Sunday, May 15, 2011

Cuba pushes for more economic ties with Mexico. Will Calderón visit?

During the 12th interparliamentary meeting between Cuban and Mexican legislators, held this weekend in Mérida, Yucatán, Ricardo Alarcón, head of the Cuban parliament, called for more extensive trade ties between Cuba and Mexico, which are remarkably weak: Reportedly totaling only around 250 million dollars yearly.
This is truly, truly low, given the longtime "special relationship" between the two countries. According to the CIA Factbook, Mexico is not even on the list of major import-export partners - behind, notably, even the U.S!

While historically the ties between Cuba and Mexico were strong, relations drastically cooled during the Fox years, thanks both to President Vicente Fox and his foreign minister Jorge Castañeda.

Alarcón, however, expressed hope that Calderón will visit the island next year - a previously scheduled visit was earlier cancelled. Will Calderón do so, or will he rather leave office without, despite having "normalized" relations a few years back?

(and he would be one of the very first presidents not to have done so -even Fox visited Cuba)

Ebrard and AMLO agree: A national poll will decide the left's 2012 candidacy

Marcelo Ebrard notably said that he and  Andrés Manuel López Obrador has reached an agreement on how the   left's 2012 candidacy for president will be decided: Through a national poll.

This is quite important news: It was earlier well known that AMLO insisted on a party primary/ies, while Ebrard preferred a national poll. Now, AMLO has seemingly come around to Ebrard's position.

Mexico's Jewish community

In connection with the celebration of Israel's declaration of Independence, of May 14 1948, El Universal has an interesting story on Mexico's Jewish community, which today numbers less than 40,000, and is mostly located in the well-heeled Lomas the Chapultepec are of Mexico City, and in Tecamachalco, in Puebla state.

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Governor Rafael Moreno Valle's pledge to investigate "anomalies" ring hollow

One hundred days: Governor of Puebla, Rafael Moreno Valle, who notably ended PRI's 80-plus-years monopoly on holding the state government, said that as the a 90-day(!) process of transferring the government has just come to an end, a "more profound process" of investigating the previous government of  Mario Marín may now commence.

I certainly hope so. Moreno Valle said evidence has already been gathered of many "anomalies" during the disastrous misrule of the scoundrel Mario Marín's government, and he reiterated his campaign pledge to castigate those who are found to have abused power. Mario Marín is the obvious candidate here, and if Moreno Valle is truly serious, he should take on Marín directly.

Yet one hundred days have already passed, which makes this reiteration sound hollow. I hope I am wrong here.

Marcelo Ebrard, ever more active on the unofficial campaign trail

Mexico City Mayor Marcelo Ebrard has made no secret that the is going for the nomination of Mexico's left parties for 2012, and is now demonstrating it through what is essentially unofficial campaigning in Mexico's interior.

While AMLO is years ahead in terms of promoting his candidacy through barnstorming tours across the country, Ebrard is showing increased protagonism: This weekend he went to Oaxaca, and he will then be off to the states of Nayarit and Mexico State to promote the left's gubernatorial candidates there, respectively Guadalupe Acosta Naranjo and Alejandro Encinas.

Enrique Peña Nieto, if elected president, will not make a pact with the drug gangs

Speaking in the United States Capital, Governor Enrique Peña Nieto said he will not make any pact with the drug gangs should he elected president.

More notable still than this rather obvious declaration was his claim that there is a "black campaign" orchestrated against the PRI in the United States and elsewhere in the exterior, which appears both a general response to very valid critiques of the PRI governments in the 1980s and 1990s, where organized crime was essentially left alone, as well as to Felipe Calderón's warnings against the return of the PRI to the Mexican presidency.

Even former President Carlos Salinas, in a presentation of his book in Spain, felt compelled to declare that his government did fight organized crime.

PRI, now playing the victim.

AMLO, if elected president, will not make a pact with the drug gangs

Andrés Manuel López Obrador, in a mass meeting of 4,000 supporters held in downtown Aguascalientes, said explicitly that he would not make a pact with the drug gangs should he be elected president.

Yet again he offered very little in terms of presenting an actual alternative to Calderón's current strategy:
"I will not make truce with the drug traffickers, we must find other strategies, to address the causes, to create employment, to provide for the young. Calderón stupidly hit the nest with a club without knowing what he was going to find."