Where Does His Anger Come From?

What part of the statement “Bill Clinton supports Mexico” didn’t the secretary of the interior understand? Where does his anger come from? Last Saturday, the former United States president announced he was in favor of a “Plan Mexico” against drug trafficking, designed by Mexico “so that no Mexican would think that we are intervening in his or her affairs or trying to determine their future.”* Yes, he did say that no country, not even our country, can win a war on its own. The next day, Sunday, Clinton defended Mexico in front of the Univision audience: “It’s not a failed country. … Felipe Calderon has made huge efforts to defend society from drug traffickers.”* He even went against former president George W. Bush because “he allowed the ban on the sale of assault weapons to expire.” But that very Sunday afternoon, some guy named Fernando Gomez Mont angrily “replied” to Clinton: “We need to bear the shame of the fact that we are collecting the weapons with which Mexicans are killed in this country, and the money comes from your consumer market, which is the one that encourages and stimulates violence in Mexico,” he said. Come again? Did he read not Clinton’s full declaration, or does he know something the rest of us don’t know or don’t understand? Obviously, the State Department spokesman, Philip Crowley, replied, “[A]s the Secretary has said and as I think President Calderon has said, on both sides of the border we need to do more.” He complained, “[W]e are significantly invested in the Merida Initiative.” Where did Gomez Mont get lost? Where did we all get lost? That thing about “hanging Arizona” does sound good. But it will never happen from the U.S., and Mexico won’t be able to do it for very simple reasons: if Mexico could find a way to “block” the economy with Arizona, it would affect Mexicans on both sides of the border. Any action against this racist law, which violates human rights, will come from politics, just like the President of the Senate Carlos Navarrate said, “This law is a wet slap in the face for Obama, a son of immigrants, part of the minority and, like an ‘evil wetback,’ just another one who’s right-winged and cornered.”

It was learned that after the attack on Minerva Bautista, the head of public security in Michoacán, the Mexican Society of Bodyguards asked the secretaries of the interior and national defense for support to bear arms in order “to have the same power that organized crime uses” and allow free access to “adequate facilities to learn how to fire arms in a constant and permanent way.” One question, though: who are they, these organized bodyguards?

On a final note: San Lazaro is like a madhouse. From today, Tuesday, until Friday, there will be work to do. The leaders of the blocs were stuck yesterday trying to define a route for the 100 initiatives and the 150 points in pending agreements. There’s only one certainty: the anti-monopoly law will be approved and sent to the Senate. So they say.

*Editor’s Note: Quotes, accurately translated, could not be verified.