Year: 2005

Both the PAN and the PRD are like the PRI

I guess that is about the worst insult you can hurl at a political party in Mexico, and those are the headlines in La Jorndad today. First, Tatiana Clouthier, a Diputado (that’s a Representative) for the PAN has left the party, claiming that the Fox administration prefers to form alliances and work with the PRI instead of his own party, the PAN. Dip. Clouthier is the daughter of one of the PRI’s founders, Manuel Clothier. According to Diputada Clouthier’s letter of renunciation, which is cited in this article,

“Entré a las filas del PAN movida por un ideal y principios que llamaban, había proyecto: democratizar a México, hacer ciudadanía y llegar al poder para servir. El bien común estaba por encima de los intereses particulares de personas y de grupos. Hoy, creo que se está buscando más el poder por el poder, y quienes encabezan al partido son una muestra clara de ello: el fin justifica los medios.

“El PAN se sacó al priísta que, ‘dicen’, todos llevamos dentro, y éste afloró en la práctica: compra de voluntades, regalar o intercambiar puestos, amenazar… Nos alejamos de lo que nos diferencia de otros partidos: el poder socializado en aras de servir. Nos estamos convirtiendo, sin mucho esfuerzo, en una mala copia del PRI.”

“Ya no se actúa por convicción”.

At her press conference, she had the following exchange with reporters, as it is reported in La Jornada,

-¿Se sumará a otro partido que defienda los principios de los que usted habla?

-Sigo pensando, a pesar de la renuncia, que el PAN sigue siendo la opción menos mala, y lo recalco: busco una nueva opción por otros caminos, los caminos ciudadanos.

-¿Alguna opción específica?

-No hay partidos ahorita. Y le diría que el partido que se está creando está peor. Con Elba Esther Gordillo, no voy.

-¿Está decepcionada también del proceso donde se eligió a Manuel Espino? Sus compañeros afirman que esa dirigencia se decidió en Los Pinos, en una reunión con Vicente Fox.

-No soy delegada, no soy consejera. No voto; habría que preguntar a nuestros compañeros que lo operaron cómo se dieron estas cosas; preguntar a los que vieron qué pasó. Comparto con usted, de alguna manera: no fue en Los Pinos, fue en un lugar peor.

-¿De qué peor lugar habla?

-Hay que preguntarle a Durazo.

”Espino no me paga”

Señaló que no se incorporará a otra fracción parlamentaria en el Congreso, porque ”no me salí para irme a un basurero”.

-¿Habló de su renuncia con Manuel Espino?

-Espino no me paga, no es mi marido y no duerme conmigo.

”Parte de no tomar esta decisión la semana pasada tenía que ver con algunas consideraciones para no provocar ruptura familiar. Las paces están hechas, el respeto está puesto y cada quien ha decidido el camino que debe seguir.”

She’s not joining up with Gordillo (the S.G. of the PRI and leader of the new FEDESSP) or any other party, but is going to look for other options? A new party? A party-less political career? Hmmmm….

In a related story, leaders of the PAN respond to Clouthier’s departure and what it means for the party. Apparently, the PAN has also taken a less hard line on the desafuero votes in the legislature. The party has issued new guidelines, encouraging members to vote on the basis of the case’s merit and not political considerations. This article suggests the softened position is in part a response to Clothier’s departure.

In related PAN news, the First Lady, Marta Sahagun, formally joined the Policy Commission of the Party’s leadership. You can read about various appointments, including hers in this article.

The second PRI insult comes from Enrique Jackson, the PRI’s leader in the Senate. According to another article in La Jornada, the PRD is a clone of the PRI, in part because many of the PRD leaders are ex-PRIistas. The comment was made during a speech at a local university where he was trying to urge unity in the PRI, which seems to be coming apart at the seams.

The PRD has other problems, in addition to be called PRI-like. Their internal membership roles are in disarray, which may cause problems for upcoming internal elections.

In completely unrelated social security news, the national social security institute workers’ union (SNTSS) has received a setback in their legal battle to stop the implementation of reforms to the social security law that would restrict their pension and retirement benefits. The union claims that benefits are determined by their labor contract, not the law, and they plan to use a national strike to defend their benefits if necessary.

Pensions for old-timers, source of political debate

That’s what the headlines should read today in Mexico. Yesterday, La Jornada reported that President Fox said that universal (i.e., they go to everyone) cash pensions for old people are “terribly unfair.” That might be the leftist paper stretching it a bit. Fox has pledged not to discuss AMLO’s desafuero, and instead is going to focus on the Mayor’s public policies. (See this post for a brief discussoin of the desafuero.) So this weekend, the President criticized the Mayor’s program that gives about $50 a month to elderly citizens, regardless of work status or income. According to the report of Fox’s radio adress in La Jornada, Fox said:

“A mí me parece terriblemente injusto que a otros, simple y sencillamente por estar como adultos mayores, se les cubra con el dinero precisamente de quienes trabajan”….

Para el jefe del Ejecutivo lo que se debe promover, cuando se habla de pensiones y jubilaciones, es que “durante su vida productiva las personas vayan haciendo un poquito de ahorro, porque de otra manera se requeriría una cifra escalofriante de recursos”.

In response, AMLO has said that what is unjust is a huge banking system bailout program, and that his pension plan should be extended to all of Mexico. According to an article in today’s La Jornada:

Durante su conferencia de prensa matutina, poco antes de encabezar en la Plaza de la Constitución la entrega de pensión alimentaria a 2 mil 774 nuevos beneficiarios, se pronunció porque este derecho se extienda a todo el país. Durante su discurso en la plancha del Zócalo señaló que “hasta el Banco Mundial recomienda a otros gobiernos aplicar el programa de pensión universal ciudadana que se desarrolla en el Distrito Federal . Y ellos (el gobierno federal) están diciendo que es injusto”.

Señaló que para sostener este programa a escala nacional se requerirían 20 mil millones de pesos al año, que si bien no es una suma fácil de conseguir, “yo sostengo que si hay un plan de austeridad en el gobierno federal cada año se pueden ahorrar cien mil millones de pesos y de ahí saldría para garantizar el derecho a la pensión alimenticia y alcanzaría para otras cosas, como becas para personas con discapacidad y la construcción de más viviendas, escuelas y hospitales”.

AMLO seems to be claiming that his universal pension plan in the DF is so well conceived that even the World Bank is recommending it to other governments. I’ll believe that when I see it.

In direct response to Fox’s comments, AMLO said:

“Ayer escuchaba yo que decían que era injusto el programa de adultos mayores, lo que me pareció un despropósito. Yo nada más digo aquí, en la plaza, que injusto es haber aumentado el gasto corriente del gobierno federal en tres años de 700 mil millones de pesos a un billón. Eso sí es injusto: hacer crecer el aparato burocrático, los privilegios para los de arriba.”

This is just one episode in the on-going political struggle between the President and the Mayor.

More drama in the Mexican labor movement

I can’t recall if I’ve written about this before. Over the last year and a half, a significant number of the unions associated with the FSTSE (the official federation of unions of government employees) have left the FSTSE. They applied for formal recognition as a new Federation of unions of government workers, and were approved recently by the Secretary of Labor, who registers unions. That confused me, because according to the 1938 law that regulates government employees, all government employee unions had to belong to one federation. This was a tool of control. Well, that confusion was cleared up last week sometime, when I read that the case had been decided by the Mexican Supreme Court. The SC decided that the portion of the law that limited government employees to only one national Federation was an unconstitutional restriction on the right to organize. So the FEDESSP is now legal, and claims to represent 8 out of 10 government employees. That’s a mass exodus from the FSTSE.

Of course, the political backstory behind the creation of the FEDESSP is more complicated. Officially, they organized to be the ‘democratic’ labor movement of government employees and to protest the way the FSTSE has not been militant enough in favor of workers’ interests. (This last part is pretty true, considering the complacency of all ‘official’, i.e., affiliated with the PRI, labor unions). The backstory takes one of two forms. That the leader of one of the teachers unions Gordillo started the FEDESSP because of her personal differences with the leader of the FSTSE, Joel Ayala (who incidently, looking at my research notes from 3 years ago, has a not-so-nice staff and is difficult to get an interview with). The other version claims that Gordillo created the FEDESSP as a personal political vehicle. She is the PRI’s Secretary General, and will become the President of the party when the current President (Madrazo) steps down to run for President of the country. (See a related article calling for him to step down.) It could be that both versions are true.

In any event, the article that prompted this post claims that the FEDESSP is now going to sue the FSTSE in court to take control of the FSTSE infrastructure (buildings, land, equipment, etc.). Since the FEDESSP is now claiming to represent 8 of 10 workers, they want the union facilities that correspond to those unions contributions. The article says that unions have already begun holding back their dues from the FSTSE.

Cardenas claims he’s the only hope for the left.

That’s the headline in an article from La Jornada based on a recent interview with Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas Solórzano.

For those that don’t know, Cardenas was a PRIista earlier in life. His father was the famous leftist Mexican president, Lazaro Cardenas, who is usually credited with creating the tripartite (labor, peasants, middle classes) corporatist system of the PRI which helped the party maintain power for seven decades. In the mid-1980s, young Cardenas (though I guess he wasn’t really that young even then) left the PRI with a group of other PRIistas, who were collectively known as the Democratic Current within the party. They were in part upset with the party’s direction and that the Cardenas group was unlikely to have significant influence (i.e., get to pick) the PRI’s presidential candidate for the 1988 elections. They were sore losers, so they left. Cardenas launched his own campaign for President, and probably won, except that the central vote counting machine in Mexico City ‘broke’ for a week, and when the final results were announced, Salinas, the PRI candidate had won with a narrow margin (less than a couple of percent). Cardenas was robbed of the presidency, or so many Mexicans believe.

Since then, he organized the Revolutionary Democratic Party (PRD) and has run as that party’s candidate in 1994 and 2000. In many ways, the PRD has been his party.

Until recently.

The current mayor of Mexico City, AMLO or peje or Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, has become the most popular political figure of the PRD. Most expect him to be elected president in 2006, that is, if he’s allowed to run. The Fox administration has been trying to disqualify him by accusing him of criminal activity related to an unfinished highway project in the city. The city government appropriated land, the appropriation was challenged in court, the court issued an injunction to stop construction, and allegedly construction was not stopped. AMLO has been accused of ignoring a court injunction by allowing the road construction to continue. For Professors Ackerman, this conflict has become a crucial issue for the future of democracy in Mexico.

Anyway, back to Mr. Cardenas. He’s no longer the political cat’s meow; he has been replaced by AMLO. And how does he respond? By saying that he’s the only politician able to bring the PRD together and to win in 2006. How is that possible? According to Cardenas:

El PRD se va a presentar. No creo que haya desafuero. El PRD se va a presentar y creo que yo voy a ganar la elección. Creo que soy la única posibilidad que existe en la izquierda de construir una mayoría política en torno de mi candidatura….No es que se empeñe. Vamos a ir a una elección interna entre los perredistas y ahí habrá una decisión democrática.

He’s referring to the PRD internal primaries. He thinks he can win those, and maybe he can. Maybe party members will remain loyal to Cardenas, though he’s clearly not the most popular PRDista available. Or maybe Cardenas is confused.

President Fox’s party, the PAN, is very happy with the announcement by the PRI that it has changed its party statutes to allow more private participation in the energy sector–the privatization of energy. In an article today in La Jornada, Fox’s Secretary of State and a PAN presidential hopeful for 2006, Santiago Creel welcomed the change in the PRI, saying:

…que finalmente en el quinto año de gobierno de Vicente Fox Quesada el PRI se haya dado cuenta de la necesidad de abrir el sector energético y que ahora dé otro paso y nos acompañe a legislar la reforma del sector. Nunca es tarde; siempre hay tiempo para legislar…

It’s never too late to legislate. Congress is in its last working session of the Fox administration, so there are going to be lots of last minute attempts to get stalled reforms passed.

The article also mentions that the President of the CCE (Consejo Coordinador Empresarial), the organization that represents several business associations, said the CCE was glad to hear of the changes in the PRI statutes and would change its lobbying strategy. The change in lobbying strategy is due to the wide variety of legislative agendas of the political parties, according to the leader of the CCE. They plan to organize their specialists into groups according to reform (taxes, energy, etc.) and then try to talk to the parties. They have formal meetings planned with each of the three largest political parties to discuss their reform agenda. Contrast this strategy with that of the unions, who are busy bickering among themselves and rarely hire private consultants to do studies to support their side of an issue.

In addition to energy reform, the Fox administration is heaving pushing a privatization of the public sector workers’ pension system, administered by the ISSSTE. According to this article in La Jornada, Treasury officials have been meeting with members of the Chamber of Deputies in order to get them to support the reform proposal:

Según la Secretaría de Hacienda, los beneficios de la reforma al sistema de pensiones en el ISSSTE, manifestados en su propuesta, son los siguientes: “en un sistema de cuentas individuales, las aportaciones están ligadas a los beneficios, ya que la pensión para cada trabajador sería en la mayoría de los casos igual a sus contribuciones más los intereses; el sistema estará en equilibrio permanente y se elimina la trayectoria explosiva del déficit”.

Se plantea un gancho para convencer a los trabajadores de que no abandonarán el actual sistema pensionario con las manos vacías. Se les plantea recibir un bono de reconocimiento a sus años de trabajo y servicio entregado a la administración federal.

It will be interesting to see whether Fox’s administration is able to push this reform through at the last minute, too.

This weekend the PRI held their national congress in Puebla, during which they revised their platform and some party rules. The PRI is the political party that dominated Mexican politics and the state since the 1920s. It lost the presidency in 2000 for the first time in over seven decades. La Jornada has an article summarizing the main results of the congress.

The PRI is very divided right now due to a clash between the President of the party (Madrazo) and the Secretary General (Gordillo). The Secretary General recently founded a new ‘democratic’ federation of unions of government employees, which critics have said is only a political vehicle for the leader. She is also the leader of a current within the party called the Democratic Union, which has opposed Madrazo’s candidacy for president. According to the PRI statutes, if the President of the party becomes the party’s candidate for President (which most expect him to do), then the Secretary General automatically becomes the party’s president. Since the Secretary General is such a controversial figure, many of the supporters of Madrazo do not want the current Secretary General to become president of the party when Madrazo becomes the party’s candidate.

Apparently, members of the Democratic Union claimed that there were voting irregularities at the congress, including during important meetings of the rules committee. Some of the Democratic Union left the congress in disgust. Most of the rule changes had to do with candidate issues, such as whether a person who was elected to the Chamber of Deputies on a party list (rather than winning a district election) could be elected to the Senate in the very next election by the same means (and vice versa). The party also passed a law requiring those that want to be a party candidate for office to pay for their own public opinion surveys to document their viability and public support as a candidate. Though some complained that such a requirement would mean that only older and richer candidates would have the funds to run for office, the rules committee approved the new rule.

According to La Jornada, changes in the party’s statutes also open the door for the PRI to support privatization of the energy sector, which is a contentious issue right now.

Other parties will be holding similar congresses in the next month or so, and conventions to choose their presidential candidates will occur in September.

It seems that the new President in Uruguay is keeping some of his campaign promises already, including a package of economic relief for the poor. There’s a follow-up article in the NY Times. According to the article:

As his first official action, Dr. Vázquez announced a sweeping “Social Emergency Plan” that contains food, health, job and housing components. The program, whose cost is estimated at $100 million, is to be aimed at the hundreds of thousands of Uruguayans who have fallen below the poverty line as a result of economic crises of recent years….

The new president’s second act in office was to restore diplomatic relations with Cuba. Ties were broken in 2002 as a result of a dispute that began when Dr. Vázquez’s predecessor, Jorge Batlle Ibáñez, suggested that human rights observers be sent to Cuba to document abuses there.

The economic crises mentioned in the text above were largely a result of the extreme economic crisis in Argentina. Uruguay’s large neighbor had to devalue it’s currency by 2/3s in 2001 and quickly went into a economic decline not seen since the Depression.

Uruguay’s new president has been inaugurated.

Today Dr. Tabaré Vázquez assumed the presidency in Uruguay. He is one of many leftist presidents elected in the last few years in Latin America. The most famous leftist president in the region right now is of course, President Lula da Silva of Brazil. If Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, the popular leftist mayor of Mexico City is allowed to run for president in 2006, many think he will win. (The Fox administration has been trying to strip him of his immunity so that he can be prosecuted for allegedly ignoring a court order to stop construction on a road–near my work BTW–on expropriated land. News programs actually had segments showing the deserted road project and interviewed gardeners to determine whether the height of the grass on the cleared area was consistent with an end to construction around the time of the court order. It’s enough for its own post.)

In an article in the New York Times (free subscription required), they make much of the recent election of lefties south of the border:

Uruguay’s shift consolidates what has become the new leftist consensus in South America. Three-quarters of the region’s 355 million people are now governed by left-leaning leaders, all of whom have emerged in the past six years to redefine what the left means today.

They are not so much a red tide as a pink one. Doctrinaire socialism carries the day far less than pragmatism, an important change in tone and policy that makes this political moment decidedly new.

The emphasis on pink is an important one because most of these leaders have been fairly moderate once in office. They may campaign as heavy lefties (and even Lula had to soften his edges this last time he ran), most of the president’s mentioned pursue a slightly left of center agenda once in office. They do not expropriate industries, run up huge spending deficits, etc. Instead, they are very sensitive to market pressures and may even move more to the center than their constituents would like, just to make sure investors do not get spooked. In many ways, they have to be more careful than their conservative counterparts because the markets distrust them more.

Oh, BTW, one of the Dr.’s first acts as President was to resume full diplomatic relations with Cuba, which had been restricted three years ago. I guess for some that would be enough to paint the new administration red.

I don’t remember where I first heard about this, but Subcomandante Marcos of the EZLN and Mexico’s best-known mystery novelist, Paco Ignacio Taibo II have collaborated on a new novel: Muertos Incomodos (Uncomfortable Dead). The two have never met, and wrote separate sections, which were then put together. Something I read earlier said that Marcos contacted Taibo with the idea of writing a novel. Taibo was working on another project, but couldn’t resist the opportunity.

Marcos and Taibo agreed to write separate chapters about separate mysteries, and their two protagonists were to meet at the Monumento a la Revolucion in Mexico City at some point in the novel to join forces to fight evil.

I enjoy Taibo’s mysteries, though his recurring character, Hector Belascoaran Shayne, can be a bit too philosophical for my taste. He’s a Mexico City detective with a bad eye, limp, and eccentric siblings. He shares his downtown detective office with a plumber, upolsterer, and a third working-class guy whose job escapes me. Some of his books are political, like No Happy Ending, which is about a government sponsored massacre of university students in the early 1970s (not the 1968 massacre that is more well known). The government has released many documents about this particular event in the last few years, so I often include this in the list of books that my undergrad students can read in my Latin American politics class. It’s a short book, and provides some insight into Mexicans’ distrust of the government. Particularly striking is a shootout in the middle of a downtown street during the mid-1980s (when the book is set) where no one tries to stop the protagonist from leaving the scene after him and his buddy shoot some bad guys.

Anyway, here is an article about the new book by Marcos and Taibo on Yahoo! Mexico article.

And the leftist La Jornada newspaper published one of the later chapters of the book written by Marcos. You can read it online here. This excerpt suggests that the book will have no shortage of political jabs.

For instance, here’s an excerpt from the chapter online (sorry, accents are missing):

…el Alakazam me estaba explicando como hace sus magias, que sea esas coasas que apareces y desaparece cosas y que lee el pensamiento de la gente. Y entonces yo muy no le entendi y el me explico que el hace que la gente mire una mano y ya con la otra mano esconde o saca lo que tiene escondido. Y entonce yo le pregunte si es como hacen los politicos que te ponen a mirar una cosa mientras por otro lado estan haciendo sus maldades. Y entonces el Alakazam me dijo que eso mero, pero que los politicos no eran magos sino que eran unos hijos de puta, asi dijo….

A rough English translation of the above:

…Alakazam (a magician) was explaining to me how he works his magic, so that things appear and disappear and that he reads people’s minds. And then, I didn’t really understand him and he explained to me that he makes the people look at one hand and with the other hand hides or reveals what he has hidden. And then I asked him if it is like the politicians do, making you look at one thing while they do bad things the other way. And then Alakazam told me that this was it sort of, but that politicians were not magicians but were sons of bitches, that’s what he said…

I haven’t found a publisher listing or expected publication date, but I’ll be sure to read the book.

I ususually avoid personal posts, but lately all my dreams are about cars, elevators, and airports. What could it mean?

Aside from that, I’ve been reading a really good book by Paul Pierson called Politics in Time. It includes a critique of ahistorical political science and a really interesting discussion of how time or sequencing can be important for political outcomes. In particular, it has a very nice explanation of positive returns and how small events can push history down a particular path, and later similar events (even on a larger scale) can have little effect. In many ways, some of the arguments are very similar to those in his work on welfare and that of Theda Skocpol. Institutions matter because they shape future possibilities.

I had been thinking about ways to relate my arguments about the development of welfare institutions in Mexico to the functional needs of the dominant actors at the time of the creation of the institutions…like much of the political economy literature, but now I’m second guessing that strategy.

The office that organizes international study at Georgia Tech has asked me to contribute a 500 word essay about my Fulbright experience. Next week, I have to give a presentation on my Fulbright experience during the mid-year Fulbright orientation session. I thought I might brainstorm some ideas here first.

What have I learned?

That students everywhere complain and think they have too much work to do.
That there is always one smartypants student (who isn’t always that prepared) in every class, even in Mexico.
That academic departments are dysfunctional everywhere, though the dysfunctions reflect the local culture.
That I really love chilaquiles, and will hate to go back to Atlanta because no restaurant in the entire North Georgia area knows how to properly make them.
That I find Mexican driving habits annoying. How can people be so polite and formal face-to-face, and so ruthless in their cars?
That I miss my dog terribly, and that all Mexican dogs (even Doby, the friendly dog of the building consierge) are ugly in comparison.

But wait, I can’t say that….

What can I say?

That I have had much more time to write and get research done while away from Tech. I sent off three papers last fall to journals! I should have 2-3 more ready to go by June!
That my time away from Tech has led me to appreciate my colleagues in International Affairs, and I’m looking forward to being back in their company.
That I plan to be in a better position for my third-year review when I get back to Tech (and I’m hoping for a raise, too!).
That this year abroad has not been without sacrifices….it has been more expensive than we planned, and Brian has had to put off school another year. A year abroad would be even more difficult for those with children.
That moving to Mexico would have been even more difficult if we had not lived here before. It helps to go someplace you’ve already been.

I should probably have something in the list about cultural understanding and sensitivity, yadda yadda, but none of that seems like much of a surprise after living here three years. At this point, I am no longer awed by how nice and friendly Mexicans can be; I am just annoyed when they cut me off on the highway and don’t pick up their dogs’ droppings. It’s not that I don’t like Mexico or its people; I love both. It’s that after a while, I take for granted the good things and am merely annoyed by the bad.

Now, let’s see if I can go write that 500 word essay.

Mexican state elections

Last weekend, there were state elections in Baja California Sur, Guerrero, and Quintana Roo. The PRD managed to win governorships in BJS and Guerrero, and the PRI managed to keep the positin in QR. Some believe this is a good omen for the PRD and the presidency in 2006. According to the economist:

Despite that traumatic defeat, the PRI has staged a remarkable comeback over the past two years. Last year, it won 11 out of 14 state elections. But Guerrero has bucked that trend. Most pollsters had expected a close result there. In the event, the PRI suffered a drubbing at the hands of the leftish Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), whose candidate for state governor won by a 12-point margin. Thus ended 76 years of rule by the PRI in a state of marked contrasts. Acapulco’s glittering façades hide a city of slums and a hinterland of mountainous poverty, a breeding-ground of guerrillas, drug gangs and death-squads.

According to an article in the leftist La Jornada the PRI-Green Party and the PT claimed fraud in Guerrero by the PRD, but the official agency only reported one polling problem: one pollworker was drunk.

The La Jornada articles on the elections and results in Guerrero, Baja California Sur, and Quintana Roo.

Was cruising the Yahoo headlines and noticed this article. Nothing seems to be posted on La Jornada yet, though Reforma has an article I can’t access because I don’t have a subscription. Of course, this ‘crackdown’ is probably in response to the new travel advisory from the U.S. Secretary of State, which is mentioned in this Yahoo article.

The story that the AP cites from El Universal can be found here. According to the article, Nahum Acosta Lugo was the director of the President’s personal office of administrative assistants and is accused of passing information about the President’s schedule to a criminal organization. Apparently, this was “con el objetivo de atentar contra su integridad fisica.” Ok, so the Attorney General’s office can catch someone in the President’s office with ties to narcotrafficking, but what does that have to do with border security? The Attorney General’s office is spinning the arrest as evidence that they are cracking down on narcotraffficking, in response to U.S. concerns. Further, the aide has had that same job since 2001. He was either turned recently, or hasn’t been giving the bad guys very good information.

The other front page drama in Mexico City this week has to do with the suicide of a 14 year old girl named Stephanie. Apparently, she left a typed letter saying that she was killing herself because she lost $275 (U.S.) worth of cocaine, that she was supposed to be selling at her middle school here in the city. She lost the drugs because her school began searching/controlling backpacks and she had to hide the stuff somewhere else. The pushers threatened her family, so she decided to kill herself. The original El Universal story was published yesterday. Now, her friends say that she never sold drugs. It seems that the neighborhood where the school is located is near a fairly well-off area, though Stephanie apparently lived in a poor neighborhood. Parents of other students at the school are worried that drugs are still being sold inside the school, and that the Safe Backpack, Safe Path program hasn’t been implemented.

Back from hiatus. Spent the holidays frequenting Austin wireless coffeehouses and revising my NSF proposal. I figure that if I keep revising and keep resubmitting, eventually it will be funded.

This article on obsesity in Mexico is interesting, but not surprising.

According to the article:

According to the OECD, Mexico is now the second fattest nation in that group of 30 countries. A health poll in 1999 found that 35% of women were overweight, and another 24% technically obese….It is a symptom of their growing prosperity that these parts of the population have, probably for the first time, almost unlimited access to the greatest amount of calories for the smallest amount of money. But with little knowledge of nutritional values, their diets are now unbalanced and unhealthy.

Rising incomes for many probably mean they eat McDonald’s and other fast food more often. My husband has noticed that if someone here in the city is standing still, they are probably eating something. Food and snacks are everywhere. This is the only major city where I’ve seen people eating on the subway.

As I write this, I am recovering from my own breakfast of fried tortilla strips drenched in tomatillo salsa, with shredded chicken and cheese on top.