Hey there, Kender,
You make some good points about Mexico and the immigration so-called problem. However, I’d like to correct some misaprehensions, if you’ll allow me.
First, the US acquired the Southwest (minus east Texas) as a result of a war that we started with the purpose of acquiring the Southwest. It wasn’t “stealing”, it’s true, because in the end we paid them for it. They had the choice of selling or not. Trouble is, if the chose not to sell, we had the choice of remaining in Mexico as an occupying army. Sounds like extortion to me. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, if we’re talking about doubling the size of the national territory and getting the best natural port in the world for trade with the far east. I’m just saying.
Next, there seems to be widespread agreement that Mexicans hate corruption but that it’s somehow imposed on them by corrupt politician and others. This is false. Mexicans love corruption when they can use it to get out of jail, get a permit, jump the line and so forth. They hate it when they lose because someone else got the jump on them. Beyond the issue of corruption, Mexicans attitude towards the rule of law is extremely flexible (not to use some xenophobic adjective). This is summed up in the famous phrase “acato pero no obedezco”, meaning “I comply but don’t obey”. It’s incomprehensible to an Anglo mentality, since the two words are more or less synonyms. However, it means “I respect the authority of the law but I do whatever the hell I want”.
The Blackberry incident is not important at all. If our intelligence services can’t deal with a few stolen Blackberries, then it’s our damn fault. I trust them on this one.
Calderón is an important ally for us. He faces strong opposition, which is rooted in the nation’s past. Especially, the opposition is rooted in the nation’s past indoctrination into a so-called revolutionary nationalism. This so-called ideology was indoctrinated into schoolchildren from the day one since the 1930s. Therefore, Calderón is facing not only political opposition. He’s facing massive indoctrination against his rather weak reform policies. Even so, he’s been making progress where it counts–for example in modernizing the oil industry and in tax reform. If he has to use rhetoric from time to time so as not to rile up the indoctrinated masses, then, well, he has to do what he has to do. The means justify the ends here, in my opinion, because that way he may get more support for real change in policy.
Mexicans are not bad people for crossing the border to get free medical services, education and citizenship. They’e only responding to economic realities. I bet you’d do the same thing if you were in their place. I would.
