Mexico: the Model Country for Today's Republicans

[Joanne98]

For OpEdNews: Mark Biskeborn - Writer

If you like the U.S. right wing and want to see its ruling philosophy in action in its purest form, look no further than the cruel, failing state of Mexico.

The Republican-style, conservative government in Mexico has always favored the wealthy ruling elite, with no real policies to improve its almost nonexistent middle class. The salient characteristic of the Mexican economy is inequality. “Mexico contains one of the greatest, most obscene gulfs between its wealthiest and most destitute citizens of all the nations on the planet,” (Mexico Unconquered, John Gibler).

This gap between the haves and the have-nots has a past reaching back through centuries of history. It's a tradition where a ruling Spanish elite took power and forever retained its conservative, right-wing reign over the country, much to its detriment. The Mexican ruling class with its authoritarian theocracy, like the Republican Party in the U.S. today, has always been populated with the privileged making policy decisions, those who, for their own profit, widened the economic gap intentionally and continue to push its divide.



“The privatization process created a new class of super-rich in Mexico. In 1991, the country had two billionaires on the Forbes list. By 1994, at the end of Mr. Salinas's six-year term, there were 24,” (“The Secrets of the World's Richest Man,” D. Luhow, The Wall Street Journal, August 4, 2007). In the U.S. the Republicans would prefer to privatize practically every aspect of the government, including even the military, as is shown in their penchant for billion dollar contracts with Blackwater, and their disgust for public healthcare.

In Mexico there have always been those who rebelled against the conservative choke hold that represses dissent from groups like the recent Zapatista Army of National Liberation. The on-going desperation of the vast majority of the Mexican people who live in poverty has made the drug trafficking business extremely popular. In many ways it serves as a new platform supporting an ongoing popular revolution for equality. A risky business on the streets, pushing dope helps elevate the poor to some semblance of a middle class where social mobility is otherwise impossible, except for those already in a position of wealth. In today's Mexico, the rich get richer and the poor learn to make money by selling drugs—though, even in the illegal drug business, the bosses at the top of the Mexican Mafia, the drug lords, or what the media likes to call drug cartels, are making billion-dollar profits.

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http://www.opednews.com/articles/Mexico-the-Model-Country-by-Mark-Biskeborn-090921-130.html

[madrchsod]

1. someone unrecommended?

nafta was the last straw for the usa and mexico.

[fasttense]

2. But Mexico has universal health care.

So, there are a few changes the Republicons would make.

[izquierdista]

3. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no

You've made the classic mistake -- you believe high sounding rhetoric has actually been put into practice. Mexico is very much a fee-for-service place, and only a very few are able to pay the fee out of their pocket. The first question to ask about any social question in Mexico is: "OK, I see what it says on paper; what are you actually doing about it?"

[Froward69]

4. Granted

but republicans in general do not know that. they rail against illegals but do not acknowledge Canadian Illegals. telling them mexico has health care (without telling them about the fees) shuts em up. and wins you the argument.\

we have to get our own country in order before we go telling others how wrong they are.

[anonymous171]

5. Neoliberalism is a scam nt