Posted on 09/25/2010 3:18:36 PM PDT by Ooh-Ah
MEXICO CITY -- As if Mexicans needed more evidence that criminal groups are trying to hijack the political life of the nation, it came with a ferocious triple-whammy punch in the past 24 hours.
Assailants shot and seriously wounded the mayor-elect of a town in the border state of Chihuahua on Friday afternoon, less than a day after commandos in Nuevo Leon state executed a sitting mayor, making him the 10th municipal chief slain so far this year.
In Mexico City, a fugitive legislator with drug charges pending against him sneaked into Congress and took his seat, automatically obtaining immunity from prosecution.
Attacks on mayors are quickening, a sign that drug cartels are seeking to intimidate politicians and neutralize them when they interfere with criminal activity.
Gunmen outside a veterinary clinic in Gran Morelos, a town in the high desert west of Chihuahua City, shot and seriously wounded Mayor-elect Ricardo Solis Manriquez, the websites of the Reforma and El Universal newspapers said.
Solis, elected in early July, is to take office on Oct. 9.
Earlier in the day, eulogies poured in for Prisciliano Rodriguez Salinas, a mayor who was slain outside his ranch house in a rural area of Nuevo Leon state.
Four mayors have been killed in the past five weeks alone. The new attacks roiled the political arena, a sign that politicians long complacent toward drug trafficking are feeling heat. Rodriguez, 53, was elected mayor of Doctor Gonzalez, 30 miles northeast of the industrial city of Monterrey, by a coalition headed by the Institutional Revolutionary Party, the once-dominant force that is now the largest opposition party.
President Felipe Calderon issued a statement Friday morning pledging that his government "will not ease up on criminal groups."
Nuevo Leon state Attorney General Alejandro Garza y Garza said members of an "armed command" had ambushed Rodriguez outside his rural home in Doctor Gonzalez, and shot him with a .223-caliber assault rifle and a 9 mm handgun.
Garza y Garza described the region, which is less than a two-hour drive from the Texas border - as "a conflict zone" due to fierce rivalries between drug cartels.
Nuevo Leon Gov. Rodrigo Medina decried the "cowardly assassination."
"They will not frighten us," Medina said of drug cartels. "We will not yield."
The mayors of cities and towns in regions of Mexico that cartels dominate face pressure to turn a blind eye on criminal activity. Given a choice of "plomo" or "plata" - a lead bullet or a cash payoff - some mayors become virtual allies of the criminal groups.
Mayors also direct 2,022 municipal police departments, and Mexican Secretary of Public Security Genaro Garcia Luna said in early August that drug cartels were paying an estimated $100 million a month in bribes to corrupt municipal police officers.
The assassinations of mayors are becoming not only more frequent, but also more brazen.
On Sept. 8, two gunmen marched into the El Naranjo Town Hall in San Luis Potosi state in broad daylight and murdered Mayor Alexander Lopez Garcia as he presided over a meeting, leaving his body slumped on the floor in a pool of blood.
After the Aug. 16 kidnapping of the mayor of Santiago, a picturesque town outside Monterrey, prosecutors said that members of Mayor Edelmiro Cavazos' own police force had carried out the act. His body turned up two days later.
The 10 mayors assassinated so far this year have governed towns in seven Mexican states: Chihuahua, Guerrero, Hidalgo, Nuevo Leon, Oaxaca, San Luis Potosi and Tamaulipas.
In late June, a commando squad gunned down the leading gubernatorial candidate in the border state of Tamaulipas, Rodolfo Torre Cantu. It was the highest-level political assassination since presidential candidate Luis Donaldo Colosio was shot dead in 1994.
On Thursday, television networks broke into programming to show legislator Julio Cesar Godoy taking his seat in the federal Chamber of Deputies.
Godoy later held a news conference to declare that his 2009 arrest warrant for allegedly offering protection to one of Mexico's most feared drug gangs, the Familia Michoacana, was an effort by Calderon's ruling National Action Party to persecute his party in Michoacan state. Godoy is a member of the opposition leftist Revolutionary Democratic Party.
"I am not a criminal," Godoy said.
He skirted a federal police cordon that was aiming to capture him outside Congress, thus avoiding arrest and taking his legislative seat, automatically winning immunity from prosecution.
Thanks for sharing that story. Not all Mexicans are bad. I know because my brother married one.
part of my family came from N mexico about 100 yrs ago. Some went to SA Others came here.....
They have French sounding names so naturally I dont even speak with them.....
Sorry to disagree...but the NEW Cubans..last 20 yrs or so are a different breed than the ones that came for freedom.
I hear that from old time Cubans..that are proud Americans.
I do hear other Latins complain about the loudness of Cubans tho LOL.
Mexico reminds me of 0bummie and the Demonrats: Always blaming someone else for horrible conditions they created.
The drug cartels are close to changing Mexico from a country into a huge criminal enterprise. Or is that what it is already? It was always corrupt.
Mexico has been a kleptocracy since they broke away from Spain. They are just in the process of deciding which criminal will be in charge.
Sorry in advance to any Mexican descent Freepers, but it's very true.
At least from every Latina woman I knew from South Florida.
Mexican men are the particular target of this sentiment. Apparently as "macho" as most South American men can be, Mexican men are reputed, justified or not, to treat women and behave far worse.
I don't know either way, I'm just reporting a widespread sentiment I've witnessed amongst my wide circle of Latino friends, from the Islands throughout South American and including some Central American nations.
I've seen hints of the said behavior personally, but nothing that would reinforce the strength of this opinion from my friends. I can only heed their warnings and keep an eye open for it.
Oh yes, a kleptocracy of the highest kind. But what is happening in Mexico today isn’t the result of any foreign(European) or American aggression/occupation . This is entirely self-wrought. The Mexicans are doing this to each other and the level of violence and political and societal destruction is unprecedented. The consequences of Mexico’s impending collapse are enormous. And seriously troubling. For Mexico and for The United States America.
Now how is Mexico going to handle absorbing California when it can’t even deal with its internal issues?
It’s Mexico. Owning a single round of ammo will get you prison time so why not own a machine gun?
Ping!
Thank you SwinneySwitch for the ping.
The Cubans that came when Castro tool power are fine folks, good hard workers with class and dignity.
Those who camo over in the boat life are garbage. Insane, and or criminals and garbage.
Sorry I sould have been more specific.
The Cubans that came when Castro took power are fine folks, good hard workers with class and dignity.
Those who came over in the boat lift are garbage. Insane, and or criminals and garbage.
Sorry I sould have been more specific.
What you said, and then all the world can complain about is the USA.
What am I saying, all the Dems can complain about is the USA!
FYI
Lugar: Mexican drug lords ‘most immediate’ threat to U.S. security
By Mike Lillis - 09/26/10 02:44 PM ET
The Senate’s top Republican on foreign policy said this weekend that drug traffickers operating on the Mexican border pose a more immediate national security threat than domestic terrorists.
Sen. Richard Lugar (Ind.), senior Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, is calling on the White House to intensify efforts to help Mexico fight drug lords at the border, where escalating violence has killed tens of thousands of people in the past few years.
“Transnational drug trafficking organizations operating from Mexico represent the most immediate national security threat faced by the United States in the Western Hemisphere,” Lugar said in remarks prepared for an Indiana-based training for Mexican prosecutors Sunday, Reuters reports.
“The United States should undertake a broad review of further steps the U.S. military and the intelligence community could take to help combat the Mexican cartels in association with the Mexican government.”
The Indiana Republican is suggesting the U.S. military and intelligence communities provide Mexico with more surveillance help, to combat the flow of drugs, money and weapons across the 1,969 mile border
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