Duncan Wood of Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) analyses the PRD's potential 2012 presidential candidates, and get much right, though I take somewhat issue with his presentation of the two main camps within the PRD as the "center" vs. "more radical ideological" faction: I maintain that the issue is not so much about ideology, certainly not in left-right terms, as Ortega et al in many ways are more left than AMLO, but one of conception of the PRD - movement vs. party,the role of leadership, discourse, methods, tactics, strategies - but not chiefly about ideology.
Regardless: What I think is beyond interpretation is Wood's statement that "AMLO has said that he will not run for the presidency in 2012, and instead will throw his support behind Ebrard."
This is just plain wrong. To be frank, you must have truly been living under a rock not to have heard AMLO's countless pronunciations that he is indeed going for 2012; the first "official" declaration was his much-publicized July 2010 rally in the Zocalo, and he has repeated it ever since.
Oh my. That's quite a mistake.
ReplyDeleteRE PRD's internal issues, couldn't agree more. AMLO's problems aren't primarily his program and never have been, but rather his destructive approach to politics.
They really need to clean house over there.
ReplyDelete"Over there" being CSIS or the PRD. If you mean the first, I agree... It describes its own purpose as "finding ways for America to sustain its prominence and prosperity as a force for good in the world." With trustees like Henry Kissinger, it is going to see the rest of the world (and Latin America in particular) though the lens of the neo-liberal lens in which "good" and American "prominence and prosperity" are synonyms.
ReplyDeleteAs Agua hints, CSIS is probably incapable of understanding a Latin American political system except in U.S. terms.
Thanks to Aguachile for the comments on my post. In fact, thanks to an earlier commentary ( on the Guerrero election) I was able to correct an error that had crept in. On the AMLO question, he has said he will support Ebrard but everyone knows that he will take a run at the presidency. Unity on the left seems as distant as ever....
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