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June 18, 2006
Like Mexico 40 Years Ago
In the United States, the Supreme Court has ruled that evidence can be used against a defendant, even if police failed to knock before entering to execute a search warrant. In California's special election, some volunteer poll workers kept the voting machines at their houses for up to two weeks with no supervision.
We hear it said often that Mexico is about 50 years behind the United States. In some cases it seems that the United States is starting to become like the Mexico of several decades ago.
Posted by crispy at June 18, 2006 02:35 AM
Comments
Actually, the police knocked, but they only waited a few seconds before entering.
But really, they had a warrant at least. The Supreme Court isn't THAT retarded. I feared they just barged in without one.
Posted by: Mark Allen at June 18, 2006 07:45 AM
As an American living and working in Mexico for the past 18 years (at least in Manzanillo where I live), we are only behind the U.S. in a few things, such as salaries (minimum wage $7/day, and ecological awareness. We are equal in many areas: education, infrastructure, medical facilities. That is not to say that there are not poor or primitive areas here in Mexico, but there are also ghettos and slums in the U.S. Americans in the U.S. expect every country to emulate their standards, but who's to say our U.S. standards are better? Remember, Mexico is Latin AMERICA, and the term "America" doesn't just apply to the United States. Mexico, particularly the state of Colima where I live, is high in education, low in crime, rich in culture, strong in industry, and has an unemployment rate of almost 0. The differences between Mexico and the U.S. are what brought me here and the reason I plan to stay.
Posted by: Susan Dearing at June 18, 2006 08:23 AM
Susan Dearing: I plan to stay too. I don't tend to think that US standards are better, although I'd add another one to the list of where we're behind here in Mexico: women's rights. This is not to say that it isn't safe for women in Mexico, but rather that they have a long way to go to reach the level of social inequality to men that they have in the United States. On the other hand, the percentage of women in political positions here in Mexico is much higher than in the United States, so that contrast is not consistent.
The Mexican Revolution brought a lot of suffering to the country, and after many years, when it stopped moving forward and became little more than one revolutionary group fighting another, Mexicans were happy to tolerate the secretive and authoritarian governance of the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI). It brought order and stability and allowed the country to move on. However, once they'd allowed the PRI to run the country without question, it took 71 years before it relinquished power in fair elections. Mexicans accepted the security provided by giving up a truly representative and just government.
Now I fear that paranoia over terrorism, the "War on Drugs," and racism, people in the United States are doing the same. I suspect that I'll never be going back there because they won't wake up from that nightmare during my lifetime.
Posted by: Chris Coen at June 18, 2006 01:12 PM
Oooo! What a nightmare I am living!
We have had a representative and just government since Lincoln consolidated power and destroyed the republic.
Posted by: Mark Allen at June 18, 2006 04:05 PM
Whoops. I meant "haven't had."
Buh.
Posted by: Mark Allen at June 21, 2006 05:22 AM