The Economist leader gets it all right

From this week's The Economist:

"Mexico would be even better served if the United States renewed a ban on the sale of assault weapons that lapsed in 2004. Sadly, this looks unlikely to happen. Yet since 2006 alone, Mexican authorities have seized 55,000 of these weapons of war. That is enough to equip many NATO armies—and most were bought legally in American gunshops...

"So permissive when it comes to lethal weapons, the United States remains steadfast in its commitment to the prohibition of drugs, in the face of all the evidence that this policy fails to curb their consumption while creating vast profits for organised crime. It is welcome that California is now debating before a referendum on November 2nd, whether to legalise marijuana. This newspaper would vote for the proposition.."

And to top it all:

"If California votes in favour of legalisation, Mexico would be wise to follow suit..." 

Read it here, while it is still freely available.  

Is it Godoy or not on the tape?

The tape recording allegedly of PRD Federal Deputy Julio César Godoy Toscano and Servando Gómez "La Tuta" of the criminal drug gang La Familia Michoacana is very well worth listening to, which can be done here. If it is accurate, it is certainly damning, as it portrays a very cozy relationship between the Michoacano and the criminal capo. Is it real?

Godoy responded in a press communique, which include the following statements:
(it can be found in PRD's homepage)

- The recording was leaked by the PGR (attorney general's office) to the press, an illegal act.
- The recording was rejected as evidence by Michoacán and Tamaulipas and by Zacatecas magistrates
- PGR wants to win in public opinion what it has not been able to win in tribunal.
-The Federal government is trying to achieve a lynching of Godoy in public opinion.

All of the above seems true to me: It is a media lynching, as PGR has not achieved arresting Godoy yet by legal means, and the federal government is certainly trying to have public opinion judge him, likely in part also as a revenge or expression of frustration as their incompetent investigation has so far rendered little fruit.

Yet at the same time: Why didn't Godoy simply write, "the person in the recording is not me"?
Is it because it is really him?

AMLO backers create Bloque de Izquierda Unitaria in the Senate

PRD and the PT announced the formation of new cross-party group in the Mexican Senate whose main mission is to promote the presidential candidacy of Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
The group include 12 out of PRD's 25 senators, though most of the names are hardly a surprise, but are rather those senators that AMLO managed to install as his candidates in 2006:
*Julio César Aguirre Méndez, Josefina Cota, José Luis Máximo García Zalvidea, Jesús Garibay García,  Arturo Herviz Reyes, Salomón Jara, Rosalinda López, Arturo Núñez, Yeidckol Polevnsky Gurwitz, María Roj, and lfonso Sánchez Anaya and Tomás Torres.

Two additional senators, Carlos Sotelo and Pablo Gómez, however, have never been close to AMLO; indeed, the latter did all he could to employ dirty tricks to prevent AMLO for running for the Mexico City government back in 2000, claiming he didn't fulfill the residency requirement. Gómez gained further noteriority in 2003 when the clumsy, stubborn, and utterly idiotic manner in which he negotiated with other parties in Congress basically led to the PRD having no impact on choosing the IFE councilors elected that year. I suspect his joining the AMLO camp has to do with  a promise that he will be a new Senate coordinator for the PRD's group. Carlos Sotelo was a big name in Nueva Izquierda, the majority faction to which national party president Jesús Ortega won, and his break with NI a while back was undoubtedly a blow to Ortega. Should he join with the pejistas to remove current coordinator Carlos Navarrete, of Nueva Izquierda,  Gómez is likely to lead the group (though  Tomás Torres has sought to do so as well).

It would be a major strike for AMLO if this were to happen.

Cecilia Romero and the Dunning effect

David Dunning, a professor of psychology at Cornell University, and Justin Kruger, of New York University, are the brains behind the Kruger-Dunning Effect, which in all essence spells that most incompetent people are simply not even aware of how drastically incompetent they are, and consequently the cards are stacked against their learning from their mistakes. Unfortunately, society as a whole tend to pay their price for this illusory superiority.

Currently, I can think of no better example than Cecilia Romero, formerly of the  Instituto Nacional de Migración (INM). Following the Tamaulipas massacre of 72 migrants, she was finally forced out from the national migration institute, yet she almost literally had to be thrown out as she refused to leave. It was hardly the first time her job had been on line; she has been an utterly inefficient and incompetent leader, who only was able to cling on to her position thanks to her friendship with Señor Presidente, Felipe Calderón. 

Yet rather than quietly disappear and seek to leave her shameful tenure at the INM behind her, Romero is not only denying any responsibility for not doing enough to prevent the murder of these and countless other migrants, as well as an amazing rise in corruption within the INM, but is amazingly moving on with her previously declared intention to become the next party president of the PAN, the fourth declared candidate for the party presidency, yet one with a snowball's chance in hell to be elected by the PAN council. 

Yes, to paraphrase, Kruger-Dunning, some people are simply too dumb to realize how stupid they are.
Another case in point: Emilio "Etilio" González.