Is López Obrador the man Mexico needs? - Bloomberg View

[TomSea]

Is López Obrador the man Mexico needs?
Bloomberg View
Last Published: Wed, Jul 04 2018. 09 13 PM IST

The novelist and one-time Peruvian presidential candidate Mario Vargas Llosa once parsed Latin America’s political left into two broad phyla. There were the carnivores, usually strongmen, who trod on democratic institutions and liberties, while railing against foreign predators. Then there were the vegetarian leftists, social democrats at heart who respected democracy, individual freedoms and an enlightened market economy. To which species does Mexico’s President-elect Andrés Manuel López Obrador belong?

The answer, it seems, depends on the ecosystem. On Sunday, assured of his landslide victory, the silver-topped López Obrador, known to all as AMLO, headed to Mexico City’s storied Zocalo to hail his supporters as a redeemer. Then, in a separate speech to politicians and business leaders, he dialed down, vowed to safeguard fiscal discipline, respect the autonomy of the central bank, and honour agreements with businesses at home and abroad.

Calibrating your message to fit conflicting constituencies is an honoured tradition in Latin America. Consider Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the iconic former Brazilian leader who ran three failed elections as a leftist hothead before veering hard to the centre, reaching out to business leaders and winning the day with assurances of fiscal sobriety.

Read more at: https://www.livemint.com/Opinion/J9bpALZLpgyjmLSkTiZjeJ/Is-Lpez-Obrador-the-man-Mexico-needs.html

[TomSea]

Blackjack Pershing is on the right, the man in the middle probably needs no introduction, Pancho Villa. No, I don't think we are gearing up for another Mexican/American war. I could be wrong, yes. I never knew the two met up, Gen. Pershing of course, led an excursion chasing Villa down in Mexico.  The picture must be from years before.