As the press and several bloggers have noted recently, US Ambassador Carlos Pascual has been quite vocal about Mexico defining the military's role in the drug war. He's called for strategies, plans, details, etc. There's been little negative reaction, which leads one to believe the majority of Mexicans are not too concerned with an American envoy telling their government what to do. After all, the Mexican government is struggling; Pascual is a well-respected diplomat who isn't known for meddling just for the sake of meddling.
Then there's US Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano. From an interview with Fox's Bill O'Reilly, follows this exchange.
O'REILLY: Calderon's a good man, unlike Fox. Fox was a crook.
NAPOLITANO: Yes.
Yes? A top US official comes out and agrees with a right-wing pundit that the former Mexican president was a crook? Personally, I find this infuriating. Good luck to the ambassador in smoothing this one over, unless the Mexican government chooses to simply ignore top US officials who slander a former president (who, incidentally, was possibly the least crooked in Mexico's history.) Unfortunately, you can't just ignore Napolitano given there's a drug war going on.
(A transcript of the interview is in the link in title.)
"Pascual is a well-respected diplomat who isn't known for meddling just for the sake of meddling."
ReplyDeleteOH? What was he doing in Afganistan?