The Old Gringo and his bossess will be on the road for the next three or four days. We are going up to the middle of the Republic of Texas to take care of a bit of business. There are a few loose ends to take care of here on the blog as well.
(1) There were no Gringos killed in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas over the 4th of July Weekend.
(2) The Borderland Beat recommendation given by the Old Gringo in a recent post needs to be qualified. There are so many different organizations with similar titles and label that one should not assume that the Old Gringo is endorsing one and all. The one I use has a number of different blogger contributors, some of whom have a points of view that are not concurrent with this blog. So, my mistake, but the blanket endorsement should not have been made. OROGs are more than capable of doing their own evaluations and casting about for decent cyber-moorings.
(3) Most of you should sit down for this one. My ideas concerning the New York Times could never be repeated on this forum. Michelle O'bama would have me deep-fat-fried and fed to The Children. BUT....my son did bring my attention to an article he found of interest. He pointed out to me that it was a strange departure for the Times and most of the international leftist press since Mexico has strung together a series of relatively conservative and anti-Castro/Chavez/Oretega/Morales administrations since the 1990s.
The New York Times has been particularly adept at speaking mendaciously and authoritatively about Mexican issues. The article included in this link, however, http://www.nytimes.com/
tells a bit of a different story. It is also substantially more accurate than the usual drivel. If the Old Gringo recommends anything from within the pages of the Old Grey Lady, then it might ought to be considered for at least a bit of perusal.
It is time to check in on my in-laws and to make final preparations for our northward trek to-morrow. As we head north, the brother-in-law, and the sister-in-law are both coming down south for very brief visits with the wife's parents. They are each bringing various family members and doggies....arriving from as far away as the Dallas/Fort Worth area and as close by as the San Antonio area. We render our little place as a refuge for most or all of the these favoured family visitors during these visits. The extra space makes things more comfortable for everybody...even the pooches.
(4) We should be pleased with the arrest of "El Mamito", Jesus Rejon Aguilar. He is one of the last remaining original ZETAS; the individuals who founded the group should be particularly despised because they were highly trained non-commissioned officers in the Mexican Army at one time. They deserted, sold out to the same people they were supposed to combat, and allowed their criminal organization to steadily adopt the "asymmetrical combat" engagement format so popular with many terrorist organisations. The Zeta group has become more and more disorganised over the last three or four months due to steady degradation both by opposing criminal organizations and due to the efforts of the Mexican Army, the Naval Infantry, and a new corps of semi-militarized Federal Police.
The Old Gringo has listened carefully to the "public response" by Rejon Aguilar to certain questions posed by authorities. These are public relations shows staged by the authorities in order to demonstrate habeus corpus and control of the "corpus". It is the opinion of the Old Gringo that Rejon's response to the question concerning the origin of the weaponry was misleading. He sounded, in responding to the question about the source of his armaments, as if he had rehearsed his answer. It is the strongly held opinion of the Old Gringo that the answer that the weaponry came from sources in the United States was being prompted by his thinking that that was what the officials wanted to hear. He is aware enough that the Mexican officialdom is more than somewhat miffed over the profoundly stupid "Fast and Furious" program of the ATF. There is nothing that can be said or demonstrated that will change the fact that this is a stupidity borne of hubris that equals what lead up to the events that resulted in the ATF's murder of a large number of religious kooks in McClennan County, Texas several years back.
But, the fact remains that the overwhelming majority of arms used by the principal cartel groups have been supplied by international black and grey marketeers from Red China, Viet Nam, Russia, Eastern Europe, Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Iran. The shipments have come into Mexico most frequently by boat and ship, most frequently off-loaded some distance off the various lengthy coasts of Mexico's east and west flank. The Cartel people have lost thousands upon thousands of arms and millions of rounds of ammunition in combat with the Mexican military. The Cartel people have lost thousand upon thousands of arms to improper usage and maintenance. That is just the way it is.
And folks, please do not waste time on this ATF thing defending the ATF bureaucrats. Before this is over, it will be learned that personal corruption in terms of financial gain is involved, and that the overriding issue in "Fast and Furious" was to advance the movement to disarm the common American slob who thinks he has the right to own a firearm.
If time permits, there might be a bit of addendum. We shall see upon returning from the Parents-in-law. Thanks for your time and interest up to this point, to-day!
El Gringo Viejo
(3) Most of you should sit down for this one. My ideas concerning the New York Times could never be repeated on this forum. Michelle O'bama would have me deep-fat-fried and fed to The Children. BUT....my son did bring my attention to an article he found of interest. He pointed out to me that it was a strange departure for the Times and most of the international leftist press since Mexico has strung together a series of relatively conservative and anti-Castro/Chavez/Oretega/Morales administrations since the 1990s.
The New York Times has been particularly adept at speaking mendaciously and authoritatively about Mexican issues. The article included in this link, however, http://www.nytimes.com/
tells a bit of a different story. It is also substantially more accurate than the usual drivel. If the Old Gringo recommends anything from within the pages of the Old Grey Lady, then it might ought to be considered for at least a bit of perusal.
It is time to check in on my in-laws and to make final preparations for our northward trek to-morrow. As we head north, the brother-in-law, and the sister-in-law are both coming down south for very brief visits with the wife's parents. They are each bringing various family members and doggies....arriving from as far away as the Dallas/Fort Worth area and as close by as the San Antonio area. We render our little place as a refuge for most or all of the these favoured family visitors during these visits. The extra space makes things more comfortable for everybody...even the pooches.
(4) We should be pleased with the arrest of "El Mamito", Jesus Rejon Aguilar. He is one of the last remaining original ZETAS; the individuals who founded the group should be particularly despised because they were highly trained non-commissioned officers in the Mexican Army at one time. They deserted, sold out to the same people they were supposed to combat, and allowed their criminal organization to steadily adopt the "asymmetrical combat" engagement format so popular with many terrorist organisations. The Zeta group has become more and more disorganised over the last three or four months due to steady degradation both by opposing criminal organizations and due to the efforts of the Mexican Army, the Naval Infantry, and a new corps of semi-militarized Federal Police.
The Old Gringo has listened carefully to the "public response" by Rejon Aguilar to certain questions posed by authorities. These are public relations shows staged by the authorities in order to demonstrate habeus corpus and control of the "corpus". It is the opinion of the Old Gringo that Rejon's response to the question concerning the origin of the weaponry was misleading. He sounded, in responding to the question about the source of his armaments, as if he had rehearsed his answer. It is the strongly held opinion of the Old Gringo that the answer that the weaponry came from sources in the United States was being prompted by his thinking that that was what the officials wanted to hear. He is aware enough that the Mexican officialdom is more than somewhat miffed over the profoundly stupid "Fast and Furious" program of the ATF. There is nothing that can be said or demonstrated that will change the fact that this is a stupidity borne of hubris that equals what lead up to the events that resulted in the ATF's murder of a large number of religious kooks in McClennan County, Texas several years back.
But, the fact remains that the overwhelming majority of arms used by the principal cartel groups have been supplied by international black and grey marketeers from Red China, Viet Nam, Russia, Eastern Europe, Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Iran. The shipments have come into Mexico most frequently by boat and ship, most frequently off-loaded some distance off the various lengthy coasts of Mexico's east and west flank. The Cartel people have lost thousands upon thousands of arms and millions of rounds of ammunition in combat with the Mexican military. The Cartel people have lost thousand upon thousands of arms to improper usage and maintenance. That is just the way it is.
And folks, please do not waste time on this ATF thing defending the ATF bureaucrats. Before this is over, it will be learned that personal corruption in terms of financial gain is involved, and that the overriding issue in "Fast and Furious" was to advance the movement to disarm the common American slob who thinks he has the right to own a firearm.
If time permits, there might be a bit of addendum. We shall see upon returning from the Parents-in-law. Thanks for your time and interest up to this point, to-day!
El Gringo Viejo
