MEXICO: AGENDA 2007

After too much sun and fun as Callie says, I guess it is time to think about what´s coming next as the year comes to a close. It is clear to me that one of the most important things to be considered by the progressive forces in Mexico for the next year (next Monday) would necessarily be the Anti-neoliberal Progressive Front real consolidation.

It is evident that AMLO was able to attract widespread popular support: it is time to reap what was sawn: First thing in the agenda? Education, and within education, political formation.

The construction of a real democracy necessary implies, as a sine qua non condition, the citizenship conformation. It is not enough to simply oppose the hegemonic forces: it is imperative to do it from a well informed, critical position.

According to official data Mexico has 103 million inhabitants: 8% out of them are illiterate, 40% has elementary level of education, 23% college education, and 1% doctorate level. The rest? Go figure. To say this might be kind of repetitive but it is always important to bear in mind that nearly 50 million people barely know how to read and write!

One of the first steps in this direction could be the elaboration of a good communication strategy with a well planned project and the use of alternative media: TV PSOE is a good example of how things can be done.

Otherwise, we are condemned to become, in Chomskyan terms, a little bit of a cynic or to perpetually experience deja-vous as it was the case with the Coup D´Etat in the last presidential elections.

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO EVERYONE!!

FULL MOON PARTY

"Looking-for-some-education
made-my-way-into-the-night
Stupid-Cupid-keeps-on-calling-me..."

3 MONTHS ALREADY: YES!!

GUESS WHO´S UP THERE!!

I don´t know either, but I wish it were me!!..

LOST PARADISE FOUND!!

I have finally reached my destiny: Acapulco Bay!! I am not going to get close to any hotel to steal its wireless Internet signal any longer so as to blog post. The problem is that I wish I could stay here for good: this place is so magnificent… It seems that the question now is to find a way of making a living here out of something: I guess that as a photographer, as you can see from the picture above, is not an option… the belly dance thing is out of question too. I´ll figure out something!!

ZHP: WHAT´S NEXT?

SOMEWHERE IN THE PACIFIC OCEAN


MERRY CHRISTMAST to EVERYONE!!!

VACATION TIME FOR ME!!

HEADING TO THE PACIFIC OCEAN!!

WAY TO GO!!

THANK YOU MICHELLE!!

CHOMSKY: WHAT´S NEXT?

Noam Chomsky, well known worldwide as one of the most important philosophers and linguists nowadays, gave a very interesting lecture last Thursday in Boston at an event entitled: “What´s next? Creating Another World in a Time of War, Empire and Devastation” organized by Massachusetts Global Action.

Chomsky gave a complete political picture of the current situation in the world: from Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict to the American paper democracy and the recently created Anti-Neoliberal Front in Latin America.

Important excerpts from his lecture were broadcasted by DEMOCRACY NOW! today.

Footnote: Chomsky mentions Haiti´s case as an example of real democractic elections: I don´t think so. Democracy is not just a matter of mass popular presumably well infromed participation. Economical conditions, level of education and real political powers are things to be considered as well, even when I recognize that as a good beginning.

TIESTO IN MEXICO!!

The world´s No. 1 DJ, Tiesto is in México!!

He already played in two concerts in Mexico City: eeeeeeeeeeh!!... and I didn´t go to any of them: ooooooooooh!!... however, he is announced to be playing in Acapulco Bay next December 28th at the best club in the country and possibly all around the world: YES!!

TIME´S PERSON OF THE YEAR

Tonight, after a 1 1/2-minute reflection period, I have decided to definitely decline the award as TIME´S “Person of the year”. My reasons are:

1. I don´t think I control the Information Age as it is stated by the Time´s people. On the contrary, what I see is an alliance between the mass media major corporations and the political elite groups in power that have the real control over the information, especially of the most important issues.

2. It is true that the Internet now plays an important role in the communication field given, above all, by its democratic profile but its influence is still very limited. It would be just a matter of considering the number of people who have access to it and those who have not worldwide. Therefore it seems to be ideological to proclaim such idea of people´s power.

3. Finally, Internet´s best expressions are, in general, efforts to oppose corporate media (Time group included). Hence I find kind of ridiculous such a designation.

Therefore I think that this time I am going to pass... Shame on.. me, I guess: for a moment I felt I was a kind of a celebrity.

TIME

UPDATE:

This might be the main reason behind the Time´s designation:

JOHNNY GOES BACK TO SCHOOL

The picture above, taken at the Mexican Congress two days ago, is fantastic.

The guy on the left is Raúl Padilla Orozco, Congress Budget Committee Coordinator, who had exclaimed with shameful excitement a deplorable “Cool!!” when it was announced a budget cut for the next year at the Mexico´s leading public University: UNAM. On the right, UNAM´s headmaster José Ramón de la Fuente is giving him a copy of a book written by the founder of Padilla´s party, Manuel Gómez Morín, on the importance of public education.

This case is not another isolated example of neoconservative chronic ignorance but, in fact, a clear expression of this guys´ well planned political agenda.

At the same time, the way they do things clearly reveal an unhidden clumsiness that, it must be said in passing, constitutes not just their biggest stepchild but also a tremendous window of opportunity for the progressive forces.

BACK AGAIN!!

I could not write a thing all this week long. The thing was that a very close friend suffered a terrible episode of short term memory loss. For ten hours he could barely remember something about anything. We took him to the hospital and stuff. He was lucky enough to be checked by one of the best neurologist in the country. He got his brain checked and everything and the final diagnose was: stress!! Man! Can you believe that?

I have thought a bunch of things out of this unexpected experience. I may be writing about them later. What I can say by know is that it is good to have him back: big time!

The funny part of this story is that one of the questions we asked him during the event to have his memory checked was: “who is the new President of México?” When we told him it was Calderón, he started laughing endlessly stating that that was impossible.

MEXICO: THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS

German sociologist Max Weber, regarded as the founder of social science, distinguished three types of legitimacy of political authority, namely: traditional authority, based on belief in the sanctity of tradition; legal authority, based on rational rules legally enacted and, charismatic authority, based on the leader´s appeal. He may have forgotten to mention a 4th type: interested authority, based on corporate groups interest in maintaining their account balance safe.

That is obviously the case of the privileged sectors. That is also the case in the partisan sphere, especially sad on the left, where politicians have retrieved to count their nickels. What has surprised me the most is that in the culture sector (with some exceptions) artists, intellectuals and scholars have kept a shameful silence after the Coup D`Etat in Mexico.

In a country where the corporate media are the ones who say what reality is and where its possibilities and limits are, this sector should be playing a more active role.

Well, and the rest of us? Striving to survive: one day at the time.

LIMEWIRE: ALL YOU CAN ASK

I guess that most of you guys must already know it but in my case I am kind of fascinated now that I have tried this peer-to-peer file sharing client, thanks to a friend of mine´s recommendation.

You may want to read THIS before you try it for free HERE.

ZHP GOES PLACES!!

I consider myself to be a somewhat discrete, moderate young man but... GUESS WHAT???

ZHP PASSED 1000 VISITORS TODAY!... WOW!!..
THANK YOU GUYS!!!

MEXICO: LESSONS TO BE LEARNED (A LITTLE BIT LATE)

In the last Mexican presidential election two things were clearly revealed:

First, that when the economical interests are at stake in a formal democracy, the real powers work together as a single force to impede, by any means, any possible change. That was the case in Chile (73), in the U.S. (2000/2004) and recently in Mexico (2006). This has been noted by all politics specialists on liberal democracy, from Bobbio to Mcpherson and from Dahl to Held, Laclau, Zolo et al. AMLO should have prevented this: now he knows it very well.

On the other hand, even if we just consider the official data, AMLO got the highest number of votes for the left ever. However it is important to ask us how many out of these votes were cast by well informed, politically conscious citizens and not so much by virtue of either simply opposing the new conservative ruling policy and its devastating effects or having sympathy with a charismatic leader. It is obvious that the political formation of the Mexican society is not in the ruling forces interest: therefore it must be one of the main goals for the progressive forces. It is the only way they could fight back against the system and its hegemonic control mechanisms.

Will they learn the lessons, even a little bit late?

GOYA, THE MASTER OF THE MODERN MASTERS

While reading the news this morning, I learned that the Goya´s fantastic surreal drawing The Butterfly Bull had been sold at a Christie´s auction.

Goya happens to be one of my favorite painters. I am especially fond of his so called “Black Paintings” from his self-imposed retirement period at his Quinta del Sordo (House of the Deaf Man). I cannot recall being so impressed by any other collection of paintings.

I found an excellent site to see them all HERE



THE MOST WATCHED VIDEO EVER

According to You Tube, the video below happens to be the most watched of all times. If that were not the case, at least it is one of the funniest. I guess that most of you guys must have already watched it: I hadn´t…

EVOLUTION OF DANCE

MEXICO: THE REAL RULING POWERS

Enrique Velasco tells it like it is. What he is basically saying is that former Mexican president Vicente Fox is a traitor to democracy.

He mentions 3 political actions that took place during Fox´s mandate in the mass media area, namely:

1. Back on Oct 10^th 2002 (Velasco says “2004” but it was in 2002) Fox signed in a new legislation that reduced from 12.5% to 4.5% the official fiscal time on T. V. (a tax mass media must pay by law) Why did he do something like this?

2. In November 2004 Fox renovated TV concessions to the 2 major private television companies: Televisa and Television Azteca. The thing is their concessions had not expired yet and therefore they were not expected to be renovated. On the other hand, these concessions were renovated for 15 years in order to avoid any possible modification by the next two governments.

3. Finally, Fox promoted the so called Televisa Law which gives unlimited power (and of course, a bunch of money) to the 2 Media Monopolies.

This renovated alliance between these two forces was fundamental in the last Mexican presidential elections. Without the mass media support it would have been unconceivable the official candidate´s imposition. All of this was more than evident in the news coverage last Friday: to be honest I hadn´t seen such a miserable mass media spectacle in ages.

Yale History Professor Paul Kennedy says, about the rise and fall of the great powers, that the weaker a power becomes innerly, the more it needs to express its force outerly. That is true.

GUESS WHO´S BACK!!

UPDATE:

Some of my friends have been calling me up wondering where the hell I was during this time. One of them told me I was seen half drunk having fun at different clubs in Acapulco Bay over the weekend. I say that´s impossible: it wasn´t me! I spent my whole weekend at home reading out loud French poetry of the 15th Century, you know d´Orléans, Pisan, Villon:

Frères humains qui après nous vivez,
N'ayez les cuers contre nous endurcis,
Car, se pitié de nous povres avez,
Dieu en aura plus tost de vous mercis…

Haven´t they heard that we all have an identical twin somewhere in this world? Mine must have been touring México at that time. That was it. Not a big deal!!

MEXICO: NATIONAL MOURNING

Given the most recent political events I have decided to begin a three-day period of mourning: therefore I will not be posting during this time.

MEXICO: FROM A SIMULATED DEMOCRACY TO A SIMULATED DICTATORSHIP

In an unprecedented televised ahead-of-time-ceremony, held at the presidential residence in Mexico City, Felipe Calderón took power as “president” this midnight. It was like a contemporary update of those bad movies of South American dictatorships from other times.

Later on, in a recorded message Calderón said that he would go to Congress later that day, as if it were something of little or no importance. Everything seems to indicate that the real ruling forces will go into an offensive mode in order to keep on holding power, no matter what.

Once this 10-minute ceremony was finished, I went to the 24hr coffee shop near my house. On my way back home, a police officer asked me to pull over. I asked him whether I had done something wrong and he told me it was a routinary check. I replied that that was prohibited by law and, stuttering over his words he asked: “by.. by what?”... I thought for a moment about the thing that I had just watched on tv. I looked at him and said: “Yes, you are right... law what?”.