Tamaulipas state police (click title to entry - thank you) unload packages of seized marijuana in Nuevo Laredo, where clashes have erupted between northeastern Mexico's two most powerful drug-trafficking rings. (Raul Llamas / AFP/Getty Images / January 8, 2010)
March 18, 2010
...The warfare gave way to an uneasy calm after one of the warring groups took de facto control. The number of deaths here ebbed, even as violence soared out of control in other border cities, such as Ciudad Juarez, about 500 miles to the northwest....I don't believe it is politics that has the President of Mexico against the ropes. I believe the people of Mexico are fearful and feeling insecure. There is probably an element of 'whom is next' even considering some sons and daughters are involved with the cartels. There is a much larger dynamic that those playing politics won't recognize and take seriously. One has to ask how long the people of the border towns with the USA can sustain the siege?
Calderon drug war support wavering (click here)
By DUDLEY ALTHAUS
HOUSTON CHRONICLE
March 17, 2010, 8:24PM
MEXICO CITY — Having wagered his political legacy on the relentless campaign against his country's drug gangs, Mexican President Felipe Calderon refuses to back down — despite a growing chorus of criticism and a death toll that rivals many wars.
Opinion polls show public support for the campaign wavering, as analysts, journalists and politicians declare the war a failure. His anti-crime campaign is sputtering into its fourth bloody year with few signs of victory and nearly 18,000 Mexicans killed.
“To build this country peacefully we need to attack and confront the problems, threats and enemies that challenge peace and security,” Calderon said this week in Juarez, which has become the make-or-break battlefield of the campaign.
Calderon's supporters, including many in the Obama administration, praise the campaign as valiant.
But critics, among them some senior members of his own political party, say Calderon's reluctance to shift strategies reflects a stubborn streak that has negatively affected other aspects of his presidency.
“When someone has an opinion different from his, he tends to see it as aggression against him,” claims Manuel Espino, a former national leader of Calderon's conservative National Action Party, who has become a vocal critic. “He tends to distrust even people on his own team.
“Maybe it's a fear of seeming weak,” said Espino, a Juarez native, who is publishing a book this month condemning the anti-crime strategy in that city....
