The Anglican Curmudgeon Appears on the Screed of El Gringo Viejo

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     This is the nature of the commentary one might receive here and wherever El Gringo Viejo might go.   I refer to the web-site of the Anglican Curmudgeon as my synagogue, or even as my little Mexican chapel in the middle of nowhere, where the cattle and goats prefer diced nopal cactus to alfalfa.

     There is a lesson about the diced, perhaps even French sliced cactus if the wielder of the machete is deft.   The lesson is that things that are different and process of change does not, in and of itself, mean improvement.

   But in the case of the common Mexican nopal cactus, it is true that it is  better forage for lactating cows and ewes than alfalfa.  The cactus is better even for the rams and bulls because it has more protein and other such testosterone enhancing minerals and vitamins that I am surprised that pills containing common Mexican cactus pills are not being sold at the unheard-of price of 19.99 per bottle of 193 power-laden capsules,  shipping not included.....But Wait....if you call right away....

     Please study this posting at the accurmudgeon.blogspot.com.  I have had the  discourteous impulse to post the brilliant, and brief article here.   You, the esteemed OROG will do well to check in with the accurmudgeon.com and become involved with the culture wars within anchor institutions of this culture.

     The Estimable Mr.  Haley, a renowned attorney and authority on matters pertaining to the interfacing between Church law and canon, and Caesar's law....an attorney who has lost...but also won many more cases in these matters is one of the best....if not the best....thinker, philosopher, and lawyer in these matters that I, in my almost seventy years, have witnessed.   Jimmy Swaggart he is not.   He is a Catholic of the Anglican persuasion, bathed with the Episcopal understanding that the Bishop of Rome is only the Bishop of Rome, and there are many Catholic Churches that are good.  He also sees the validity of our Protestant brethren and sistern  in their adherence to the spoken word of the greatest Saints and the Son of Yahweh...the Nazarene, hope of our redemption and salvation. 

     But us, the Orthodox...he defends.

    And for that reason I beg and humbly require the OROGs' investment of six to eight minutes.   Your compliance is profoundly appreciated.

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The Rout (not Rule) of Law

I am an attorney, licensed to practice law in California (and also to appear in a number of federal courts, including the United States Supreme Court). As such, I take an oath to uphold the Constitution, and I take the oath seriously.

The Justices of the Supreme Court take two oaths upon entering their lifetime offices, which you may read here. Suffice it to say that each Justice undertakes "to support and defend" our Constitution, and to "faithfully and impartially" perform the duties of their office. After the 5-4 "decision" last month in Obergefell v. Hodges, there is a legitimate question as to whether Justices Kennedy, Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor and Kagan any longer respect their oaths.

Are those strong words? They are intended to be. Consider just this fact:

Well before the Obergefell case ever came to the Supreme Court, both Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Justice Elena Kagan officiated at same-sex marriage ceremonies. Yet neither of them saw fit to recuse themselves from deciding whether same-sex marriages must be imposed on all States under the Fourteenth Amendment. They simply ignored the request to do so, because it was filed not by a party to the case, but by amici curiae ("friends of the court", who may offer advice, but are not actual parties).

How does the Justices' insistence on participating in the decision reflect any impartiality in the matter whatsoever? Their minds were already closed on the subject.

Imagine the left's outrage if two lawyer-obstetricians had been on the Court in 1973 when Roe v. Wade was decided, and their votes had changed the outcome to one that refused to make an abortion a federal constitutional right. But when two liberal Justices see no reason to recuse themselves for having already performed same-sex marriages, nobody (not even the parties!) makes a peep.

As for Justice Kennedy, he broke his oath by legislating from the bench -- i.e., climbing out of his role as judge and deciding by fiat to impose what he thought was the constitutionally required definition of "marriage" upon America. The other four Justices, including Justices Breyer and Sotomayor, signed onto his legislative usurpation without a single qualm, so they are just as complicit in the violation of their oaths.

Note for the five Justices in the "majority": the word "marriage" nowhere appears in the United States Constitution. So where, pray tell us, do you find the source of your power to define the word for the entire country?

Answer: Nowhere. Justice Kennedy and his four cohorts simply assertedthat authority.

Once five Supreme Court Justices decide to abjure their oaths, and make up the law for the occasion, what is left of our much-touted "rule of law"? It has become a rout -- and nothing deserving of our respect, to say naught of allegiance.

We have a lawless President, who changes or suspends the laws at will, and ignores whatever he doesn't like.

We have a lawless Congress, who has to vote to pass laws before they can know what they contain, and who routinely (and fraudulently) exempts itself from the laws to which it subjects the rest of us.

And now we have the ultimate oxymoron -- a lawless Supreme Court.

When all three branches of the national government show such contempt for the rule of law, one might expect anarchy to result, but instead (because of the powers already vested in them) we get Animal Farm. The resulting elitism of those within the Beltway turns our country's founding principle on its head.

Once the common folk begin to grasp the fact that there is no leadership, but only lawlessness, and competition to "get mine first", the country may have to resort to martial law to preserve order. Such an extreme measure in response to an external threat (such as invasion) would be understandable. But in response to internal unrest engendered by elitist lawlessness, it will be a tragedy for the republic.

People need to use Facebook, Twitter and all the other social media not just for chatter, but to begin holding their elected leaders (and unelected judges) accountable. Without accountability, there can be no responsibility.

And where there is no responsibility, there can be no republic, but only a descent into tyranny.

Maybe Robinson Jeffers was prescient:

Shine, Perishing Republic

While this America settles in the mould of its vulgarity, heavily thickening to empire

And protest, only a bubble in the molten mass, pops and sighs out, and the mass hardens,

I sadly smiling remember that the flower fades to make fruit, the fruit rots to make earth.

Out of the mother; and through the spring exultances, ripeness and decadence; and home to the mother.

You making haste, haste on decay: not blameworthy; life is good, be it stubbornly long or suddenly

A mortal splendor: meteors are not needed less than mountains: shine, perishing republic.

But for my children, I would have them keep their distance from the thickening center; corruption

Never has been compulsory, when the cities lie at the monster's feet there are left the mountains.

And boys, be in nothing so moderate as in love of man, a clever servant, insufferable master.

There is the trap that catches noblest spirits, that caught – they say – God, when he walked on earth. 

When the Negro "civil rights movement" becomes a disease....nothing good can come of it

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     The OROG is afflicted usually with the notion that there is a readable  balance between reality and reason.   Most OROGs have the idea that if something makes sense, it probably has evidential proof that their belief or understanding actually does make sense.    Something as complicated as, "It is necessary to boil water with eggs inside the container with the boiling water with the eggs inside and covered with the boiling water in order to have boiled eggs" might be a hard angle to figure for some liberals, socialists, Democrat-mainliners, and deranged marxist black folks whose socially psychotic pathology has become steadily more obvious since their train fell off the track with the establishment of the Great Society.

    Their movement has hit points far lower than what used to put my mother into a frenzy of laughing and crying at the same time.   That was when she would have to deal with a white racist....usually white-trash....who would say variations of, or almost precisely something along this line:   "Well, if'n I ain't no better than some n*****, then who ain't  I better than?"

     The "cutting edge" thinkers in the pretty much useless "African American civil rights" movement becomes duller and duller, and more and more committed to a path that can only be described as group derangement.    The chant about ''Hands up! Don't Shoot!" doesn't even make sense, for instance.   Then the notion that "black lives matter, but no other lives amount to a hill of gorilla puke." does leave quite a bit to be desired in terms of the Beatitudes and certain Oriental philosophies and religions.

     The notion that somehow people who never suffered Jim Crow, much less slavery, have the right to the assets of the people (a) who fought for the concept of the abolition of slavery (b) people who fought for the right to control how the Negro would be manumitted from the imbecilic concept and practice of slavery, and (c) people who risked much in order to fold the Negro as a race and as a citizen fully into the American tapestry is preposterous.    Never mind the people who came after all the dust had pretty much settled.   Why does anyone have the right to tax people such as those identified above, so as to support what essentially is another form of slavery.

     That slavery, of course, is the status of being born into multigenerational welfare dependency and into a sub-intellectual notion that one has the right to never be offended, to never be denied, to be immune from any inconvenience that happens to not meet one's favour.   This lamentably now takes in perhaps a majority of those who count themselves among the cohort of "African-American" in the American population universe.   It also points to the fact that 77% of the babies born into the black-African ancestried American population are born without benefit of marriage and with AFDC built in, almost as a birthright.

     The writer is quick to point out that one can almost immediately point out the person with Black African ancestry who might be a conservative and/or a Republican, a category of the population that is thankfully on the increase, in spite of everything.   That person will be literate, studied, clean, intelligent, usually comely to a fault, almost always instilled with the noblesse of a Southern gentleman / gentlelady, and well adept at handling the white man or any person, extraterrestrial, or other eventuality.

    So that the OROG will be sufficiently armed, this is the Demand Manifesto of the Black Lives Matter movement.

According to the website, BlackLivesMatter.com, the movement’s list of demands for “Black men, women, trans and gender-nonconforming people,” includes:

1. We demand an end to all forms of discrimination and the full recognition of our human rights.
2. We demand an immediate end to police brutality and the murder of Black people and all oppressed people.
3. We demand full, living wage employment for our people.
4. We demand decent housing fit for the shelter of human beings and an end to gentrification.
5. We demand an end to the school to prison pipeline & quality education for all.
6. We demand freedom from mass incarceration and an end to the prison industrial complex.
7. We demand a racial justice agenda from the White House that is inclusive of our shared fate as Black men, women, trans and gender-nonconforming people. Not My Brother’s Keeper, but Our Children’s Keeper.
8. We demand access to affordable healthy food for our neighborhoods.
9. We demand an aggressive attack against all laws, policies, and entities that disenfranchise any community from expressing themselves at the ballot.
10. We demand a public education system that teaches the rich history of Black people and celebrates the contributions we have made to this country and the world.
11. We demand the release of all U.S. political prisoners.
12. We demand an end to the military industrial complex that incentivizes private corporations to profit off of the death and destruction of Black and Brown communities across the globe.

Following the list of demands, the BLM website features some commentary on the Obama administration’s current program addressing race relations, known as “My Brother’s Keeper.” The BLM website claims that My Brother’s Keeper “ignores too many members of our communities,” and fails to address the “white supremacist system.”

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     The commies and anarchists never change.   Always assert, never deny.  Demand the impossible and refuse to accept the impossible if it given.  Always express dissatisfaction and declare abuse whether it occurs or not.  Always demand reparations from the rich....who are defined as anyone who has anything.   Always be surly and act superior, morally and especially in terms of threatening physical violence and/or massive destruction of property.

     A sad submission.  Thanks for your continued attention and interest.  We retire for a bit, in order to return to the fray, perhaps later to-night or to-morrow.

El Gringo Viejo

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Teachable Moments: a few brief points concerning current events and the public theatre of madness

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     THE FIRST point concerns ex-Governor O'mally of Maryland.  He was famous for having turned over Maryland's largest prison for violent and other felony offenders to one of the prisoners.   That prisoner ran the prison in the way of all mafia-like...criminal-enterprise type convicts. The prison became essentially a criminal enterprise headquarters.

    His (O'mally's) conduct of State business was so bad that the body politic of Maryland voted for a Republican to be Governor of their State.

     O'mally made further inroads on the point that liberal Democrats have no inner moral compass, and they have no guiding moral or philosophical convictions.   He was answering a question about some matter, when he made the unfortunate remark, "Black lives matter, White lives matter, All lives matter."

     The assembled group of Democrats, mainly people of the leftist Negro pursuation, went berserk.  They shouted down the ex-governor, and drove him from the stage.   During a later interview with one of the berserk, marxist Negresses, she asked the ex-governor if he understood that the inclusion of the term White lives matter was offensive to what she and her fellow berserk-0-matic nut-cases see as the truth that she felt moved to force the ex-governor to confess, grovel, and essentially excuse himself from existence.

      And, do you all know what....????   He did.   He apologised for having said such an offensive thing as 'White lives matter' and he now understood the error of his ways, and he begged forgiveness from a socially psychotic, berserk marxist and her posse of nut-cases.

     Who needs critical thinking, testosterone, normalcy, and backbone when you can grovel?

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    Ahhhh!   And then there is that friend to the woman....I am woman...I am strong!!!! Planned Parenthood.   The spin-off subsidiary of the Margaret Sanger legacy.   Margaret Sanger who make truck with the Ku Klux Klan, the Prohibition Movement, the Communist Party USA, and with the innovative public health and cultural improvement measures of the German Democratic National Socialist Workers' Party.   You had to admire that she could put together such a gaggle of perverts, murderers, arrogant holier-than-thou meddling old WCTU battle-axes, Negro/Jew/Catholic/hating white-trash Klanners (the vast majority of whom were in northern States by that time).

     Throw in a contingent of wealthy New York and Massachusetts doctors and eugenics "scientists" of the day....the same people who in previous incarnations came up with the idea of "abolition" as a solution to the "Negro Problem".....and what a wonderful witches' brew of death and hate they could brew.

     In 1970....thereabouts...your humble writer was working for a community action agency in Hidalgo County...actually the largest one in the United States.   It was funded by the Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO - Executive Office of the President) and other central government and State bureaucracies.   Among the programmes operated by the community action agency in question was a sub-contracted project titled "Family Planning Services".   The receiving agency was the Planned Parenthood Association for the county in question. 

    It fell to my task....(actually my task was to Republicanise to the extent possible the programmes operated by the Agency)....to evaluate and assure compliance with stated objectives and procedures.   My job was to do this for all the programmes, including Head Start for the whole County, and various other  projects....totalling to almost 10,000,000 worth of annualised funding...a fortune in those days.

     The Planned Parenthood account was relative small, because they had other funding and many volunteers.   My number one task was to make certain that the operations did not include abortions, or even the insistence that clients and participants consider abortion as a Family Planning alternative.  The Executive Director, a long-term combat public health Registered Nurse (RN), was definitive, "We do no abortion.  We recommend no abortion."

     Still there were wisps of opaque smoke that seemed to spell out to people in the inner sanctum,"Yes, officials in the Planned Parenthood Association organization in this County recommend and direct girls and women to abortion services."

     It was true that the Executive Director RN, a brilliant medicine woman and excellent administrator, was telling the truth.  It was true according to all the women working in the five or six sub-stations of the organisation throughout the County.   The normally-disposed-to-gossip women did not "drop the dime'' on some surreptitious aborting going on late at night in some alley somewhere.   They could not, because in this area, much of the gossip and "chisme" (whisperings), is based in truth.

     A couple of months into the passive investigation later, it was the task of this humble employee to drive down to Weslaco where the Board of Directors of the Planned Parenthood Association for the County would be meeting at a public facility.   The community action agency had a clause in the agreement that its inspectors and programme analysts of the grantor could come by at any time, and attend or presence any activity of the grantee.

     And it dawned on me as I drove down.....the staff knows nothing about anything pertaining to abortion.    What about the hootsey-tootsey snootsies, all rich-folks and real, live MD-type doctors?   I went into the meeting room and took a seat in the far back.   As people filed in...finally about 15 folks...I stayed seated in the back, minding my own business.

     There was a call to order...no prayers, pledge of allegiance, etc.  A report of the balance and a report of the activities was read.  Then the chairwoman called a certain doctor to report on his research about the need for intervention services and availability of provision of such services.  A very well known Ob-Gyn strode to the lecturn.  He immediately announced that he had good news.  He took his wallet out, extracted a small piece of paper.  He then declared, "Ladies and gentlemen, I am proud and excited to tell you that we now have a women's health centre facility in Corpus Christi....a telephone number and address....where elective pregnancy termination has become a reality for women in South Texas.   There is some indication that soon there will be a facility in Harlingen.   So, nobody can say that we haven't been doing  our job down here."

     There was applause and "hurrahs" and other celebratory comment.  The chairwoman reminded everyone before departure that, in spite of this 'good news', everyone needed to remember that so long as Planned Parenthood was receiving money from the community action agency it would be necessary to continue to follow the line that there were no abortions performed by Planned Parenthood Association in the service area covered by this local chapter.

     She reminded that all referrals will be discreet and handled by the man who had made the announcement a few minutes previous.   As we broke up, some of the people who knew me socially and others who knew me as an officer of the community action agency exchanged salutes and comments, but none seemed at all concerned that I had been there.

     A full report was made.  Preparations were also made to begin to withdraw funds from the local Planned Parenthood Association over the next eight quarters.    Some time after, however, there was an out and out firing of all the top ranking personnel...the RN and her bookkeeper, several of the office managers, and so forth.    People more "realistic and sophisticated" were put into place and the PPA became integrated into the abortion chain of relationships.  You know...women's health issues.

Planned Parenthood has always been a House of Horrors, a ghoulish dealer in the death of innocents and the barter of their dead flesh.   It is the crime of the Century and the Judgement will come upon America when and/or if we ever stop fighting this macabre worship of Baal on American soil. 

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     And now at the risk of being called an Old Grumpo, we are totally disgusted with the stupid advertisements that dwell on the fact that there are auto insurance companies that force people to drive around on three wheels.   The insurance companies do this to the hapless policy holders on purpose because they want the poor unsuspecting policy holders to stop saying things like, "Hey, insurance companies, nobody's perfect!"

     Be there a mind so numb, be there so many stupid people who believe Banks when they offer "Buy one suit and get 10 suits, FREE!"?

     Did the stupid people whining about having to drive around on three wheels think that the insurance company they were using would be glad to essentially put on the "accident forgiveness" rider just like the one advertising with these stupid advertisements, if the client agrees to begin paying for the rider that provides that coverage.   Then, perhaps, the hapless victim client might have a chance to uselessly expend money for something that might be better covered by a savings account.

Arrrrrggggghhh!!

     And no, Virginia, the shipping is not free, either.   It might be included in the cost of purchase of the product, but it is not free.

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More later.

El Gringo Viejo

TRUE EXCHANGE - OPINION of ONE WHO IS MORE QUALIFIED TO COMMENT: EL ZORRO

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This may be one of our very few disagreements.

I do not see John McCain as a war hero.  Trump is correct, not that I am a fan of him, that McCain is considered a hero because he simply was captured.  The fact that he was in the military is honorable.  However the things he did, that by most outside of the military would be considered as extraordinary, are a part of the job.  Most people would respond to catastrophe with the same courage and instinct for survival.  McCain gave up information while in captivity.  Many others did as well because the torture is irresistible to all but the very strongest of character. 

I don’t know the real story of the actions he took on the aircraft carrier incident but even if he were to jump into the effort with all the other pilots and crewmen that would be a reflexive reaction of most in the military.  That kind of character is instilled in every one of them first in the oath of entrance and then through basic training, and in McCain’s case through his Academy training and OCS.

John Kerry was a hero before he wasn’t.  Trump is McCain’s swift boater (but not as successful).  That being said, McCain is honorable by any standard.  He may even be a hero by definition.  But… the only reason he is being identified as a bonifide hero is because he was captured.  If he had not been captured, he would have been given medals, which he actually was but there is not one heroic thing that makes him more outstanding than thousands of others.  Maybe he deserves the “title” because he is well known, a political figure, or by association.

I served with heroes.  I don’t even remember their names or know where they are.  I don’t know how I would have reacted had I been in situations such as those as was McCain but I hope I would pitch in.  On an aircraft carrier there is not much choice.  It is either put out the fire, save your brothers, or jump in the shark infested ocean.

Bottom line, Trump is obnoxious but he is right.  He did not say John McCain is less than honorable.  He did not even insult him.  He just told the truth.  Trump later said, in his attempt to walk back his truth, McCain is a hero but so is anybody else who is captured unless a traitor.

I don’t like what he said.  It was not called for.  He knew what he was implying.  But the truth is he did not denigrate McCain’s service.  He did not even say McCain is not a hero.  He simply said McCain is a hero “because he was captured”.

I have felt this way for years about McCain.  He rode on his father’s coattails, his money, and his notoriety.  He is not a good Senator.  He is mediocre one at best.  He and his partner Lindsay Graham.  He was a terrible choice for a Presidential candidate.  I think I, and thousands of other veterans, felt the same way.

The mainstream, uninformed talking heads are gushing all about how terrible Donald Trump is and what a national disgrace he is for his simple statement.  They know nothing of honor or duty of the military.  They are looking for anything to bring Trump down.  They are terribly afraid of him.

Okay, that’s enough.  My last thought is Trump is better than the Hag or Bernie.  I did and do support Ted Cruz but I am afraid we could end up with Marco Rubio or Jeb Bush (either would be better than Hag Clinton).  I don’t think Trump will go the distance.  The media will probably have their way.  That might be a good thing even though I don’t approve of their devious methods.

EL ZORRO

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     The above comments and observations give even an opinionated person such as myself the chance to ruminate, considerably.  McCain and I agree on about 40%, concur on about 40%, and pretty much disagree on 20%.   He has never been my idea of anything like a strike-force conservative voice.   His "suspension" of the campaign during the 2008 "crisis" brought on by the artificially induced "banking emergency" was stupid, ridiculous, and pointless for instance, and it played into the hands of a person who hated America then, hates America now, and who will always hate America and white people and black and Latin Conservatives.

     Perhaps my problem is that my service was not marked with any noteworthy valour.   A bit of dabbling in peripheral intelligence, nothing more, nothing dangerous, nothing romantic or chivalrous, no self-sacrifice.  El Zorro, as an advanced jet-engine and ground technician did not have to volunteer for out-of-theatre black and grey ops, very dangerous search and recover of personnel and hardware forays outside of South Vietnam.....but he did.   Those missions had a 1 - 3 per cent casualty rate.   Not good odds for repetitive forays.   After three or four...your clock starts to run out of ticks.

       So, perhaps it is best to put what he says into our pipes and smoke that as well as the fury of El Gringo Viejo's reaction.  I shall.

El Gringo Viejo

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COMMENTARY CONCERNING TRUMP's REMARKS ABOUT McCAIN - (very brief)

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     It is well that the Republican class see the disadvantage to having a person such as Donald Trump leading any charge, heading up any faction or fraction of the GOP, or in any way postulating as a valid candidate or spokesman.   The notion that he could denigrate the service and sacrifice of John McCain is preposterous beyond description.   We remember that McCain was also a hero in terms of the on-board catastrophe that affected his aircraft carrier before the Viet Nam War intensified.   McCain ran towards the fire that killed many and manned the hoses until the fire was done.  He was seriously injured along with several other F - 4 Phantom pilots who became firemen that day and not combat pilots.

     I am not a first line supporter of John McCain in terms of my positions as opposed to his within the debates held inside the Republican universe.  I am, and will continue to be a supporter of Ted Cruz.  But, I shall defend Governor Perry and John McCain from these ridiculous attacks made by a man who cannot help but say terribly stupid things and do astoundingly silly things as though he thinks it makes him irresistible to a gullible, ignorant political party.

     We are neither gullible nor ignorant.   We do await the moment when the deck is cleared for 19 better boys and girls who are on the "A list".   We have no time for clowns who are just another form of Hillary and Obama narcissistic self-adulators.

These comments are addressed to the OROG community and to the GOP community in particular.

Sincerely,

El Gringo Viejo

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EL GRINGO VIEJO revises and extends remarks concerning Mexico and the Mexican Government

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     IN THAT there may have been a bit of misunderstanding concerning the El Gringo Viejo's attitude concerning the Mexican Central Government in a recent and previous blog entry, we would like to make our sentiments known with greater clarity.   Fault lies with the writer, not the reader.

     While demonstrating that Donald Trump may be a billionaire, there is one thing that he is not.   He is not an expert of any kind concerning the infinite complexity, strengths, weaknesses, history, present composition, nor overall cultural projective ability of the central government of the United States of Mexico.

     To start, the Mexican central government, nor the 31 State governments, do not "send" the Mexican criminal class to the United States.  In the various offices of the Secretariat of Government, and the Secretariat of Exterior Relations,  Mexicans and Central Americans are exhorted, in fact, to avoid going to the United States of America and/or Canada in any illegal manner.   They are admonished not to use the services of "unauthorised" border-crossing assistants.  They are admonished not to go to the USA or Canada for the purpose of any illegal activity.

     There are radio and television advertisements that say the same thing, on different levels of comprehension.   The Mexican military flushes out people who are essentially being held hostage in safe houses in Reynosa, Laredo, and all along the border.   They clean the people up, and most frequently bus them down to Tapachula and dismiss them to the Guatemala entrance into Central America.

      The idea that the Mexican Government "sends" people with criminal intent and backgrounds to the United States is ludicrous.   What can be pointed out is that during the last fifteen years, requests for extraditions filed with the Mexican legal system have been met with increasing compliance.   This began in earnest during the term of Zedillo Ponce de Leon (PRI), continued through the regimens of Vincente Fox Quesada and Felipe Calderon Hinojosa (both PAN), and is still the rule de rigueur under the present administration of Ernesto Pena Nieto (PRI).
      What can also be pointed out is that Mexico during the past fifteen years, especially, has moved to the Right in terms of privatisation and de-nationalisation of industry and commerce steadily, while the United States, especially in the past five years has jumped into the boiling cauldron of acidic vomit of socialism with seeming abandon.  

THESE THINGS BEING SAID,  during this present administration of Pena Nieto, things started well enough.   But, in keeping with the normal nervousness that seemed to pervade the victory of the candidate of the old "Ruling Party" of Mexico and its 70 years stranglehold on the Los Pinos Presidential Estate, the government of Pena Nieto has steadily lost popularity.
    The Old Partido de la Revolucion Institucional (PRI) seems to have left an inescapable imprint on the chromosomes  and DNA of the New, Improved PRI.  It was my nervous belief, and the nervous belief of every literate, half-sober or more, Mexican.

     There is a parallel inertia going on while people run around in the confines of Los Pinos, apparently lobotomised, and make one stumble after another.  The very slight cut-back from aggressive action by the Naval Infantry and the Mexican Army sent a bad signal.   The "Cartels" have been and continue to be in disorder.   There are scores of "cartelitos" now, all badly led, composed of gaggles of drunken post-teenage illiterate thugs who are little more than street-corner ruffians with no souls.   They have continued to do a good job of killing themselves and setting themselves up to assault larger elements of better fighter (the Naval and the the Mexican Army), always with disasterous results.   The slightest lessening by the President of Mexico's pressure on the accelerator....turning away of interest and/or attention....failing to approve new initiatives for search and destroy and confrontation by the military seems to have co-incided with the building of the tunnel that will quite possibly lead to the castration of the Pena Nieto relevance as Presidente de la Republica.
     While business booms, the new labour unions prosper with freer negotiating authority and business at all levels steadily expands....perhaps it is well that a central, authoritarian, strong presidential presence is neither wanted, nor needed.    But it leaves the state of the War.   Once again, the forces of good are in the position of watching victory be squandered by people who have long been associated with being at times in collusion and at time tolerant of the "Cartel" activity.    I do not believe that the "new" Mexico, a two-trillion dollar economy Mexico wants to "share the stage" with a permanent class of extortionists and transporters of death poison.
     The populace wants the War continued to the furthest end that can be reached by human design and effort.  Elimination of all criminality anywhere is impossible, but to destroy the highly organized and massively lucrative activity can be  done by delivering repeated blows to ever diminishing cells and clics  of thugs.

That is the failure of the Pena Nieto Regime.  And, it is the opinion of this writer that the blow of the escape of El Chapo Guzman may have destroyed this administration....totally.   As I listened to the overnight radio in Texas and in Mexico during my last stay down at our little place on the side of the Sierra Madre Oriental, it became apparent that reasonably intellectually enabled Mexicans were disposed to be willing to accept or even demand the retirement of the present administration.
     There are two alternatives.  One would be a military junta holding power, leaving Congress and the Supreme Court intact and functioning and holding elections on the regular schedule, with the presidentials coming in a little less than three years;  and two, allowing the President to step down and installing,  as the Constitution prescribes, the President of the Supreme Court as President of Mexico pro-tempore.   These things are being talked about in the better saloons and restaurants, beauty parlours, family barbecues, and so forth even as I am writing these words.    That is the damage done by losing the greatest victory that could have been obtained.....the incarceration of a scumbag such as El Chapo Guzman.   The Army and Naval Infantry had wanted to keep the....individual....under military custody.   The OROGs can imagine the attitude of the military at this time. 

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     Trump knows nothing of any of this.  He says the Mexican Government sends criminals to the USA.   He says Mexicans take American jobs.   The fact is that American labour unions and the unwillingness of American automakers to stand up to American labour unions is the engine driving the loss of American jobs.

     But even that is too much of a convenient explanation about jobs, commerce, and economic vitality.   The fact is that Texas and Mexico at this time have taken cross border economic/industrial activity from less than one hundred million USD in 1980 to what is now well in excess of one billion dollars per day, both ways, to-day.

     We deal with the Mexicans on a daily basis, and they deal with us.   During my time with our little property on the side of the Sierra Madre Oriental mountains I have had no corrupt dealings by the State or Central governments.   During a quarter of a century, while my wife and I operated a very nice deluxe excursion company throughout Mexico we had little or no issues with any level of Mexican government.    We have had adventures, even served as counsel in criminal and civil legal proceedings, with effectiveness and no bribes.

     We have dealt with the realities and there are many, many American operations, small and large in Mexico who derive profit for both Mexican and American interests due to their presence.   We have dealt with the silly Mexican posturing about hurt feelings and "concerns about the immigrants" in the United States, and we have dealt with certain ridiculous posturing by politicians from the United States....as well as reporters....who pretend to be experts.

      I will assure one and all that Donald Trump does not know how bad the criminal illegal alien problem is in Texas.   It is far worse than he could understand.  He also does not know, less does he understand, how huge the economic activity between the Republic of Texas and the Republic of Mexico is during these days.    Were it not for the existence of Barrack Hussein Obama, our situation would be even better.   And yes, Governor Perry did act, and he did act effectively during the days of the Obama Invasion of the Unqualified of the Summer of 2014.   Mr. Trump did and said nothing about any of it until he could misconstrue and demagogue the issue and ridicule that which he chooses to not understand.

El Gringo Viejo.

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