"Mexico is in free fall"

Policy Analyst David Rieff, writing in the The Manchester Guardian is the one who says so.  Here is his article, which explains the situation and points out that US policy toward Mexico is flawed.

Talking about Vice President Joe Biden's October 2008 prediction about the new Administration facing a crises early on in its term, Mr Rieff says:

That crisis is located in Mexico, which is in free fall, its state institutions under threat as they have not been since at least the Cristero uprising of the late 1920s and possibly since the Mexican revolution of 1910.  While the Obama administration is obviously aware of what is happening south of the Rio Grande, the threat simply does not command the attention that its gravity requires.

But, to readers of this blog, this should not be news--except for the history lesson.

We have ignored the southern border for too long. Latin America is not about President Fidel Castro and Cuba or even about President Hugo Chavez and Venezuela.  It is first and foremost about Mexico, our neighbor to the south.

Actor Leo Carrillo told my Ninth Grade Class in Lakewood, California, this truth over 50 years ago.  If a TV kids show co-star can figure it out, why can't all the smart policy wonks in DC and up the Eastern Shore from there?

In closing out, I was given this web site to look at.  This is the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA). WOLA is active in the Social Justice arena, on both sides of the border.  I expect that they are for finding a non-violent solution to the current troubles, as am I.  However, my expectation is that the path to restoring peace and freedom to the people of Mexico will be via managed violence--police and military action.  Legal police and military action, but still, the use of force to enforce the laws of the land.

Regards  --  Cliff