Why the U.S. is so nervous about the border.

Mexico

Victor Flores Olea

El Universal

The Americans are “militarizing” the border, said Victor Flores Olea in Mexico City’s El Universal. The U.S. Senate has voted to call out the National Guard to prevent Mexicans from crossing illegally into the United States. Soon we can expect to see 6,000 armed soldiers to the north. Most commentators, both here and in the U.S., believe that President Bush is pandering to “racists” in his country in a pathetic attempt to shore up his poll numbers. If that’s the case, the docile silence of our own leaders is “grotesque.” But there may be an even darker reason behind the rush to beef up border security. Bush “fears a victory” by Andrés Manuel López Obrador in Mexico’s next presidential election. López Obrador happens to be a leftist, and the Americans—as well as their Mexican lackeys—can’t abide the thought that a new government might “touch, even gently, the rules of savage capitalism that they have imposed.” They’re afraid, too, that a left-leaning Mexico might “resume friendly relations” with other leftist countries such as Venezuela and Bolivia. In this context, American troops pacing the border are “an ominous sign.”

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