Hit them in the pocketbook.
Awesome! ‘Bout time we put some muscle behind it.... though frankly, avoiding travel to Mexico is just a good idea in general.
Big props to the Congressmen/women (out friend Duncan Hunter among them) who took up the cause. His cause was finally gaining momentum this week.
Speaking of travel into Mexico, Simply carrying an old expended shell casing in your luggage or automobile glove compartment will put you into a miserable prison.
Most of the tomatoes you find in supermarkets are grown in Mexico. A boycott of Mexican agricultural products would also hit them hard.
I’ve been boycotting things Mexican for a long time. I would NEVER travel there anymore, it’s been years. We give them enough of our money. I don’t need to travel there as well. You don’t even know if you’d make it back home. Of course, that can be said of going to the grocery store here at home, but if you’re incarcerated there, good luck to you.
Kudos to Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Florida Republican, and Rep. Duncan Hunter, a California Republican, for pushing for this Marine’s freedom.
I just got back from Mexico City on Monday, and lived 10 miles from the border for a few years (Ft. Huachuca). At the border, the US is hot on intercepting drugs, and Mexico is hot on intercepting guns. That is a significant cultural difference.
Overall, Mexico has been a pretty good news story since the 1990’s (the years following the collapse of Soviet Communism), when the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) decided to liberalize their virtual monopoly on power, reduce the concentration of power in the office of the Presidency, and diversify the State’s massive role in the economy.
It is not well known in the US just how radical politics were in Mexico in the 20th century, because a virtual one party state re-wrote the history being taught, censored the press and pandered desperately for tourist cash. Trotsky didn’t flee to Mexico from the Soviet Union at random, he was welcomed by socialist revolutionaries in power who were implementing many aspects of his vision.
In the 1920’s and 30’s, the Mexican Government harshly suppressed religion - killing or driving out over 90% of priests, nationalizing Church properties, outlawing religion in public, and sparking the Cristero War which resulted in tens of thousands being killed. The Government eventually backed off its enforcement of the anti-clerical provisions of its revolutionary constitution, but kept its poverty-inducing socialistic practices until the 1990’s.
From 2000 to 2012, the conservative National Action Party (PAN) held the Presidency, and instituted economic liberalization which has transformed Mexico (a big factor in turning the tide on immigration). My wife and I rode to the pyramids of Teotihuacan outside of Mexico City with another couple who had been there in 2000. They were amazed by the dramatic transformation of what had been an endless slum of corrugated metal shacks.
Just this month, the PRI party re-assumed the Presidency after a 12 year break. A lot of folks are still very bullish on the prospects for the Mexican economy though, because the new PRI leadership grew up after the PRI liberalized, and power is more dispersed now throughout civil society. More concretely, PRI has a minority in the legislature, and can only pass legislation by consensus with the PAN. Also significant, is that public consensus is pretty strong now for free trade (Mexico has more free trade pacts than any other country), stronger anti-corruption measures, and more resources to counter narco traffickers. PAN, PRI and even the more left wing PRD were pretty much all espousing the same thing on these issues during the election.
So even though some things suck in Mexico, they have been getting better faster than most places. It offers great value for the tourist dollar, and my wife and I always have a good time when we go there. Having been to more than 70 countries, we go back to Mexico more than any other country. Some local law enforcement screwed an American in this instance (police corruption/inefficiency is a big problem there), but higher-ups have reacted to try to fix it. I would not hold it against the whole country - it was not a malicious anti-American policy, like you see in many other countries, but rather reflective of their own problems with law enforcement and their particular hot-button focus on gun smuggling.
How else would they keep their cartel masters paid off?