Mexico candidate Calderon may ease up on leftist

Mexico candidate Calderon may ease up on leftist
Fri Apr 21, 2006 8:19pm ET

By Alistair Bell

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexico's ruling party presidential candidate, Felipe Calderon, is wary of going too far in his attacks on the leftist front-runner in an increasingly ugly election campaign, his top aide said.

Calderon, the conservative National Action Party candidate, is waging a war of words with left-wing hopeful Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, a man he accuses in television ads of being "a danger to Mexico" who would destroy the country's finances.

Calderon's campaign chief, Josefina Vazquez Mota, told Reuters the candidate will keep on criticizing Lopez Obrador, but does not want to alienate voters with a negative campaign.
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Mexico's Federal Electoral Institute regulator ruled on Friday that Calderon had to modify some of his television spots because of their aggressive tone.
(snip/...)

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=winterOlympics&storyid=2006-04-22T001852Z_01_N20337891_RTRUKOC_0_US-MEXICO-ELECTION.xml



Felipe Calderon, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador

diverting government funds to education, health care, infrastructure repairs/maintenance, and job training programs. From what I can tell, Mexico needs it badly. I'm guessing cronyism and corporate corruption in the government have led Mexico into its current plight.

I made a quick grab at the first link which referred to NAFTA at all, in order to mention the fact that trade agreements, like NAFTA have cut the legs out from under agricultural workers in Mexico. Here's the small passage containing a brief reference:

“Rep. Hinojosa has often expressed his concerns with NAFTA’s results: higher-wage manufacturing jobs in his district lost and his constituents then forced to take low-wage service jobs; increased immigration from Mexico as NAFTA destroyed the livelihoods of millions of campesinos and the further militarization of the border and the terrible civil rights violations that have ensued with the congressman’s own constituents mistakenly swept up in immigration raids,” said Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch. “In his district, many people are asking: Why would Congressman Hinojosa vote to expand this damage?”
(snip/...)

http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/release.cfm?ID=2034

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I've seen it described in many places that the consequences of the NAFTA destroyed the life-long farming jobs of agricultural workers in Mexico who raised corn, and sugar cane, their two HUGE products. The sugar cane industry was simply wiped out in no time at all, followed by the home market for corn, as these products were rejected in favor of U.S. taxpayer-heavily-subsidized corn, and sugar cane (from South Florida) which flooded Mexico at dramatically lower prices, making those crops far too expensive to produce, with absolutely no profit whatsoever. People who had raised crops on their family property over generations were left without income.

In the meantime, the Cuban "exile" Fanjuls, who own sugar plantations in South Florida (and the Dominican Republic) are called America's "First Family of Corporate Welfare." A look at the scale of their taxpayer-derived price supports:

The GAO estimates that the sugar program translates into about five cents for each pound of sugar produced in the United States. Taking Flo-Sun's output of 650,000 tons of sugar, that means that about $65 million per year goes directly to the Fanjuls' bottom line as a result of the price-support system. A more complicated calculation, taking into account the acreage, its milling operations, and apportioned benefits, was performed by the staff of Rep. Dick Armey (R-Texas). It also arrived at benefits of $65 million.

http://www.opensecrets.org/pubs/cashingin_sugar/sugar08.html

Here's an article on the Fanjuls:
Bitter Sugar
http://www.newtimesbpb.com/issues/2004-08-26/news/feature.html

THE POLITICS OF SUGAR
S U G A R ' S
F I R S T F A M I L Y
http://www.opensecrets.org/pubs/cashingin_sugar/sugar08.html



Pepe Fanjul on the left, Alfonso in the blue shirt
More photos around 1/2 down the page:
http://www.newyorksocialdiary.com/socialdiary/2005/01_18_05/socialdiary01_18_05.php

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This is the kind of catastrophe which has created the programs which have turned people like the suddenly disposessed people in Mexico into immigrants. If we have destroyed their jobs, it's our place to take the time to learn what we have done, for Christ's sake. Ignorance is no excuse, and it has allowed so many Americans to live in the very darkness which makes it possible for these goddawful bills to be slipped right by us, to everyone's detriment, other than the very wealthiest among us.

shun the notion of free-trade in general and be in favor of fair-trade.