¡FUTBOL! — all the rest is secondary
“Soccer is first. The craziness surrounding soccer is second. Then there is the rest of the world”
(Carlos Monsivias, Mexican author, critic, social commentator, all round intellectual and nerd, quoted in Gulfnews of Dubai)There was a posting on the “Lonely Planet Thorn Tree” message board the other day asking where in Mexico one could watch the World Cup on wide-screen TV. The answer is … anywhere there is a wide-screen TV. If you’re not committed to wide-screen, you’ll be able to watch it… anywhere. Every taco stand, newsvendor, “temporary” puesto along the street will have a portable TV turned to the matches.
Even the Virgin of Guadelupe, or Cardinal Rivera, on her behalf, gets in on the action. The Basilica received an autographed futbol to add to its collection of retablos:In the 2002 World Cup (in Korea), the morning Mexico beat Italy, I was teaching a “Business English” course at General Electric’s headquarters in Polanco. According to the schedule, I had a training film to show, and the main conference room reserved. Given the time difference between Mexico City and Seoul, the games were shown very, very early in the morning. When I arrived at 7:30 AM for my 8:00 AM class, I discovered the conference room was in use — everyone from the CEO to the cleaning ladies were jammed into that conference room — no way there’d be a dull film on business meeting etiquitte.MEXICAN ETIQUITTE, por supesto, meant everyone brought “snacks” — i.e., enough tacos, tortilla, tamales, chips and refrescos to feed the Mexican Army. We did, in a way, have an English class. The Scotsman who taught another class at the same time taught the names of field positions in English and I, thanks to having attended a Catholic high school in a town where you picked your parish by ethnicity — knew plenty of rude English words for Italians. The students — and the CEO, and the cleaning ladies — at least got some kind of education that morning.As soon as the game ended, there was a Presidential Address — Don Chente and Martita were filmed in their living room (you could see the nachos and empty beer bottles on their coffee table) congratulating the team (of course) and… with a wink and a nudge… giving the disappointing news that it was a work day, not a national holiday. It might as well have been. The other stuff (i.e. work, life, politics) somehow has to adjust…
Firms worry World Cup will affect productivity:
During the 2002 World Cup in South Korea and Japan, absenteeism was over 10 percent. The games in this year´s tournament, which starts on June 9 and is being held in Germany, will be broadcast between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. – prime work hours. …
“Since the last World Cup, a lot of companies, taking into account that their workers love their team and religiously follow futbol, negotiated with unions to make sure workers came in at the most important times” said Jorge Monteagudo, head of the company AON Consulting….
“Thousands of Mexicans are sick of politics and the World Cup will be an important distraction.”
Monsters and Critics (a U.K site that seems to think Mexico is in South America) has a DPA wire report on how the presidential campaigns are bowing to reality:
Because Mexicans are crazy about football, the floodlights currently are aimed at the forthcoming events in Germany far more intensely than they are on political rallies and other events featuring candidates.
…
So it is no surprise that the candidates are leaning into the spotlight beamed at Mexico’s World Cup team to grasp some of the limelight. Mexico’s World Cup experience in Germany is fitting more frequently into political strategies for taking power in Mexico.…
While campaigning, [Roberto] Madrazo {PRI-PVEM] passes out little calendars containing shortened names of the locations where matches will be played – because the entire German name would be a tongue twister for a Mexican. All matches, times and groups are listed from Munich to Berlin.
And there is a card for keeping track of tournament results. The slogan of the PRI is printed across the top: Alliance for Mexico.
The former mayor of Mexico City, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador of the leftist Democratic Revolution Party, who had steadily led the polls for more than a year, now is speaking even more about football. …Recently, his handlers switched to a television spot showing AMLO with football scenes in the background. The words on the bottom of the image say: ‘Andreas Manuel, Mexico is your team’.
…
‘We cannot ignore that Mexico through and through is a football country,’ said a PAN strategist.
AMLO may have something of a problem, given that he’s a baseball guy. Rafael Guillien, aka Sub-Commandante Marcos, who is — of course — running “the other campaign” (meaning the ignored masses should ignore the elections — though it looks more like “Marcos” is the one being ignored) is a futbol kinda guy. He also recognizes (in a Rebeldia interview reprinted in NarcoNews) that making it to the semi-finals is the REAL CAMPAIGN:
There is no country up above colliding with either of those realities. In the Mexico of above, the country above, there is only simulation. A simulation that is betting everything on July 2nd and shouts at the mirror, “We are modern! We are modern!” Although the flesh that it has is rotting. Although this is the same story as before: 1968, all the stories of repression, those that are hanging like pieces of rotting meat in the face of what is being seen here. On the other hand, there is the soccer championship, that yes, has an impact below, but it begins and then it ends the same as July 2nd.
Meanwhile… the Associated Press reports Fox’s press secretary, Ruben Agular, is pleading with his countrymen to at least pay attention to the campaign:
President Vicente Fox’s spokesman on Tuesday urged voters in soccer-crazy Mexico to not let the upcoming World Cup distract them from the presidential elections in July.Spokesman Ruben Aguilar called on citizens to maintain “a measure of civility” and community spirit once the games begin June 9, just three weeks before the elections. Mexico’s first game is on June 11, against Iran.
…
Ranked sixth internationally, Mexico opens play June 11 against Iran. Pollsters say all three major presidential candidates already have trouble getting Mexicans to care about them – and that sharing the national stage with soccer will only make things tougher in the final weeks before the July 2 vote.
There are no games scheduled on election day, although two quarter-final games are scheduled for election eve.
What election?
Indio Zapoteco takes on the gringos…
El Universal’s “foro” asked its readers what they’d suggest to the presidential candidates to handle emigration to the U.S. Raise taxes, lower taxes, more public employment, less public employment, a higher minimum wage, a lower minimum wage, better education, foreign investment, no foreign investment — turning to Jesus… about what you’d expect. “Indio Zapoteco” wasn’t …
GET RID OF WALMART, CHEDRA.., And ALL FOREIGN CHAINS AND PROHIBIT AMERICAN FRANCHIZERS… INSTEAD OF BUYING AT WALMART SHOP IN THE CORNER STORE. PROHIBIT THE USE OF WINDOWS AND FORCE COMPANIES TO USE MEXICAN DEVELOPERS, FUCKED UP AS THEY ARE AND PUT UP A WALL THREE TIMES HIGHER THAN THE AMERICANS BUILD, AND DON’T LET IN ANY FUCKING AMERICANS AND ANY FUCKING AMERICAN BRANDS AND NO FUCKING LEVIS OF ANY KIND… WITH NO HOME MART CONSTRUCTION WORKERS AND PLUMBERS FENCED OUT OF THE UNITED STATES OF DAY LABOR WILL HAVE SOME CASH IN THEIR POCKETS. AND MUCH LESS PROCESSED FOOD F… WE’LL EAT MAIZE AND CHILES AND … IT’LL BE THE ZAPOTECAS AND THE HUCHOLES THAT END THIS FUCK UP INDUSTRIALIZTION — UP WITH MANTAS.
Illegal space alien gay mariachis…
…oh my!
In North Carolina’s 13th Congressional District, Republican candidate Vernon Robinson is running against the Democratic incumbent, Brad Miller. Robinson is African-American, which cuts down on the possibilities for run-of-the-mill “race-baiting” when the going gets tough. Robinson call call Miller a “childless, middle-aged personal injury lawyer” (Mrs. Miller had a hysterectomy for medical reasons when she was still young) which at least lets Robinson run on an anti-gay platform…all very normal in the dirty world of U.S. politics.
But… this being “open season” on immigration, it gets very, very weird there in Charlotte. Pam’s Blend dissects one of Robinson’s more “intriguing” TV commercials:
The Twilight Zone-theme and music are quite appropriate in this case. This is one of the most offensive — and amusing — pieces of political theatre I
have ever seen, with a picture of a fetus, then invoking the Homo AlertTM with an image of men kissing. He moves on to “aliens,” showing spaceships, then cutting to a pic of Mexicans scaling fences. (my emphasis)
Even better, Robinson is running a radio ad that attacks both gays and “illegal aliens” (and gay aliens) featuring mariachi music. You can listen to it MPeg audio here:
“If Miller had his way America would be nothing but one big fiesta for illegal aliens and homosexuals,” the ad continues. “But if you elect Vernon Robinson, that party’s over.”
SOUNDS LIKE MY IDEA OF A GOOD TIME!
Black gold… Tampico Tea… OIL, that is…
There is a short report in today’s Caracas El Universal (English edition) on the up-coming OPEC meeting:
Representatives of Angola, Mexico and Syria will act as observers in the 141st special meeting of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). The event will take place next Thursday in Venezuela….
The OPEC meeting to be held in Caracas will deal with keeping, reduction or increase of the oil
supply. Also, production and refining capabilities will be explored, as well as the use of currency in global oil dealings, Ramírez told reporters.
This comes the same day Business Week On-line reports:
Mexico’s Treasury Department said Tuesday that the government had a budget surplus of US$3.3 billion (euro2.6 billion) in April, with revenue boosted by high oil prices and better tax collection.
In a news release, the department said that budget revenues grew 9.8 percent from the year-ago month, with oil receipts up 5.6 percent from April 2005 and tax receipts up 18.1 percent.
The U.S. Department of Energy figures show Mexico as the #2 foreign supplier (about 1500 barrels a day, only slightly behind Canada, at 1509 BBl/day).
I realize there are some good reasons Mexican oil sells for only 57.38 USD (well below Brent Crude’s 72.00 USD) per barrel, but… given that many now recognize that Mexico’s decision not to join OPEC in 1982 was a major blunder , that higher oil prices will meet the demand for more social benefits (a given, no matter who controls the new administration) … and, if AMLO wins (as I suspect he will) more willingness to cooperate and coordinate foreign policy with other Latin American and Asian nations. Interestingly enough, Raphel Guillen, AKA “Commandante Marcos”, sees a “leftward” trend too. Take it for what it’s worth — Marcos is only relevent to the Mexican right and in his own mind.)
U.S. news sources always talk about the need for more foreign investment in Pemex. But, if oil prices go higher, it will take the pressure off Pemex to raise foreign capital. And, besides, what everyone seems to overlook is that foreign capital is already involved (in a small way) in Pemex — from Spanish, French, Brazilian firms. There’s no guarantee that even a conservative administration would open Pemex to Exxon-Mobile or BP or the other giants.
Oil is going to go up… so, what’s left to exploit. Oh yeah, silver and heavy metals.
The Canadians are the leaders here. Dia Brass bought out the Cusa silver mines. They go in for Mexican dirty industries anyway — makes ’em feel virtuous at home.
The fix ain’t in
There’s probably some truth in the adage “power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely”, but when one has to deal with a three (or four, or six or eight) way split between alliances, parties and factions, it’s hard to figure out who has the power — except, as you’d expect, the guy with the money… in this case, Fox. Who isn’t a candidate.
El Finanaciero en línea (English “News” section)
Mexico City, May 26.- The pulse in México’s presidential race quickens. As recent polls show again a widening gap between Felipe Calderón and his nearest chasers, the two trailing incumbents unlocked horns and intend to prove the Federal government has played a hands-on role in the race.
Tossing aside hard feelings dating back 10 years, when they ran for the Tabasco State government, Roberto Madrazo overtly advocated a joint effort with Andrés Manuel López Obrador in order to derail a fixed election. Together, the Institutional Revolutionary Party’s (PRI) candidate said, they could curb the Fox administrations all-out drive to put Calderón in office.
Should they fail, Madrazo proposes a last-ditch move to stop Fox: quit the election.
Outwardly, López Obrador –running for the Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) — has played hard to get. He sticks to his lines, insisting the president’s split-personality does not benefit the nation’s pursuit of democracy. In a recent letter, though, López Obrador told the president that performing his duties as México’s chief executive officer and seeking reelection at the same time, grossly impairs the ability to fulfill his responsibilities as the country’s head of state.
The PRD camp dislikes the idea of a merge. Senior campaign managing officers responded that an alliance of this sort is highly unlikely, considering ideological differences. The truth is, however, that these two parties share political genes. The PRD budded from the PRI. In fact, with the PRI’s technocratic faction in self-ostracism, these parties’ DNA may look the same.
The bottom line in Madrazo’s proposal is that a PRI-PRD alliance is the only effective device to stave off a crushing defeat. Otherwise, the embattled candidate forecasts, the huge flood of TV and radio advertising, paid time in talk shows plus doctored opinion polls, will wash them away.
Madrazo has placed hard figures on the foreground to produce a clear picture of the situation. He said the Federal government spent, during the past two months, over 1.3 billion pesos in advertising to prop up the position of ruling National Action Party’s (PAN) candidate, Felipe Calderón, and has set aside earmarked a similar allocation for the climaxing stage of the race.
Such outsize expenditures which, Madrazo charges, are siphoned off the nation’s treasury, jeopardize Mexico’s democratic development. From his viewpoint, the chilling prospects of the next president being elected by means of TV advertising schedules and opinion polls are real.
The Madrazo-López Obrador personal feud is a well known political affair. In 1996, they disputed the State of Tabasco gubernatorial seat. Backed up by the late Carlos Hank González, and the Atlacomulco political powerhouse, Madrazo won. López Obrador challenged the election outcome and produced, to no avail, overwhelming evidence of illegal campaign expenditures.
(Then) President Ernesto Zedillo had to take back his decision to unseat Madrazo. Instead, he was forced to remove Esteban Moctezuma from the Secretary of Interior and give the big job to Emilio Chuayfett, a rising member of the Atlacomulco group.
López Obrador and Madrazo may not settle this account, for the time being. Both have covered a great deal of political ground and presently may decide to reconcile their pressing priorities.
To begin with, freeze President Fox’s rampant promotion of Felipe Calderón’s candidacy. Next, reverse the trends in voting intention that surveys have reflected over the past eight weeks. More important, to respond efficiently to advertising that savages their political character.
Along this line, Madrazo’s electoral ally in his party’s ticket, has come across with a public exposé that cracked the walls of the PAN’s war room. Quite unexpectedly, Senator Jorge Emilio González, chairman of the Mexican Green Party (PVEM), revealed to the press that President Fox himself had tried several times to talk him out of his electoral partnership with Madrazo.
According to González’s public statement, Fox recommended that he wise up because “he (Fox) was prepared to do everything he could to obliterate Madrazo’s and López Obrador’s presidential endeavors.” Should the story be solid, the president messed around with the law and might fall through the cracks.
Nicknamed the Niño Verde (the Green Child), González quoted Fox as saying the PRI runner was undependable while López Obrador represented a peril. “Therefore, the right move for him to make was to defect from the PRI-PVEM coalition and switch to Calderón’s winning team”.
In exchange, Jorge Emilio told reporters, Fox offered top-level cabinet posts for the Green Party in the eventual Calderón administration, “but he had refused the barter”. Instead, he blew the whistle on the president.
Though the Office of the Presidency has not released a formal response on the issue and Fox brushed it off as an impossible piece of gossip, Jorge Emilio has said to have proof and be ready to attach it as evidence in suits opposition parties are fixing to file. The PRD already did it.
Also, the young senator has assured he is prepared to cooperate with a legal inquiry should it be opened and, if needed, to testify in a prosecution room. His display of courage and commitment should help not only restore but bolster Madrazo’s regard for his ally’s loyalty.
In particular if he reflects on the Green Child’s fast professional background which Madrazo knows thoroughly. His associate’s political career shows he’s a deft wheeler-dealer who can sail through troubled waters.
Early last year, González was caught in what he called a frame. He was video taped doing business allegedly involving a two-million dollar bribe. He toughed it out and returned stronger to his legislative work. He made sure not to get mad, but to get even. Seemingly Green Child has.
Gonzalo Olvera
Trashy fashions…
I suppose there’s something either to be said about “one man’s trash …” or something profound about the decadent western society’s need to exploit EVERYTHING from Mexican … but what the hey. Here’s your chance to own genuine Mexican trash.
Mexico’s trash becomes boutiques’ treasure – and Indians’ livelihood
By LISA J. ADAMS
The Associated Press
LA SOLEDAD, Mexico — Empty candy wrappers, potato-chip bags and cookie packages that once littered roads and filled Mexican dumps are now making fashion statements in New York, Los Angeles and Tokyo.
Indian m
en and women from the central state of Mexico have converted the food labels into colorful women’s clutches, shoulder bags and hip belts that are selling on Web sites and in upscale U.S. boutiques and department stores for up to $200 apiece.
The idea began here with the nonprofit Group for the Promotion of Education and Sustainable Development, or Grupedsac, an organization that since 1987 has helped poor Mexican Indians become self-sufficient through development projects that also aim to preserve the environment.
… a daughter of Grupedsac’s executive director … showed a few purses to friends in Palm Beach, Fla., where they quickly caught the attention of retired British textile manufacturer Stanley Cohen and his wife, Elaine.
The couple were so attracted by the bags’ designs and socially conscious origins they began buying them in bulk last year.
The organization currently provides the Cohens with up to 150 bags, plus dozens of belts, a week. The Cohens resell them to Bloomingdale’s branches and small boutiques throughout Florida, as well at www.Sweetiepurse.com.
Anything can happen…
I want whatever it is Roberto Madrazo is having… Despite his consistent third place showing in the polls, defections by key party members openly urging party members to vote for PAN or PRD and a promised party purge after the July 2 election, Madrazo remains optimistic. Madrazo is a funny kind of Mexican politician — he’s a Tabasco puritan, who neither smokes nor drinks, who watches his diet, and who runs marathons. But he’s gotta be on something. He’s quoted in today’s (29 May) El Financiero as believing the “loyal PRI voters” will come through on election day, and he’ll be the next president of Mexico.
Yeah… and Dominica is going to win the World Cup.
Both Reuters and Bloomberg are reporting the latest Milenio Poll, with AMLO now leading Calderón, 33.6% to 33.1%. This is within the 3.2% margin of error, but so… and this is where it gets really, really weird, is Madrazo (30%).
I think the shift to AMLO has a lot to do with immigration (or emigration, for those in Mexico) and Calderón’s lame excuses for the FOBAPROA mess… as with any advertising campaign. Both U.S. and Mexican papers are crediting AMLO’s successful suit to stop “negative advertising” from Calderón’s spin machine for the turnaround.
Or… maybe Calderón’s people are just getting desperate. AReuters Financial reporters seem to accept the possibility that AMLO may be the next president. Much as the incumbent president for the longest time was “Vincente Fox, whose 2000 election marked the end of 71 years of one-party rule”, AMLO was always a FIREY LEFTIST. Now he’s just a leftist.
I think he’s saving the fire for the debates.
Clowns on the campaign trail…
Mexico has always had it’s masked heros — Zorro… el Santo… Marcos… Brozo the Clown. Behind the clown makeup is Victor Trujillo, a sharp-witted political reporter. As Brozo, he can grill newsmakers, and even insult them, with impunity. Hey, it’s only a clown act. If Steven Colbert stopped dressing like a Fox newscaster, and more like Harpo Marx, you’d have a gringo version of Brozo.
Brozo is 
an important opinion-maker, and the politicians know it. Marta Fox, when she had presidential ambitions of her own, uised an apearance on Brozo’s show to present herself as a legitimate candidate. When the Fox administration wanted to discredit AMLO’s administration in Mexico City, there was no better way than to ambush a hapless City administration hack with videotapes of him stuffing cash in his pockets (campaign contributions, he claimed) — on the morning clown show.
Don’t mess with the clown.
Felipe Calderón has been leading in the polls, but his lead has been slipping. The latest Indemerc-Harris poll (Diario de Yucatán) showed him only 3.07 percentage points ahead of AMLO (Calderón 35.98; AMLO 32.91; Madrazo 23.90) . The pollsters had to take the unusual step of explaining that the 3.07% difference between the two front-runners was still outside the margin of error.
The poll was taken last week. Calderón faced Brozo this week. Brozo, who is normally a spokesman for conservatives (I once wrote that another political clown act, Rush Limbaugh isn’t nearly as funny or artistic), had the temerity to ask the “wrong questions” — specifically whether Calderón benefitted from the mess created by FOBAPROA, which was supposed to reorganize the banks — and, incidentally, enriched career politicans involved in the sale of Mexican banks to foreign owners. Asking the question hurt… the most Calderón can do is claim it was the previous PRI adminstration’s fault. and so, Brozo’s under attack from the PANista blogsphero… one more sign that the election is swinging back to AMLO.
It looks like the attempts to tie AMLO to the Atenco riots are a bust. The Zapatistas (who attack AMLO as too bougeois) and the PRI adminstration in Mexico State are the obvious culprits in everyone’s mind… Dick Morris and Rob Allyn negative campaigns notwithstanding. As it is, Calderón was whining that a court ruling against negative campaigns was a violation of free speech — though he’s still free to make negative ads, but not with public funds.
And… AMLO’s campaign has been on an upswing. He doesn’t need to say a thing about immigration — thanks to the U.S. Congress and Fox’s unsuccessful trip to the U.S. — all he has to do is show up at the border — something only Patricia Mercado (and she doesn’t expect to get more than 2.5% of the national vote) had the cojones to do.
With Manuel Bartlett defecting to AMLO and the PRI in the middle of another purge (Bartlett and pro-PAN PRI leaders have been stripped of their party membership. Bartlett was a former Secretary of Energy, and one time PRI presidentialable), it looks as if Bartlett is right — the PRI is never going to be a major party… and it certainly will never be the party of the left (Bartlett’s problems with his own party have always been with it’s tecnocratic wing).
AND… in my informal “count the message board numbers” poll, AMLO’s comments on Immigration (“Fox put on a show, but nothing happened”) generated 127 comments; Calderón’s “FOBAPROA wasn’t my fault” got 54; and Madrazo’s “Well, maybe the immigration situation isn’t so bad” only garnered 7 responses.
Extreme right-wingers used to write off AMLO as a “clown”. They forgot about Brozo. Clowns can be serious threats.
Drugs… again
A lot of nonsense was put out in the United States when Congress tried to reform the drug laws down here, and President Fox, after denying that there was pressure from Washington, vetoed the reforms. It was never a dead issue, but the U.S. has been focused on fence-building and “illegal immigration”, and just hasn’t been paying attention.
There are some objections, mostly from PAN (some of whose supporters see any liberalization as likely to encourage drug use) and the Church, and some concerns over giving enforcement authority to local police and prosecutors, but overall, the feeling was that prosecuting Mexico’s relatively small number of users is a waste of time and money. What support there is for the growers (protectionist policies in the U.S. and Canada have made marijuana and opium poppies some of the few export crops where Mexico has an edge over its NAFTA partners) and the dealers, is followed by the shame-faced admission that the business is either a necessity (for the farmers) or — while it is devestating to others, it provides some local benefits within communities.
Fox’s veto was always seen as a favor to the world’s largest consumer nation. And, overriding a Presidential veto is very rare here. Fox will be out of office in December, and it was always assumed here that the bill will be introduced in the next Congressional session.
I don’t think it has anything to do with the U.S. debate over immigration, but Mexico doesn’t have much reason to trust, or listen to Washington right now. And — although Felipe Calderón continues to support Fox’s veto — either the PANistas realize his support may be evaporting, or, being “lame ducks” themselves, see no reason not to push through the reforms sooner, rather than later.
There has been discussion in the press (Statement from the President of the Chamber of Deputies Human Rights Commission in support of the reforms, a Financial Times report — “U.S. Users cause problems for countries like Mexico”, and editorials in El Universal and Jornada.Ione Grillo, who also writes from Mexico City — and writes very well — for the Dallas Morning News, covers the story in today’s Herald (Lawmakers work to revive drug decrim)Lawmakers are working to revive their bill decriminalizing the possession of small amounts of marijuana, cocaine and heroin, and hope to override a veto if necessary, so that police can better respond to the waves of drug-related violence that has killed more than 600 people this year.President Vicente Fox called on Congress to drop decriminalization from the drug-law overhaul after intense lobbying from the U.S. State Department and mayors of several U.S. border cities, who called it a disaster that would encourage hordes of U.S. youngsters to cross the border for “drug tourism.”
…But the issue isn´t going away, and with every new battle over drugs in Mexico City, Acapulco or the violent northern border cities, public pressure grows for reforms to laws that many say have handicapped law enforcement agencies here.
“Consumption and addiction are public health issues while drug dealing is a criminal problem,” said Rep. Eliana García, who worked with the federal Attorney General´s Office as well as the health and public safety departments to draft the original bill. “When you mix them you get corruption.”
…
Under existing law, drug dealing is a federal crime, and so local police usually avoid taking on armed drug gangs, instead filling arrest quotas by detaining small-time users, García said. The bill Congress passed last month with the support of all major parties would empower local police as well as federal agents to investigate drug pushers.
The president´s spokesman initially said Fox would sign it. He sent it back a day later after an uproar in the United States and criticism from the Roman Catholic Church over the drug possession details.
While increasing penalties for large amounts of drugs, the bill would decriminalize possession of up to 25 milligrams of heroin, 5 grams of marijuana (about four joints) or 0.5 grams of cocaine – the equivalent of about four lines.
The leading presidential candidates, leftist Andrés Manuel López Obrador and conservative Felipe Calderón, haven´t taken positions on the bill. But García and other members of López Obrador´s Democratic Revolution Party are among the most outspoken supporters, while Roman Catholics, part of Calderón´s base, are generally against it.
“Mexico, I fear, could become even more violent,” said Cardinal Norberto Rivera, the Archbishop of Mexico City.
…
Only 5 percent of Mexicans say they have gotten high once in their life, compared to 40 percent of U.S. citizens. However, these numbers hide the gravity of the growing problem of hard drug use among Mexico´s urban youth, nearly 1 million of whom have used crack, heroin or methamphetamines.
…
Gang violence surrounding drug consumption now mixes with bloodshed unleashed by the big smuggling cartels, adding up to more than 1,500 drug-related killings last year, with violence plaguing border towns like Nuevo Laredo as well as big cities.
…
If I hadn’t given up guilt for Lent (in 1987, never to take it back), I might feel some remorse for the decadent pleasure I take in reading the worst poetry in the Spanish language, La Prensa’s police blotter. Somehow, paying police reporters by the word inspires them to impart a baroque magnificance to even the most ordinary and sordid of urban tragedies. While it is impossible to translate Prensa police blotter items literally and baldly, I think it is possible to capture the essense of this odd literary form — run-on (and on and on) sentences ornamented with a plethoria of relevant and irrelevant details, a refusal to use one word where pleonasm, circumlocution and redundancy might spring to mind and, as in Restoration drama, a positive zest for the artistic possibilities of bad taste, murder and mayhem presented in the most indirect way possible.
I have translated arcana written in bad Spanish before — an accounting flow chart written by junior accountants and programmers who hadn’t a clue what they were doing, purposely confusing commercial leases and academic papers (rates available)… but to capture the essense of a Presna police blotter item has been maddening, frustrating, a difficult and tiring labor, being such a task as one should not normally undertake, but one does, with the proviso that such an impossible and improbable translation will still fall short, not meet and only dimly match, the brilliance of the original.Here then, is a small masterpiece, by Manuel Olmos
Crime of Passion
A man was executed by the discharge of a firearm at the corner of 28th Street and 20th Street, Colonia Proletaria Guadalupe, Delegation Gustavo A. Madero.
The bloody deed occured at about 18:40, when the driver of a Passat, navy blue, with license plate PVN-64-63, issued in the State of Morelos, moving in the direction mentioned above, was passed by a bottle-green Chevy model Chevrolet, with polarized windows, a back one of which was lowered, and a shooter, with gun in hand and saying not a word, fired two times, taking the life of a 36 year old man named Lazaro Miguel Canchola Cosío.One of the projectiles perforated the back door of the vehicle while another — the fatal injury — drilled into the chest of Canchola Cosío, passed through and vanished into the right side of the seat, while the automobile continued on its path until crashing against a gray Nissan Tsuru with license plates 932-MLY which was parked in front of 119 20th Street, where it was being repaired in the mechanic’s shop known as Ribero Service.
During the course of the homicide the green Chevy shifted into reverse and fled at full speed down 28th Street, until it was lost in the streets of Colonia Proletaria Guadalupe.
A few meters from the scene of the crime the wife of the recent murdered victim was mounting a bicitaxi, and present at the terrible scene in which her spouse was killed, the now-widow who is reported to be Claudia Sanabria Cureño, 32 years of age.
This is only a few short meters from the location of a house occupied by 32 year old Angelica Martinez Alvardo, who supposedly maintained a sentimental relation with the recent murder victim, this house being immediately facing the site of Canchola Cosío’s fatal wounding, which gave reason for a confrontation between the two women, both of whom accused the other of masterminding the crime.
In light of the bloody doings, the neighors and witnesses in the vincinity called the rescue squad, which arrived at the scene 10 minutes after the attack in a Red Cross ambulance, economy number 555, commanded by paramedic Alberto Xochihua, who upon viewing the body diagnosed that the victim had already left his existence due to a projectile wound to the chest caused by a firearm. 
Also arriving at the scene were units of the Secretariat of Seguridad Publica (SSP), in car numbers GAM2 0142 and GAM2 0135, who, witnessing the scene between the women, detained both the presumed lover and the wife of Canchola Cosío, for transfer to Public Ministry GAM2’s facilities, where a determination will be made as to who is responsible for what seems a crime of passion.
Once in control of the situation between the women, the police units called for backup from the Public Ministry and the Judicial Police stationed in the Capital, the same arriving to begin preliminary investigations and to order the body removed, and the transfer the two persons involved, as well as sending for the mechanics who removed the automobile in which lay the dead Canchola Cosío.
Investigations made at this time indicate that Lazaro Miguel Canchola Cosío had been sent to the South Preventative Prison on 5 April 1997 for grand larceny, reason enough to open a second line of investigation, looking into revenge related to organized crime.
The Invasion of the Spin Doctors
Did anyone else notice that the “some” in Ginger Thompson’s article in today’s New York Times (Some in Mexico See Border Wall as Opportunity) who speak well of “THE WALL” were all Fox administration officials, former officals or regular apologists for the administration?
Ms. Thompson is an excellent reporter, but I’m wondering if she wasn’t fed this story by the spin doctors, something new in Mexican politics, according to this article (“Presidential race takes on U.S. flavor”) in today’s Mexico Herald.
Conservative Felipe Calderón opened his campaign for president with slogans focusing on honesty (“Clean Hands”) and patriotism (“Passion for Mexico”), but the nice-guy image wasn’t working.
So the Harvard-educated lawyer embraced a U.S. style of political attacks against his top rival. He even spoke — informally, his campaign insists — with U.S. consultants such as Bill Clinton adviser Dick Morris and Dallas’ Rob Allyn, a Republican strategist. Whether the consultants had anything to do with the change in tactics, no one will say, given Mexico’s extreme sensitivity to any appearance of outside influence in elections.
But some critics are blaming the gringos for Mexico’s plunge into the mud. …
“Negative ads are a new phenomenon in Mexican democracy, and Felipe Calderón has been, so far in this election, the one that has resorted” to using them the most, said Armand Peschard-Sverdrup, director of the Mexico Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington research organization. “There are fingerprints of U.S. political electoral strategists all over it because it’s not something that has traditionally been used in Mexican elections.”
Calderón began his turnaround with a TV ad whose impact some analysts compared to the “swift boat” commercials that bedeviled U.S. presidential nominee John Kerry in 2004.
It equated Andrés Manuel López Obrador, then the front-runner, with leftist Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez in terms of “intolerance” and zeroed in on López Obrador repeating the phrase, “Shut up, Mr. President. … Shut up, you country hen.” He was referring to President Vicente Fox. Ads that followed called López Obrador, a former Mexico City mayor, “a danger to Mexico.”´ Whether Morris or Allyn was involved with the decision to go negative is unclear, but critics agree the inspiration is American.
…
“Calderón’s negative campaign has all the writing of Morris, who’s an expert on destroying the vote of hope by raising the vote of fear,” said pollster Daniel Lund, … who has worked for López Obrador. “U.S. political consultants at their best produce mischief. They may know how to manipulate media, but do they contribute to the good governance of a country, to the democratic maturity of a nation? I would argue no.”
…
According to Sourcewatch (Center for Media) and a 6 April 2000 article in the Dallas Observer, Rob Allyn was a key player in the George W. Bush campaign to discredit his rival for the 2000 Republican presidential nomination Senator John McCain. Millionaire Bush supporter Sam Wyly funded Republicans for Clean Air to attack McCain in key states during the 2000 primary campaign. Rob Allyn was paid $46,000 to help create the ads. Sourcewatch also claims ties to the “Swiftboat” campaign used in the 2004 Presidential election to discredit Democratic candidate John Kerry.
Dick Morris (Sourcewatch) is “a former apolitical/amoral pollster turned Republican operative”. There is much more on Morris’ U.S. campaign spinning at Media Matters.
Al Giordano in Narco News, goes further. I only claim these two are scumbags, but I don’t go in for the salacious details of their personal lives and I won’t even attempt to tie the two foreign spin doctors to the recent Atenco riots, which led to accusations in the Mexican courts of rape and sexual assault against the police. Still, he makes a good point:
Dick Morris and Rob Allyn….advise President Vicente Fox and his favored presidential candidate, Felipe Calderón, of Fox’s National Action Party (PAN, in its Spanish initials) on how to manipulate the mass media and in the art of “crisis management.”…
Allyn — a Republican Party consultant from Texas who has advised both George W. Bush and his father George Herbert Walker Bush, as well as a Texan energy billionaire with obvious interest in seeing Mexico’s electricity and oil privatized — is joined in Mexico today by U.S. political consultant Dick Morris.
Morris was the top political advisor to U.S. President Bill Clinton until August of 1996, when Morris … had to leave the Clinton campaign in disgrace.
Morris recently penned a column in the New York Post in which he admitted, “I have worked as a consultant for Fox and PAN.”
… Article 33 of the Mexican Constitution prohibits participation by foreigners in Mexican electoral campaigns. It says:
“Foreigners may not involve themselves in any way in the political affairs of the country.”
We report… you decide.
Raíces
This 1943 Frieda Kahlo self-portrait in oil (did she ever do anything BUT self-portraits?) , Raíces set a new record for Mexican art prices at a Sotheby’s auction last night: 5.6 million dollars.
I am not a Kalo-phile. My preference is for artists whose work stands independently from their lives. What do you need to know about the O’s ( O’Higgins, O’Gorman, Orozco) to enjoy their art. What can we believe — besides his art — about serial liar, Diego Rivera. And does it even matter?
Kahlo was self-indulgent and self-referential: if you don’t buy into her biography (or, rather — her version of her psychobiography) the art is relatively meaningless. I always thought the art should be independent of the artist, and should stand alone without the myth — which may be what makes this portrait so unusual — Kahlo was healthy and happy at the time.
mexfiles.net 
