Obrador, the potential for upcoming violence in Mexico

[UTUSN]

With a by-your-leave to AMLO's idealistic supporters.

Previously I have posted about some contacts from Mexico about who are PAN/Calderon and PRD/Obrador supporters: That the PAN people, more from the industrialized and more prosperous North, are working people of the head-just-above-the-waterline-and-above sort, not the super-rich, and their anti-OBRADOR feelings are VOCIFEROUS, paranoid about losing their hard-won-gains to the underclass.

Today, the author of "Mexican Messiah," George W. GRAYSON, was on the radio again, responding to the latest developments of the electoral commission refusing a full recount, allowing only 10% recount in the areas where PAN victories appeared unusual, and the current blockade of Mexico City's central district by AMLO's followers.

He said: That OBRADOR is "authoritarian, dogmatic, messianic, lays claim to a higher mandate," that the PRI of old would have been easier to deal with because it was "more pragmatic, BELIEVES IN NOTHING."

He said that the working people in the capital are furious at being blockaded in getting to work, that 60% of the tourist business is being interfered with, that OBRADOR might call for a disruption of FOX's state of the union speech and the swearing in of the congress, that on the other hand OBRADOR's followers "are relatively small in number, but that if there were "a bloodbath like 1968, the U.S. border region can expect an overflow of persons fleeing."


*******QUOTE*******

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/oped/bal-op.mexico04aug04,0,1317871.story?coll=bal-oped-headlines

Mexican left's false messiah

By George W. Grayson
Originally published August 4, 2006

A messianic politician has laid siege to Mexico City. He is Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, the self-described "Little Ray of Hope" for the dispossessed who served as an extremely popular mayor of this metropolis from 2000 to 2005. He and his apostles have installed 47 encampments in the Zocalo central plaza and along major thoroughfares, turning the heart of the capital into a huge parking lot teeming with furious motorists.

"To those who don't think like us, I offer a sincere apology for the inconveniences that our movement can cause," Mr. Lopez Obrador sermonized. "I hope that one day they come to ... understand that this struggle is necessary." ....

If Mr. Lopez Obrador were an orthodox politician, he would calmly await the tribunal's ruling without occupying the capital. Even if not declared the victor, he accomplished remarkable gains in the recent election. He rolled up twice the vote of his party's standard-bearer six years ago. He also helped the left soar to all-time highs in Congress: 160 seats in the 500-member Chamber of Deputies and 36 seats in the 128-member Senate.

Above all, he placed economic inequality (the 10 percent elite control 45 percent of national wealth) and poverty (nearly 50 percent of the nation's 107.5 million people) high on the country's agenda. Mr. Calderon, a moderate who is inspired by social-Christian principles, has already assembled a task force to improve the nation's public health system. ....

Yet by indulging in holier-than-thou rhetoric and alienating the public with street blockages, he is smearing the image of the left and laying the groundwork for his own political crucifixion.





George W. Grayson teaches government at the College of William & Mary in Virginia. His e-mail is [e-mail].

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[ananda]

1. rightwing media at work..

.. and boy are they good.

Palast was right.

[pretzel4gore]

2. sell this lying liar crap to freepers, not here

how the hell can a rightwing agent of the rich/powerful win an election with a representative of the working people/poor (who vastly outnumber the pig class)?
answer: by lying.

[KittyWampus]

3. UTUSN, would you ask your contacts who the super rich in Mexico support

and give some insight into WHY the struggling middle class believes a Leftist will take away THEIR gains and not so much that of the super rich in Mexico?

[UTUSN]

6. my GUESS would be that the super-rich would mainly be PRI with some overfl

overflow into the upper reach of the PAN. And my further GUESS would be that whenever there is a CRUNCH, it is the smallest of the Bigs that feel it more, sort of like how we here feel the gas and grocery prices more than the LIMBOsevic set. But I'll ask.

[Vidar]

4. More fascist propaganda.

[nadinbrzezinski]

11. Why becuase it does not match your version of reality?

It matches my obsrvations ON THE GROUND in Mexico City, but two weeks ago

[Vidar]

14. 200,00 patriotic Mexican protesters or an anonymous profileless

poster who says he's talked to a few people. Hard choice.

[UTUSN]

15. & you've talked to how many? n/t

[lonestarnot]

5. Grayson sure knows how to twist things doesn't he. Only a zombie would

believe him.

[UTUSN]

7. I ----------LOVE--------- the zombie episode of Kolchak n/t

[lonestarnot]

9. What is Kolchak?

[UTUSN]

13. Kolchak the Night Stalker?

*******QUOTE*******
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071003/

Plot Summary for "Kolchak: The Night Stalker" (1974)

Carl Kolchak was a reporter for Chicago's Independent News Service, and a trouble magnet for situations involving the supernatural. Kolchak turned his investigative skills to vampires, werewolves, zombies and all manner of legendary creatures, but in the end he always failed to convince his skeptical editor, Tony Vincenzo, that the stories weren't products of Kolchak's own overworked imagination.

Summary written by Marg Baskin {[e-mail]}

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071003/episodes

Season 1, Episode 1: The Ripper
13 September 1974
When a rash of serial murders suddenly begins in the Chicago area, Kolchak establishes a similarity between the new killings and the murders committed by Jack The Ripper. The killer soon reveals himself to possess superhuman characteristics, and Kolchak suspects that they may be dealing with the original Ripper after all.

Season 1, Episode 2: The Zombie
20 September 1974
Carl follows up on a series of murders where key figures in the Chicago numbers racket are turning up dead, their spines snapped by someone with incredible strength. The body of a murdered numbers runner keeps turning up at the scene of each crime, and Kolchak soon learns that someone is using voodoo to gain revenge on the criminals in the form of a murderous zombie.

********UNQUOTE*******

[nadinbrzezinski]

8. I posted my observations from talknig to people

from all social classes when I was down there, but two weeks ago... I was lanblasted for it as well since it did NOT fit the idealized version many in the American left have.

Obrador is far from a Messiah, and in fact he might be quite dangerous. Oh and he is far from a lefty either, but a moderate, populist that trends slightly left.

[Fountain79]

10. My family is from Northern Mexico...

and they for the most part all support the PAN. Some people here tend to forgot that it was not the PAN that held power for 70 some years in Mexico but it was the PRI. Their general perception is that Fox has not done all what they thought but that he did alright considering he was fighting so many years of entrenched corruption. It seems some here are so quick to pair the PAN with the Republicans that they forgot that this is a different country with a far different political landscape.

[UTUSN]

12. Thank you, posters 8 & 10 for the civility and reason.

I found GRAYSON's saying that the PRI "believes in NOTHING" to be chilling.

[tkmorris]

16. Here's my problem

I try to keep an open mind. Based on what I know of the man, I am a fan of Obrador (and Hugo Chavez for that matter), but I DO keep an open mind. I read these criticisms with an eye to learn whatever I can.

The trouble is that after reading your post, and the associated article clip, twice I cannot find any hard facts in there that support the opinions given. Obrador is descibed as "messianic" and an "authoritarian". How so? I'd like the article's author to tell me WHY he feels Obrador is these things, not just toss the names out there.

It is suggested that there are Mexicans who are not poor, though perhaps are not wealthy either, who are troubled by Obrador. If so I would not be terribly surprised, but in a country where nearly half the population lives in poverty I think that perhaps those people that support him deserve to be heard. In fact, it is long overdue. If there are actual reasons why those who barely are keeping their head above water fear him, I'd like to hear them. They are certainly not spelled out here.

I read a lot of articles which say similar things about Chavez. They use negative labels, and express vague unease amongst the "haves", but they never seem to quite contain any allegations of real wrongdoing backed up by any facts. They read like smear pieces, because that is what the majority of them are. I don't wish to call this article a smear piece, I'd like to think the author is being honest, but without any evidence to support his claims that becomes difficult.