Thread: Mexican Presidential Candidate on the Rise

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Mexican Presidential Candidate on the Rise

By WILL WEISSERT
The Associated Press
Wednesday, January 11, 2006; 10:42 PM

MEXICO CITY -- Ruling-party presidential hopeful Felipe Calderon registered his campaign with election officials Wednesday, saying he understands the problems facing common Mexicans and will stem the flow of migrants who head north in search of higher-paying jobs.

The tough-talking, Harvard-educated attorney has become the rising star of Mexican politics, gaining ground in public opinion polls despite widespread disappointment with President Vicente Fox, also a member of the National Action Party.

But he has acknowledged that he is the least-known of the three major candidates _ and that his momentum could evaporate if he fails to connect with voters.

Calderon addressed would-be voters directly on Wednesday, saying "I am fully aware of your problems and your needs."

"I share the worries of the farmer who does all he can to cultivate the land from sun up to sun down and doesn't get paid fairly for his harvest," he told 400 cheering supporters outside the electoral commission headquarters in southern Mexico City. "I share the worries of the mother who is unable to support her children ... the sadness of young people who, after putting all their efforts into their studies, can't find dignified work."

Former Mexico City Mayor Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, of the leftist Democratic Revolution Party, for months the front-runner in Mexico's July 2 election, has lost much of his lead as other candidates have begun to campaign more intensively, according to polls.

Roberto Madrazo of the Institutional Revolutionary Party _ which held Mexico's presidency from its founding in 1929 until losing to Fox in 2000 _ is fighting to bring his party back to the presidential residence, Los Pinos.

"Our adversaries are agitated and upset," said Calderon, whose speech was interrupted more than a dozen times by applause and chants. Our campaign "is the only option that is growing, that is rising and advancing."

Calderon promised to build a strong nation that can provide enough high-paying jobs to reduce illegal immigration to the United States. He also promised to give Mexicans universal health care, better education and safer streets.

Fox is limited by the constitution to a single six-year term. Opinion polls show that the president himself remains popular, but many Mexicans have become frustrated at his inability to push reforms through a Congress dominated by opposition parties.

"I share the worries of the farmer who does all he can to cultivate the land from sun up to sun down and doesn't get paid fairly for his harvest," he told 400 cheering supporters outside the electoral commission headquarters in southern Mexico City. "I share the worries of the mother who is unable to support her children ... the sadness of young people who, after putting all their efforts into their studies, can't find dignified work."

Such are the woes in a Third World Economy. However, it is interesting to note that the total Gross Domestic Product of Mexico makes it the 12th largest economy in the world (based on World Bank statistics from 2004). The problem there is the distribution of wealth, with wealth concentrated dispropotionally in the hands of the elite few, facilitated by a corrupt system of government. Such is the model the Bush Administration seems to following in the US. And what better way to reach that goal than to import workers accustomed to such exploitation.