BajaNomad

Interesting overview of many facets of U.S./Mexico co-operation politically

Cisco - 11-22-2014 at 11:54 PM

Mexico-Missing-Students-Protests-2

The Mexican state is gripped by a deepening political crisis amidst mass protests over the disappearance and likely massacre of 43 student teachers. The military has threatened to intervene as popular anger mounts against the government and the entire political apparatus.

On Thursday, hundreds of thousands of workers and youth converged on Mexico City�s Zocalo Square. Many of the parents of the normalistas from the Ayotzinapa Rural Normal School took part in the rally, which was held just under two months after the disappearance of their children in late September. Participants denounced the government of President Enrique Pe�a Nieto, which is complicit in the disappearance of the students and is widely hated for its right-wing, pro-business policies.

The military has responded with ominous warnings about the danger of social �instability.� At a military graduation ceremony Thursday, General Salvador Cienfuegos, Pe�a Nieto�s defense secretary, alluded to the demonstrations by citing �insecurity� as one of �the great challenges we confront.�

The Army, Cienfuegos declared, �acts with strength and determination when it becomes necessary.� He added, �In times of disunity is when the country has suffered its major fractures.� This is the standard language of a military clique prepared to intervene with force in political life, and the Mexican ruling class has a long history of ordering military attacks on demonstrations.

At the same ceremony, Pe�a Nieto proclaimed, �Under no circumstances can the loyalty and noble service that the armed forces have lent to the nation be put in doubt.�

Thursday�s demonstrations took place in 30 cities across the country and were the largest since the normalistas disappeared after calling for improvements to rural education. Jos� Luis Abarca, the mayor of Iguala, located in the state of Guerrero, responded to their initial protests by ordering local police to violently attack the student teachers, killing six and abducting 43.

The 43 were subsequently turned over to the notorious and state-connected drug gang, the Guerreros Unidos. Reports have emerged that the normalistas were tortured and then burned alive by members of the cartel.

Demonstrators called for the resignation of Pe�a Nieto, whose effigy was burned as thousands of onlookers cheered. The main speakers were the parents of the disappeared normalistas, who had traveled over 80 miles from Guerrero to make a national appeal.

�Today, the 20th of November, we celebrate the 104th anniversary of the beginning of the Mexican Revolution,� said Felipe de la Cruz, a father of one of the disappeared. �If we are halted here, it is because the governing class has mutilated our Constitution for their benefit and to justify their acts.�

The government had earlier announced the cancellation of its own Revolution Day parade on account of the expected demonstrations�an act that is itself a significant indication of growing political crisis.

Not only Pe�a Nieto and his Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), but all the major political parties are in one way or another implicated in the massacre. Both the mayor of Iguala (Abarca) and the governor of Guerrero are members of the oppositional PRD, with close ties to drug gangs. The party of Andr�s Manuel L�pez Obrador (known as MORENA) backed Abarca and has other ties to officials implicated in the massacre.

All the major parties have also backed Pe�a Nieto�s �Pact for Mexico,� aimed at introducing free market �reforms� and restructuring the economy to benefit the ruling class and foreign capital.

As the Mexican ruling class prepares to suppress social opposition domestically, it can count on the full support of its counterparts in the United States.

In a February 2014 press conference with President Pe�a Nieto held in Toluca, Mexico, US President Barack Obama touted �our shared commitment to democratic values and human rights� and praised the �enormous sacrifices� made by the Mexican security forces in the fight against drug cartels.

While the US has remained largely silent about the normalistas, US State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki addressed the Ayotzinapa massacre earlier this month, urging �all parties to remain calm throughout the process,� as though peaceful demonstrators and those responsible for the murder of the normalistas stood on equal ground. Noting that the US government is �concerned about the tensions on the ground,� Psaki added the US was �engaged, also, closely with officials there.� This, no doubt, includes top officials in the Mexican military.

Meanwhile, the United States military and intelligence agencies continue to deepen their already close ties with their Mexican counterparts, under the cover of the �war on drugs.� A report yesterday in the Wall Street Journal noted that officials from the Department of Justice were donning the uniforms of the Mexican Marines and taking part in armed raids in Mexican territory. The US has supplied the Mexican state with some $2 billion in arms aid under the pretext of fighting crime.

Representatives of international finance capital have also responded with concern over the demonstrations. Alfredo Couti�o, the Latin American director of the investment-rating firm Moody�s, said on Friday that, �the political and social events of the last months have begun to generate questions with respect to the promising economic perspectives which were generated with the beginning of the new administration. The markets, above all the international markets, are beginning to be disillusioned��

The �promising economic perspectives� cited by Moody�s refers above all to the historic privatization of the Mexican oil industry, a move that international finance capital�and the American ruling class in particular�views as a prime money-making opportunity.

PlanB - 11-23-2014 at 09:26 AM

Excellent insight to a shared distrust of the "ruling elites" on both sides of the border. Much to their chagrin, those elitists are now learning the bitter lesson that political power flows from economic power, not the other way around.

The politicos have caused serious social unrest in Mexico by removing necessary subsidies causing an erosion of the very fabric of an emerging standard of living amongst the workers. Why was this mandated?, only to make a more favorable investment climate for the US investment community.

Same issue north as Obama promised the demise of the coal industry and is making it happen, at the very existence of the coal miners and the surrounding economies; then to carry in on with his promise to tragically increase energy costs for the U.S. consumer households - all in the name of alternate energy and his (their) global climate change initiatives; while all along knowing beyond any doubt that their initiatives are a resounding failure - i.e. Mojave desert massive solar fiasco that is now blaming the sun for not delivering as planned when those folks received massive taxpayer donations and now demanding more.

In Mexico, the wages remain stagnant but inflation is rampant plus gasoline and electricity are at record highs - all to make the US banking investment community comfortable in funding the national debt of Mexico while ignoring the US debt crisis.

BUT, this is but a page in the continuing saga of US-Mexican political-economic relations. Most interesting treatise is "Empire and Revolution, The American in Mexico since the Civil War", by John Mason Hart. A comprehensive chronology of the checkered past on both sides of the border - the US to foment an economic takeover of the Mexican economy and the political response of the Mexican politicos to hold onto their power - all at the expense of the Mexican people.

And now to hear that the US agencies are sending their elitist warriors into Mexico dressed in Mexican Government uniforms is a tragic step in a continuing downward spiral toward social unrest. This time led by the economically oppressed in Mexico and followed sheepishly in the US by the results of the ballot; then of course, ignored by the elitists; who, in their ultimate wisdom seek to increase their stranglehold of absolute power; or maybe not.

mtgoat666 - 11-23-2014 at 09:48 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Cisco
The military has responded with ominous warnings about the danger of social �instability.� At a military graduation ceremony Thursday, General Salvador Cienfuegos, Pe�a Nieto�s defense secretary, alluded to the demonstrations by citing �insecurity� as one of �the great challenges we confront.�


high poverty rates, inequality, lack of opportunity, income inequality,... are root of instability and insecurity.
if people are hungry and have little or no economic opportunity and no social safety net (neither family nor govt), they do what they think necessary to survive

nieto and that wife of his are clueless, they are tone deaf, they are examples of the elite that is out of touch and has been the problem for decades.

revolution now!

the revolution should eliminate the elite political class, the corrupt business class and and the drug lords and corrupted military and police -- need to clean house of all the bad guys

[Edited on 11-23-2014 by mtgoat666]

chuckie - 11-23-2014 at 03:37 PM

YEAH! Blood and Death...Destruction...POWER TO THE PEOPLE! You'll be right in the thick of it, Right Goat....?????

You say you want a Revolution ?

MrBillM - 11-23-2014 at 08:31 PM

OK, But Goat ...................

You're Delusional if you think it's going to Happen. Successfully.

At worst, it would get ugly and a lot of Leftist bodies would pile up, but that's about it.

Come to think of it, Dead Leftists would be an Upside.

Lefties Left Dead is Always GOOD.

reflect

nobodylikesyouanyway - 11-24-2014 at 10:27 AM

Read "The Law" by Frederic Bastiat for deep political/economic inisights.

Excellent Book

MrBillM - 11-24-2014 at 12:14 PM

I "doubt" that many [dissident] Mexican Peasants have read it, though.

Those that have would likely dismiss it.