaldo Colosio (backed by ???) finally forced PRI to open up the system, though there's no doubt the system was tilted (with the help of ???) towards PAN, not the left (which tended to meet with an incredible number of fatal accidents in those days, though you only heard in the U.S. about anti-PAN actions from the U.S. sources). Of course... the U.S. couldn't be involved today. Could it? The National Security Archives Project is here. Documents link past presidents to CIA El Universal October 20, 2006

WASHINGTON - Mexico´s president and interior secretary at the time of the 1968 massacre of protesters in Mexico City were both CIA informants and the intelligence they provided had the effect of misleading Washington policymakers about who was responsible for the repression, declassified U.S. documents show. The revelations appeared Wednesday on the web site of the National Security Archive, a Washington-based independent research organization. The group posted more than two dozen declassified documents detailing the CIA´s recruitment of senior Mexican officials over the 1956-1969 period. The highest-placed CIA sources were Gustavo Díaz Ordaz, who served as president of Mexico from 1964-1970, and his eventual successor, Luis Echeverría, who was interior secretary. "Never before had there been official verification, via declassified documents, that the CIA relied on high-level Mexican government officials to provide intelligence reports on political events in that country," Kate Doyle, director of the Archive´s Mexico Project, told EFE. ... The documents shed light on what the CIA knew and did not know about the events of Oct. 2, 1968, in Mexico City, where a student protest ended with a massacre in Tlatelolco Plaza. ... While Mexican authorities put the number killed in Tlatelolco at 39, hundreds are believed to have been slain in the square by members of a government-run paramilitary squad known as the Falcons, which also played a role in other acts of repression during the PRI´s "Dirty War" against leftists, which went on until about 1980. ... In February, the National Security Archive published on its web site a copy of a draft report on the Mexican "Dirty War" that the country´s current conservative government has yet to publish. The initial draft accuses the administrations of Presidents Díaz Ordaz, Echeverría and José López Portillo of committing "crimes against humanity that culminated in massacres, forced disappearances, systematic torture and genocide." Under Mexican law, the term "genocide" can refer to instances of mass murder that fall short of the attempted extermination of an ethnic, racial, religious or other group.

Et tu, Tabasco? More shady vote counts...

2006-10-20T20:24:00.000-05:00

Rene Alberto Lopez, Jornada (my translation)

Villahermosa, Tab(October 18) Reinfoced by riot police, and guarded by 17 PREP police officers, the Citizen's Particiation and Electorial Institute (IEPC in Spanish) of this Gulf state began officially counting votes for the election of governor, municipal presidents and local deputies. As on election day, anti-riot police from the Public Security Secretariat (SSP) surrounded the facility. As a result of a lawsuit filed by the "Coalition for Everyone's Benefit" (PRD-PT-Convergencia), votes for the Centro Municipio, which includes the city of Villahermosa, electoral packets from that district were opened today. The Coaltion expects the eventual triumph of Fernando Mayans Canabal, but numbers the Preliminary Electoral Results Program (PREP) count shows Mayans trailing PRI candidate Evaristo Hernandez, by more than two thousand votes. Mayans Canabal's supporters congregated early this morning outside electorial headquarters demanding the vote by vote count, claiming fraud in the PREP results. Police stood by, but there were no distrurbances at the gathering. The problem was noted when actas (precinct totals) in district 248 failed to tally with the number of votes cast. Coalition representative, Carlos Canabal Ruiz asked for that that package was opened and each vote was counted, against the wishes of the elections officials. Candidate Mayans Canabal, who was prevented from entering the building this morning by the police, alleged that "there are more votes in our favor. We won the election, and are already demonstrating agreeing in advance that the calculations will clear away any doubts." In the municipalities of Cunduacán, Paradise and Centla, where PREP results gave the PRI a narrow advantage over its rivals, coalition candidates are also convinced they won. Nidia Naranjo Cobián, candidate of the coalition, assured that she won, said "I won't let them rob me" of my victory. In the municipality of Jonuta, vote counts confimed that Coalition candidates did win the delegation and mayoral elections. Juan Manuel Focil, PRD state chair, said the coalation candidates will defend their wins, and sue where the losses are extremely close. On the other hand, PRI chair Pedro Gabriel Hidalgo, informed reporters that his party will be opposing narrow defeats in Balancán, Huimanguillo and Centla.

2006-10-19T21:18:00.000-05:00

wetback mountain

"Tear down that wall..." or don't build it -- from a guy who knows what he's talking about

2006-10-18T19:13:00.000-05:00

Bob Campbell, Midland (TX) Reporter-Telegram Former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev compared the United States' proposed 700-mile wall on the U.S.-Mexico border to the Berlin Wall during a Tuesday visit to Midland. ... "You remember President Reagan standing in Berlin and saying, 'This wall should be torn down,'" said the 1990 Nobel Peace Prize winner. "Now the United States seems to be building almost the Wall of China between itself and this other nation with which it has been associated for many decades and has had cooperation and interaction with. "I think what is really needed are ideas and proposals about how to improve that cooperation and work out all of those issues regarding immigration flows. I don't think the U.S. is so weak and so much lacks confidence as not to be able to find a different solution.

On a clear day... WOW

2006-10-17T23:08:00.000-05:00

This was Mexico City this morning. Jornada photo.

Good news or not? I donno

2006-10-17T12:30:00.000-05:00

President-elect Felipe Calderón named Agustín Carstens, a deputy managing director of the International Monetary Fund, to head his economic transition team Hard to say if this is good or bad. I have the usual "knee-jerk" distrust of the IMF, and expect a conservative adminstation is going to continue the same economic policies as the previous conservative administration -- which haven't been all bad, though they failed to deal with equality and opportunity as well as they should. Inflation is low, investments are up, but there is concern that too many of the investments (and the jobs for younger and unskilled workers) are headed north. And agricultural policy has been a semi-disaster for the small farmer. At worst, Carstens would continue the old policies, but with more confidence from outside investors. Not bad in itself. What struck me though, were some of his statements, which indicate he may be willing to take measures that are decidedly outside the neo-liberal orthodoxy... the same ones recommended by Carlos Slim and Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador during his campaign. From today's Herald:

"The market by itself is not sufficient to create an economy that is truly human," Calderón said. "The sensibility and guidance of the state is needed to correct the terrible inequality that exists in our society - Dr. Carstens knows this." The appointment makes Carstens a likely candidate to become finance secretary under Calderón, Chappell Lawson, a political science professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, said in a telephone interview. "He´s clearly a frontrunner, but these appointments don´t make it a sealed deal," Lawson said. "His name is good for the markets because people know him and trust him." Carstens holds a doctorate in economics from the University of Chicago. From 2000 to 2003, he served as deputy finance secretary under Francisco Gil Díaz before taking the third-highest position at the IMF. He has worked as an economist for Mexico´s central bank. ...Carstens, speaking beside Calderón today, said his experience working with underdeveloped economies in Africa, Asia and Central America gave him insight into solving Mexico´s problems. "What Mexico needs is to foment economic growth and alleviate poverty," he said. "These should not be seen as separate goals."

La Raza and THE RACE...

2006-10-15T19:36:00.000-05:00

In light of the passing of one of the border's greats (posted below), I thought this editorial by R. Daniel Cavazos, publisher of The Brownsville Herald and El Nuevo Heraldo was worth noting -- MEXICANS prefer Formula One races, but hey, in the United States, everybody adjusts...

... The entertainment industry, like nearly every other part of the American private sector, is grooving programs and products that focus on growing Latino populations in this country.Wal-Mart, Target, Ford Motor Company, General Motors, Coke, and all the cell phone companies employ legions of advertising and marketing agencies to help them reach a Hispanic market that now touches every corner of this country. Even NASCAR (NASCAR!), the epitome of white Southern culture, is anxious to reach out to Latino audiences. A story in USA Today last week detailed how NASCAR officials hope to market and promote driver Juan Pablo Montoya to expand its fan base.“Short term, you’ll have more Hispanic fans tuning in and becoming fans,” NASCAR spokesman Ramsey Poston said in USA Today. “Long term, we’ll have many wanting to get involved in the sport, and we want lots of drivers from lots of backgrounds.” How ironic, verdad, that during a time when xenophobic politicians in Washington are voting to build a border fence as part of their desperate efforts to stem Latino influences in this nation, the powerful U.S. private sector in all of its capitalistic glory has already decided this issue. There’s no anti-Hispanic walls being built by U.S. capitalists. What they want to know is how we can get “La Fea Mas Bella” on American television. Meanwhile, the nation’s fastest-growing sport, NASCAR, wants to rev up and diversity its fan base, with a special focus on the Latino market.

Baldemar Huerta: "The Mexican Elvis"

2006-10-15T15:25:00.000-05:00

I was never a fan, but back in the mid seventies, you couldn't avoid hearing (and knowing), Baldemar Huerta's pop classics. Who? Tejano music -- and Tejano culture -- is easy to make fun of. The music is sometimes described as "German oom-paa-paa played by Mexicans on instruments stolen from Gringos" and its an acquired taste. Tejano culture is unique in that it blends two blended cultures (U.S. and Mexico) into a third. Balemar Huerta understood this. And, while some of us deplore the creeping gringo-ization of Mexican culture, we've overlooked the Mexicanization of U.S. culture. For years it was limited to South Texas. UNTIL.. Baldemar Huerta, mixed Tejano with Blues, R&B, Rock-n-roll and Country-Western. Before him, Latin music was "exotic" (think of Dezi Arnez in the 50s) and after him... just part of the American musical scene. Born in the Rio Grande Valley (his parents were migrant workers), Baldemar took the tradtional path of ambitious valley kids, joining the Marines. When he got out, he returned to the Valley, where he enjoyed some local success as "El Bebop Kid" (pronounced "keyed") in local bars. He did Spanish-language covers for Elvis and Harry Belfonte and perfected his art. His friend Augie Meyers called him "a Mexican Elvis" but in the late 50s, stars with names like Baldemar Huerta had a limited audience. So, taking the name of his guitar's manufacturer, he reached a new audience as "Freddy Fender". His "Wasted Days and Wasted Nights", released in 1960, was a regional hit... and a little closer to the truth than most knew. Busted for marijuana possession, Huerta did three years in a Louisiana prison before he was pardoned by that state's own musically inclined governor, Jimmie Davis (Gov. Davis is best known for writing "You Are My Sunshine, My Only Sunshine". He was a early 20th century country star in his own right, and a fixture on the Grand Ol' Opry as well as the Lawrence Welk Show in the 50s). As Freddy Fender, Huerta was a phenonomon. Marketed as a "Country" star -- and he was the only Mexican-American country star -- his style and sound made him a cross-over hit. It was impossible in the 70s NOT to hear "Until The Last Teardrop Falls" or "Behind Closed Doors" ... and an updated version of "Wasted Days". Though he hasn't been a national star since the 70s, Fender opened the door for other border musicians (Los Lobos, for example) -- and his fellow Texans, Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings -- to enter our musical consciousness. Nelson, especially, is open to Mexican and border influence. (If you don't believe me, walk around suburban Monterrey some day... every geezer around looks like Willie.) Fender had been working mostly in the Spanish-speaking market until a combination of diabetes and hepititis slowed him down. Lung cancer finally got him last week. He was 69, and will be buried in San Benito Texas.

If he brings you happiness

Then I wish you all the best

It's your happiness that matters most of all

But if he ever breaks your heart

If the teardrops ever start

I'll be there before the next teardrop falls

Si te quire de verdad

Y te da felicidad

Te deseo lo mas bueno pa'los dos

Pero si te hace llorar

A mime puedes hablar

Y estare contigo cuando treste estas

Give me some space!

2006-10-12T11:50:00.000-05:00

Mexico City has more than 25,000 streets and 2,150 colonias. Anyone who has driven in the city knows what a jungle it is. You share the streets with thousands of green VW taxis, belching buses, delivery trucks, pedi-cabs, hawkers, numerous pedestrians as well as hundreds of thousands of cars. Parking in the commercial districts is a nightmare. The following is a story from El Universal (May 29, 2006) which describes the turmoil and stress you'll find on any given day in the downtown areas of Mexico's greatest city. The story focuses on some of the city's most colorful hard working people.... the franeleros. They're really the ones who ultimately "hold the power" midst all the chaos. It is 10:30 a.m. Grimy green Volkswagen taxis grind forward, arms punching from drivers´ windows to wave away pedestrians

It is 10:30 a.m. Grimy green Volkswagen taxis grind forward, arms punching from drivers´ windows to wave away pedestrians. Horns screech. Somebody screams, "Muévete!" - Move it!
A man jumps frantically out of an ancient, exhausted Toyota and tries to edge it to the side of the road. Behind him, handcarts piled high with stringy green onions seem to lurch and stop on their own, levitating amid the chaos, the drenched men who push them hidden by mountains of produce.
Gridlock.
Nothing moves.
At the edge of El Mercado de la Merced, Mexico City´s sensory feast of a downtown market, the tangle is getting ridiculously tangly. But somehow, above it all, two magic words ring out: "Viene, viene!"
The meaning, in Spanish, falls somewhere between "Come on!" and "He´s coming!" But everyone in this spectacular morass knows what it means: A parking spot has opened.
Juventino Villegas Alvarez, 65, his jacket slung cavalierly over his shoulder, blows his whistle and shouts again, raspy and loud: "Viene, viene!"
Somehow, impossibly, order is restored. Villegas sternly halts one of the edgy taxis with his outstretched arm, pulls away an old crate and waves a brown sedan into a parking space. The driver steps out, greeted by Villegas´ outstretched palm, and dutifully hands over 10 pesos, roughly about US$1.
Villegas is a "viene, viene" man, one of thousands in Mexico City. It is nearly impossible to park on public streets here without sliding a few pesos to one of his brethren or their counterparts, the "hombres del trapo rojo" - red rag men, so named because they draw parkers by waving a red rag. INFORMAL ECONOMY Their work is not officially sanctioned. No government entity grants them domain over their street corners. But they are universally accepted. Some get by on their charm, their rapid-fire shtick. But there also is a sinister undercurrent to their street-level economy: People who don´t pay often return to find their windshield smashed.
Villegas runs his stretch of asphalt - 100 feet of prime parking space across from a guy who sells scorching guajillo chilies by the kilo - with restless, mesmerizing efficiency. At 10:45, a lumbering delivery truck tries to sneak in without his permission. Villegas is apoplectic. "Para!" he blares. Stop!
His cheeks puff out, expelling a series of gusts through his whistle. A woman standing nearby covers her ears. For a split second, all is still. Vendors turn to Villegas. The truck driver pounds his brakes.
Eyes ablaze, Villegas points to his left. There, wedged next to a pole, is a baby stroller. Two tiny brown eyes are all that is visible amid the mass of blankets. "Somebody get that baby out of here," Villegas yowls. "We´re going to have a tragedy."
No one, including the truck driver, hesitates to follow his instructions. This is Villegas´ realm, and while he is not menacing, he is clearly in charge. He has worked this chunk of Mexico City for 15 years. When he leaves in the afternoon, a nephew of his takes over.
Villegas´ voice catches as he looks around his little empire, waxing about the generations he´s rolled into parking spaces - fathers growing old and giving way to sons. "Everything that begins in life has to end," he says, his eyes becoming red. "I´ll be here as long as God´s willing."
A shrill horn shakes him out of his reflection. Villegas looks up and beams. Juan Zamora, a squat taxi driver, idles a few steps away. Zamora is an old pal, a customer from way back. He gets special treatment.
Zamora tosses Villegas his keys. He´s not just handing over a car, he´s handing over his livelihood. "Eh, I just trust the guy," Zamora says before dipping out of the sun and into the cool, dark market. Villegas double-parks Zamora´s green taxi. But within minutes someone wants to get out from behind it. Villegas jumps into the taxi´s driver seat and turns the ignition. A weak, rattling sound stirs in the engine. He tries again. And again. Nothing.
Rubén Domínguez García appears. Domínguez works the streets by the market, too, carrying a bag of tools that he uses to hammer out dents on the spot. He is a busy man in this zone of constant fender benders. Two other guys run up. They lean into Zamora´s car, shoving it out of the way, giving it just enough momentum to coax the engine to life. EARNINGS Villegas glows. He has 130 tax-free pesos in his pocket, more than twice the minimum daily wage of 48 pesos. It is only 11:30, but his day is almost done. He claps Domínguez on the shoulder and the two break out in song. They croon "Marta," a melodramatic bolero, gloriously off-key. But their celebration is interrupted by a tooting horn. A man in a fat truck wants a place to park. http://www.mexiconews.com.mx/18507.html

Were they pink elephants by chance?

2006-10-11T17:44:00.000-05:00

No, we haven't become the Mexican afflilate of Animal Planet this week! In honor of the U.S. elections, we're covering elephants and donkeys here at the Mex Files! The late Ann Richards said Texas was the kind of place where we don't hide our crazy people in the attic... we give them the best seat in the parlor. Texans are proud of their crazy people (take a look at the Republic of Texas' founding fathers some time!) and it's a little embarrasing to get a foreign import (from, as Juanita would say, "one of them foreign states up north) who out-crazies the natives. Sara Inés Calderón of the Brownsville Herald had the happy experience of stumbling on just such a treasure. As I wrote yesterday, she's the one who broke the story of the elephant invasion across the Rio Grande. This afternoon -- for perfectly legimate reasons (I'm contracted to do 1500 words on the effects of border security measures on my stretch of the river) -- I called Calderón. Of course I had to congratulate her on finding such a treasure, but what's more important, is she's found the story is even nuttier than we thought.

October 11, 2006 — Reports of an elephant crossing the river or people trying to smuggle an elephant across were rampant Tuesday while an elaborate political stunt was taking shape near the mouth of the Rio Grande. It was a while later that the stunt, which was a photo shoot, was abruptly met by federal agents. “The elephant never made landfall into Mexico, but I tell you something, he could have made 15 laps back and forth, but no one showed up,” said Raj Peter Bhakta, a former star on the NBC show “The Apprentice,” who also is a Republican candidate for the 13th District U.S. House of Representatives seat in Eastern Pennsylvania. Bhakta decided to see if he could get an elephant accompanied by a six-piece mariachi band across the river. According to his Web site, he is in favor of “sensible immigration reform” and supports a border fence, local law enforcement assistance with immigration laws and the use of the National Guard troops to help the U.S. Border Patrol. “To my surprise, the band played on, the elephants splashed away, and nobody showed up,” Bhakta said of the stunt. “I’m astounded.” The elephants came from Shrine Circuses, said James Plunkett, who produces the circus. ... Plunkett said he and his crew were hired for a “photo shoot” and entered the Boca Chica beach area without any notice from the Border Patrol. However, when it became clear that the elephants were in a quarantined area, the Border Patrol alerted the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and the elephants had to be detained. ... [Bhakta] said he was “staggered” by what happened on Tuesday and was planning on sharing the story with his potential constituents. “If I can get an elephant led by a mariachi band into this country, I think Osama bin Laden could get across with all the weapons of mass destruction he could get into this country,” Bhakta said. The mariachi band was not immediately available for comment.

The Philadelphia-area congress-wannabe (it's a safe-seat Democratic district) has been having to share all kinds of things with his constituents... like two drunk driving convictions he somehow neglected to mention, and producing inaccurate campaign literature. OK, it wasn't quite relevant to what I'm doing on security in the Big Bend, but I was fascinated by Raj's assertion that Osama bin Ladin could have crossed the border... especially since I telephoned him (215-628-4005) and he claimed the elephants had never been in Mexico. Calderón notes that the river isn't very wide -- or very deep -- at Browsnville-Matamoros, and elephants are very wide. They may have been IN Mexico... illegally, as has happened before, much to the consternation of the U.S. Fish and Wildelife Service. Not to mention animal rights people, and even anti-immigration groups like "Ranch Rescue" which tell the story of Benny, smuggled into Mexico from Texas back in 2001 -- resulting in a customs inspectors on both sides of the border losing their jobs. And, no word on whether the mariachis were U.S. citizens... now that would be a good scandal! [The Brownsville Herald October 12 editorial mentions that the folks involved in this stunt ran from the "tick watchers" who nabbed 'em, making it a definite maybe] So, the elephants were never in Mexico, but apparently Raj was.

...at least one of them was taken in as an undocumented immigrant. Bhakta, who was born in India, is a legal U.S. resident but didn’t have his papers. Customs and Border Protection officials reportedly detained him for four hours before proof of legal U.S. residency could be ascertained.

Says Raj on immigration: (http://www.rajforcongress.com/)

I am a first generation American. My father was born in India and my mother was born in Ireland. We would not be the country we are today had immigrants not paved the way. We do, however, need sensible immigration reform. I support additional funding for border enforcement as well as efforts to attract the best and the brightest from around the world.

. The best and brightest... mariachi players? Elephant handlers? P.R. flacks?

They Got it Right the First Time....

2006-10-11T11:43:00.000-05:00

I'm aware of the risk of putting up another animal article and having this site turned in the cyber version of the Animal Planet, but.... Small Mexican farmers are finding out that in order to compete, they need to bring back the mule. Tractors aren't doing the job on all types of farmland. Exactly what is a mule? They are the offspring of a male donkey and a female horse. That makes them a hybrid. Except in rare cases, mules (males and females) are sterile and cannot reproduce themselves.... donkeys have 62 chromosomes and and horses have 64. Their offspring end up with 63 chromosomes and therefore cannot be divided evenly. Mules are thought to be stronger and smarter than donkeys and are somewhat easier to work with. People in third world countries around the world have used them to do the plowing and transporting needed on farms. When farmers could afford, they've been upgrading by purchasing John Deere tractors and replacing their mules, altogether. The problem is that these tractors don't work well on steep inclines and the cost of gas has risen so much that they aren't cost effective. Sara Miller Llana reports in: http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/1011/p07s02-woam.html that project leader, Leonel Gonzales Jauregui, wants a mule breeding center with donkeys from the U.S. The center is located near Tlajomulco, Mexico. "The Precious One", a male donkey, was donated to the Cofradia Ranch, part of the University of Guadalajara, six months ago. Leonel Gonzalez Jáuregui, executive director of the research ranch, says he wants to create a breeding center that will turn out sturdy mules to help local producers work their fields and remain competitive. In 2005, six Kentucky Jacks were brought in because they are taller and stronger than their Mexican counterparts. "These are work animals, the American ones," says Sepulveda. "Not like the Mexican ones." There are those here who view the effort to revive the donkey population as regressive. "They see it as going backward," admits Mr. Patrick Fenton, director of the Kentucky Agricultural and Commercial Trade Office. . "But a burro can be technology." The mayor-elect of Tlajomulco, Antonio Tatengo, says donkeys could help the 10 percent of landowners in his municipality with properties too small to necessitate tractors. He is quick to add that most would prefer them, though, over donkeys. "We are very modernized here," says Mr. Tatengo. It seems that modern technology isn't always the best technology. The "Beast of Burden" is making a comeback!

Global warming on the Rio Grande?

2006-10-11T01:32:00.000-05:00

Last week it was a crocodile (a comedian said you can expect Mexican leather dealers on the streets of Laredo any day now) .. now it's: Elephants storm the Rio Grande By Sara Inés Calderón The Brownsville Herald Three elephants were reportedly splashing in the Rio Grande today near Boca Chica beach, prompting reports that someone was crossing into the United States from Mexico on an elephant. The elephants were part of a photo shoot, according to James Plunkett who was tending to the elephants. On their way back to Brownsville from the shoot, the trainers and the elephants were detained at the U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint on Highway 4. The elephants were transported to the U.S. Department of Agriculture office on FM 511 where the animals were quarantined, officials said.

Oaxaca... again

2006-10-10T22:03:00.000-05:00

One of the more reliable English-language sources on Oaxaca is Ana-Maria Salazar Slack, who runs the Mexican news blog "Mexico Today." Her summation of the situation as it stands now is hopeful:

Conclusion: What seemed to an irreversible use of force to regain control of the City of Oaxaca last week, today it appears that there may be a different solution… One of the huge issue is when will the teachers return to the classrooms. It has been more then five months that they have been on strike…

The entire post is here. On the Lonely Planet's "Thorn Tree Mexico Message Board", South African Oaxaca resident "gbbackpack" posted this:

Overland bus transport has been nearly back to normal for weeks now. Day-time Oaxaca is basically calm, though people (and taxis) simply no longer leave much after 10 or 11pm (midnight buses are also the only ones still cancelled). This is not normal for Oaxaca at all, but maybe exactly because it used to be such a safe place – that it is actually surviving this lack of governance in a strange way. This week probably remains crucial: Predictions are hard right now, but watch ... news reports for updates (but keep in mind who the information source is).

That last comment -- in parenthesis -- is probably the wisest thing I've seen about the whole situation. Most of the anti-APPO "analysis" I've seen comes from either big business executives, or corporate sources. Consciously or not, they are going to be biased towards the way things SHOULD work... not the way they are working. What's ironic is that we're seeing a libertarian pro-democracy uprising going pretty smoothly... much to the chagrin of those who normally pay lip service to "self-reliance" and "do-it-yourselfism". Unfortunately, a lot of the pro-APPO reportage is also biased... I'm annoyed with U.S.-based analysis that somehow conflate a larger-than-usual, but not unheard of push to out a Latin American crook with U.S. politics, the Bush agenda and the 2000 Presidential vote count in Florida. None of which have anything to do with a mismanged state economy or a teachers' strike. And, even though Mexicans like to refer to Karl Marx, they aren't ones for following the rule book -- unlike European revolutionaries, Mexican history is written after the book comes out. Nobody wrote a Mein Kampf or Communist Manifesto for the 1910-20 Revolution. They still managed to have one. Having said all that... from the CORPORATE MEDIA (or, "MSM" as the right-wing likes to call it these days), this from the Mexico City News (El Universal's English edition, published in cooperation with the Miami Herald). What I noted was that top business leaders are now involved... making this look all the more traditionally Mexican, where crises are resolved through negotiation and compromise, as was the electorial crisis of 1988:

...In a press conference late Monday, Interior Secretary Carlos Abascal, who has headed the negotiations with the local chapter of the teachers union and the Oaxaca People´s Popular Assembly (APPO), said a tentative agreement had been reached over the return of law enforcement to Oaxaca City. ... Abascal said the crisis needed an immediate solution and called for the teachers to return to classes. School has been suspended during the unrest, affecting over a million Oaxacan children. ... APPO and the teachers reportedly put a three-page document on the table that calls for the establishment of a dialogue process in Oaxaca itself that would include a broad representation of the state´s citizens. The talks would start October 12. The secretariat, meanwhile, has offered full back pay to the dissident teachers, according to media reports. It has also said that an investigation was under way involving Oaxaca Governor Ulises Ruiz. The specifics of the investigation was unclear, but a document signed by Abascal indicated that previous Oaxaca state administrations were also being investigated. The ouster of Ruiz is the strikers´ top demand. ... The only major party that has backed the idea of Ruiz´s removal or resignation is the Democratic Revolution Party (PRD). On Monday, the PRD said it could accept that Ruiz´s replacement be from his own party, the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). ...On Tuesday, a Senate committee will decide if it will continue proceedings that can legally remove Ruiz from office on the grounds of inability to govern. ...Also on Monday, a diverse new citizens group called the National Democratic Dialogue called on authorities to avoid using any repressive means to deal with the ongoing unrest in the southern state. The group, which includes National Employers Confederation president Alberto Núñez Esteva and renowned pro-democracy activist and Colegio de México social scientist Sergio Aguayo, urged a political settlement to the crisis. "Efforts at dialogue must have priority," urged the group in a statement, "especially those that involve the participation of civic society and the construction of long-term solutions."

Calling long distance....

2006-10-10T13:33:00.000-05:00

Let's cross our fingers that they don't get a busy signal.CID=2 http://www.cio.com/blog_view.html?5660 is reporting that "Teotihuacan will be the launch pad for an attempt to communicate with extraterrestrial life". "In addition to the data being shot into space, some chosen submissions will also be projected onto the side of the 216-foot-tall pyramid for spectators and other Web surfers to view via a real-time, global Web broadcast, according to Reuters"

Interested parties from around the world will have an opportunity to contribute text, images, video and sounds that reflect human nature to be included in the message which will be sent off on October 25, 2006. Submissions may be submitted starting today.

Yahoo's "Time Capsule" project will digitize and beam the messages up into space with a laser.

" We have this incredible ancient site and from that site we can project contemporary content," Srinija Srinivasan Yahoo's editor in chief, told Reuters. "What is new is the ability to capture this information in such scale."

Maybe we should submit an image of the newly funded "anti-immigration" fence which is to be built along the U.S./Mexican border. It could send the message to extraterestrial aliens that the U.S. doesn't take a liking to aliens coming up from the south. That way, if any Martians recieve the Time Capsule messages, they(ET aliens) can plan on entering the U.S. from its northern border.

Ain't that a nice "How do you do"? I wonder if the INS captures any ET aliens wandering around Roswell, N.M. (as a result of the Time Capsule experiment)..... will they foot the bill to send them home, too....like they do the Mexican illegals???

Submit your own ideas to:http://timecapsule.yahoo.com/capsule.php

Who's invading who? Or ... deja-vu all over again

2006-10-09T21:09:00.000-05:00

¡Para Justicia y Libertad! -- with devastating logic on their side -- concludes NAFTA is designed to erase our national borders, as the right-wingers claim ... and it's not exactly a new idea.

...a conquest does not have to be done militarily. Three years before NAFTA took effect, José Luis Calva of the National University of Mexico, predicted, "If the governments and legislatures of the three countries agree to liberalize trade in agricultural goods, U.S. citizens should be prepared to receive some 15 million Mexican migrants. The Border Patrol will be unable to detain them, and even a new iron curtain, rising on the border at a moment when the Cold War has given way to economic warfare among nations, will buckle under the weight of millions of Mexicans thrown off their lands by free trade." The essence of the American empire is not territorial control but wresting of economic control from another country and dominating that nation economically. How long will this "peaceful conquest" of Mexico continue to go unnoticed?

Get the fire department...

2006-10-09T20:52:00.000-05:00

I'm married to one of these guys who loves to downplay the "heat" in his cooking. He'll spend a couple of hours cooking up some green chili in the kitchen and he'll offer me a taste. Inevitably, I'll ask him if it's too hot for my liking. He comes back with something like, "Oh no, honey, I made it just the way you like it." He has no tastebuds left because he's burned them off. He's the type who puts habeneros in his cereal. I like some spice, but I don't get any pleasure out of a 30 min. afterburn on my tongue or from wiping beads of perspiration from my forehead. Apparently, there was a gathering of kindred spirits (to my hubby) who voluntarily put themselves to the ultimate "test" in Dallas last weekend. And I bet I could guess which room in their house saw a lot of action the following two days. DALLAS (AP)- A 62-year-old retired accountant from Nevada swallowed 247 peppers in eight minutes to win the Jalapeno Eating World Championship at the State Fair of Texas. Richard LeFevre won $2,000 for prevailing in Sunday's contest, which was sponsored by the International Federation of Competitive Eating. "I love to eat, and I love to compete, so the two go pretty well together," said LeFevre, the world's eighth-ranked eater according to the federation. LeFevre, who has also won the fair's World Corny Dog Eating Contest three times, said his winning strategy was to mix three or four peppers in his mouth with a swig of milk before swallowing. LeFevre was one of four professional eaters who took the top four places in the competition. Sonya "The Black Widow" Thomas said she had never eaten a jalapeno before the contest. Ranked third in the world by the federation, she downed 239 peppers to take second place and $1,000 in prize money. Christopher Huang, of Arlington, entered the competition even though he doesn't normally eat spicy foods. "I eat mild salsa," Huang said. "But there's nothing like putting yourself through a lot of pain for no reason." The 26-year-old required several minutes of recovery time after eating 53 jalapenos. "I cant feel my face," he said when he was able to speak again. http://www.kltv.com/Global/story.asp?S=5514385&nav=1TjD

Mojados...

2006-10-08T18:30:00.000-05:00

Two tidbits from along the Rio Grande... Fishermen capture 7.5-foot croc in Rio Grande Associated Press

NUEVO LAREDO, Mexico — Mexican fishermen captured a 7.5-foot-long crocodile in the Rio Grande, the river that divides Mexico and the United States, and turned the animal over to a local animal shelter, authorities reported today. The animal was caught on a fisherman's line on Saturday in a sparsely populated stretch of the river on the outskirts of Nuevo Laredo, across from Laredo, Texas The crocodile weighed about 130 pounds and appeared to be in good condition, said Jose Moreno Araiza, a commander of the Nuevo Laredo fire department, where the fishermen first brought the animal in the back of a pickup truck. It was then turned over to the local Animal Protection Society, whose president, Gina Ferrara, said the croc would be kept for the time being in improvised holding area complete with a pool of water. Federal environmental officials were informed of the capture, and will eventually decide what is to be done with the animal. Crocodiles do not normally inhabit the Rio Grande, and authorities believe it may have been brought to the area as a pet and then released into the river by its owner. Undocumented migrants frequently swim or ride inner tubes across the Rio Grande to reach the United States. Nuevo Laredo Environmental Department biologist Irvin Donath Paredes said the croc appeared to be young and in good physical condition. "We'll have to see what species it is, but it's young, three or four years old, judging by the texture of its skin and the size of its head," said Donath Paredes.

CROCS? My neighbor is a misplaced crocodile specialist (he did his dissertation in Tabasco, Belize and Thailand), who moved here to teach biology at Sul Ross, after a stint at an Indian College in South Dakota. He's pumped! And, yeah, it was a croc, not an alligator, though I wouldn't want to get close enough to tell the difference. And... Jesse Bogan of the San Antonio Express-News managed to find two people who actually support the Great Wall of Texas.

In Laredo, Ray Segura, owner of Segura Fence Co., said he's eager to compete for government contracts to help build the fence. He already has teamed up with a San Antonio company to submit a bid. "There's going to be a lot of contracts, there's going to be a lot of bidding, there's going to be a lot of action," Segura said. He said that based on his experience, the fence probably would be built on an easement along the river that the government owns and runs along the entire border, usually 30 to 50 feet wide. He estimated it would take about two to three months per mile of construction for a thick wire fence with holes too small to fit a boot in; twice as long if it is a double fence, as Congress wants. Also standing to gain was a shirtless man with a tattoo of a bat on his chest. He was drinking beer last week with two colleagues along the river where smugglers commonly bring immigrants in rafts from the Mexican town of Miguel Alemán to the Texas town of Roma. The self-described "patero," or smuggler, sat among trash, just beyond the reach of flies buzzing around a dead animal. "We aren't politicians, we are ruffians. It's going to be more difficult (to cross), but it's going to cost more money," said the man, who appeared to be about 40 and declined to give his name. "If they want to spend the money on the wall," he said with the flick of a hand, "then spend it."

Bishops battle over Oaxaca

2006-10-07T13:31:00.000-05:00

Archbishop Raul Vera of Saltillo, a clerical "liberal" -- and Cardinal Juan Sandoval Iñiguez of Guadelajara, a "conservative" -- both want the Oxaca situation solved now. While it's still unusual to see churchmen commenting on political issues, what's very odd is the open disagreement between them. Vera blames the political parties for protecting Governor Ruiz, whom he says "no longer has anything to do" and is just "delying his exit" . He says the state has been kidnapped from the people by the politicans, who -- like in Morelos, where corrupt PAN governor Sergio Estrada Cajigal remained in office by openly bribing state legislators to vote against his impeachment despite his known ties to organized crime and huge demonstrations against him (and where one municipality overthrew the local government and set up a people's municipality which the State attempted to put down by force), the Saltillo archbisop called the government response a "terrorist tactic". "Neither the nation nor the people of Oaxaca should run the risk of violence just to protect the career of Ulises Ruiz," he said. Vera was formerly Co-adjucator Bishop of Chiapas. Chiapas bishops have a tradition, going back to their first bishop, Bartelemo de las Casas, of defending the people against the ruling powers. Las Casas was America's first investigative reporter. His letters to the King and the Pope, later published as "The Destruction of the Indies" ended both Indian slavery and led the Pope to publish a Bull, Sublimis Deus (1537) settling the question of the Indian's souls once and forever. In Catholic America, anyway, the Indians were people, who might be exploited and cheated and abused by the powers that be... but unlike in the English-speaking parts of the Americas, they were not pushed aside, killed off and forced into reservations. Samuel Ruiz, the former Bishop of Chiapas (and Vera's sometimes collaborator) was forced into early retirement by Pope John-Paul II, in part because of the Mexican government's complaints that Ruiz was giving aid and comfort to the Zapatistas (Bishop Ruiz used to keep a state map in his office, showing non-Zapatista regions as "occupied territory"). Meanwhile, Cardinal Sandoval -- whose best known political act was organizing street protests when he was indicted for interfering with a murder investigation (his predecessor was assassinated, either by mistake [both the late Cardinal and the local crime boss drove black Buick Rivieras] or to cover up... something. Sandoval tried to pass off forged evidence suggesting a government plot. The prosecutor was looking into ties between the Guadalajara Archdiocese and narcotics trafficers) is a law and order man. He spoke to a miliary group, defending the state's right to defend against aggression, foreign and domestic. Jesus Christ was not available for comment.

El Grito!

2006-10-06T15:03:00.000-05:00

This last month we all heard and thrilled at the “Grito”. The celebratory Presidential proclamation made on the 16th of September, Independence Day. This series of Viva Mexico! that stirs the souls and hearts of the thousands packed into the Zocalo. But here I would like to pay homage to that more humble grito. This grito is not political nor is it making a nationalistic statement for the TV cameras. It’s the Grito of the individual’s depth of joy, that primal scream that rises from the child within all of us. Although unfortunately many people have stifled that child and when that happens the Grito dissolves into a whimpering murmur accompanied by a sheepish grin and, maybe, even embarrassment. This grito accompanies the guitar and the trumpet at the wedding dance, aaaayyiiii! It bursts out from the dance floor at the Saturday night pachanga, AAaaYYiiii! It erupts when your team scores the winning goal, AAAHUAAYYYIIII! This grito is as humble as the family barbeque and the corner cantina, AAaaayYYyiiiII! It announces the ecstasy and the exaltation of that moment of sheer delight. It’s the scream that says we’re alive and loving it. This is not the primal scream of fear and pain, but the sound of indulgence with mirth and pleasure. The exhilaration generated by el grito spreads throughout the crowd, the cantina, the dance hall, the arena; it burrows into the souls of all present. It does not discriminate: young and old, man and woman, some rich and many poor. It says good-by to hard days and promises tomorrows lottery wins; it pledges your woman a good night and tells your competition to step down. El GRITO! QUE VIVA EL GRITO!

Looking for the Biggest Burp.....

2006-10-06T13:37:00.000-05:00

We've all heard about the "Big Bang" theory.... but have you heard about the "Big Burp"? Leave it to Chiapas to become the center of yet another war..... the war between Coke Cola and Pepsi. A recent article in: http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/2840/ by Beverly Bell tells us all about the 'perfect storm' taking place in the state of Chiapas right now. Politics, religion and commerce have taken up their positions and without the aid of "menthos", the gases are exploding. "Thousands of candles flicker in the dim chamber. The air is thick with the smoke from copal incense. On the altar, men in black wool tunics and white knee-length pants play solemn music on drums and gourds. Below them, a score of Tzotzil Indians chant in small circles on the pine needle-covered floor. In the center of each circle are candles, eggs, copal and pox—fermented corn mash—in an old glass container, stopped with a corn cob. And next to the pox is a half-liter bottle of Coca-Cola or Pepsi. In the 484-year-old Church of St. John the Baptist, in Chamula, a town of 60,000 in Chiapas, Mexico, those bottles indicate the intersection of religion, politics, water and consumer markets. In the United States, Coke and Pepsi vie for monopoly contracts with schools and universities. In Chiapas, the stakes in the soft drink war are as high as the purity of one’s soul. Traveling through the cold highlands of the San Juan Chamula municipality any Saturday afternoon, one regularly encounters a scene resembling a battleground: dozens of bodies sprawled on the ground, arms and legs sometimes extending perilously into the road. At the epicenter of each of these scenes are plastic tables and chairs in front of a diminutive wooden store. There, men, women and children who are either on their way to collapse, or who have resuscitated themselves and are back for more, sit drinking pox, which means “mad dog” in Tzotzil. Along with pox, they swig Coke or Pepsi, depending on whose store they patronize; each store sells only one brand. Like fireworks and copal, pox is a sacrament in a local religion that blends Catholicism with elements of native tradition. It is a sacred drink that cleanses the soul; the more pox one drinks, the greater the purification. Over the past several decades the caciques—local elites who wield economic and political power and control the soft drink concession—have convinced the faithful that pox should be drunk with Coke or Pepsi, depending on who is doing the proselytizing. They say the cola induces burping, which releases evil from the soul. The caciques and their affiliated drink companies do a booming business—nevermind that the beverages sell for 50 U.S. cents a can, exactly the average daily income. Purchasing a soda often means not purchasing food, and Chiapas has one of the highest rates of both malnutrition and Coke consumption in Mexico. " For the rest of this interesting story, click on the link (above) and find out how Coke Cola/Pepsi play into the politics and economy of Chiapas. It's an excellent eye-opening article about the inner workings of commerce and power in Mexico!!!

Playboys of the Southwestern World

2006-10-05T22:25:00.000-05:00

We actually have three radio stations in Alpine, but the college station (that was being run by profs over the summer, and was heavy on Led Zepplin, Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson) doesn't have much of a broadcast range and fades in and out around the mountain roads. The second station is trying to save me, and bring me to Jesus through really bad music. The other choice has baseball, local news and BOTH kinds of music -- Country and Western.

It also introduced me to a guy I'd never heard of, Blake Shelton... who has a good version of this classic on Mexican tourism... and yeah, I know. But I couldn't find any other pictures of two cowboys with an old truck. Besides, who knows?

(Neal Coty/Randy VanWarmer, ©2003) This is a song About best friends John Roy Was a boy I knew Since he was three And I was two Grew up two little houses Down from me The only two bad apples On our family tree Kind of ripened and rotted In our puberty Two kindred spirits bound by destiny Well now I was smart But I lacked ambition Johnny was wild With no inhibition Was about like mixin Fire and gasoline (And he'd say) Hey Romeo Let's go down to Mexico Chase senoritas Drink ourselves silly Show them Mexican girls A couple of real hillbillies Got a pocket full of cash And that old Ford truck A fuzzy cat hangin From the mirror for luck Said don't you know All those little Brown-eyed girls Want playboys of the southwestern world Long around Our eighteenth year We found two plane tickets The hell out of here Got scholarships To some small town School in Texas Learned to drink Sangria Til the dawns early light Eat eggs Ranchero And throw up all night And tell those daddy's girls We were majoring in a rodeo Ah but my Favorite memory At school that fall Was the night John Roy Came runnin down the hall Wearin nothin But cowboy boots And a big sombrero (And he was yellin) Hey Romeo Let's go down to Mexico Chase senoritas Drink ourselves silly Show them Mexican girls A couple of real hillbillies Got a pocket full of cash And that old Ford truck A fuzzy cat hangin From the mirror for luck Said don't you know All those little Brown-eyed girls Want playboys of the southwestern world And I said We had a little Change in plans Like when Paul McCartney Got busted in Japan And I said We got waylaid When we laid foot On Mexican soil See the boarder guard With the Fu Manchu mustache Kind of stumbled on John's Pocket full of American cash He said Doin a little funny business In Mexico Amigo But all I could think about Was savin my own tail When he mentioned ten years In a Mexican jail So I pointed to John Roy and said It's all his now please let me go Well it was your idea genius I was just layin there in bed When you said Hey Romeo Let's go down to Mexico Chase senoritas Drink ourselves silly Show them Mexican girls A couple of real hillbillies

Got a pocket full of cash And that old Ford truck A fuzzy cat hangin From the mirror for luck Said don't you know All those little Brown-eyed girls Want playboys of the southwestern world Ah we're still best friends Temporary cell mates

Ulises Ruiz... the Denny Hastert of Mexico?

2006-10-05T18:35:00.000-05:00

... or... I've fallen and I can't get up! No... not that he's covering up sex crimes (that'd be Enrique Peña, the PRI-governor of the State of Mexico)but that he's trying to blame his own incompetence on others -- or, rather on others who expose his incompetence. Another key ally, PAN congressional leader, Jorge Zermeño, is now calling for Ruiz' resignation. The Fox administration has been claiming that destitution (that is the legal term for removing an incompetent elected official) would be undemocratic, but... given that it's the people who want Ruiz out... nothing undemocratic about it at all (assuming he was even democratically elected to begin with -- which is, itself, a dubious proposition, as reported yesterday in ¡Para justicia y liberdad!). What foreign reports fail to note (though the ¡Para justicia...! report does note) is that much of the opposition comes from PRI organziations within Oaxaca. It's the party's own fault -- trying to be everything to everybody for too many years, it's natural that there are huge blocs in opposition. Just like Denny Hastert cannot on the one hand claim he's representing a "moral majority" while simultanously presiding over immoral and unethical blocs within that same party. Along with party-leader Zermada of PAN, the PRD congressional delegation is now also calling for destitution, which the Senate has every right to do. Maybe President Fox forgot how democratic it was back when he tried to have AMLO destituted by the Senate about two years ago. As Kelly Arthur Garrett reports in today's Mexico City Herald:

"Not only is (Ruiz) unable to govern, he is responsible for the breakdown of political and social coexistence in Oaxaca," said Carlos Navarrete, the PRD Senate coordinator. "The state legislature has difficulty holding sessions ... the state capital is socially and economically paralyzed ... tens of thousands of children have been out of school for months, (and) the productive sector is suffering enormous losses." The Senate´s Interior Committee would hear debate on the removal procedure, known as "desaparición de poderes públicos," or disappearance of state control. The membership of that committee was just decided on Tuesday. Presiding over it will be Jesús Murillo Karam, a PRI senator opposed to the removal of Ruiz. But Javier González Garza, the PRD floor leader in the Chamber of Deputies, said he was confident that all sides will soon realize that a Ruiz exit is the only way forward toward a solution to the Oaxaca crisis. "His resignation alone won´t solve all the problems, but the problems won´t be resolved without his resignation," he said. "Ulises has to step aside to clear the way for all the parties involved to discuss (solutions)." González Garza said he supported an effort in the Senate to have Ruiz removed, but said he thinks the governor will step down before the process is complete. "He´s already fallen," the deputy said. "But nobody has told him yet."

Meanwhile, the APPO and citizen's representatives (led by Francisco Toledo) have walked out of negotiations within Mexico City, claiming Ruiz has to go before talks can continue. Ruiz was present at the meeting. "He's already fallen..." sounds like Hastert to me.

MINUTEMEN INVADE MEXICO!!!!!!!

2006-10-04T18:52:00.000-05:00

Nothing happens. Hey, Romeo... Let's go down to Mexico. I gotta an Ford Truck and a pocketful of dough. Let's go down to Mexico. You-Tube video It's dull, but watch the very end... Billy Bob and Bubba Jue had a nice time looking at girls in Nuevo Laredo, and gawking... which is fine. But they really, really, really ought not to bring firearms into Mexico. What part of "illegal" don't they understand?

The Great Wall of Texas... good for (shady) business

2006-10-04T15:43:00.000-05:00

From Guadalajara-based Canadian journalist David Agren's "Tales from the Chicken Bus"...

Politics and hurt feelings aside – the Mexican government likens the barrier to the Berlin Wall and considers the construction plans unneighborly – the biggest beneficiary will probably be polleros (traffickers), whose business of smuggling migrants should become a whole lot more lucrative. In an insightful column in today's Publico (Guadalajara), editor Luis Miguel Gonzalez laid out the polleros' economics. According to a 1993 study, one of every six undocumented migrants hired a pollero. By 2004, the figure jumped to two out of every five. The value of the human-smuggling business is estimated to be worth $5 billion annually.

In Oaxaca they hate the gov'nor... now we all did what we could do...

2006-10-04T00:51:00.000-05:00

(Edited 14:30, Wednesday) Xicanopwr and The Unapologetic Mexican present an excellent backgrounder on Oaxaca. Kelly Arthur Garrett (the "Mexico's best damn political reporter in English") with help Justino Miranda in Cuautla, Morelos and Jorge Octavio Ochoa in Oaxaca presents an overview in today's Mexico City Herald:

Interior Secretary Carlos Abascal told Congress Tuesday that the federal government has no intention of using force to end the four-month-old civil strife that has closed the state´s schools, paralyzed Oaxaca City´s Historic Center and rendered the state government virtually impotent. Abascal, the Fox administration official in charge of the ever-intensifying Oaxaca crisis, was interrupted and jeered by placard-carrying Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) legislators, but managed to make his point in no uncertain terms. "In the name of God, we will carry out absolutely no repression," he said. But in the kind of hedged language that has convinced many striking teachers and allied social groups that a federal crackdown is imminent, Abascal also said the Fox administration would be within its rights in sending in federal police or military troops. "The Constitution establishes the obligation of authorities to re-establish law and order," he told a full session of the Chamber of Deputies. "But I am not anticipating an intervention." Abascal´s invocation of the deity in his remarks to Congress later prompted a wry response from a teachers´ spokesperson 100 kilometers away. "He (Abascal) preaches from the pulpit with a crucifix in his right hand and a club in his left," said Omar Olivera Espinosa, spokesperson for a contingent of several thousand teachers and their supporters who are marching from the city of Oaxaca to Mexico City. Olivera made his comment in the town of Amilcingo in the state of Morelos, where the marchers rested Tuesday night. Abascal criticized the Oaxaca teachers and the Oaxaca People´s Assembly (APPO) for spurning recent invitations to dialogue. "The efforts that this secretariat have made have not always been responded to," he said. "We will continue to do everything within our reach." Abascal urged strike leaders to participate in a "forum" scheduled for Wednesday, at which bankers, business leaders, clergy members, party leaders and elected legislators plan to discuss a proposed reform package called the Pact for Governability, Peace and Development for Oaxaca. But the union leaders announced Tuesday night that they would skip the forum, saying the list of participants was stacked in favor of "interest groups." Instead, Oaxaca teachers union leader Enrique Rueda Pacheco said a formal request had been sent to the Interior Secretariat for an "alternate table" at the forum, separate from the clergy, the business leaders and the governor. If that request is honored, he said, the teachers will consider making the trip to Mexico City. APPO leaders were still meeting Tuesday night to decide if they would follow suit with the teachers. The teachers broke off talks with the federal government on Sept. 20 after becoming convinced that their demand for the ouster of Oaxaca Gov. Ulises Ruiz would not be honored. Fox and Abascal´s National Action Party (PAN) has sided with the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in protecting Ruiz, though so far the PRI is the only political force openly calling for the use of federal troops to protect Ruiz´s state government. APPO joined the teachers´ protest in June, after Ruiz decided to physically challenge the strikers instead of negotiating with them. But the dozens of labor and social organizations that eventually united in APPO had opposed Ruiz long before his failed attempt to remove the striking teachers from their encampments in downtown Oaxaca City. "There are robust antecedents in the authoritarian style of the previous governor, José Murat, who left behind (in 2004) a social polarization," said political scientist Alberto Aziz Nassif in his weekly EL UNIVERSAL column Tuesday. The PRI has had such a longtime lock on Oaxaca politics that Ruiz´s 2004 victory over a coalition candidate representing all the other parties was seen not as an indication of his popularity but a confirmation of the PRI´s ability to manipulate the electoral process in that state. "Ulises came in with a credibility deficit and started right in with repressive actions against social leaders and an attack on independent media outlets, such as the daily Noticias," said Aziz. Only the PRD has backed the teachers and APPO in calling for Ruiz to step down, and in ruling out federal force under any circumstances. PRD leaders said Tuesday they have called off a planned Oaxaca City meeting of their national committee that had been announced for Wednesday. PRD secretary-general Guadalupe Acosta, who originally promoted the presence of the PRD leadership in the heart of the conflict as a deterrent to violence, said Tuesday he feared the meeting would be used as a pretext for trouble. With talks stalled, the marchers steadily approaching Mexico City and Oaxaca kids still out of school, the crisis has turned into a kind of slow-motion waiting game. Military helicopters circling over Oaxaca on Sunday and Monday added to the tension, as did several explosives set off in front of Oaxaca buildings Monday. Federal Attorney General Office spokespersons on Tuesday said the bombs (which hurt nobody and did little damage) may have been the work of known guerrilla groups such as the Revolutionary People´s Army (EPR) using a new alias [see below] APPO and the teachers suspect the explosions were deliberate provocations by authorities to justify a federal crackdown. "If a political solution is achieved and Ruiz leaves ... that would be a triumph of the political process," said Aziz. "But if force is resorted to, that will only aggravate the conflict. We´ll see."

The teachers' march has reached Mexico City, and talks bbetween APPO, the Federal and State Government, the Catholic Church and a citizens group led by Francisco Toledo are still scheduled to start Wednesday (tomorrow). Oaxaca Tense at start of Talks

(I know it's the Cuban News Agency... but for "just the facts" news, they generally have better Latin American coverage than the U.S. and Canadian press) Mexico, Oct 3 (Prensa Latina) Tension still prevails in the Mexican state of Oaxaca, though the Secretariat of Government has guaranteed security will be maintained to resume talks with its social movement. Oaxaca residents are on the alert, after military planes flew over the city last weekend, three firecrackers exploded in the banking area, and one student is missing. Also, the tense situation persists amid the risk of an intervention by the federal forces to solve the socio-political conflict in Oaxaca, whose residents are demanding the dismissal of governor Ulises Ruiz. The resumption of negotiations with the leadership of the Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca (APPO) is scheduled for Wednesday, when the so called pact for the governability, peace, and development of the state is expected to be signed. Regarding this, President Vicente Fox assured his government will spare no effort in solving the Oaxaca conflict, but warned that if things do not work out, those who violate the law will be punished. Fox also indicated his administration favors talks and is working hard to reach all the agreements necessary to solve the crisis democratically.

Jornada Enrique Méndez with Octavio Vélez in Oaxaca (Jornada)my translation

The People's Assembly of Oaxaca (APPO) has responded to Interior Minister Carlos Abascal Carranza, saying that if the Army enters the State Capital, "you can be sure, it's lot us who will be running." APPO leader Flavio Sosa said Abascal is talking out of both sides of his mouth, warning us we need to bargain in good faith, while issuing an ultimatum we aren't going to accept. Also this morning, Oaxaca Governor Ulises Ruiz appeared in Llano Park to "inaugurate" a stone image of the Virgin of Guadalupe produced in a local quarry, protected by about 500 municipal and ministerial police. Ruiz took advantage of the occasion to demand the Federal government "takes the side of the citizens who want their rights restored," because "federal crimes were committed by the civil movement that is demanding he stepped down, contrary to law." "We are going to meet the needs of a society that is fed up", he added. APPO considered Ruiz' appearance, in an armored SUV surrounded by armed guards as a provocation. In other news, a tense situation has developed in the community of San Antonino Castillo where the head of the local Padres de Familia (an organization something like the PTA, crossed with the Christian Coalition -- trans. note) shot the APPO selected police chief, and was taken into custody by the community.

Read that last paragraph again... where is the violence coming from? And, it looks to me like the APPO is not just an anarchist group, but has been taking the necessary steps to form functioning municipal governments. Fishy to me... A few bombs went off the other morning outside banks in downtown Oaxaca, supposedly set by some group calling itself the "Revolutionary Armed Organization of the People of Oaxaca" according to the professional anti-terroritsts (it's a security consulting firm) "Strafor" . When I first read about it, I remembered the similar incident about two years ago in Morelos, where another crooked governor was fighting for his political life (though in Morelos, it was only one non-conforming municipality). Then, the alleged "bank bombing terrorists" turned out to be the State Police... part of the plan to force the feds to intervene. Apparently, that's what's going on here, though the new "Revolutionary Armed Organization" could be any number of groups ... pro or anti- Ulises. Organized Crime Special Prosecutor José Luis Santiago Vasconcelos said the story didn't pass the smell test. There is still common sense on the Federal level.

Something old, something new (not Oaxaca, not politics)

2006-10-04T00:42:00.000-05:00

This fellow showed up Tuesday at Templo Mayor, where he's been hiding in plain sight on Mexico City's Zocalo since 1524 or so. (Photo: AP)

2 Octubre: Tlatelolco 1968... Oaxaca 2006

2006-10-02T20:50:00.000-05:00

Today is another anniversary. 2 October 1968 is -- or should be -- on everyone's mind when we talk about Oaxaca. Then, as now, the "intellegencia" and the people (ordinary people) said ¡No Mas! to corruption and missed opportunities and misplaced national priorities. Then, the Secretaria de Gobernacion and the President took "drastic measures" against "anarchy." Tlatelolco was the beginning of the end of the old system. The army itself spent decades undoing the shame (it's apocryphical, but the General who fired on the Politechnical High School is said to have spent the rest of his life apologizing to school kids... and telling the Presidents that the Army was not trained to attack High Schools). The PRI no longer automatically was THE party of all. And, the people no longer automatically trusted the President. Now... Oaxaca. The Secretaria de Gobernacion, Carlos Abascal may come from a fascist family, and he may represent the "law n' order" side of PAN, but he is, publically anyway, telling the press that there is no "war" in Oaxaca. And, "thanks" to George W. Bush's mishandling of the immigration question, there's little chance the Mexicans are paying attention to U.S. claims of "subversion". While there isn't any good explaination for naval overflight of Oaxaca and the obvious explanation is that the Mexican Marines are supporting PPF officers who are ready to enter the City,, it may be that Fox is just playing hardball, getting everyone to reach an agreement. I'm still hopeful for a peaceful settlement. Life, it seems, goes on even under trying circumstances. I received the following e-mail last Sunday from a non-political foreign resident of Oaxaca:

I wish I knew what "The Real Story" is.
As I stepped out of the plaza on my way to the market this morning, I noted a whole bus load of tourist, and more tourist than I have seen in days wandering down the street, and even some more in the Internet cafe. Not droves of them as in years past, but a sprinkling here and there, gives one hope.
In the market I see a flower seller creating an arrangement of flowers in a basket, it is the type that the dancers wear are their head in a festival, and that tells me much, there is always hope in preparation for a festival, you know. Again, daily, I find Oaxaca to be friendly, hopeful, full of color, smells, taste, art, smiles, Oaxaca continues to be kind to me. I went to a new exhibition down at the Museum on Garcia Vigil and Independence this evening, there are the works of various artist celebrating the life of Benito Juarez, took in more than I could digest, walked away stuffed on colors, textures, concepts.
Wandered down thru a Zocolo which is packed with sellers selling tourist stuff to no tourist, it is late and the few tourist I saw earlier today are no longer out. Ironic that APPO gave the ambulatory sellers their rights to work the Zocolo that the governor had revoked a year ago when he remodeledand now there are no tourist to sell to. Oh well, that was a no win situation. If his cabinet had not wasted the money remodeling, and not chased out the sellers, oh well, it is done.
So, as I wander, past the stalls, I see this little kid sleeping in a crate and I just know this is a perfect picture. I ask his Mom if I can shoot, she looks at her husband, I comment to him, "es por arte" and with those magic words, he nods in agreement. I get my picture, and buy a fuzzy little yellow wind up chicky toy from them for my granddaughter. I walk past a kid twirling fire batons in a ring of fire, I get another good shot. Up Alcala on my way home, it is almost deserted now. I stop for a second to ask the guy selling bus tickets about transport, he assures me all is normal as usual, one can take a first class bus to Mexico City anytime they want. I stop in and buy popcorn from a couple of girls in the ice cream shop, I am the only client and as I pay while I wait for the popcorn to pop, the girl ask me if I want a receipt, I tell her not to concern herself, I doubt she will confuse me with the non existent customers crowding the place. We have a great laugh over that concept. It never ceases to amaze me how no matter if these are difficult times, it is so easy to raise a smile or a laugh out of someone here. And again, I realize how blessed I am to have chosen my path to be Oaxaca.

The Unapologetic Mexican, is, as always, eloquent on the "big picture":

Look to Mexico, swarmed upon by the same criminals that have lived throughout time, in every land. Look to Mexico, where the people understand that it is better to die bloodied and with your heart and hands in accordance, than it is to ride a comfortable chair to Hell. Look to Mexico, the land that birthed the man who said Es mejor morir de pie, que continuar viviendo de rodillas. It is better to die on your feet than it is to continue to live on your knees. Look to Mexico, in her time of need. But do not look with pity, for she will live on, and her spirit will never die. Regardless of what el gobierno does or does not do. Look to her to know better how we ought to live. Perhaps you and I can draw strength from those proud people. For it is you and I—right here in America and snoozing in the shadow of those same dark forces that Oaxacans meet with axe handles and gasoline—who are in true need of help.

He's still dead...

2006-10-01T17:59:00.000-05:00

THANKS, Francisco! Today is the 70th anniversary of Franco's assumption of power as head of the Army and Head of State in Spain. This was one of the great tragedies of the last century, but Europe's loss was Mexico's gain.

Mexico was still recovering from the Revolution in 1936. Pre-revolutionary Mexico had depended on outside expertise for much of its industry and commerce.

Mexico's extremely liberal asylum policies (if you could find a job, and you were fleeing political persecution, you were welcome to stay as long as you liked) and the Mexican government's anti-fascist tilt (you can still claim automatic immigrant status if you're fleeing a fascist state), meant Spain -- and Europe's -- loss was Mexico's gain. It wasn't just artists and intellectuals like Luis Buñuel, but businessmen and engineers and ordinary workers arrived bringing needed skills at a time when the whole world was in a depression.

And they continued to come until Franco was dead. I had a student whose dad had come from Catalonia at 16 to avoid the draft. Santa Maria la Ribera, my Mexico City neighborhood, went from a conservative to a leftist stronghold, thanks in good part to cheap housing available in the 30s, and the large number of Spaniards (and later German, French, Polish and Dutch refugees) who found apartments in the neighborhood.

In the Franco Era, Mexico City was the center of Hispanic culture and arts. The Colegio de Mexico and Fondaction de Cultura, originally "Spanish Republican" institutes in exile, are major publishers and academic insitutes. It would be impossible to name all the Spanish cafes, publishers, art galleries dating from the Francoist era.

Mexico's support for the Republic went beyond the "good Mexican bullets" Ernest Hemingway wrote of. The Republic still existed -- as a government-in-exile in Mexico. The photo below has nothing to do with Mexico, but it shows the stupidity of that regime. Eva Peron, hardly a democrat, adn not the smartest economist on the planet still knew the basics. She was trying to sell Argentine wheat to Spain. "What for?" asked el caudillo? "So there's something edible in your bread." Evita replied.

For many years, Spaniards could receive Republican passports upon arrival, no questions asked. And come they did. Some were just hungry, and couldn't afford Argentine wheat. Some, like Opus Dei supporters, wanted to implant Francoismo in Mexico. The county has become more conservative, but I have to admit that their flagship, Universidad de Anahuac, does turn out some smart alumni. Some -- like Vincente Fox's mother -- were Basques who saw no future in Francoist Spain.

Basque culture survived, more, sometimes in Mexico than in the Basque country. In Mexico, Basques kept the language in literature alive. In the Basque country, persecuted beyond all reason, they became what are now called "terrorists". However, the "Basque Terrorists" did the world a great favor. In 1974 when they blew up Franco's successor, Luis Carrero Blanco, with a hundred kilos of dynamite under his armored Dodge Dart. Launched five stories straight up, and coming down on an apartment house, Carrero Blanco became Spain's first astronaut. Thankfully, he didn't survive the experience, and neither did Francoismo. There is some suggestion that Mexican Basques were involved in the operation.

Modern Spain is progressive (Franco probably hasn't stopped spinning in his grave from the marriage of two gay air force officers -- by a mayor who belongs to the successor party of the Falange earlier this year)and wealthy. The huge change it underwent after Franco's death is due to two factors -- my buddy, King Juan-Carlos took good advise, and the Mexico's tolerant and liberal social (not political) climate kept Spanish culture alive during the 40 years of darkness.

Oaxaca -- Naval helicopters signal end to protests?

2006-09-30T20:36:00.000-05:00

(UPDATE: Sunday --The Secretaria de Gobernacion announced that the military will dislodge the protesters Wednesday, if talks are unsuccessful. They're playing hardball, and -- like I said -- I expect the Governor will be forced to resign). Sara from Oaxaca has the "woman in the street" (or, rather, woman staying at home) report in the "Comments" section. Helicopters Flying Over Oaxacan Encampments Navy flyovers of teachers union and APPO lead to "maximum alert". Warings that protesters may be forcibly dislodged tonight. Jorge Octavio Ochoa (translation by "St. Jacques" and myself) Oaxaca City, Oaxaca (Saturday 30 September 2006)

At 4:30, 4:50 and 5:00 p.m., two Navy helicopters flew through the airspace over the center of Oaxaca City, apparently doing reconnaisance. [Sunday's Jornada confirms that the navy is transporting PFP -- national police paramilitary units -- with flights from Salias Cruz and Baja de Hualtalco] From La Ley radio, the Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca (APPO) called for a total alert. At the same time they asked their members to show prudence and calm. "It is not the deciding moment for us. What the PFP [Federal Preventive Police] and Ulises [Oaxacan Governor Ulises Ruiz] want is to provoke a stampede." With this in mind, the APPO called for strengthened vigilence, reiterating that the operation is designed to spread panic. Furthermore, the station claimed Federal forces would seek to dislodge protesters, beginning at 8:00 p.m., and that the attacks would come from two flanks: one on the highway that goes in the direction of Mexico City and another on the encampments erected in the center of the Oaxacan city. Flavio Sosa, one of the directors of APPO, called on all the group's members to mobilize and carry out a march around the Zocalo capital plaza [in the center of Oaxaca City]. In a telephone conversation, Omar Flavio Sosa, asked the governmental representative, Francisco Yañez Centeno: Is this the governmental response?" The government functionary responded that the flights are only for reconnaisance or vigilance. Even so, Flavio Sosa expressed his doubts: "I don't believe it. Fox will have blood on his hands if they undertake these these operations." The Navy helicopters, one of them with the call letters AMMLT-200, also crossed the airspace where the broadcast antennas of La Ley radio are found, which is the only one which continues transmitting APPO's statements, after Radio Oro went off the air yesterday due to supposed technical difficulties. From the kiosk of this city, the directorate of APPO began lighting bonfires to signal the maximum alert.

Something is going on... Jornada reports that APPO claimed shots were fired at their encampments last night. But, as far as anyone knows, the Feds and APPO will be negotiating a settlement this week. Given Ulises' actions last week -- where it looks as if his guards fired on the protesters (and may have been the people behind the attacks on Ricardo Rocha) -- the flyovers and the shots may not be connected. Ulises MAY be trying to provoke an excuse for a crackdown before the Feds -- who are fed up, basically -- remove him from office and put in ... who knows, stay tuned. I'm betting, as an outside chance, Demetrio Soldi, the PRD ex-senator who ran for Mexico City Jefe de Gobernacion as a PANista. will be the interim governor. It makes sense: the opposition to Ulises is from all non-PRI parties (and even from some within the larger "PRI family", like Elba Esther)

No, they aren't headed for the border...

2006-09-30T01:29:00.000-05:00

Oaxaca schoolteachers march on Mexico City. Photo taken near the Mixteca community of Petlacingo Oaxaca by AP photographer Joel Merino. While the PRI is still making some claims that Federal troops are needed (to fire on more civilians?), the Federal Government seems to have finally stepped in, announcing they will hold talks with the APPO and the Teachers on October 4.

Unconfirmed report on Minutemen helocoper crash...

2006-09-30T00:50:00.000-05:00

I picked this up on "freerepublic.com":

Texas Minutemen / Minuteman Project Operation Sovereignty border watch helicopter crashed in the early evening of the 29th while patrolling north of Laredo - south of Eagle Pass - west of Carrizo Springs. Reason for crash unknown, condition of the pilot believed to be ok... no further info available.

There's nothing on any of the wire services yet, nor on the Texas Minuteman site. If true, and nobody was seriously injured... thaen all well and good. Helocopters ain't cheap. Hopefully, they crashed on somebody's land, who isn't going to be real pleased, and will be contacting a lawyer about the nuisance. If anybody -- even if just the minutemen folks -- were injured or killed, it's going to create a real stink. Did this divert the National Guard, or the Border Patrol, or the Local Sheriff's deputies being payed under "Operation Linebacker" (the $10 million the State threw this way to pay deputy sheriffs to work overtime backing up the backups to the Border Patrol... I know a lot of Deputies. They're tired of 80 hour weeks!) from whatever it is they normally do? Are we taxpayers supposed to pay for the damages the Minutemen caused? Wanna bet we're gonna hear some nonsense about the Zetas shooting them down? Oh the humanity!!!!

OK, maybe a terrorist did cross the border...

2006-09-29T02:21:00.000-05:00

Why did I have to find out about this from a CANADIAN source?

The Bush Administration prefers to paint the War on Terror in stark terms of good and evil, but the reality is not all terror suspects are considered equal. That much was clear on the same day that the nation solemnly recalled the fifth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, when a federal magistrate recommended freeing a man being held on immigration charges who is also awaiting retrial in Venezuela for the bombing of a Cuban airliner 30 years ago that resulted in the death of all aboard, including the Cuban national fencing team.
Cuban militant Luis Posada Carriles has been fighting for his release since May 17, 2005, when Department of Homeland Security officials arrested him in Miami for entering the country without having a visa or passing through passport control at the border. But in a move that may come back to haunt the U.S. government Posada, despite his suspected terrorist past, was held on immigration violations, not terror-related charges...
He claims he came in through Mexico by car and then took a bus to Miami. But it is widely believed that a friend may have smuggled him into Miami by boat.

The only other terrorist incident at the Mexican border, BTW, was a stupid gringo from Minnesota trying to enter Mexico with some vague idea of joining a Somali jihad.

Not good... Oaxaca update...Reporter beaten, one shot... and desperate housewives take control

2006-09-27T00:46:00.000-05:00

Dane Schiller, of the San-Antonio Express-News reports from Mexico City:

MEXICO CITY — Tension spiked in the state capital of Oaxaca after masked men armed with clubs searched a luxury hotel room by room, looking for the governor, who was rumored to be there but wasn't.
The state government insisted those who carried out the attack were members of a group of striking teachers and their supporters who have controlled the city's center for months.
...
Activists and police had their biggest clash in months Sunday when hundreds of people marched on the Camino Real hotel, a stone compound built as a convent in 1576.
They surrounded the hotel, and about 40 people entered and searched restaurants, guest rooms and other areas.
The Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca, known as APPO, said on its Web site that one member was shot outside the hotel by police or security agents who fired more than 60 rounds.
...
The group searching for Ruiz on Sunday instead found a nationally prominent radio and TV personality, Ricardo Rocha, who had interviewed two congressmen in his room.
While the intruders, who identified themselves as APPO members, threatened to break down the door, the congressmen hid in the bathroom and used their cellular phones to call for help, said Daniel Robles, a producer who works with Rocha.
The congressmen later escaped out a side door, but Rocha was clubbed, temporarily detained and had some of his equipment and video recordings confiscated.
Daniel Dehesa Mora, a Oaxacan and federal congressman with the leftist Democratic Revolution Party, said the men who entered the Camino Real were disguised state police officers trying to make activists look dangerous.
"You could tell from their military-style haircuts and the tone of their voices," he said. "Also, everyone there knows who is who."
APPO has a "mobile brigade" that patrols the city to ensure government officials can't conduct official business. Members have entered offices and detained people.
The organization operates its own security force and has erected more than 100 barricades throughout the city to control who comes and goes after dark.

NO, it is not ok to beat up reporters, even if they are in the same hotel as shitheads like Ulises Ruiz! I'm appalled that the usual left-wing English-language sources (like Narco News) have yet to comment on this. Even (as U.S. newspapers always call him) "ex-communist Mexico City Mayor" Alejandro Encinas was quick to defend Rocha and was appalled by what happened. Encinas, ironically, was attending a luncheon to honor "Freedom of the Press" when he was informed of the doings in Oaxaca. Ciro Gomez Leveya interviewed Rocha yesterday for Radio Foruma (Real Player video here). And... I am more than a little suspicious that Congressman Dehensa Mora is right. This sounds like Oaxaca... where the previous governor tried to pass off a faked assasination attempt (and got himself actually shot in the process -- the dolt!) as a "extremist plot" to overthrow the state government. The "extremists" tend to be more like these desperate housewives turned TV news anchors and media moguls... Soldatas de la revolucion mediatico? Moms? (Google Videos don't always work, for some reason: if not, here's the link.

Light My Fire!

2006-09-26T17:01:00.000-05:00

The "missionary" season(summer) is ending and my own "virtual" hunting season has begun. The Christian neighbors to the north have been planting their 'seeds' all summer long throughout Mexican cities and rural villages. The focus of most of their energies has been on the poor and uneducated indigenous villagers, young orphans, alcoholics, troubled teens, and the aged. Now I'm about to turn my focus on the Evangelicals and their management teams. "I have no problems with Jesus Christ; it's his fan club that disturbs me." (unknown author) Too many well-meaning Christians are piling into their vans to do "good works" south of the border in the Lord's name. They claim to be rescuing souls so that they can enter heaven. The missionaries begin their mission by passing out candy and leaflets to unsuspecting villagers. Before they know it, the children and parents are invited to attend get-to-know-you parties which are sponsored by the missionaries. More candy and small toys are given to the kids, teens get to see Bible movies, and the group sings along to Christian music. Before you can light a candle, their new "friends" are building them an orphanage and a playground. "What the heck, you're so nice, we'll build a little meeting hall for your alcoholics to hold meetings in, too. " "Gee, you're such good people, we'll build you a simple church and we'll help you pray for answers to all your problems. If you'd like to go to heaven, someday, we can teach you how to be "saved", otherwise, the devil owns your soul." Simple as 1-2-3. "Onward Christian Soldiers" They are soldiers, indeed. They are armed combatants who use Christ as a "front" for a diabolical goal. Christ, orphanages, food kitchens, toys, used clothing, and Bibles are there for window dressing. They will dress Christ up as a rock star or as Santa Claus in order to enlist these Mexican peasants into their army. They want numbers.... BABY! Like TV ratings or "hits" on a blog, it's all about numbers. It's all about world domination! These missionaries are working Africa, India, China and the Phillipines as well as Mexico to 'spread God's word' and make conversions. According to the http://www.crusadewatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=337&Itemid=27 there are presently 395 foreign mission agencies in Mexico ...., # of service agencies... 205, # of major missionary institutions... 1,500, # of minor missionary institutions ... 5,000. These numbers are not insignificant! Jomo Kenyatta, Kenya's first elected Prime Minister (1963-1964) and President (1964-1978) said: "When the missionaries arrived, the Africans had the land and the missionaries had the Bible. They taught us to pray with our eyes closed. When we opened them, they had the land and we had the Bible." Evangelical missionary work is a "glorified" pyramid scheme that keeps on giving! Their real goal isn't to "save souls", it's to build their army. The real "mission" is to put up high numbers in order to influence governments for their own self-interests. The end-game is world domination. It's a lobbying movement to end all lobbying movements. The Catholic Church did it in Mexico centuries ago and now the Evangelicals, the Mormons, the Muslims etc, are back (in Mexico) to increase their own flocks.... full steam ahead. Evangelism is unethical. It is dishonest and arrogant to impose ones beliefs on another culture by the use of trickery and deception. Whether they come with guitars, or candy, on skateboards or in caravans.... they bring trouble. Every man, woman or child, peasant or scholar has the right to his/her own spiritual beliefs and practices. "Most of the true Christian denominations are not involved in missions and evangelism. They strongly argue that missions is the corrupted and evil expression of true Christianity." Crusade Watch "Religion is sort of like a lift in your shoes. If it makes you feel better, fine. Just don't ask me to wear your shoes. " [George Carlin] "In the fuss over the human loss and its political implications, what was largely overlooked is the extraordinary vanity and presumption that underlie the zeal of missionaries. They make it their goal and active business to disrupt the most fundamental ideals and values of the people on whom they inflict themselves. The measure of missionary success is how much dissatisfaction they can create among the often-poverty-stricken people they encounter. Missionaries only fail when their victims are holywaterproof. Missionaries are frank imperialists. But because they operate in the spiritual realm, they continue to enjoy a fuzzy kind of permission to conduct a kind of business that is largely impossible in other less ethereal spheres of life." New York Press~Nov. 22, 2005

Amen, brothers and sisters!

The Dog begs...

2006-09-25T22:15:00.000-05:00

I'd never heard of "Celebrity Stink", or Scott Gwin, but couldn't help but pass on this update on a barking good tale of gringos gone bad.

"Dog The Bounty Hunter" is frantic to avoid becoming the kind of person he's known for catching. Usually he's the one dragging people to justice but now the Mexican government wants him, his son Leland and another of their associates extradited on charges of illegal activity. The big Dog is prepared to do whatever he has to do to keep it from happening, even apologizing... According to a report from the AP, Dog is willing to forfeit the bail paid in Mexico, apologize for everything except capturing Luster (which ironically is why he's in trouble in the first place), and even make a generous charitable contribution . What's he trying to do, give them grounds for a bribery charge too? ... If there were ever a time for someone in Mexico to want to make a name for themselves as a bounty hunter, this could be their chance. I hear Univision is looking to expand into reality TV. I imagine the guy who brings Dog to justice in Mexico might land a TV show of his own.

That'd be ruuufffff!

I'm coming for YOU... pinche gringo!

¡Por la libertad!

2006-09-24T21:52:00.000-05:00

By Richard Gonzales Fort Worth Star-Telegram Carmen Puertos drank, smoked and laughed for most of her 92 years. When she chuckled, her open mouth revealed few remaining teeth; she never bothered with dentures. Her earlier photos show a pretty woman with thick brown hair. Time turned it gray and caused her legs to hurt when she walked. But it never took her pride, spunk or freedom. She cared for her grandchildren -- including me -- while her children worked in Chicago factories. She taught her family, in Spanish, not to be cowed by the big, blustering American city. After all, she was a chilanga -- a native of Mexico City who had lived in the capital during the days of dictator Porfirio Diaz and revolutionaries Emiliano Zapata and Pancho Villa. Perhaps the rebellious airs in the days of the Adelitas and soldaderas, or female warriors of the revolution, filled her with an independent spirit. One night when she was 14, she stayed out late to attend a neighborhood fiesta. Fearing the wrath of her father, she ran away to a convent where her older sister was studying to become a nun. Her father forced her to return to his comfortable, maid-tended house, where she could have lived out her years. But Mexico was a macho country with macho men. (Her father was 30 when he married his 14-year-old wife, with whom he would have 14 children.) She wanted to live in the world beyond Don Puertos's reach. So she ran away again at 19 with the help of an older brother. This time she fled to Nuevo Laredo with a female friend to care for her aunt. She worked as a laundress at the Hamilton Hotel in Laredo. When she heard that a family was going to Waukegan, Ill., to open a restaurant, she went along. She proudly told her children that she was never undocumented -- "No era mojada." She walked across the bridge spanning the Rio Grande with papers for which she paid $8. It would be nice to say that life in the United States was pleasant and bountiful for her. In truth, life in the Depression was hard for her and millions of others scrambling for food and work. She married another Mexican immigrant, Juan Reyes, bore him four children and followed the jobs to Chicago, Lyons, Kan., and back to Chicago. In Kansas, she joined other Mexican women to form a mutual aid society that raised money through jamaicas, or fairs, for the election of Mexican President Lazaro Cardenas. During Mexican Independence Day celebrations, she sewed Mexican dresses for her daughters and herself, splashing red, white and green in their skirts, blouses and hair. She played old Mexican songs and taught them to dance traditional steps that she recalled from fiestas. When Kansas commemorated the 400th anniversary of Francisco Vasquez de Coronado's exploration for gold, Carmen Reyes and other Mexican women pooled their money to bring Mexican matadors and bulls to demonstrate the corrida (although the bullfighters would go through the sweeps and turns in their suit of light and crimson capes without the fatal sword plunge). The Kansas townfolk easily accepted the Mexican garb, dances, customs and Spanish. Perhaps the small number of Mexican immigrants, their hard work and neighborliness calmed any fears that they might have harbored of the children of Coronado. There was no bitter history of the Alamo and the Mexican War; instead, they shared a memory of a conquistador traveling with his soldiers and priests in search of wealth. In Chicago, there would be more disappointment and heartache for Carmen as a daughter followed in her footsteps and ran away. Despite their advanced age, Carmen and Juan Reyes adopted the runaway daughter's five children. In later years, Carmen and Juan wanted to live closer to family. And so when she died Aug. 6, 1996, it was in Garland. When I asked my grandmother why she had come to the United States, she answered: Por la libertad -- for the liberty. She wanted the liberties to smoke, drink, marry the man she loved and live in a country where a runaway girl could find a home. Carmen Puertos de Reyes taught her children to cherish their golden freedom.

¡PENDEJO!

2006-09-24T20:06:00.000-05:00

I know this really has nothing to do with Mexico, but it's outrageous... No dogs, bottles or Spanish-speakers allowed! I don't know how much good it does to talk to pendejos like Dr. Ken Cherry, but you can always call or write him at: 2105 Park Plaza Dr Springfield TN 37172-3937 Phone: 615-384-2558 The City of Springfield's email address is here. Somehow, if that isn't sufficient, print off the photo below, paste it on a BLUE candle (why blue, I don't know, but that's what my local cuaradaro recommends) and light it at sunset every day for nine days, earnestly reading the attached prayer. Who knows... stranger things have worked.

WITCH WAY DID THEY GO -- a real MeX-FILE

2006-09-22T22:35:00.000-05:00

Monterrey, Mexico (18 Sept 06) - A policeman from Santa Catarina claimed having seen two witches while on a routine patrol near a graveyard several months ago. He only made this information known today. Gerardo Garza Carbajal explained his experience with the supernatural very near the Panteon Municipal, a few meters from the road to Villa Garcia. "It was nighttime, I stayed behind to stand guard on my own and suddenly someone started pelting me with stones. Then I saw two people with wings and wrinked faces." "I was so scared that I got into my squad car. I could hear them laughing in an ugly way, flying a short distance. I thought they were witches--I saw them very close," said the officer, who has a long service record with the local police. Garza Carbajal said that he immediately requested backup, and in a matter of minutes was surrounded by several municipal police cars even some from the Ministerial Police. "The witches flew off, but the police officers who came to my aid saw what I saw. They can attest to the fact that I didn't imagine anything. What I saw was real. I'd never been so scared before," said the officer. He added that he was subsequently taken to a medical center, since his blood pressure dropped excessively. He soon recovered from the powerful shock. Witnesses to this event stated that they do not know for sure if two witches were involved, but are indeed certain that they have no explanation for this phenomenon. (translation © 2006, S. Corrales, IHU. Special thanks to Marco Reynoso, Fundacion Cosmos) I found this on one of the weirder... and more interesting websites around, Inexplicata-The Journal of Hispanic Ufology

Viernes: blogiando de Los Gatos...

2006-09-22T18:37:00.000-05:00

Everyone from Woody Guthrie (whose wrote it, along with California high school teacher Martin Hoffman), to Joan Baez to Bruce Springsteen to the Byrds to Dolly Parton has sung this... but for some odd reason, there isn't a free internet copy available. Can't figure that one out. Woody's attitude towards copyrights was: "This song is Copyrighted in U.S... for a period of 28 years, and anybody caught singin it without our permission, will be mighty good friends of ourn, cause we don't give a dern. Publish it. Write it. Sing it. Swing to it. Yodel it. We wrote it, that's all we wanted to do." Plane Wreck At Los Gatos (Deportee)

The crops are all in and the peaches are rott'ning, The oranges piled in their creosote dumps; They're flying 'em back to the Mexican border To pay all their money to wade back again Goodbye to my Juan, goodbye, Rosalita, Adios mis amigos, Jesus y Maria; You won't have your names when you ride the big airplane, All they will call you will be "deportees" My father's own father, he waded that river, They took all the money he made in his life; My brothers and sisters come working the fruit trees, And they rode the truck till they took down and died. Some of us are illegal, and some are not wanted, Our work contract's out and we have to move on; Six hundred miles to that Mexican border, They chase us like outlaws, like rustlers, like thieves. We died in your hills, we died in your deserts, We died in your valleys and died on your plains. We died 'neath your trees and we died in your bushes, Both sides of the river, we died just the same. The sky plane caught fire over Los Gatos Canyon, A fireball of lightning, and shook all our hills, Who are all these friends, all scattered like dry leaves? The radio says, "They are just deportees" Is this the best way we can grow our big orchards? Is this the best way we can grow our good fruit? To fall like dry leaves to rot on my topsoil And be called by no name except "deportees"? Words by Woody Guthrie and Music by Martin Hoffman © 1961 (renewed) by TRO-Ludlow Music, Inc.

The agreement of 1947 (between Mexico and the U.S)... contained a novel provision which established amnesty through deportation, agreeing to limit deportations to one per year per farm worker. Under its terms, undocumented Mexicans who were sent back across the border could return to the U.S. as temporary contract labourers; during the life of their contracts, they could not be again deported. In practice, employers often called Border Patrol stations ( la migra) to report their own undocumented employees, who were returned, momentarily, to border cities in Mexico, where they signed labour contracts with the same employers who had denounced them. This process became known as "drying out wetbacks" or "storm and drag immigration." "Drying out" provided a deportation-proof source of cheap seasonal labour... The 28 men who died in Los Gatos were victims of this bizarre system.

What's Mexico Hiding?

2006-09-22T11:51:00.000-05:00

By Irma Sandoval and John M. Ackerman September 22, 2006 (Los Angeles Times ©2006) MEXICO now has two presidents-elect. One officially recognized by the electoral authorities — Felipe Calderon — and the other proclaimed the "legitimate president" by millions of followers — Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. There is one way to settle this crisis. As in the aftermath of Bush vs. Gore in the 2000 U.S. presidential election, a group of Mexico's newspapers should be allowed to conduct their own canvass of the ballots. Unfortunately, the Federal Electoral Institute, which organizes the presidential elections, has announced that it will not open up the ballots to public scrutiny. The institute appears bent on repeating the government's performance after the 1988 presidential election, in which the computers "malfunctioned." It is widely believed that massive fraud allowed Carlos Salinas de Gortari, the candidate of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, to mysteriously overcome the early lead of the leftist candidate, Cuauhtemoc Cardenas. To cover its tracks, the government then quickly burned the evidence. Mexico's freedom of information act, enacted in 2002, is one of the best in the world. It gives full priority to transparency, stating that everything should be made public except when disclosure might harm economic stability or national security. But even this "reserved" information must be made available after 12 years have passed. Mexican law does keep confidential personal information, including names, photographs and sexual orientations of particular individuals. But, of course, secret ballots don't contain any of this material. Although the institute is required by law to destroy the ballots eventually, there is no need to do so immediately. And it would be illegal to carry it out prematurely for the purpose of avoiding the freedom-of-information requests. To his credit, Calderon has asked the institute to "preserve the ballots for as long as possible" in the interest of ensuring the "certainty" of the electoral results. This is a positive step, but it does not get to the heart of the issue. Preserving the ballots will do no good if no one is allowed to examine them. Even worse, Calderon's National Action Party voted Tuesday against forming a special congressional commission to keep watch over the ballots, placing doubt on PAN's commitment to transparency. Calderon and his party should explicitly state that the ballots should be opened to public scrutiny and take measures to ensure this takes place. There is a larger issue. If the Federal Electoral Institute is permitted to hide and prematurely destroy the ballots, this would open the door to widespread flouting of the access-to-information law by other government agencies. The institute has argued that the ballots are not "documents" but only the "material expression of electoral preferences" and therefore not subject to the information law. Such ad hoc re-categorizations for the purpose of avoiding disclosure are punishable by law, and allowing it here would set a dangerous precedent in this fledgling democracy. Mexico's Federal Institute of Access to Public Information, which has the mandate to promote compliance by all government agencies to the access-to-information law, also has maintained a worrisome silence on this crucial issue. It is high time for a public pronouncement by its commissioners backing up the information law. Such a statement also would help dispel concerns about the personal ties and any conflict of interest between the chief commissioner and Calderon IN GENERAL, the electoral authorities have needlessly encouraged suspicions about Calderon's victory. The Federal Electoral Tribunal, which certifies the election results, announced that Calderon won. But it failed to disclose details of its partial recount, which showed widespread irregularities in the computation of the votes. And even though it condemned illegal campaign advertisements and the intervention of President Vicente Fox, it failed to assess their overall impact. In an election decided by only 230,000 votes out of 41 million cast, even small discrepancies could have made a big difference. The Florida ballots from the 2000 U.S. presidential elections were not destroyed. They are available for public viewing and research for generations to come. Recently, Ohio delayed the destruction of its presidential ballots from 2004 to allow further study of irregularities. Mexicans deserve no less. They have a right to know what actually happened on election day. We are at a crucial moment in Mexico's transition to democracy. After 70 years of electoral fraud under the PRI, Fox's PAN government must ensure absolute integrity in the process through which he passes power to Calderon, his PAN successor. Burning the ballots would set back Mexican democracy 20 years. Full access to the ballots — and then a full recount, if it's deemed warranted — by reputable civil society organizations in the manner of Bush vs. Gore would restore credibility to Mexico's damaged electoral institutions. IRMA SANDOVAL and JOHN M. ACKERMAN are professors at the Institute for Social Research and the Institute for Legal Research, respectively, at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. They advised Proceso magazine, whose request for access to the ballots was rejected this month.

MAR-EEEE-AAAAAA-CHE!!!!!! (in the concert hall)

2006-09-21T00:15:00.000-05:00

Mariachi Juvenil Aguila Azteca

ALIEN INVASION, remittances to Mexico, etc. Oh my!

2006-09-20T16:10:00.000-05:00

The Perfect Swarm...

Yes, in former California Governor Pete Wilson's immortal words, "They just keep coming." Over the last decade, the U.S. State Department estimates that the number of Americans living in Mexico has soared from 200,000 to 1 million (or one-quarter of all U.S. expatriates). Remittances from the United States to Mexico have risen dramatically from $9 billion to $14.5 billion in just two years. Though initially interpreted as representing a huge spike in illegal workers (who send parts of their salaries across the border to family), it turns out to be mainly money sent by Americans to themselves in order to finance Mexican homes and retirements.
Although some of them are certainly naturalized U.S. citizens returning to towns and villages of their birth after lifetimes of toil al otro lado, the director-general of FONATUR, the official agency for tourism development in Mexico, recently characterized the typical investors in that country's real estate as American "baby boomers who have paid off in good part their initial mortgage and are coming into inheritance money."
Indeed, according to the Wall Street Journal, "The land rush is occurring at the beginning of a demographic tidal wave. With more than 70 million American baby boomers expected to retire in the next two decades… some experts predict a vast migration to warmer -- and cheaper -- climates. Often such buyers purchase a property 10 to 15 years before retirement, use it as a vacation home, and then eventually move there for most of the year. Developers increasingly are taking advantage of the trend, building gated communities, condominiums, and golf courses"

Sit Them In a Corner

2006-09-20T13:46:00.000-05:00

The word of the day is "stupid". Normally, I don't spend my time running down the U.S. of A. (though I definitely could if I wanted to) .Only some of the people who inhabit it deserve that attention. Remember when there was a movement to teach Americans to get on board with other countries of the world by learning the metric system? It seemed pretty innocuous, but citizens resisted it with all their might. Now, a Texas principal has learned just how fiercely some of his student's parents would fight back when his school participated in some minor celebrations for 16th of September (Mexican Independence Day). The "The Facts.com (Brazoria, Co., Texas) has reported about a flag controversy that has escalated into demands for Principal Sam Williams to be demoted. The flap is around teachers having the kids hold a Mexican flag in their hands while 6 parents read the Mexican Pledge of Allegiance aloud. The students were asked to stand (out of respect) as the pledge was read. Approximately 65% of the school's students are Mexican American.... the principal of 18 yrs is black (if that makes any difference). “We have stated in our mission statement that we are a campus that is a beacon of hope for a culturally diverse population,” Williams said. I guess that doesn't go over too well in parts of Texas! Apparently, teaching students about cultural diversity is un-American in these parts. Parents were outraged because they felt that the brief "lesson" subverted the U.S. 's present stand against illegal immigrants. I kid you not! That's what I would really call a big s-t-r-e-t-c-h. I guess the climate has to be just right before teachers can give their students a lesson in diversity. Example: It's acceptable to teach about Holland and tulips and wooden shoes, about England and Shakespeare or tea and crumpets, about Japan and Pearl Harbor, kimonos and the Cherry Blossom festival or China about the Great Wall and the Wu people who live along the Yangtze River. Since Mexico is out of favor with our present-day politicos, parents want to vent their rage when someone teaches their children that Mexico is a neighboring country deserving of their children's respect.... not to mention a country that justifiably has its place in Texas's own history. Our nation says that we as a people need to prepare ourselves for a global economy... yet some segments of our population resist even the tiniest sharing of a celebration belonging to a neighbor. Our students go into the workforce and the globalization period with such ignorance and with such a skewed view of the world they live in. When my daughter was in high school (1986), I looked through her history book. It had chapters on the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, WWI and WWII. I asked her if she had ever been taught about the Vietnam Conflict (War). She said that her teacher told the class that it was too "new" and too "controversial". It had ended ( for the U.S.) in 1975. I guess the "timing" wasn't quite right, yet. George W. was the product of a similar education... wasn't he? If we can't deal with "controversy" in the classroom, is it any wonder we can't rationally deal with it in the halls of the 'mentally challenged' Congress? Oh, let's just line up the lame-brained 'parent protesters' in a neat row and put decorate their pointy heads with dunce caps and call it a 'day'.

Color Me With Hope....

2006-09-18T13:35:00.000-05:00

When I used to travel across Mexico by train, I would have the opportunity to see quite a few areas of immense poverty that you don't often see by car or bus. While Mexico's middle class has grown by leaps and bounds, there are many poor who have been left behind. Often, they are struggling families who left their rural homes to seek better jobs in the larger cities. They took huge risks because they were generally unskilled and poor to begin with. Numbers of these families end up "surviving" in the squalid slums like the one from Tijuana pictured (below) or Mexico City on the (above):

After viewing slums in Tijuana, Mexico City, Juarez, Chihuahua etc, I came up with a theory. My theory is that "the color of poverty is brownish/grey". It's particulary true of the huge slums on the outskirts of Mexico City where the dirt from the roads and the barren land blows over and through the "houses". There is no distiction between the land and the sky where the horizon completely blends the two with the brownish/grey polluted air. The monotony of the colorlessness seems endless and reflects the hopelessness of the families who must exist there. The residents of the slums are robbed of the delicious 'gift' of color in a country which cherishes color in their every day lives.

Is it any wonder that Mexicans would bring bright colors into their homes if given the chance? When families have the opportunity to express themselves, it's often done with brilliant shades rather than with soft pastels. Regional cooking is done with a variety of vegetables, fruits and spices which satisfy your eye and palette. Spices, which are unique to Mexico, give your tongue an extra "tingle". Hot, Hot, Hot! ... can be as hot as their colors!

Mexicans and art are synonymous. Expression through art can be seen everywhere in Mexico! Not just in their famous murals or cathedrals. They wear it in their indigenous clothing, they use it in decorating their homes (inside and out). Eye-candy exits even in simple Mayan huts (decorative bowls, and bright hammocks), hair-dos (bright ribbons) and belts in Chiapas. It's as if colors and designs lift/feed their spirits.

Items from colorful serapes and handpainted tiles for the patios, kitchen walls, or decorative stairways are plentiful in Mexican homes. The styles and patterns are different thoughout the regions, but there's something for everyone.

How much is too much? If you've ever visited the fishing town of Tlacotalpan, you'll find out that that there's no limit! This unforgettable town, which is situated along the Rio Papaloapan, is filled with houses, shops and government buildings painted in deep blues, bright yellows, and cool greens along with spicy hot reds. Every color that Diego Rivera ever used has been applied to the buildings in Tlacotalpan.

This is the beauty and artistry that is absent from the lives of the unfortunate families who dwell in the misery of the "left behind" Mexico. So close, but so out of reach.

Self-appointed bouncers

2006-09-18T13:06:00.000-05:00

"The Circus is Back in Town," Victor Landa, San Antonio Express-News Sept. 18, 2006

The Minutemen are back at the border. This time, they picked Laredo, and reports indicate that most Laredo residents would rather they go home. ... ...why are the Minutemen — who, by the way, have proven they need more than a one-minute warning to defend our border because it takes time to pack an SUV and organize a press conference — wasting their time in Laredo? I'm convinced the answer is Hispanic Heritage Month. For four weeks, we'll be celebrating Latinos from the Carolinas to California; the noise will be deafening, the news coverage will be intense, the attention will be hard to ignore. The last thing they want is for foreign Latinos to get the wrong idea. So the Minutemen have gone again to the southern border, along with the Guard and the threat of a two-layered fence. We're having a party, and they are our self-appointed bouncers. Maybe what these people should do is use their enthusiasm in a truly creative way. Maybe they should line their lawn chairs along all the exits of airports that handle international flights. Imagine if this citizen patrol were to stop and question anyone they felt might be a threat to our country. After all, isn't that how the terrorists got in?

Rain on the parade...

2006-09-17T02:31:00.000-05:00

Photos José Antonio López (Top) and Francisco Olvera (Bottom) Jornada

It looks as if Tlaloc, the rain god, is an AMLO supporter:

The Mexico City Herald's coverage was pathetic, missing what was a good story.

There was concern that there might be a confrontation if the two gritos ended up in the same Zocalo.

In Doloros Hidalgo, the 8000 or so spectators included 3500 were police and security personnel. The town was clamped down, and even residents had to show IDs to enter the area. Fox came and went by heliocopter. AND IT RAINED gatos y perros.

In DF, where Alejandro Encinas did the bell-ringing (from City Hall, not the National Palace), assisted by old lefty, human rights fighter and all round rabble rouser (and, now Senadora) Rosario Ibarra de Piedra, all-round intellectual Carlos Monsiváis and... as a sop to the Administration, Secretary of Gobernacion, Carlos Abascal Carranza.

In Doloros Hidalgo, the grito was "¡Viva nuestra Independencia! ¡Vivan los héroes que nos dieron patria y libertad! ¡Viva Hidalgo! ¡Viva Morelos! ¡Viva Allende! ¡Viva Josefa Ortiz de Domínguez! ¡Viva Leona Vicario! ¡Viva nuestra democracia! ¡Vivan nuestras instituciones! ¡Viva la unidad de las y los mexicanos! ¡Viva México!''

In Mexico City, the people gave ¡Vivas! for Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, José María Morelos y Pavón, Ignacio Allende, Josefa Ortiz de Domínguez, Vicente Guerrero, an extra loud, enthuastic viva for Benito Juárez (the tea-leaf readers are figuring that one out -- BJ managed to maintain the Presidency, while a fraudulently elected foreign-dominated adminstration tried running the country for a while) and popular sovereignty.

As an extra bonus, the people razzed Abascal, joining in the new cheer, "Get lost, asshole!" (¡FUERA! ¡CULITO!). It didn't rain on that party.

Jornada has a good "compare/contrast" on the two gritos.

Seems Mexico City aint't big enough for two gritos... or presidents?

From ¡Para justicia y libertad!

Delegates at the National Democratic Convention (CND) have formally declared Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) as Mexico's "legitimate president" which he is formally set to take office on November 20 at 3 p.m. at Constitution Square in Mexico City.
The delegates at CND also authorize López Obrador to appoint members to his cabinet, he is also authorized to select where the new capital in will be set up in Mexico and right to act as Mexico's official and legitimate president. The new government will observe the framework of a democratic republic, whereby the President of Mexico is both head of state and head of government. As President of the new government, he has the right to collect taxes.

Aerial view of the National Democratic Convention. Photoby Alfredo Dominguez, Jornada

Meanwhile, in Oaxaca...

There was, for the first time, no OFFICAL celebration. The governor doesn't dare show his face... instead, José Cruz Luna, presidente municipal of Zaachila, gave a grito on behalf of the APPO from their headquarters. There were the traditional celebratory dance music and pyrotechnics afterwords, but -- for some reason -- people in Oaxaca tend to leave when there are explosives in the neighborhood these days.

The People celebrating Independence Day by declaring Independence?

HOLY SHIT!!!!

Cats and Dog (Friday Night blogging)

2006-09-15T21:46:00.000-05:00

IN what passes for tradition in the Blogosphero, you're supposed to put up a cat picture on Friday nights. So... being Friday, here's "Illegal Alien Mexican Cats" Now, going to the Dog. Duane Lee Chapman (the kind of name that if it's not on a country music singer, is on either a serial killer or the guy whose family is covered in your local paper's county police report). Dog the Bounty Hunter. Duane Lee is in a heap o' trouble. He's a bailbondsman, and famous for bringing bail jumpers to justice. In a "man bites dog" story, the Dog was arrested in Hawaii by U.S. Marshalls on Thursday morning ... on a Mexican warrent charging him with very, very serious crimes. Seems our boy... the famous bail jumper stopper ... jumped bail. Although something of a pariah among "respectable" bailbondsmen "Dog" has his admirers. They seem to overlook the obvious, things you can find, say, in Wikipedia:

Chapman ... joined a motorcycle gang, the Devil's Disciples, that reportedly had a distaste for blacks... According to Chapman, another gang member, Donny Kirkandall, murdered pimp and drug dealer named Jerry Lee Oliver a crime for which Chapman was found in complicity by a Texas judge. Chapman has reportedly been arrested at least 32 times In 1977, Chapman was sentenced to five years of hard labor on murder charges, he served just 18 months before being paroled in 1979. Before his sentencing, Chapman had married, and fathered at least one child. His wife Lafonda filed for divorce while he was in prison on the murder charges. Because Chapman owed money for child support, the judge in charge of handling the child support case asked Chapman to catch a fugitive for $200. This is considered the beginning of his bounty-huting career.

That last sentence doesn't sound like anything that would stand up even under the laxest possible intrepretation of the Texas Code of Judicial Conduct. "Dog", out of prison, moved to Hawaii and set up shop as a bailbondsman... how, with his prison record, is never quite clear. Somehow. He's a master showman. When Andrew Luster, heir to the Max Factor cosmetics fortune and serial rapist, ended up in Puerto Vallerta, the Mexican police knew he was there. PV has its share of shady gringos. Intespersed amongst the retirees, the old queens, tthe eurotrash and the gay vacationers are the retired marijuana dealers, ponzi schemers keeping a low profile, the occasional mobster on the wrong side of a family disagreement. Not nice people, but not any particular concern to the Mexicans. Andrew Luster though. A serial rapist, already convicted in California, and facing a 124 year prison term? Mexican prosecutors had already prepared extradition papers and were waiting for the FBI to come in and quietly pick the guy up in June 2003 when ... and if this seems a tad "convenient", you're not alone in thinking so, but newspapers reported that a couple spotted Luster, called the FBI... and the DOG. The Dog showed up -- with a TV crew in tow -- in time to get into a barroom brawl with the fugitive heir. Mexican cops threw the whole lot of them into jail. Where someone paid "bajo fianza" to spring the Dog from the pound. Luster somehow also was out of jail -- presumably as a courtesy to the FBI, allowing the G-men to put Luster on a plane and fly him back to the U.S. without going through an extradition hearing. That would not make for great drama. Or tacky television. DOG kidnapped Luster, put him on a private plane and ... the rest, they say, is history. Lest we forget, DOG is a bailbondsman. Somehow he managed to get bajo finanza for this very serious charge... and promptly fled the country. Sort of like... oh... Andrew Luster? Dog milked that "capture" for everything it was worth. He's a master showman who manages to appeal both to his white trash roots and to the sophisticated. In Mexican terms, he's a naco -- rich white trash, with excreable taste in jewelry and a ridiculous haircut that was a joke even when it was semi-fashionable 15 years ago. But, then, American culture since WWII has been defined by a lot of poor boys who never passed through the middle class. Though those boys had talent -- Warhol, Liberace, Elvis. Dog had...? Good publicitiy, basically. Somehow the biker and his big-boobed foul-mouthed wife became de rigor television viewing in the U.S. While no one with any taste or culture would want to BE THOSE people -- there's a weird fascination with the Chapman family (maybe due to the fact than we're lucky none of us know anyone remotely like them). For people who DO know people like them, there's the satisfaction of seeing themselves as the "good" people against the bad guys. The bad guys, more often than not, are darker skinned than Duane's fan club. I don't think that's quite coincidental, as the amazing posts from The JAWA Report article on his arrest indicate. I'll leave their names off to protect the moronic:

Fuck Mexico!! How dare those assholes take our number one well known american hero and imprision him aftrer all the crimes they committ here.. Screw Mexico..Let's go to war and blow em like we did in Iraq!!

I guess two wrongs make a right, or something like that. As to getting blown in Iraq, ok... but what does that have to do with Mexico.

he is not a criminal and he did not break any laws, because mexico has no laws, just revenge for taking out a rich man, who was pooling tons of money into mexico. i agree with military action, take the illegal mexicans out of our country or the people will one way or another.

Uh... kidnapping gets you 30 to 50 years in Mexico. Murderers only get 20. Duane was a very, very bad boy. And, the one I love...

What is wrong with this sick world is it not bad enough we have so many mexicans taking our jobs and and their spanish on every recording and instruction mannuel we have ever gotten! Dog and Beth are good family people Bush step your sorry but in on this one.They have gotten so many bad people off the streets and helped many that would be nowhere without Dog And Beth's and the whole Chapman family, I will be praying for them all, we can't let them get away with this!!!!!!!!

"Instruction mannuel"... wasn't he the translator I used to work with when I was a technical writer?

Protecting America

2006-09-13T21:44:00.000-05:00

We're rough mountainous terrain down here in the Chihuahua Desert. Some people say it looks like Afghanistan. West of the Pecos, we have mountains, drugs are a big part of our rural economy, and there's some well-armed crazies back in the hills, too. But all similarities end there. Rick Perry (and even Kinky Friedman, who is a smart guy and should know better) might be saying something different, but the National Guard is NOT here to look for some enemy. There is no enemy. There is only us. The 1200 or so Texas Guardsmen, and the units from Illinois and elsewhere are nice enough guys... young kids to me. Their job is to answer the telephones and do the filing (and man some observation stations) for the Border Patrol.. They are not looking for "terrorists", we are not at war with Mexico, nor with its citizens, (even the drug dealers just get turned over to Judge Edwards and his one-room Federal Courthouse in Alpine). And they are not at war with American citizens. Take young guys, a hot night along the Rio Grande/Bravo del Norte, nothing much to do but ride around and drink beer... add in never getting any time off after returning from a war zone, and give them weapons... What do you think is going to happen?

Three Texas National guardsmen were in custody Tuesday, accused of firing guns in an Eagle Pass neighborhood, officials told News 4 WOAI. The three men were down on the U.S./Mexico border to help in the fight against illegal immigration, officials said. The guardsmen face felony charges of deadly conduct for a shooting spree last week, investigators said. The guardsmen were drinking and driving, and taking turns shooting a gun out of the window, authorities said.

People here remember the last time we had military "assistance" with border security.

On Mexican Time....

2006-09-13T00:56:00.000-05:00

One of the things that I've grown to appreciate is being on the recieving end of being on "Mexican" time. I've never heard of it described in positive terms before.... so this may be a first. Many people complain about slow services or of how Mexican friends or businessmen tend to arrive late, but there's a flip side that I find wonderful. There's a reason why this clock has a smile on it's face. It lives in Mexico. Nobody takes it too seriously. People in Mexico don't yell at their clocks or throw them on the floor because nobody friggin' cares about the minute hand or least of all... the seconds hand.

When traveling through Mexico, I don't feel rushed. You can take as much time as you wish to eat in a restaurant, sit and read the newspaper at the table if you want. People take the time to talk with you if you want a conversation. If it starts raining, no matter, just take it inside.

One sunny afternoon, my hubby and I took a leisurely drive down the coast from Merida to Ciudad del Carmen. We spent the night in Campeche and headed back out around noon. A short distance away, we came to the small town of Lerna where I spotted a restaurant on the beach that looked inviting. It had the typical palapa top and it sat on the edge of the Gulf with a "killer" view.

Service was sloooow, but we weren't in any hurry. There were lots of tables, but only a few other customers. As I looked out at the water, I spotted HIM. He was Hemmingway, he was Picasso, he was to be my next photograph! He was my bald headed, dark skinned, large bellied, subject. I approached him like a school girl getting an autograph from a rock star.

"Would you mind if I take a picture of you?" He did not disappoint. Somehow, my limited Spanish rolled off my tongue and he was mine and I was his. It didn't matter that he was about 70 or that he was clad in a pair of warn swimming trunks.... I was captivated by his presence.

Instead of an easel or a writing journal, my subject had a sharp knife and a fish in his hands. His hands were as strong as his eyes and his smile as broad as his shoulders. After taking a few photos of him, I asked him if I could watch him clean one of his fish. He not only let me watch, but he also put a fish in my hands and taught me how to clean one, too. Then, he showed me how to draw more fish up to us by throwing the guts over the railing into the water. He taught me the names of fish that swam up to eat the innards.

Before my lessons were done, he pulled a fish out his bucket that he called a toro fish. It had two small horns atop its head. He sat the fish on top of the rail and placed his cigarette between the horns and declared it an ashtray! After a good laugh, I went back to my husband and ordered lunch.

When the plates came, there were generous portions of food on them. Halfway through our meal, our waitress brought out an entire platter of assorted cooked fish. When I told her that we hadn't order it, she smiled and pointed to her papa. It was a platter filled with all the fish we had cleaned together. Oh, God, there was enough food for an army! What to do, what to do.

Screw getting to Ciudad del Carmen... this was gonna be a long afternoon. 'Picasso' came over to our table and we invited him to sit with us. He shared his stories of being a fisherman and of owning this restaurant, which supported his big family. It seems that he was a French/Mexican whose family came from Merida many generations ago. His stories were filled with his contageous humor.

When he was duly comfortable with us, he walked over to a box which was attached to a wooden post in the restaurant. He handed me a leather bound notebook which was filled with his hand-written poems. I listened as he read aloud from some of them. The joy and the enthusiasm that came from him will stay with me always.

I hadn't gone to a restaurant that day. I had inadvertantly gone to the theater by-the-bay and I was sitting in the audience watching a one-man show. Even the family members in the kitchen were enjoying the action. You couldn't have put a price on it.

Time didn't exactly stand still. The sun did begin to set over the water. But no one seemed to care.

Twist and shout!

2006-09-12T21:52:00.000-05:00

Mexicans love their Independence Day -- so much so that they make it a two day holiday. Padre Hidalgo rang the church bell either late the 15th or early the 16th of September 1810. He called the people to church to hear a rather ill-thought out impromptu sermon on... among other things, Napoleon Bonaparte, the evils of atheism and the perfidity of the Spanish. What, exactly he blathered on about wasn't all that important. The Padre had a boffo finish: "Kill the Spanish! Viva Mexico!" At which point the locals did kill the Spanish. And then were killed by them... and ... killed the Spanish... who killed the Mexicans... who killed each other... who, ten years later, ended up with a pro-Spanish Mexicans rebelling against pro-Mexican Spaniards to join with pro-Mexican Mexicans. Quite the sermon! Silly Maximiliano de Absurdo... er, de HAPSBURGO... who had some strange ideas of how to get people to take him seriously (he took himself seriously),rounded up the royal court, hauled them out to Delores Hidalgo, recreated an edifying version of the Padre's patriotic "grito" and then bored everyone with an interminably dull lecture on the need for Mexican patriotism and good relations with Spain. Ok, Max, can we go to bed now? OK, good idea, bad execution. Porfirio Diaz, realizing that "Hey, it's Mexico's birthday... well, it's my birthday too!" had a better formula. Like Max, he wasn't out to kill the Spanish, and -- for all his faults -- was a real Mexican. If you're going to keep people up all night -- HAVE A PARTY! If you have to give a speech (and Porfirio did), get it out of the way. Porfirio learned from the Padre - the speech itself is unimportant. Just have a good closing. And no need to invent one: that VIVA MEXICO works is a sure crowd pleaser. SO... every 15 September since then, at 11 p.m., the President (and State Governor, and Municipal President and Alcalde) goes out on the local government palace balcony, rings a bell in honor of the Padre's churchbell, gives a (generally upbeat, "ain't I great") speech and starts the grito... Viva this, Viva Mexico! Viva that, VIVA MEXICO, viva the other thing, ¡VIVA MEXICO! The best gritoistas can really string it out. You start Viva-ing along for mom, tacos and Manzana "Lift", and before you know it, you're shouting for the long life of... Pemex, the "Corridor al Pacifico" rail-toll road project and the Algamatated Sheet Metal Workers Union Local #345 (or the Mexican equivalent thereof). And, of course, vivaing Mexico. ... or, as Vicente Fox (a master gritoista) puts it... VEEEEE- VAAAAAAAAA MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE - HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE- COUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU! AND then, PARTY TIME. Slaughtering Spaniards being passe, the worst any foreigner can expect is to be silly-stringed by passing patriots. Consuming mass quantities of patriotic national products -- Coronoa, Dos Eqqis, Modelo... If you can't fight em, join em... which is why you need the whole next day off as well. What could be better than a national party? TWO NATIONAL PARTIES, of course. The "virtual president", Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, never one to let a chance for a theatrical performance slip through his fingers, will be giving a counter-grito on the Zocalo the same time as President Fox. This will be ... interesting. May the grittiest gritoist win. ¡VIVA MEXICO! (twice).

Over My Dead Bank Account!

2006-09-11T13:45:00.000-05:00

The Congressional House of Representatives wants to send them back. The Republican Kool-Aid drinkers want them all thrown in jail. But that’s not what Corporate America wants.There’s gold in them thar pockets, and we aims to scoop it out. Protesters march in front of City Hall wrapped in American flags and carrying their “This is America, English only” signs. Minute Men, garbed in army fatigues and carrying their rifles and binoculars, cruise the dirt roads along the Arizona border. The conservative talk show hosts decry “sure they’re human beings, but they’re illleeegal! We’re a country that believes in the Rule of Law!” Meanwhile, Corporate America is going about what it does best; making money off of them. The following article inspired this post: BusinessWeek online JULY 18, 2005 “Embracing Illegals” By Brian Grow, with Adrienne Carter and Roger O. Crockett in Chicago and Geri Smith in Mexico City Picture this. Four or five years ago a couple crosses the US/Mexico border illegally. They had little money, no jobs, and lacked basic documents such as Social Security numbers. Guided by friends and family, the couple soon discovered how to navigate the increasingly above-ground world of illegal residency. First they went to the local Mexican consulate, where each signed up for an identification card known as a matrícula consular, for which more than half the applicants are undocumented immigrants. Scores of financial institutions now accept the matrícula for bank accounts, credit cards, and car loans Next, they applied to the Internal Revenue Service for individual tax identification numbers (ITINS), allowing them to pay taxes like any U.S. citizen -- and thereby to eventually get a home mortgage. The IRS does not care whether you are a citizen or not so long as they can get your tax dollars. Banks, insurers, mortgage lenders, credit-card outfits, phone carriers, utility companies, car dealerships, furniture stores, and anybody looking to make a buck have decided that a market of 11 million or so potential customers is simply too big to ignore. It may be against the law for this couple to be in the U.S. or for an employer to hire them, but there's nothing illegal about selling to them. Yet all the while, farms, hotels, restaurants, small manufacturers, and other employers have continued to hire the undocumented with little regard to the federal laws intended to stop them. Among the first to embrace illegals have been financial companies, eager to tap into the billions in so-called mattress money -- the cash kept at home by illegals and others without bank accounts. Wells Fargo Bank and several other nationwide banks got the OK from the U.S. Treasury in 2001 to accept the matrícula. Since then hundreds of thousands of matrícula bank accounts have been opened. What's more, 84% of illegals are 18-to-44-year-olds, in their prime spending years, vs. 60% of legal residents With hundreds of thousands of illegal alien households earning enough to qualify for $95,000 mortgages, according to the National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals, ITIN and conventional mortgages taken out by illegals could be worth as much as $60 billion over the next five years. Now, in all major US cities where the immigrant population is predominant you will see ads for ITIN Loans. For some strange reason you don’t see them in the suburbs. All this knits the U.S. and Mexico closer together; the nation and population distinctions are melting and blending. An economic flame is forging a new 21st century reality. Now they work, set up small businesses, buy cars and houses, go to movies, restaurants, watch soccer on cable TV. And it’s all in Spanish! Furthermore, the Mexican immigrant is sending back to Mexico some 18 billion dollars to keep the pump primed. The old Pat Buchanan, Tom Tancredo, Ann Colter, and Michel Malkin tag team are lying on their backs crying foul in this economic lucha libre. Cry me a river! On Saturday, Sept 9th, there was a demonstration against illegal immigration in front of the Houston City Hall. About 40 protesters showed up.The Houston Chronicle notes. “Illegal immigration called threat to U.S.“ By ANITA HASSAN Copyright 2006 Houston Chronicle However, President of Texans for Immigration Reform, Louise Whiteford, who also attended the rally against illegal immigration, said those who come to the country illegally may be confused about what they are getting themselves into. "The people that are coming over here think they are coming over for the American dream," said Whiteford, 76. "But they are just going to become a part of the cheap-labor core.” It appears, and I am careful about this, that older white folks just don’t get it. Or they are as racially and mentally challenged as those little white poodles they carry with them. The problem for critics of illegal immigration is that corporate efforts to sell to the undocumented weaves them ever more tightly into the fabric of American life. This pragmatic relationship may be anathema to immigration critics. But day by day, the undocumented in the U.S. are finding it ever easier to save and invest their hard-earned dollars.

Vincente Fox does Sinatra...

2006-09-10T15:20:00.000-05:00

VERY, VERY FUNNY... though, a little sad. A doff of the sombrero to Ana Maria Salazar's English-language "Mexico Today" blog for this. Cartoon by Rictus, (http://elrictus.blogspot.com)

The Boob on the Tube...

2006-09-10T14:34:00.000-05:00

The only documented terrorism arrest at the Texas border involved a U.S. citizen crossing at El Paso in 2004. Wyoming college student Mark Robert Walker was accused of trying to go to Somalia to help overthrow the Somali government. Walker pleaded guilty last year and was sentenced to two years in federal prison. (AP, September 09, 2006) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mh4NIz6GEUo Oh well, it is an election year in Texas, the weirdest state in the Union. (REPUBLISHED POST)

"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses"... now serving #12

2006-09-10T12:19:00.000-05:00

Check out the visa bulletin on the Web site of the U.S. State Department, and you will see the problem immigrants face. The government offers 140,000 employment-based visas a year, with 5,000 set aside for unskilled workers, and most have been allotted years in advance. The State Department has a quaint term for the unavailability of visas — they are "oversubscribed." Two Mexicans received visas as unskilled laborers last year, according to the New York Times. And so it goes. Anti-immigrant forces tell the workers to step "to the back of the line." But if you are Mexican or Guatemalan or Colombian, the line for legal residency is not merely long; it is nonexistent. "There is no line to step to the back of," Marshall Fitz, an official with the American Immigration Lawyers Association, said. "The biggest misconception is that the reason people come here illegally is because they would rather do that than do it legally. The vast majority does so because they have no legal channel to come here. That is the reality." (San Antonio Express-News)

Poetry and protest...

2006-09-09T02:25:00.000-05:00

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore-- And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?

Or crust and sugar over-- like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

photo: Reforma.com

The protests -- and the photo (these protests were in Cuernavaca, and forced President-elect Calderón to cancel a visit to his hometown) made me think about what the people are really protesting -- not the particular candidate, but the whole system that they see as rigged. Mexico has done fairly well in the last century, and the poor should not be poor... but are. What AMLO and the election meant to these people was a chance to change a rigged system... to get their shot at a decent life... if not a Lexus, at least a used Vocho.

There's the theory that what causes people to rebel is not inequality, but the perception of inequality... the frustration of seeing a wealth and a decent standard of living denied... there are academics who've written on this, and you can look up "think tank" position papers on it... or you can read poetry.

Wouldn't you know it. There is a Mexican connection.

Langston Hughes was born in Lawrence Kansas in 1902. His family was middle-class, educated and distinguished. A grandfather had fought with John Brown. On the other side, his grandparents were pioneer settlers in Okahoma. His father had a law degree. But, the family had a problem -- or America had a problem. The Hughes were African-American. James N. Hughes could not reconcile himself to his own "dream deferred." Unable to practice law, he left his family behind to take up a new life running a factory in Toluca.

In Mexico, Hughes Sr. was just another gringo. He was prosperous, and -- by the standards of Toluca -- wealthy. When 16-year old Langston graduated from High School, his father sent for him. Langston always claimed he wrote his first poem ("A Negro Speaks of the River") on Kansas City to Mexico City train. Though he would travel widely the rest of his life, Mexico ... and later Harlem, would remain his true home.

James was a proud, difficult man. To his Mexican workers, we was a codo pinche gringo, but they accepted his son. Langston, like so many gay adolescents, wasn't comfortable with his father, nor his father with him. Like so many footloose gringos since, he found a job teaching English. And, he learned to write. Langston spent more time with the workers, one of the people, than with his gringo father -- like most writers, more an observer than a participant, but he managed to acquire fluent Spanish that stood him well in his future life.

James had turned his back on Jim Crow America, and even if he did not quite understand his son, he did not want Langston to go back to a race obsessed country. James was a wealthy man -- he offered to pay Langston's education, provided he study something practical, and out of the United States. But, Langston was already a poet. And his mother wanted him back. James finally agreed to pay for Langston to attend Colombia University, since he and his mother could live in Harlem -- a respectable "Negro" neighborhood in the segregated U.S. of his day.-- if he studied Engineering.

Langston never finished his degree. He soon tired of a "respectable" academic job, as a secretary to Carter Woodson, the father of African-American history, but found he made more money (and for a young gay man, had a better time) working as a waiter and busboy... and then as a cabin boy on merchant ships.

Good-looking, bilingual, witty and intellegent, Langston got by until 1925, when he was "discovered" by Vachel Lindsay. Lindsay was white, but his poetry mixed jazz riffs and evangelical religious themes (he was the rap star of the Great Gatsby era) which made him the expert on who was -- and who wasn't -- an authentic Negro voice. Langston was in.

Like other artists, he had to put up with patrons. Someone launched the bright idea of sending him on a speaking tour around the rural South -- which during the Jim Crow 1920s, was not exactly the safest place for an African-American intellectual. With some rueful humor, he noted the absurdity of segregation. In places that wouldn't serve "negros", they would serve him if he was a Mexican. In Texas, where there was segregated facilities for Mexicans... he was tempted to claim to be Cuban -- just to see what would happen.

Though he could laugh at segreation and racism, like his father, he never reconciled himself to it. Unlike his father, he never saw wealth or respectabilty as a way of immunizing himself from it. He continually returned to Mexico, sharing an apartment (now gone, near Plaza Garibaldi) in the 1930s with Henri Cartier Bresson, who documented the lives of la Capital's poor. Hughes wrote respecfully of the city's poor, and of Mexican rural life for a number of publications. Like other minority writers of the time, he joined the Communist Party, but other than writing for "The Masses," he was too much an artist to have much to do with the Party. In the 1950s, he returnrf to Mexico to avoid political persecution for his former Communist association.

By the mid-1960s, Hughes' writings were more or less relegated to junior high school anthologies. Already dying of cancer, he gave up writing his weekly newspaper column in 1965, and died in 1967. Despite admirers like James Baldwin (himself African-American and gay), Hughes was seen as passe, a figure from the "Harlem Renaissance" and insuficiently militant for the time. He wasn't "black enough". Nor should he have been. As his Mexican writing shows, it wasn't "race" or place that he noticed -- it was the people, their folk ways and spirt of survival, their dreams and their dreams deferred.

Photos, Henri Cartier Bresson,

Mexico City, 1934

Damage Control....in Full Swing

2006-09-08T18:26:00.000-05:00

The people have voted, the votes have been counted and some re-counted, TRIFE has declared the winner(Calderon). The loser (Obrador) ain't movin', and therein lies the problem. There is no doubt that Mexico's Presidential election was fraught with irregularities. If Calderon is to enact his policies, he must cut into AMLO's substantial support. It's an ugly business. We've been listening to the pundits preditions, of AMLO's refusal to accept the new government, leading Mexico into a bloody civil war. Obrador has been labeled a "dangerous messianic mad-man" by some critics. From the Taipei Times: http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/08/24/2003324614

"What we Mexicans want is stability, order and harmony," Fox said. Society rejects extremist solutions, and messianic or apocalyptic visions that belong to the political culture of the past.

Opponents have frequently used the term "messianic" to describe Lopez Obrador, citing his devotion and the leftist's belief in his own personal sense of mission. It's another case of trash talk/demonize your opponent/attack his or her character. We witnessed these tactics in the U.S. when our administration felt threatened by John Kerry and Max Cleland. When Cindy Sheehan, mother of a dead American soldier (in Iraq), began a movement to end the war in Iraq, Pres. Bush's associates began what Frank Rich (New York Times) called the "Swift Boating of Cindy Sheehan". She was called a crackpot (Fred Barnes) and a whack job. For an added punch, she was accused of being a secret agent of Michael Moore. When Rep. John Murtha addressed the Congress and called for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq, he was accused of being a "coward" by House Speaker Dennis Hastert, Rep. J.D. Hayworth and Majority Leader Roy Blunt. None of these three yahoos had had any military service. Murtha (ironically) spent 37 yrs. in the service and had been awarded 2 Purple Hearts, 1 Bronze Star with a combat "V", and a Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry. There is no shame! Those in power in Mexico.... or about to be in power, seem to be ready, willing and able to follow suit in the case of Obrador. No means to neutralize him will be overlooked. The following is exerpted from the Nation article: http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060918/ross (John Ross)

The president-elect (Calderon) will no doubt seek to split AMLO's forces, offering members of López Obrador's Congressional delegation minor Cabinet posts and canonazos ("cannonades" of pesos) to neutralize the coalition's strength in the new legislature, where it is now the second-largest political force. Calderón cannot pass proposed constitutional changes such as the promised privatization of the national petroleum monopoly PEMEX without a two-thirds majority in both houses. Calderón is also expected to pump windfall profits from $70-a-barrel oil into social programs to undercut López Obrador's deep support among the underclass, an obligatory strophe for unpopular Mexican presidents. As was the case with Carlos Salinas after the long-ruling (seventy-one years) PRI party stole the presidency for him back in 1988 from López Obrador's onetime mentor and now archrival, Cuauhtemoc Cardenas, Calderón will have more support outside Mexico than inside. Both George Bush and US Ambassador Tony Garza were quick to congratulate Calderón following the July 2 balloting. Now that the TRIFE has confirmed his "victory," Washington and European Union members--like Spain's prime minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero--are eager to get in on the ground floor of the PEMEX fire sale and will seek to legitimize Calderón's presidency beyond Mexico's borders. But within the boundaries of this distant neighbor nation, diminishing AMLO's immense popularity and isolating him from his political base may not be all that simple. Whenever challenged by the Fox administration, López Obrador has been able to mobilize millions. Following the disputed July 2 election he has organized the largest political demonstrations in the history of the republic. Calderón's only option may be mano dura, the "hard hand." Fox's attorney general, Carlos Abascal, has already warned that should López Obrador form a parallel government, he could be tried for usurpation of powers, a crime that carries a hefty prison sentence. López Obrador's Party of the Democratic Revolution is being threatened with the loss of its electoral registration for preventing Fox from delivering his State of the Union address. But in the past, such threats have succeeded only in boosting AMLO's numbers.
Indeed, López Obrador's commitment to resisting the Calderón presidency could well come down to eliminating his physical presence altogether. Such a development has ample historical precedent in Mexican power politics. In 1994 PRI presidential candidate Luis Donaldo Colosio was gunned down after he turned against his predecessor, Salinas. Agrarian martyr Emiliano Zapata met a similar fate in 1919 when he proved too troublesome for the Carranza government. One of López Obrador's role models, Francisco Madero, was assassinated soon after the stolen 1910 election that triggered the Mexican revolution and eventually installed him as Mexico's first democratically elected president.

Many Mexicos... beyond Calderón v AMLO...

2006-09-08T00:18:00.000-05:00

"This idea that there is a country split between two ideological positions is a deceptive fabrication of the political actors and the candidates.

Alberto Saracho, director of the non-governmental Idea Foundation

The way Mexicans voted in July and several opinion polls show that political preferences are not clearly split along socioeconomic, political, ethnic, age, regional or party lines.
...
According to the official vote tally, Calderón took the votes of just 20.8 percent of the 71.3 million voters registered in this country of 106 million, while abstention amounted to 41.5 percent.
Meanwhile, López Obrador of the "For the Good of All" coalition made up of his Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) and the small Convergencia and Trabajo parties, won the votes of 20 percent of registered voters. The leftist candidate earned more than 50 percent of the vote in three of the country's 32 states, while Calderón did so in just two states.
And each of the two candidates was defeated by Roberto Madrazo of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) -- which ruled Mexico from 1929 to 2000 -- in several states.
...
"It is intellectually dishonest to maintain, as political leaders are doing in city squares or in private, that the country is politically divided between right and left or rich and poor, when reality shows otherwise," political scientist Rossana Fuentes, at the Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico, told IPS.
The simplification of the confrontation to two positions or candidates "disregards the pluralism that defines any society, and distances civil society from the political system," said Fuentes.
In a nationwide survey of 2,100 people carried out by the daily Reforma just before the elections, 29 percent of low-income respondents said they would vote for López Obrador and 22 percent for Calderón. The breakdown, meanwhile, was 30 percent for each candidate among the lower-middle income respondents; 29 percent for each candidate among the upper-middle income respondents; and 25 percent for López Obrador and 47 percent for Calderón among the upper income respondents.
...
With regard to ideological orientation, 54 percent of those who defined themselves as left-of-centre said they would vote for López Obrador and 14 percent for Calderón, while 36 percent of those who identified with the right said they would vote for Calderón and 21 percent for López Obrador. The two candidates had the support of equal portions -- 29 percent -- of respondents who see themselves as in the centre of the spectrum.

(Full article, MEXICO: The Myth of a Country Divided Between Left and Right by Diego Cevallos, September 8 2006, InterPress News Service.

Fresh vegetables... pick your own...

2006-09-07T17:42:00.000-05:00

Why immigrants come to the United States and work crappy jobs is no secret. Carolyn Lochhead, of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote an excellent article on this back in May. People go where they're paid a decent wage. But what about the crap jobs that can't pay very well. You listen to the blowhards at CNN or Fox, and they'll tell you that of course there are American workers to do these jobs. Calling Lou Dobbs, paging Ann Coulter -- you're needed right now out in the California farm fields.

Labor shortage worsens as peak harvest nears By Kate Campbell, Assistant Editor California Farm Bureau Federation Ag Alert Against a backdrop of Congressional inaction, California farmers wait for comprehensive immigration reform and prepare for harvest. ... right now growers say labor uncertainties are their biggest worry. Members of the U.S. House of Representatives, meanwhile, are holding a series of public hearings across the nation that largely exclude agriculture. "Right now we're heading into peak harvest season in California when there's the greatest demand for farmworkers," said California Farm Bureau President Doug Mosebar. "Because we know there already are critical shortages, we are joining other agricultural groups to better track the labor supply situation. We'll be surveying our members in coming days to get the best and most up-to-date information on labor shortages as possible." ... Already some fields in the Pajaro Valley in Santa Cruz County are being abandoned because farmers can't find enough workers. Farmers in that area say there are 10 percent to 20 percent fewer workers available to harvest strawberry, raspberry and vegetable crops. Carolyn O'Donnell of the California Strawberry Commission says her organization is hearing that labor is very tight. In the Watsonville area some farms have enough and some don't. Others blame a broken H2A temporary worker program for the shortage. Many point to tightened border security and competition from other business sectors for entry-level workers. ... "Due to shortages, guys go where they get paid the most so they keep moving. Labor contractors are short of people. Harvest scares me to death," the grower said. In Santa Clara County, a field crop farmer said, "Because of the lack of help, we cannot get our crops irrigated in a timely manner. We will lose about 30 percent of our alfalfa this year." A tree fruit farmer in the Fresno area said because of lighter than usual crops, he thinks his operation will get by with 10 percent fewer workers this season. But he expects that when the grape harvest gets going in late August, the labor shortage will become extreme. "If we have a normal crop next year, we could experience even more crop losses because of a big shortage of labor," he said. Information released by the Agriculture Department's National Agricultural Statistics Service for the first quarter of 2006 pegs the number of hired workers on U.S. farms at 718,000, down nearly 4 percent from the previous year. As the crop year progresses, these statistics from USDA suggest the labor squeeze will be greatly magnified not only in the United States, but in California, the nation's No. 1 farm state. The government report, which offers the most current statistical look at the national farm labor situation, shows that wages increased sharply during the same period, while the number of workers dropped. The national average wage paid to farmworkers is up nearly 5 percent from one year ago and up 18 percent from 2001. Wage increases for hired farmworkers were reported in every region of the country where government data is collected. Earl Hall, owner of Hall Management Corp. in Kerman, said, "Everyone is struggling for workers. It has been a struggle even for us--we're looking for machine operators, tractor drivers and sorters. I personally got three different calls last week from people I'm not supplying farm labor to that want help because they cannot find enough workers. "These are big companies that normally use only in-house workers and don't use farm labor contractors," Hall said. "They can't find enough people for picking tree fruit, working in canneries--they're short everyone. And for the first time I'm getting calls from growers of green and fresh market tomatoes that are short workers. Irrigators are really in short supply. "On the Central Coast, they're struggling to find people to harvest strawberries," said Hall, who operates in 26 California counties and employs between 1,500 and 2,500 agricultural workers a day, depending on the season. "And the heat a few weeks ago seriously compounded problems. Every employer I know made adjustments--working crews shorter hours while the crops were ripening faster." But, Hall said even with cooler temperatures in the fields, the workers just aren't out there. And, California isn't the only place where farm labor is in short supply. According to recent media reports, one farmer in Cowlitz County in Washington state reported one-third of his blueberry crop rotted in the field for want of enough pickers. Apple growers in Central Washington were scrambling to find someone--anyone--to do the important work of thinning the apple crop to ensure the best and largest fruit for harvest. The Associated Press reported that some Oregon farmers contend the U.S. government's decision to place National Guard troops along the Mexican border is contributing to a shortage of workers to pick their ripe fruit. Terry Drazdoff said farmworkers should have been harvesting 25 tons of fruit per day from his Polk County cherry orchard. Instead, he could hire only enough temporary farmworkers to pick 6 tons. In the Bradenton Herald, Mike Carlton, director of production and labor affairs at Florida Citrus Mutual, noted, "There's very little doubt we'll leave a significant amount of fruit on the trees." Orange production in Florida has been predicted to be the lowest since 1992, in part due to last year's hurricane damage. But even with a smaller crop, it appears the primary problem growers face now is a shortage of fruit pickers, Carlton said. The American Farm Bureau Federation has compiled data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the U.S. Department of Labor and from its own studies and analyzed that information in light of legislative efforts to amend existing immigration law. The conclusions are stark. AFBF has found, among other things, that if Congress enacts legislation that deals only with border security and enforcement, the impact on fruit and vegetable farmers nationwide would be between $5 billion and $9 billion annually. Net farm income in the rest of the agricultural sectors would decline between $1.5 billion and $5 billion a year. "If federal legislation is enacted that fails to take into account the unique needs of agriculture, which include our increasing dependence on hired labor, our extreme vulnerability to competitively priced foreign-grown produce and our inability either to absorb cost increases or pass those on, we will all watch as Congress takes literally billions of dollars out of the pockets of American farmers and sends it to our competitors overseas," said Stefphanie Gambrell, domestic policy economist at AFBF.

If the best the Republicans can push is a wall... don't be surprised if there's a consumer response...

(photo courtesty U.C. Riverside)

Is it surreal enough yet?

2006-09-06T05:53:00.000-05:00

Ok, so Calderón won by... what, 230,000 out of 41 million votes? That's strange, that's incredible. And, if you think he might not have been legitimately elected, you're not alone. Now... for a real kicker... what if Vincente Fox is really a.... GRINGO? Chente and Martita are going to be heading back to their little ranchito in Guanjuanto soon... though some of their neighbors might not be so glad to see them. It seems one of the neighbors, researching a lawsuit, stumbled across some documents from 1940, where José Luis Fox Pont, Chente's dear old dad, swore he was a United States citizen. Everybody knows Fox's mom was a Basque, and you have to have at least ONE Mexican parent if you're going to be President, so this could be a real problem. But, wait... it's Mexico. It gets weirder. The story about the Don José Luis' deposition appeared August 30. September 1, dead old dad's birth certificate just happened to surface, showing he was born in Iraputo, but his parents "maintain their North American citizenship"... meaning? According to the powers that be... Vincente Fox is the son of a Mexican ... though, some of his neighbors think he's a hijo de... something else. Just as well. Would TEJPF have to oversee re-running the 2000 election?... or would Mexico resolve the problem the way they resolved it last time a foreigner claimed (erroneously) to run Mexiico? You know, that nice Max Habsburg... the guy that inspired Eduard Manet... The Agnonist has great fun with this.

The pen is mightier than the grenade...

2006-09-05T01:58:00.000-05:00

You read about drug POLICY in publications like New York Times or Jornada . If you want to read about the "war on drugs," you won't find it on the front lines either. The McAllen Monitor or the Laredo Morning Times might give you some combat reports, and the body count, but there's only so much they can do... or will. Anyone who writes on the border -- on either side -- is going to think twice about covering the narco wars. Too much money -- coming from the U.S. appitite for this shit -- is involved. And the Mexican narcos, having no way to settle their territorial disputes, aren't prone to legal nicities. If you think writing on some crooked land deal or corporate chincanery is risky, you really don't want to deal with these businessmen. Some of my colleagues in places like Del Rio and McAllen -- and Nuevo Laredo and Ciudad Acuña mkae the common-sense decision that no story is worth getting tortured and killed over. They're crime reporters ... not war correspondents. Down in the Yucatan, far from the border, Por Esto! is one of the more popular newspapers in Mexico. It's not a "great" paper in the sense that its reporters are talking heads on the news shows, or that the editorials are discussed in Congress. It's a good, old fashioned sports, scandal and crime paper. The kind of thing taxi drivers and hair dressers have around to pass the time. But, the Yucatan is a hotbed of corrpution and dubious money. There's a lot of cash floating around -- thanks to the tourist trade -- which makes it a perfect place for the narcos to set up business. Reporters for papers like Por Esto! are poorly paid, or free-lancers. They're enterprising. They're fearless. Or, maybe, they're crazy. But they've given Por Esto! de Merida an international reputation. To my knowledge, it's the only regional Mexican daily ever sued for libel in a New York State courts. The banker suing the paper (they'd claimed he was involved in money laundering), I'm happy to say, lost. Lately, the paper -- or rather a moonlighting anthopology professor -- has been writing about environmental damage related to the tourist hotels, and the problems dealing with toxins around Cancun. So, when a couple of guys jumped out of a truck last week, lobbed a couple of grenades in the paper's front office and hightailed it to the bus station... the state police arrested -- the professor! If something doesn't seem right about that... you're not alone. Those taxi drivers and housewives and shoe-shine men didn't buy it either. While the professor is out of jail, the paper is surrounded -- by the people -- and the taxi drivers have set up round the clock surveillence to protect THEIR paper. I hadn't heard about this (like most commentators, I've been preoccupied with the Presidential election), but Por Esto!'s sometime partner-in-crime, Narco News (which was co-defendant in the New York lawsuit) -- with their usual spin and flair for yellow journalism -- has been on top of this. That's a shame. Taxi drivers, housewives... and now the local Bishop... standing up for the free press. Casualties of the drug war fight back ... demand free press... power to the people: and, we'll be lucky to see a small AP article by the same reporter who has to put out "Spring-breakers run beserk in Cancun." Someone suggests bombing the New York Times, and the most you get are some worried editorials and sad comments from the talking heads. And people wonder why I say Mexico is under-reported.

V. Fox -- seen the "right" way

2006-09-03T01:05:00.000-05:00

I know I'll get some criticism for this, but not everyone at the freerepublic.com is a raving lunatic reactionary. I make fun of freerepublic.com all the time -- which is sometimes like shooting fish in a barrel. It attracts more than it's share of religious cranks, homophobes, racists and know-nothings. But, then, so do most ideological message boards -- and all message boards, for that matter. But cranks have their uses -- anybody with a real hangup on one or another issue is going to take the time to mine everything -- and anything -- for information. I skim through freerepublic.com about one a week (sometimes once a day) looking for articles on immigration and/or Mexico... usually some "illegal alien" somewhere had a car accident and no insurance, but sometimes something more useful, or interesting. Hey, I'm a crank that way too. I've read more than my share of "fight the capitalist hegonemy, go AMLO!" posts from cranks in small (and not so small) ideological left-wing blogs -- written generally by folks who may know their Trostksy, but never have been anywhere near Mexico, or know anything about the Mexican political or economic system. I admit I was suprised to find in a forum I usually only visit for vicarious thrills -- or to find out what "the other side" is up to -- to run across the reasonable, logical "St. Jacques". Of course, we'll never agree on politics -- nor, I suspect -- on anything else. We had a fruitful "private message" exchange about the Zapatistas, when he mistakenly included them in the "Por el bien de todos" coalition of AMLO. "St. Jacques" experience has been in Columbia, where there has been an oddball "leftist" rebel group that sometimes sounds like the Zapatistas, but the issues are very different -- and, I don't see the Zapatistas as the "left", but as indigenous anti-modernists (i.e., reactionaries). "St. Jacques" sees AMLO as anti-democratic, I don't. I agree that Fox's 2000 election was a democratic success -- but think the transition has been a step backwards. And, I agree that Fox's economic program was semi-successful. I might disagree on the particulars (I think bringing in foriegn oil companies would be a disaster, for example), but he makes some good points, and gives Fox the credit for things I sometimes forget. Hey, I'm liberal enough to give a conservative a voice in here! With some slight editing (I ran together three message threads, moving the second above the first, and incorporating some explications he made in his third), "St. Jacques" produces a well-written, conservative's assessment of the Fox administation that's a rarity in the U.S., from the left or the right -- managing to accept Mexico on Mexican terms.

The administration of Vicente Fox has been far more honest in its intent and in its accomplishments than any of the PRI regimes which preceded it, and were all genuinely corrupt to their core. Vicente Fox was the first truly democratically-elected President of Mexico since the PRI organized Mexican politics into a one-party system in the 1930's. Fox has made some progress, especially in the handling of national government finances and the exercise of federal power over state and local governments. Not a lot of people know about the economic and fiscal successes of Fox's administration. Mexico had 0.2% negative growth in its GDP his first year in office, the most recent statistics say this year's growth to date is 5.5%. They had an inflation rate of 6.3% that has now been reduced to something just above 3%. Their national debt, not the annual deficit, has been reduced 20%, from about $50 billion (U.S.) to $40 billion. Poverty rates have declined, particularly in the rural countryside. Interest rates have dropped significantly. The purchasing power of the peso has grown in step with all of the aforementioned. When you compare these accomplishments with the absolute and near criminal mismanagement of Mexico under the PRI for the previous twenty years or so, the record is a very good one. And as for foreign investment, it has been flowing into Mexico for the last few years. Citigroup just bought out a Mexican bank, several other large foreign consortiums have opened up shop in Mexico, and the Mexican stock market, the Bolsa, which was put on a very tight leash by the Fox administration, has begun attracting capital at a very high rate over the past three years or so. Money sent to Mexico by immigrants to the U.S., whether the small number of legals or the great number of illegals, is the second largest source of foreign exchange for the country after oil revenues. But that flow of money has been constant, though growing slightly, over the past twenty-plus years which begs the question "why didn't the PRI governments do better when it constituted a greater percentage of their GDP than it does today?" And the money is a smaller percentage of Mexico's GDP today given the higher price for oil, which is actually more important in explaining Fox's success. The real story here is that for the first time in memory and increase in the price of oil was actually returned to the Mexican government, rather than being stolen by those in the PRI. However, Fox has been unable to tame Mexico's "crony capitalism," which is still a holdover from the years of PRI dominance. Mexico's banking and financial system is still top-heavy, with wealth concentrated in a small number of institutions. Access to capital is still very much dependent upon "who you know" rather than an independent assessment of your credit-worthiness. And then there are the state-run monopolies in the Oil and Electricity industries that are still a source of significant corruption among the state bureaucrats who run them. Kickbacks for job placement and promotions, bribes funneled into the right hands result in the awarding of contracts, and the outright purchasing of union agreements by their leaders, at times under terms contrary to the interests of their own rank and file, are all still a part of the way "business is done" in Mexico today. It is no longer possible to raid the treasury directly or to deposit public funds in private accounts, even if just to keep the interest, as was done under the PRI, which was due to Fox' – but it is not enough. Fox tried to address so many of these issues with the Mexican Congress (and I do give him credit for trying), but it was dominated by the PRI, bent upon sabotaging his reform program, and permitting them to approach the Mexican people in the elections this year as "the party who can get things done." It backfired on the PRI, because they were the really big losers this past July 2 and now find themselves demoted from the number one power in the Mexican national legislature, to the number three. I must confess that I am disappointed in the fact that Fox, the PAN and PRI Deputies and Senators, and others who could have made a difference did not stand up to the intimidation of the PRD last night when they occupied the rostrum in the Mexican Congress and prevented Fox from delivering his official Informe, or the "Government Report," which is similar to our "State of the Union Address" in this country. But as I read Fox's address, I detected a tone of conciliation and a larger call to Mexicans to step up and keep the social and political peace before the protests over the election and other conflicts take the country off the deep end. So in light of that observation I think I at least understand Fox's thinking in that a conciliatory message would not be well-received if its very delivery was predicated upon a physical confrontation on Mexican national television. I must say to everyone that the way all of this went down yesterday has caused me to sit down and reflect upon what may have been some miscalculation on my own part as to what is really driving events from the viewpoint of Fox and the federal government. And what I mean by this is that I may have underestimated the threat Fox and his administration perceive in conflicts outside of the presidential election controversy, creating a nightmare scenario that they may all come together as one. I refer specifically to the near-chaos that now exists in the southern Mexican states of Oaxaca and Chiapas, where two separate controversies raise the possibility of what is repeatedly referred to in the Mexican press as La Ingobernabilidad del Pais (The Ingovernability of the Country). In Oaxaca a teachers strike that began last May has morphed into a popular demand, which is approaching a popular uprising, for the ouster of the PRI Governor Ulises Ruiz, whose corruption and mismanagement of the state coupled with a strong police crackdown on demonstrators, has brought public life there to a complete halt. In neighboring Chiapas the recent gubernatorial election a few weeks back appears to be an obvious instance of election fraud -- real election fraud -- in that the PRD seem to have stolen the seat and their state electoral institute has validated it. I expect to see this election "annulled" (a possibility under Mexican electoral law) in the not too distant future and, whether this happens or not, someone is going to be very angry. There have already been some instances of para-military actions against the landless poor in Chiapas and the whole situation there is a veritable powder keg waiting to explode in my opinion. So right now I'm mulling all of this over in my head, because my mind is not entirely made up as to whether I should view the post-election presidential controversy in and of itself, or whether I should place it within the larger context of a possible and coming "ingovernability" of Mexico. I really need to think this one over.

"St. Jacques", in Free Republic

Informe... y contre-informe....

2006-09-02T22:21:00.000-05:00

Informe coverage from Televisa. "No iremos al Informe para no caer en provocaciones; AMLO" provided by XHPEJE In the first, you see President Fox NOT give a speech, but pass off the document out in the hallway. Note that the "radicals" all join in singing the Himno Nacional...