Letter from Mexico

It’s not a pretty sight. President Vicente Fox, trying to hang on to his cowboy hat, tottering around in his cowboy boots, chasing a ball being thrown just over his head by Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez, Lula de Silva and Nestor Kirchner.

The ball is inscribed “Latin America’s Most Important,”and he still has delusions that he will be able to grab it. One wonders when he will learn …

He would like to grab it away from his fellow Latinos and present it to his best pal, George. Then, if George wants, he can allow Vicente to play with it now and then. His biggest problem is he doesn’t want to share with Hugo. Or with Fidel. Or with Lula (of Brazil). Or with Kirchner (of Argentina). Or with any of the other emerging populist presidents to our south. At least I think that’s the problem. How else can you explain the irrational way in which he is behaving?

Now, I know there are those who would say he is just a product of his unfortunate upbringing: son of a fabulously wealthy land baron who owns the town his workers live in (his Rancho surrounds it); Mexico’s leading exporter of broccoli; retired CEO of Coca Cola Mexico; totally brainwashed advocate of unfettered economic globalism. Fox has never met a national resource he didn’t want to privatize: the workers in the national archeological institute (INEGI in its Spanish acronym), by constant agitation and organizing, have managed to keep his most hair-brained scheme, the privatization of Mexico’s pre-Columbian ruins—“PepsiCo presents Chichen Itza”—from happening. I can’t argue with such an analysis. It hangs together with a certain whiff of Logic to it. It’s probably true. Still, I find myself unwilling to leave it go at that.

Anybody else remember Vicente and George’s first meeting after the 2000 election? When Vicente, 20-gallon Stetson in hand, made the pilgrimage to George’s hacienda near Crawford, Texas? How George promised him a new guest-worker permit for Mexicans working here, and Vicente showed his appreciation by bending the laws to allow U.S. agents of the CIA and FBI and more to operate on Mexican territory? How he stuck by his decision, even in the face of a furious reaction from a legislature and an electorate who accused him of selling out? How the U.S. Congress rejected the guest-worker idea, opting for more troops and higher fences, and George sort of shrugged his shoulders, spread his hands, and said “Sorry, Vicente, they just won’t listen to me,” and Vicente just went along with the stationing of U.S. agents anyway?

Then there was the “diplomatic crisis” with Cuba. Castro accused Fox of kowtowing to the great empire of the north. In spite of all the evidence, including what the Cuban government perceived as interference in its internal affairs when Fox commented negatively on the imprisonment of a whole slew of dissident intellectuals, Fox took umbrage. This, I remind you, is the man who allowed Fidel to come to Mexico to attend an international conference a few years ago, only to whisk him off to a plane back home just hours before his buddy George was due to land.

A couple of weeks ago, there was another international conference, this time in Argentina, to discuss hemispheric economics among other things. George’s favorite new globalist scheme, the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), was, by a consensus of the attendees, not to be discussed. Off the table. In the closet. In spite of that, Fox tried—unsuccessfully—to introduce the so-called trade agreement. This behavior was considered rude by many attending, as one of the rules agreed upon by the participants was that the FTAA would not be on the agenda, making Fox’s advocacy a direct slap in the face of president Kirschner of Argentina.

Chavez, confused as to why anyone would behave so badly, was led to conclude that Fox was acting like a “lapdog” of the U.S. When he stated this conclusion, the Mexican government (it is not clear that the vast majority of Mexicans don’t disagree with Hugo) pulled the Patriotism Card. Even López Obrador, “leftist” front-runner in the 2006 presidential race, criticized Chavez for his statements. The two countries, both major oil exporters to the U.S., and both struggling with too-high unemployment and too-low economic figures, recalled their ambassadors. And what reward did Vicente receive from his buddy George? A strident speech a few days ago in Tucson—or should I say on a military base near Tucson?—calling for more militarization of the border, more walls and high-tech equipment to keep undocumented workers out, and a loosening of legal and human rights laws in order to make expulsion of undesirable Mexicans more efficient.

So, here is Vicente, being kicked around by his buddy George, and refusing to join the other major players in Latin America in finding a non-globalist, regionally oriented solution to their common problems. Go figure.