On Nazis, Discount Tacos And The Return of The PRI

PRI shirtAs Enrique Peña Nieto accepts Mexico’s presidential sash from failed drug warrior Felipe Calderon in the glow of flashing emergency lights and burning molotov cocktails, we are reminded of the historical context that journalist Sam Quinones used to describe Nieto’s party — the PRI — in his 2001 book, True Tales From Another Mexico,

What is now the PRI formed in1929, the same era as the Nazi Party, the Italian Fascists, and the Bolsheviks. While those parties faded into history, the PRI has lasted to become the world’s oldest one-party regime. Key to the PRI’s longevity is its understanding of human nature. Its authoritarian brethren posited ideologies — a master race, a proletarian dictatorship — that needed an iron fist to keep people in line. The PRI’s working concept was beautifully simple, more humane, and a lot easier. It bought people’s loyalty. It became history’s proof that every man has his price. As a powerful government in a poor country it found that men come pretty cheap. In return for loyalty, the PRI offered a candidacy, a professorship, money, land to squat, three years as a congressman, a construction contract, or a million other things a government can us to co-opt a poor people.

We are grateful for this perspective, however we also join the staff of Marfa’s Boyz2Men taco trailer in wishing Nieto the best of luck. Via MarfaList:

To celebrate the inauguration of new Mexican President Luis Pena Nieto (of the PRI) this weekend we’ll be giving a SPECIAL EXCHANGE RATE for pesos at 10 pesos to each dollar! That’s the rate at which the Mexican peso would be strong enough to have shown a major improvement in Mexico’s economy, which is the stated goal of Nieto and we hope it comes to pass.

So, for this weekend, bring your pesos over for purchasing delicious RC Colas, BC Headache Powders, tacos, Chili, Red Beans and Rice, frenchy fries and much much more and eat for essentially 20% off

Big Bend Water Wars: Aristocratic Ranchers Versus Resource Extraction Plutocrats

Sure, La Mina Grande, the newly re-opened silver mine outside of Shafter is a source of light and noise pollution, but nobody moves to a remote community of eleven (11) people for quietude and dark skies, right? And it’s hard to imagine a resource extraction operation doing anything other than improving a landscape and enriching the local population in its quest for shiny minerals.

Though now some artistocratic gentleman ranchers and their wealthy tourist friends may be affected, so the environmental impact of Aurcana Corp’s mine is being called into question. John Poindexter, a “Houston manufacturing magnate” and the proprietor of Cibolo Creek Ranch — an exclusive Far West Texas getaway where “captains of industry” and their hangers-on might experience “the exotic feel of a remote and foreign land located safely within the border of the United States” — is the one raising the biggest stink, according to the Houston Chronicle:

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Role of Snipers in Apprehending Undocumented Immigrants Called Into Question

From the New York Times‘ coverage of the increasing militarization of the US-Mexico border, specifically an incident in South Texas wherein two Guatemalan men were killed by a shooter from a DPS helicopter:

“Essentially what they’re doing is, they’re allowing D.P.S. troopers to become snipers. That may be something appropriate for Afghanistan or Iraq in a military operation, but it’s not appropriate for a community law enforcement function.”

Pancho Villa, the Battle of Ojinaga and the Roots of Modern Media War

A contemporary newspaper speculates on the likely consequences of the appearance of newsreel cameras at the front. New York Times, January 11, 1914.

As it turns out, questioning the accuracy of reportage on conflicts in Mexico is nothing new. From Smithsonian‘s re-examination of the way Pancho Villa’s film deal impacted the Battle of Ojinaga:

We should begin by noting that the Mexican Revolution was an early example of a 20th-century “media war”: a conflict in which opposing generals duked it out not only on the battlefield, but also in the newspapers and in cinema “scenarios.” At stake were the hearts and minds of the government and people of the United States—who could, if they wished, intervene decisively on one side or another. Because of this, the Revolution saw propaganda evolve from the crude publication of rival “official” claims into more subtle attempts to control the views of the journalists and cameramen who flooded into Mexico. Most of them were inexperienced, monoglot Americans, and almost all were as interested in making a name for themselves as they were in untangling the half-baked policies and shifting allegiances that distinguished the Federales from the Villistas from the Zapatistas. The result was a rich stew of truth, falsity and reconstruction.

The Big Bend’s First Bath Salts* Bust

The Alpine Daily Planet is reporting that two of the people behind The Purple Zone — the Big Bend’s finest purveyor of Zig-Zags, tobacco bongs, porno tapes and dildos — are the latest soldiers to fall in the War on Bath Salts*:

The investigation began with the March 23, 2012, search warrant at the Purple Zone that netted a large quantity of a controlled substance commonly referred to as “Spice” and often sold as a type of potpourri, according to the APD and BCSO.

Arrest warrants and a second search warrant were obtained Thursday and executed by Alpine police officers and Brewster County sheriff’s deputies at the Purple Zone. Another large quantity of what is believed to be controlled substance was recovered during the Thursday search.

In case you are still confused, The Aerostat would like to remind its readers that the chemicals used in manufacturing bath salts/potpourri/synthetic marijuana/hookah cleaner are mostly illegal in Texas unless we are talking about the Epsom variety. The laws banning the sale of such synthetic psychoactives are proving difficult to enforce on both the state and federal level, though that may soon change: Continue reading →

Nate Silver Sort of Makes The Case For Texas Secession

Nate Silver’s 2009 map of El Norte

When Texas’ pill-addled Republican governor Rick Perry took affront to the Obama administration’s Stimulus Bill in the spring of 2009, he started jabbering about the state’s supposed right to secede, prompting celebrated statistician (even then!) Nate Silver of fivethirtyeight.com to consider just what a separate Texas might look like. Now as Texas bucks the national trend of Democratic victories in the 2012 elections, there is once again ample internet chatter of secession as white people mourn for Romney* across America.

Seems like a good time to revisit Silver’s 2009 analysis. First, much to the chagrin of Republic of Texas true believers, he points out that there is no provision in the Texas Constitution that gives it the right to secede, but as part of the conditions of its annexation to the Union in 1845, it sort of has the option to divide itself into up to five new states. This is a game-changing revelation for those of us out here in the Big Bend region of Far West Texas.

By the terms of Silver’s theoretical exercise, the portion of Texas that falls under The Aerostat’s jurisdiction — the borderlands between El Paso and Laredo — would comprise a state that he christens “El Norte,” due to the region’s close relationship — culturally, geographically and financially — with Mexico. “It would be impossible to define El Norte by anything other than through reference to its Hispanic culture and its proximity to Mexico, as about 85 percent of its residents have Hispanic ancestry,” he writes. “El Norte would also be the poorest state in the Union, with one-third of its residents living below the poverty line. Continue reading →

Drought Relief For Northern Mexico’s “Reclusive Tribe of Near-Mythical Athletes”

The Tarahumara are famous among Yanqui readers as one of the peyote-using [pdf] peoples of Northern Mexico; for their apparel — huarache-style sandals in particular — and their ability to consume ample amounts of alcohol and tobacco in the course of dominating ultramarathons.

As such iconoclastic athletes, their practices served as the genesis of the barefoot running movement that has slowly been undermining the falsehoods of the running shoe oligarchy — from Nike’s insistence that humans need shoes to protect their feet to the rigged-reviews in Runner’s World — and bear some of the responsibility for the proliferation of the oft-maligned “fivefingers“-style of foot-glove.  Such stories are central to Christopher McDougall’s bestselling gonzo runner’s tale, Born to Run, and before that in Richard Grant’s excellent Sierra Madre travelogue, God’s Middle Finger.

But outside of veneration and condescending backlash from gringo runners plus the occasional National Geographic photo shoot, the day-to-day life of the Tarahumara is somewhat less well-documented in the English-language press. One notable exception has been Pilar Pederson’s writing in The Big Bend Sentinel about her efforts to bring corn to the drought-stricken Tarahumara villages of the Batopilas municipality of Chihuahua, a compendium of which Aerostat readers will find after the jump …

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