Vázquez Mota, fit to govern?

I have been thoroughly disappointed with virtually every aspect of Vázquez Mota's campaign so far. Granted she has not much of a record to show to - her highest positions were relatively brief posts as secretary of social development and secretary of education, and despite having some credibility from having fought very publicly with SNTE teacher union despot Elba Esther Gordillo, has really very little to show for in her career. Can anyone point, for instance, to any relevant legislation pushed and passed when she was head of PAN's parliamentary group?


But I was at least expecting to see some future potential on the campaign trail, through her speeches, encounters, responses to criticism, and so forth.


Instead, she has managed to draw the ire of students and the university world, and revelations from here thesis work suggest an extreme anti-popular but also anti-intellectual bias, appearing closer to a Santorum and Palin than anyone else.
- It all began when she, in front of audience at the college ITAM giggled that she was "not perfect, because I studied at La Ibero," or the Universidad Iberoamericana.


Not likely to endear her to Ibero alumni. But then, her Ibero thesis has surfaced, where she in a classist rant refers to UNAM, Mexico's premier public university, as a "monster" - "it slowly converted into a political institution, a monster that harbor half a million students who unfortunately have no interest in their professional preparation."


And the kicker? Beyond the blatant generalization and depreciation of what is the best university in Mexico and its student mass, many who indeed come from lower class families and are first-generation students, the thesis in which she rants against UNAM was begun in 1983 and finished in 1998(!). Yes, unlike all those pesky students at UNAM who don't even study, Vázquez Mota only took fifteen years to finish her thesis masterpiece. 


Now, given the way education is structured in Mexico, it often happens that students finish their coursework but at a later point finish their thesis, though 15 years is quite a stretch - and particularly for someone who depreciate students at other universities for not being dedicated to studying.


But again the worst is yet to come in the fall out: She answered then in the most pathetic way possible: She is the victim - yes, a victim - of a "dirty war," where here commentaries are taken "out of context" with the purpose to "defame" her. Since when is holding someone accountable to earlier statements a "dirty war"?


Vázquez Mota then went to ITAM, the best private college in Mexico, and as it draws primarily from the upper layers of Mexican society one might have expected a friendly audience. To their credit, the students questioned seriously her record. The best comment yet from one of the students:

Many of the things you are saying are not true, because as Secretary of Public Education, of Social Development, twice a member of parliament, you did not pursue any of the reforms you are now talking about, why should we now believe that you are going to do so?

Why indeed should we?