¡Qué alguien me explique! Why did AMLO senators vote against the tobacco tax?

Yeidckol Polevnsky, Rosalinda López, Josefina Cota Cota and Francisco Castellón Fonseca are four of the PRD senators who on numerous occasions have professed their loyalty to Andrés Manuel López Obrador, and among a group of PRD and PT senators who most recently declared they would back AMLO as a presidential candidate.

Two days ago, however, when the Senate ratified the proposed rise in 7 pesos - a mere 50 U.S. cents - increase in tobacco taxes per cigarette pack, the four legislators voted against it - the only ones from the PRD to do so.  In addition, three Convergencia senators, a party that also has declared its ultraloyalty to AMLO, did the same - Ericel Gómez Nucamendi, Francisco García Lizardi and Eugenio Govea Arcos.
From the Partido del Trabajo, ostensibly diehard andresmanuelistas, its senate coordinator Ricardo Monreal abstained from voting, while his PT colleague Javier Obregón Espinoza voted in favor.

Why? Why on earth would these ostensibly "radical" politicians vote against raising the tobacco tax?
¡Qué alguien me explique!

a) Is it that AMLO is particularly pro-smoking?
b) Can it be that these "radical" senators are really corrupt opportunists, bought and paid for by the tobacco industry?
c) ????

You make your pick.

PT deputy Fernández Noroña at it again: Calderón a "drunkard."

Professional rabble rouser Gerardo Fernández Noroña, who was spokesperson for the PRD, loudly resigned from the party, and then became a national deputy for the Workers Party (Partido del Trabajo, PT), produced yet another memorable moment in San Lázaro, in relation with the appearance of the (admittedly inept) Secretary of Communication and Transportation, Juan Francisco Molinar Horcasitas in Congress. Noroña dixit:

"In this spurious cabinet there are three secretaries that are even worse than Calderón. They are Molinar Horcasitas, Javier Lozano and Genaro García Luna, and are of a cynicism, a shameless, a bad abominable chore, you should be in prison, and they will be, because in life all is temporary... and moreover they need to be like this, they need to be like this in order to take a job from a drunkard like Calderón."

OK, so Noroña, who rejects the legitimacy of Calderón at any and all occasion, can be quite entertaining in his antics. Yet how much good does these insults do to make Mexico a better place - and to make the Chamber of Deputies a more respected institution?

Three most sensible statements from Marcelo Ebrard in Madrid

From Marcelo Ebrard, Mexico City chief of government, during his visit to commemorate the Spanish exiles who fled to Mexico during and after the Spanish Civil War, when Lázaro Cárdenas opened the doors for them:

1. On AMLO:

"I have a good relationship with him, with different accents and different tactics and strategies. But the deal is that the Left must only have one candidate, because anything else would be madness."

2. On how to choose the Left's candidate:

"We will determine the candidate with a simple method, which is that in the second half of 2011, through polls, decide who has the ability to better represent the Left in order to what the majority of the electorate thinks. If we do an internal consultation, between party members who would vote this day, we will be making a strategic mistake."

3. And finally, on the Spanish exiliados:

"The exiles didn't arrive in Mexico in order to demand; they arrived in order to give and share what they had: labor, knowledge, talent, creativity, teaching, and solidarity."

Amen to all three.

Feigned anger as Alonso Lujambio marks territory as presidential candidate.

Federal Secretary of Education Alonso Lujambio, in an attack on both Marcelo Ebrard and Enrique Peña Nieto, made his biggest step yet toward presenting himself as a contender for the 2012 presidency. In Madrid, Spain, in what would have been the first debate  between the three "pre-candidates," Lujambio criticized both his possible future opponents for failing to show up this would-be coming-out party, a forum arranged by Fundación Botín, bankrolled by Banco Santander, to engage in a first open debate with the education secretary. Neither Ebrard nor Peña Nieto attended the forum. 


Lujambio huffed and puffed at this perceived affront: Against Peña Nieto, he noted:

"It alarms me that señor Peña Nieto has become an example of unilateral communication. From the monologue of the [political television/internet] ad, or that of paid news stories. It alarms me that he will only appear publicly in controlled environments, encapsulated for smiles and photos."

Yet his anger was more than a tad feigned: It was revealed that Peña Nieto had announced days ago he would not attend; as for Ebrard, when his team learned about the participation of former president Carlos Salinas, a figure loathed by the left, in the said forum, Ebrard backed straight out of it. 

What the incident did serve to do, however, was to present Alonso Lujambio as a candidate for the nomination to be PAN's presidential candidate - if any doubt remained, that is. 

PAN leadership approves alliance in Mexico State. Of note: Talks with PT and Convergencia

With no opposing votes and merely one abstention, the national executive committee of the Partido Acción Nacional (PAN) voted in favor of "exploring" an alliance with the Partido de la Revolución Democrática (PRD) in the state of Mexico.


While this outcome was a foregone decision, it is of note that PAN national president César Neva revealed that PAN is also having talks with the Partido del Trabajo (PT) and Convergencia, the two smaller parties aligned with AMLO and who like him publicly and loudly reject any electoral alliance with PAN in Mexico State. It indicates that should a PAN-PRD common candidate materialize, significant sections of both parties may break with AMLO's intransigent line to support the candidate rather than any quixotic run by AMLO's "own" left-wing candidate.

From Ebrard: NO means NO for alliance with PAN for presidency. Will AMLO take note?

It didn't seem to matter how many times national PRD leader Jésus Ortega declared that PRD will not seek a common presidential candidate for 2012: AMLO and his "radical" supporters keep on existing that this is really the ulterior motive of the PAN-PRD talks to launch a common candidate in 2011 in Mexico State. 


Yet now Marcelo Ebrard, in Spain for events relating to the Spanish Civil War, yesterday again made it very clear that an alliance with PAN for the presidency would not be "logical" or "desirable": The parties are far too different; the electoral alliances at the state levels follow a very different logic. 


To repeat: There will NOT be an alliance with PAN at the national level for 2012. There won't. The PRD will not have a common candidate with PAN for 2012. They won't. PAN.And.PRD.Will.Not.Ally.In.2012. 


Will AMLO finally take notice and stop accusing the PRD of planning this? 

Mexico Supreme Court squashes Ulises Ruis' attempt to evade auditing

While Ulises Ruiz is still enjoys impunity as governor of Oaxaca (given the ridiculously long transition period in this and other states), a ruling by Mexican Supreme Court suggests that he might be in trouble soon after leaving office.


In July, the state congress steamrolled through, among other "covering-the-back-of-an-outgoing-governor legislation," a change to state law that in essence declared that major aspects of Ruiz' government could not be audited. The Supreme Court finally threw out the ruling yesterday, given that the PRI-dominated legislature broke a series of legal procedures in the process, and declared it unconstitutional.

Ulises Ruiz is one step closer to finally answering for the mismanagement during his 2004-2010 disastrous government.