[StJacques]

I'm not going to be doing any translating today since my boss, GeronL, has given me the day off. :-)

I've looked over the Mexican web sites today and I do not see anything of pressing significance however. Fox is speaking in a very conciliatory manner about the action this past Monday to clear the legislative grounds at the national congress, he is calling for dialogue, and doing his best to reassure everyone that the country is not heading for violent confrontation. At the same time he has ordered armored vehicles to the legislative grounds, all of the streets approaching the grounds have been sectioned off with metal barricades, and he has over 800 Federal Preventive Police on-site, rotating out on a regular basis.

On the recount; no word from the Electoral Tribunal, though there is an article up on El Universal in which a Mexican legal expert says we can expect to see things start happening "possibly in the first days of the week."

And I linked this article because it gives a pretty good overview of everything, though it seems to suggest a much calmer appraisal of things than the tone I see expressed in the Spanish articles on the same site, and especially when prominent political actors are quoted. This article seems to suggest this entire "National Democratic Convention" is going to be a "monitoring" effort on the part of AMLO and the PRD. That is not the tone taken in the discussion revealed in the Spanish language web sites in Mexico, nor is it what I read in AMLO's own words. So, consider yourselves warned, I see some "MSM Spin" in this particular article, it's a Miami Herald subsidiary, so keep that in mind.

[StJacques]

A Mex-Elex ping for you all.

[GeronL]

Sort of like a Shadow Government but more ominous. Thanks for the update just before I go offline.

[StJacques]

Well I've got a brief update for you all on the progress of the Mexican post-election controversy which essentially is that, "nothing of note has happened over the past couple of days."

For those of you who may want to read about the continuing splits within Lopez Obrador's PRD over the campaign of civil disobedience, and especially the threatened intention of rejecting the eventual decision of the Electoral Tribunal, go up in this thread and begin with my post #14 to Shuttle Shucker from a couple of days ago and continue through our various exchanges to read about the public statements of former PRD presidential candidate and party founder Cuauhtemoc Cardenas that the party should be prepared to accept what the tribunal delivers.

There has been a sideshow going on over the past couple of days regarding the disclosure that a major public scandal surrounding Lopez Obrador of 2003 - 2004, the so-called "videoscandals" in which key AMLO aides were videotaped accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes and later shown gambling in Las Vegas, were in fact orchestrated as a "sting" operation by key members of the Fox administration and the PAN party. Nothing that has been revealed even suggests that the videos were forged however, no; AMLO's aides genuinely took the money in return for the promise of favoritism in awarding contracts, but AMLO and company are raising the roof about how this "proves the conspiracy" to keep AMLO out of the president's chair. It's just a sideshow.

They have just concluded voting in the southernmost state of Chiapas today, in which the Governor's seat was up for grabs, with the two main candidates being the representatives of the PRD and the PRI party, with the PRI candidate being endorsed by the PAN and New Alliance parties. And guess what? Both candidates are claiming victory right now. LOL!

Expect to hear news on the presidential election from the Electoral Tribunal some time over the next couple of days. I'll let you all know what goes down.

[Cold Heat]

This may be posturing, to get some concessions and appointments from the new government. They need to nip this in the bud by forming a committee to deal with this preemptively.

At least I hope so.

If not, this could be a real problem for the new government and pain for us as well.