Mexican Left threatens continuing protest if Calderon is declared President-Elect (Translation)

Well I guess the PRD has nothing left but conspiracy theory to keep its ever-dwindling protest numbers from declining further. A month ago these words would have looked a lot more threatening than they do today. I note that the tone of this article does not seem to hold out much hope that the Electoral Tribunal will conduct any hand recount of all the ballots of the election, as Lopez Obrador has demanded repeatedly, nor that it might declare him the winner by annulling either all or most of the recounted precincts, as the PRD and its coalition partners have requested.

I expect we will hear something important from the Electoral Tribunal later this week.

A Mexican post-election ping for you all.

Anyone wishing to read the other translations I have posted on the Mexican post-election controversy may do so by using the forum's "keyword search" option with the unique keyword -- STJTRANSLATION

There aren't enough of them left.

To the left, elections can only come out two ways:

Either they win outright as they should; or, the opposition stole the election - in which case, it must be overturned by whatever means necessary.

Leftists are always right and the public, while dumber than all leftist politicians, is smart enough never to vote for anyone but a leftist. Ergo, all honest elections result in victory for the left and all elections that don't give them victory are dishonest.

Un minuto por favor. ¡Estoy en mi camino!

wow. This is their reaction when they go from the #3 party to the #2 party?? Crazy kook stuff? I bet a lot of their voters want to go back to the PRI after all this idiocy.

The wimpy and weakkneed ought to have declared the winner at once rather than allow this nonsense to fester.

Every day that goes by gives ammunition to the malcontents.

It's a quagmire heading to a civil war. It's time we pulled out of Mexico.

Mexican electoral law may be criticized legitimately in my opinion for its withholding of the declaration of an election winner until after the Electoral Tribunal reviews the entire process. This is the statutory legacy of fraud in Mexican history and, even though I think they should have found a more expeditious way to do it, I do understand the reasoning behind the system.

Continuing protests from the left. Now there's something new.

There were so many safeguards in place to assure the election was honest, I don't see what is to be gained by this delay. However, I certainly defer to your more informed opinion. Perhaps this is a lesson learned by the Mexicans.

Leftists such as these are the enemies of democracy. Once they show their colors, they should be rounded up and shipped out! Out to where, you might ask. Out to the North Pole! :)

Thanks for the news that is actually very good. So Obragore and his useful idiots are going to keep on whining and carrying signs-where have we seen that before? Sr. Gore-Al Gore-usted hace que una distancia invite el telefono rojo de la cortensia...

I read a bit on the Spanish language version of Zenit (newsletter from Vatican) that the Archbishop of Mexico City has filed a complaint because Obragore's supporters have twice stormed the Cathedral and disrupted the Mass. The PRD say the Church isn't supporting them and they want it to...fat chance.

I guess one crook is has good as another

Thank you, snippy Algore, for setting a world precedent.

A-hole.

NYer and Salvation, I'm pinging the two of you here just for purposes of keeping you both informed.

livius; you wrote:

"I read a bit on the Spanish language version of Zenit (newsletter from Vatican) that the Archbishop of Mexico City has filed a complaint because Obragore's supporters have twice stormed the Cathedral and disrupted the Mass. . . ."

This is a much bigger issue in the PRD protest movement than a lot of people realize in my opinion. About three weeks ago, I recall reading that at one of AMLO's big demonstrations there were numerous protestors walking around with pictures of Pope Benedict either dressed with a Hitler mustache or paired up with Hitler. I remarked when I read that, knowing as I do that Catholicism is very strong in rural Mexico in particular and throughout northern Mexico in general, that these protestors were not people looking for solutions, no; these were people looking to pick a fight. I cannot imagine what they could do to increase conflict between themselves and the rest of Mexico more than to attack the Catholic Church, but I think that conflict is exactly what they are seeking.

The first of the two protest confrontations took place on Sunday the 13th at the metropolitan cathedral in Mexico City to specifically disrupt the homily Cardinal Norberto Rivera intended to give during mass. Everyone was forewarned of the PRD's intent because the protestors, probably numbering only a handful of individuals, showed up beforehand carrying banners and signs out front, which led to the closing of the doors after the beginning of mass. Several PRD demonstrators forced their way in anyway, shouting at the Cardinal and the congregation and had to be forcibly removed from the interior of the church so that Cardinal Rivera could finish his sermon. Obviously, many among the PRD are upset that the PAN party is closely aligned with the Catholic Church and they are blaming Cardinal Rivera for this. But after mass, Rivera made a statement trying to calm down the situation, but which I believe may have only aggravated it. After saying that the doors of the church were open to everyone to come and hear the word of God, he tried to suggest that those protestors should not be considered as exemplifying the whole of the PRD. His exact words were "There are very violent currents within the PRD, but of course that is not the PRD, that is only a slight madness of the PRD."

I think Rivera probably should have withheld that last comment, even though he only understated the truth in my opinion, and why should the truth be important in a statement from a sitting Cardinal? But putting my sarcasm aside, things got a little more rough this past Sunday. Though no numbers are given, it is evident that a larger number of PRD protestors showed up since it was reported they were able to block the entrance to the cathedral. This time the congregants were obviously better prepared since a number of security guards and teenage boys locked themselves together arm-in-arm to form a cordon preventing any physical approach to the Cardinal when he appeared. In spite of the shouting of the PRD supporters, many of whom were evidently women, order was restored, the doors were shut and mass continued with the protestors circling the building. About this time Lopez Obrador's speech concluded and more PRD supporters, the article says that there were about 300 total by this time, went over to the cathedral, whose entrance was secured by the teenage boys who prevented their entrance. Very soon afterwards, two prominent PRD spokesmen; Gerardo Fernandez Noroña and Manuel Camacho Solis, disavowed any formal contact with the organizers of the protest or its intent.

There evidently has been some public reaction against the PRD following these incidents. Today Lopez Obrador publicly requested his followers to stand down from any further protests directed at any church and Leonel Cota Montaño, the PRD leader interviewed in the article at the top of this thread, further disavowed any association with or authorization of the protest actions against the church. He stated that this is what their political opponents want and they are inflaming opinion against the Lopez Obrador-led coalition because "they are desperate," a comment which struck me as significantly divorced from reality, but then we are talking about the Left here, so I guess we shouldn't be surprised.

I haven't read anything about Cardinal Norberto Rivera's official protest yet, but I think the just-discussed events do make clear that the Catholic Church in Mexico is not going to be an outsider if the PRD's demonstrations get violent. No; the church will be a target and understanding this makes clear why the church has been so vocal in its pleas with AMLO not to "ignite" Mexico with his protest to the elections. I also think that making the church a focus of protest action shows desperation on the part of the PRD and it will definitely work against them in the long run. And I will keep an eye out for any further events which may illuminate this controversy in the future.

"Well I guess the PRD has nothing left but conspiracy theory to keep its ever-dwindling protest numbers from declining further. A month ago these words would have looked a lot more threatening than they do today. I note that the tone of this article does not seem to hold out much hope that the Electoral Tribunal will conduct any hand recount of all the ballots of the election, as Lopez Obrador has demanded repeatedly, nor that it might declare him the winner by annulling either all or most of the recounted precincts, as the PRD and its coalition partners have requested."

A victory for democracy, as the losers look more and more pathetic.

I hope the loserman attitude of the PRD collapses their pathetic party.

"I hope the loserman attitude of the PRD collapses their pathetic party."

You and me both WOSG.

So when does the civil war start?

"¡Toda su base es pertenece a nosotros!"

Thank you for that detailed description of PRD attacks on the Church over the last couple of weeks. You said this, which I thought was interesting:

...knowing as I do that Catholicism is very strong in rural Mexico in particular and throughout northern Mexico in general, that these protestors were not people looking for solutions, no; these were people looking to pick a fight. (bold added)

You probably know that the PSOE - the mainstream socialist party in Spain, of which their odious PM, Zapatero R., is a member - has spent a fair amount of time provoking fights with the Church, for reasons that are obscure to me. I honestly can't fathom what they thought would be the benefit to them, and in fact it has actually been beneficial to the Church because some Spaniards have taken a second look at something they just regarded as a cultural artifact. Obviously not the goal of the PSOE! Still, I can't imagine what their goal is, just as I can't understand the PRD's goal in walking around with pictures of the Pope as Hitler.

The only thing that I can think is that it's just part of the bizarro-left's view that is seeping into formerly "mainstream" leftist parties. Not that the PRD was mainstream, but overall it seems that this position is more acceptable among the left in general now than it used to be, and attacking the Pope or the Church is a way to gain ones bona fides in leftist circles.

Chiapas used to have a rather active Muslim population, btw, recruiting mostly through a group of Spanish converts and Arab Muslims who seem to have been brought there by the head of ETA in Mexico, who converted to Islam a few years ago. He is a Spaniard from País Vasco or Asturias, I don't recall which. In any case, being a radical leftist, he was in with the whole Chiapas scene. I don't know if this Muslim group is still active down there - IIRC most of their converts were indigenas who had first converted to Pentecostalism and then for some reason grew dissatisfied and moved to Islam when the Muslims started recruiting. They got along just fine with "Comandante Marcos" and his gang, of course, because they were united by a hatred of the West.

"The only thing that I can think is that it's just part of the bizarro-left's view that is seeping into formerly "mainstream" leftist parties. Not that the PRD was mainstream, but overall it seems that this position is more acceptable among the left in general now than it used to be, and attacking the Pope or the Church is a way to gain ones bona fides in leftist circles."

livius, I've isolated this comment of yours, and pinged a couple of others who have paid closer attention to what has been going on inside Mexican politics, to relate what you have said to some very recent developments that have taken place inside the PRD and which seem to suggest, in my opinion and that of El Universal Editorialist Ricardo Alemán, that more "mainstream" members of the PRD, to use your term, are splitting with Lopez Obrador and may be carrying the day in important ways.

As was mentioned above in the translated article at the top of this thread, earlier this week the newly-elected PRD Deputies and Senators to the incoming Mexican national Congress met and chose their parliamentary coordinators. What was not discussed in the translation, and what really frames the moderate tone which Leonel Cota Montaño uses when he commented on the PRD choosing its congressional leaders, is that the two individuals selected are not from what we might describe as the "AMLO wing of the PRD." AMLO's two candidates for parliamentary coordinators, Ricardo Monreal (Senate) and Miguel Ángel Navarro (Chamber of Deputies) were both defeated, respectively, by Carlos Navarrete Ruiz y Javier González Garza who Alemán describes as representatives of the "Institutional Left," a group more inclined to seek conciliation that confrontation. Let me translate one key paragraph of the editorial I linked:

". . . The AMLO loyalists: Ricardo Monreal y Miguel Ángel Navarro, candidates who the still presidential candidate supported to head the benches of the PRD in the Senate -- where they will be the third most-powerful force -- and in the Chamber of Deputies -- where they occupy the second position -- were relegated [to a diminished status] by the real factors of power, by this same power [of the institutional left]. Thus, the new composition of these centers of power signifies the first great setback for Lopez Obrador in the postelectoral stage, even when a president-elect has not been declared and while the civil resistance is going to the bottom. Even more so, the fact that the preferred choices of AMLO did not secure these positions confirms that in the interior of the PRD not only is AMLO's defeat assumed as a fact, but also the end of his formerly invincible leadership. . . ."

Alemán goes on to say that he believes that what is going is that a formerly secondary group within the PRD commonly referred to as Los Chuchos, i.e. "The Mutts," is now asserting itself and coming into a more powerful position of influence in the party and, particularly in the instance of the selection of Javier González Garza as the PRD's coordinator in the Chamber of Deputies, this represents the party distancing itself from Lopez Obrador. González Garza, who AMLO's supporters refer to not affectionately as El Güero, which could be translated as "the Blond Guy," but "White Boy" may be more appropriate here; is a very close associate of Cuauhtemoc Cardenas and Rosario Robles, the two party leaders Lopez Obrador pushed aside in his rise to dominance within the PRD. So AMLO's star is falling in more ways than one.

I mention all of this here because the PRD anti-Catholic activism we've just been discussing represents in some way, the rebirth of one of the more troubling aspects of Mexico's revolutionary past. The Catholic Church was severely restricted in its public life during the Mexican Revolution, when they were victimized outright, and in the early years of the PRI, when they were quietly suppressed. The fact that certain elements within AMLO's coalition are now singling the church out for further protest activism must be reawakening memories among many Mexicans, and the more moderate wing of the PRD must be included here, of events in Mexico's political and cultural history no one would wish to see repeated. I think that is only a part of the underlying motivation behind the recent movement within the PRD to diminish AMLO's stature as party leader; there is after all, the desire to avoid throwing away recent electoral gains. But in one way or another there is a sentiment of seeking compromise and keeping the PRD within the mainstream that is clearly surfacing within the party and that can only bode well for the future.

And I'll bet all of this is now being discussed at great length in Havana, Caracas, and La Paz with some dismay.

I hate to keep talking weather, but these POOR souls camped out as squatters on Reforma have NO HELP from the Heavens.. this link of Mexico City is it hail or snow?
http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/noticias.html

What is happening with the vote count in the Chiapas Governor's race? I don't see any news.

Leonel Cota Montaño = hombre dolorido del perdedor