As usually in Mexico I stock up on recent interesting books on current politics. So far I've aquired the most recent book by Carmen Aristegui on the child-raping fascist Marcial Maciel - great for bedtime stories - Soledad Loaza's recent collection of articles on the PAN, and Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas' recent memoirs. Yet speaking of memoirs, one book I will shy away from for many reasons is Carlos Salinas' recent desperate 959-page attempt to reinvent himself and defend his presidency. Yet my decision was not made merely to save a few pesos, or for ideological reasons: The book appears an absolute piece of junk, combining petty attacks on many of Mexico's intellectuals with an array of stuff that is simply made up.
A few cases in point:
- Salinas attacks the presidency of Fox and his first foreign minister, Jorge Castañeda for having voted in favor of the Iraq War! Where on earth does he get this from? First, as Castañeda points out, Mexico never voted - there was never a vote in UN, to recall, despite or in spite of Colin Powell's pathetic "presentation" of WMDs - yet more importantly, Fox was the entire time against Bush's war on Iraq.
- He is accusing Castañeda of having presented the thesis of Mexico as a "failed state" - though Castañeda has consistently argued against this view.
Now I admit I am not the world's greatest admirer of Jorge Castañeda, who, despite of many notable insights, in addition to being a bit of a pompous windbag has also opined far too often on topics of which he has very little knowledge. Yet compared with Salinas, he is an intellectual giant.
If Salinas can't even get such basic facts straights, or is as stupid as to knowingly and blatantly distorting them in this manner, his apologia is hardly worth anyone's time, and your 300 pesos should rather be spent elsewhere.
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