Borderland Beat

A stupid rant on how I lost faith in my country and its citizens...
Letter to My Disappeared Son
Mexico hypes high-profile captures,but quietly releases other leaders
KEEP UP HOPE OR FACE REALITY?

A stupid rant on how I lost faith in my country and its citizens...

Posted: 27 Oct 2014 03:35 PM PDT

Tijuano´s NOTE: First of all, I want to make clear that this is NOT a news article and this DOES NOT represent anyone at Borderland Beat but MYSELF.

If you are one of those easily offended when they don´t read a politically correct article, then PLEASE stop reading, if you consider me a "turncoat" (whatever the hell that is) for previously expressing my belief that the 43 Normalistas were executed in retaliation because some criminal got mad at them for their conduct then again, PLEASE stop reading, save your time cause I wont take that back, I still believe so (NO, I´m not saying they DESERVED it, read again what I wrote!).

I must also warn you, this might not make any sense, it is after all a rant, a way of getting out my anger and nothing more. If, after all that, you are still interested in reading what a simple Mexican citizen has to say about his country and how he feels all is going to hell, then, please, continue...

I don´t know how to start this, how to express the anger I´m feeling right now, all I can say is I lost hope in Mexico, I´ll explain myself: I lost hope in living in a country where the rule of law and justice prevails, I lost hope of living in a country where you can actively participate in politics and make a change in your community, I lost hope in myself as a Mexican citizen.

The Ayotzinapa massacre (I´m sure they are dead, sorry) is just the last of a HUGE number of criminal acts which have taken place in Mexico in the last years, criminal acts which could have not happened if not for the compliance and corruption of both the Political/Government and Society as a whole.

While the idea of a Federal Government powerful enough and willing to kill 43 rebellious students because they oppose the current economical powers is quite frightening and a great propaganda tool for those in the political opposition, I feel something even worse is taking place in my country, I feel all the power the Federal Government once had is gone, We live in a country where a mere small city Mayor believes He has enough power to disappear 43 students without having to face justice, a country where local politicians do whatever they want and have their kids meeting with druglords to have a drink(Vallejo´s son, anyone?), a country where anyone can be executed and nothing will happen, where you can have your kid go out and never see him alive again, a country where 72 immigrants are savagely execute and nobody gives a damn because "they were some damn sudacas", a country where people forget this massacres in a matter of weeks, sometimes less. That´s a reason why I lost hope in my country.

I must admit I do not share the Normalistas political views, I even admit I´ve expressed in the past my dislike of their acts, and have called them in several times vandals, I won´t deny that. What I will say is NONE of that makes them deserving of anything close to what happened to them.

Speaking of political views, I feel I got to write about this too, I find it extremely nauseating how many in the Mexican opposition are using this case as a way of hitting their enemies without having any real interest in the Normalistas or their well being.

Right now there is no clean political party in Mexico, while its true that EPN and PRI are those in Federal power, both PAN and the leftist parties have a lot to do with the current situation, even AMLO who some blindingly see as a Mexican savior (forgetting he was part of PRI too and forgetting the ties some of his close associates have had to criminals in the past) has a lot of explaining to do. That´s another reason why I´ve lost faith in my country´s future.

The way I see it Mexico is FUCKED (excuse my words, but that´s the only word I can think of), With a society divided between those with little to no concern to anything else to soccer or their soap operas and a group of "political activists" who act only as fanatics of a Caudillo, I feel Mexico has no hope of changing its ways in this generation.

Many will call me a quitter, a bad Mexican, you name it, but How can I have hope in a country where kids outside of elementary school argue over who´s the baddest cartel, over who is more powerful while listening to corridos on their cellphones with their parents amused for the scene? How can I have hope in a country where there is not a single politician willing to do a REAL cleanup? A country where those who criticize the "mafia del poder" are the same who hang around with Julio Cesar Godoy (Familia Michoacana member turned Federal Deputy by PRD), those who launch political careers like that of Jose Luis Abarca (Iguala´s butcher) or that of Narciso Agundez(former BCS Governor accused of having his campaign paid by Francisco Javier Arellano Felix), a country where politicians like Tomas Yarrington, Fidel Herrera or Humberto Moreira rise to huge power levels, a country where the Arellano Felix brothers partied with PAN´s Tijuana mayor?

How can I have faith in a country where a great man like Dr. Mireles is jailed while several of Tijuana´s criminals I knew had been arreste are already free? How can I have faith when I failed as a citizen by omission?

This is just the tip of the iceberg, excuse me if I don´t make sense with this but I HAD to take it out of me, there are a lot of other reasons why I lost hope in my country which I might add later, right now the anger is too much to keep writing.

As a citizen who loves his country and who truly tried and failed at making a change, all I got to say is I´m sorry Mexico, I failed you miserably as a citizen.

Tijuano.

Letter to My Disappeared Son

Posted: 27 Oct 2014 01:40 PM PDT

Letter to My Disappeared Son

By: Ramiro Padilla Atondo

Columnist, Sin Embargo

Translated by ME

Son, first of all I apologize. I know that this apology is coming too late, but I think it's the only way to do it.

Though you're not my biological son, you are my son by being born in this land. So it hurts, I get an infinite rage knowing that your dreams have been cut short, precisely by those which we pay so that you could fulfill them.

I also know that much of the responsibility falls on me, as on any citizen who has not cared much for the country's direction, I prefer watching TV to reading, I am gullible to anything coming from the idiot box.

I knew from the beginning that those who swore to take us to a better world, are but a business club for those who do not care about the average citizen like you and me. They are already on the other side, the side of impunity side of the untouchables.

And you know why? Because I've allowed. I am easy to buy. I'm a pushover. So when they go to my house in a campaign, I perpetuated the image of the idiot, submissive Mexican who still believes in the eternal promises that never come.

Why this happened, has caught me deeply. You're a boy and you're a boy like many that rose ut to walk in the mountains, like the ones shot and burned. Both are victims of a broken system, a system like Saturn, has started to devour his children.

Demanding a better country should not be a cause of death. Joining a cartel should not be an option to circumvent poverty. But this is what we were taught. .We live in a country that lives the culture of the minimal effort If you're a soap opera actor or president (which are generically interchangeable) or on his political shortlist, you know you do not have to work. Just walk around and have your picture taken at public events, to prove that you're working.

We live in a country where being poor and demanding your rights is synonymous with being a vandal. You as a poor student must understand that you have no rights, even the right to life.

The sad thing is that I, your father, I understood this too late. It gives me an infinite shame knowing I could have done something and did not.

But you know what? It is never too late. This parasitic class has to go. They are mistaken if they believe they have control of the country.

The simulation has an expiration date, and now they are paying a very high price. Every day that passes without them knowing it was you will turn into a very heavy burden for them to carry.. The house of cards they built will collapse. .

And although they bet on delay and the people forgetting, we, the majority, have four words, no forgiveness, no forgetting. They will try to divert attention, they will try to blame a few and then say it was resolved.

But do not forget. The world is with us. And for the first time in ages, we are united.

And this I do for you. For my other children. It's my country too, and have the right to decide what goes on in it..

I bid asking forgiveness from the bottom of my heart, and promising you that I will not stop fighting until I know it was you, and that justice is done.

Let me end with this quote by fBerltolt Brecht:

"First they took the Jews, but I was not Jewish, I did not care.

Then they took the communists, but as I was not a communist, nor really care.

Then they took the workers, but I was not labor, nor really care.

Later they took the intellectuals, but as I was not intellectual, nor really care.

Then followed with the priests, but I was no priest, so I did not care.

Now they come for me, but it's too late.

(DD. I would have added

"Son, we care and will not let that happen again")

Mexico hypes high-profile captures,but quietly releases other leaders

Posted: 27 Oct 2014 10:18 AM PDT

Borderland Beat translated and republished from Reforma

From 2012 to date, 10 of the top leaders of drug trafficking in Mexico were arrested or killed, but another dozen dealers in the same time period were released. The administration of President Enrique Peña has captured legends criminal cartels of Sinaloa and Juárez and organizations Beltran Leyva and the Knights Templar.

Among these are Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman; Miguel Treviño Morales, "Z-40"; Hector Beltran Leyva, "El H"; Vicente Carrillo Fuentes, "The Viceroy" and Nazario Moreno González, "El Chayo".

In that same that same period, 10 high-profile drug traffickers were released from prison, most released quietly and after a short sentence. Only one of these traffickers who was released from prison, was rearrested and is back behind bars. The other nine are free, some of which are untraceable.

In some of these cases, the federal court concluded that the guarantees of due process of the accused was neglected, or ; the detainee was a protected witnesses, that the accusations endured proved fallacious and some captures derived from warrantless searches.

The most emblematic case is that of Rafael Caro Quintero, who on August 9, 2013, after serving in prison for more than 28 years, a court ruled that he should have been tried in the local jurisdiction rather than in the federal. He was ordered released, without notification to the United States, where he was wanted. This ruling was revoked and today, once again is haunted.

The Sinaloa capo Jesus Albino Quintero, "Don Beto" who reconciled the interests of cartels of Sinaloa and Gulf, was released last June 12^th after being convicted by a federal court in Mexico City and sentenced to 12 years of imprisonment.

Another high profile drug dealer who also left the jail is Carlos Alberto Rosales Mendoza, "El Tísico", who had influence in Guerrero and Michoacán until 2004, when he was arrested. Rosales, who led Los Zetas in Michoacán for more than a decade, was boss of the leader Nazario Moreno, founder of La Familia Michoacana and Los Caballeros Templar, Rosales left the federal prison Matamoros last May 22.

For Albino Quintero and Carlos Rosales soon could be prosecuted again, because the PGR appealed their sentences and unit courts could modify them. Something similar happened with Martin Alejandro Beltran Coronel "El Aguila "jefe for the Sinaloa cartel in Jalisco, following the death of his uncle Ignacio" Nacho "Coronel. He was acquitted and released on September 24 for failure of due process and inconsistencies in witness protection.

The PGR challenged the exemption to a unitary court . The lot is very different for Ricardo García Urquiza, "El Doctor", commander for the Juarez Cartel, released Jan. 17; Roberto Beltrán Burgos, exonerated on May, 16^th who was a leader for the Sinaloa Cartel, and Rogelio González Pizaña "El Kelin", Operator of the Gulf Cartel released on August 30^th .

Garcia Urquiza and Gonzalez Pizaña was awarded a higher court ratification that greatly reduced the sentence, which they had already fulfilled. Meanwhile with Beltran an unitary court confirmed his innocence by finding he was not involved with trafficking.

José Gil Caro Quintero "Jogil", nephew Rafael Caro Quintero was arrested in 2004, also released after serving 10 years with 5 months in prison. Although they did not elaborate, some sources consulted said that he was arrested and again today is confined to the Criminal Puente Grande, Jalisco.

In 2013, in addition to Caro Quintero, Arturo Hernández González "El Chaki," also was released from prison, one of the bloodiest operators of the Juarez Cartel, who in April completed their sentences to 10 years in prison for laundering money.

Another bad guy that left prison is Adán Medrano Rodríguez "El Licenciado", who at the time considered one of the main operators of the Gulf Cartel.

Leaders and commanders released and on the streets:

Adán Javier Medrano, Cártel del Golfo

Rafael Caro Quintero, prominent and historical narco leader

Arturo "Chaki" Hernández, Cártel de Juárez

Ricardo García Urquiza, Cártel de Juárez

José Gil Caro Quintero, Cártel de Sinaloa, the only one recaptured

Roberto Beltrán Burgos, "El Doctor", Cártel de Sinaloa

Carlos Alberto Rosales, Maximum leader Zetas in Guerrero and Michoacán

Rogelio González Pizaña, Cártel del Golfo

Martín Alejandro Beltrán Coronel, Cártel de Sinaloa

Jesús Albino Quintero, Sinaloa and del Golfo

KEEP UP HOPE OR FACE REALITY?

Posted: 27 Oct 2014 10:45 AM PDT

By DD for Borderland Beat

One month after the horrible tragedy of the murder and kidnapping of the students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos school in Ayotzinapa, Father Alejandro Solalinde arrived at the school to conduct a mass for the missing students.

He had been invited to conduct the mass by a group of parents of the missing students that he had met with in Mexico City earlier in the week. However the religious ceremony did not happen.

When he arrived at the school he was met by another group of parents who heckled, chided and questioned him about statements he had made regarding their children being dead.

The frustration, anger and rage of the parents was palpable. And understandable. Their government was telling them one thing and Solalinde was telling them and the world something else.

Father Solalinde, who is one of the most prominent and respected human rights activist in Mexico had met earlier in the week with the Attorney General of the Republic, Murillo and given him a statement. He had said that according to eye witness students he had talked with and one other witness who had come One month after the horrible tragedy in Iguala when the local police attacked the students from the Rural Normal "Raúl Isidro to him that all of the missing students were killed and their bodies burned. Some of them burned while still alive.

And he further told the AG that their bodies are buried around Iguala. and "there is no hope" they are still alive".

Father Solalinde was recently interviewed by the television journalist Carmen Aristegui. In the interview, Solalindeargued that it was cruel to encourage the families of the students to hope that they might still be alive.

He said that he knew they were dead, because people—including one man who, he insisted, had witnessed what had happened to the students—had come to him to tell him what they knew. He said the students, some of them wounded, had been marched up into the jungle-covered hills, and forced to dig their own graves. Then they were executed. But some of them were still alive when, along with the bodies of their dead companions, they were soaked with diesel, laid over wood, and set on fire.

Under a barrage of questioning from Aristegui, the priest, his voice tight with anguish, insisted on the credibility of his sources. Solalindebelieves that the authorities lied and that the grave holding twenty-eight badly burned bodies did indeed contain the students.

After a 2 hour meeting with the parents who believed the students were still alive and wanted him to withdraw his statements that the students were dead, the Vicar agreed to not comment further on the facts, cancelled the mass and left the campus.

The press was waiting for him as he left and peppered him with questions. Solalinde told the media,

""I'm respectful, I will be on hold until they ask me for help," said the priest, who explained that it is they who have to process the information. "I will not lead anything, I am not a leader or anything, I am not their spokesperson, nor will usurp their leadership. Just want to tell them that if in anyway I can serve, you will tell me,"

In the interview with the television journalist Carmen Aristegui , Solalinde had argued that it was cruel to encourage the families of the students to hope that they might still be alive. He said that he knew they were dead, because people—including one man who, he insisted, had witnessed what had happened to the students—had come to him to tell him what they knew. He said the students, some of them wounded, had been marched up into the jungle-covered hills, and forced to dig their own graves. Then they were executed. But some of them were still alive when, along with the bodies of their dead companions, they were soaked with diesel, laid over wood, and set on fire.

"We do not know if they are in the pits, the Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team has the technology to know, they can work in normal, but not impossible ways with charred remains"

(DD. The Argentine forensic experts have been collecting DNA from family members, but the AG of the state of Guerrero has impeded and obstructed their investigation by not allowing them access to the remains or the fosas).

"What causes less damage to the system?" Solalinde asked. "To say they [the students] were burned, with everything that implies? Or say they're disappeared and that they don't know what happened. The second has less impact, and is less incriminating, but it's more painful for the families to keep them hoping. "

The priest said "the Mexican government is giving a political rather than judicial case management and to assess what truth say the least political cost. "What is less painful for the system ?, say they are burned with all that implied that ?, or say who are missing and do not know what happened, because it is less shocking to say the latter, and also less compromising but it is more painful for the family to have them with hope.

The government knows many things, if you are retaining the truth it is your responsibility, I must say, this management is already polluted and management of the investigation is not about justice, it's political, "he said

Sources;

Sin Embargo

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