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.
Sunday, May 15, 2011
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.
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.
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:
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."
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Just what Oaxaca needs: Yet another homophobic archbishop
José Luis Chávez Botello, archbishop of Oaxaca, was kind enough to provide us with his profound insights into the issue of homosexuality in his Sunday homily: "If a man and a woman are clean and honest, they would never become gay and lesbian."
Sunday, May 8, 2011
EZLN reappear in public after five years of silence
The Zapatistas of Chiapas, Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional (EZLN), made the first public appearance outside their home community in almost five years. According to one estimate, 15,000 supporters gathered Saturday in San Cristóba to protest the Calderón governments offensive against the drug cartels.
The meeting was part of a general "march for peace" held in a range of cities across Mexico, a mobilization that for the EZLN represent its first rally since the confusing and unproductive "Other Campaign" of Marcos and the EZLN in 2006, when the essential message from the Zapatistas was a "plague on all your houses," where Marcos called on citizens not to vote, either for the PRD or any other party, a decision that may have cost the left its victory in 2006, in favor of the conservative PAN.
Yet then as now it remains unclear what the EZLN's agenda is, particularly beyond Chiapas state.
The meeting was part of a general "march for peace" held in a range of cities across Mexico, a mobilization that for the EZLN represent its first rally since the confusing and unproductive "Other Campaign" of Marcos and the EZLN in 2006, when the essential message from the Zapatistas was a "plague on all your houses," where Marcos called on citizens not to vote, either for the PRD or any other party, a decision that may have cost the left its victory in 2006, in favor of the conservative PAN.
Yet then as now it remains unclear what the EZLN's agenda is, particularly beyond Chiapas state.
Saturday, May 7, 2011
AMLO accepts Ebrard's proposal on candidate debates and time frames
Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) accepted the proposal by Marcelo Ebrard to hold two debates in October, and then decide in Novemeber who should be the left's candidate in 2012. AMLO also reiterated that should Ebrard come out on top, he will back him.
One clear issue remains to be settled: While Ebrard wants a national poll to be held to determine who has the most support among the electorate, AMLO wants a primary open not only to PRD but to his Movimiento de Regeneración Nacional, or Morena movement. Herein, in this "detail," the devil lies.
One clear issue remains to be settled: While Ebrard wants a national poll to be held to determine who has the most support among the electorate, AMLO wants a primary open not only to PRD but to his Movimiento de Regeneración Nacional, or Morena movement. Herein, in this "detail," the devil lies.
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