I represent that remark!

I have one complaint about the New York Times story on el escandalo de WalMart.

Mr. Cicero …  spent hours explaining to Mr. Torres-Landa the mechanics of how he had helped funnel bribes through trusted fixers, known as “gestores.”

Gestores (pronounced hes-TORE-ehs) are a fixture in Mexico’s byzantine bureaucracies, and some are entirely legitimate. Ordinary citizens routinely pay gestores to stand in line for them at the driver’s license office. Companies hire them as quasi-lobbyists to get things done as painlessly as possible.

But often gestores play starring roles in Mexico’s endless loop of public corruption scandals. They operate in the shadows, dangling payoffs to officials of every rank. It was this type of gestor that Wal-Mart de Mexico deployed, Mr. Cicero said.

My job title with Editorial Wisemaz S. de R.L. de C.V. is “Gestor de proyectos”.   I should be offended.  I am not a “fixture”  in any byzantine bureaucracy that I know of, but I spend a hell of a lot of time on the byzantine task of tracking down writers, and distributors and reviewers and translators … and facts…  and the correct spelling of obscure place names.  And going to book fairs and writers’ conferences and making telephone calls, and e-mailing people (and  now and again having to shop for office supplies).

A gestor just is a representative, and someone who physically goes places on behalf of the employer.    On the application for my work visa, the job title had to be listed as “edecane” — which derives from the French military term, “aide-de-camp” but has the legal meaning on work permits of  “consultant or business assistant”.

Or “personal assistant”… Alas, in the want ads… and in the popular imagination… “edecane” is often understood to mean a VERY personal assistant… the kind of personal assistant that in Colombia, may ask as much as $800 US for a night’s worth of personal assistance, not 30 bucks, as some Secret Service agents seem believe.

I donno.. what the Secret Service agent wanted to pay is about what I get for about 12 hours of work a day, but I suppose it’s better to be tagged  a bagman than a whore.