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Mexico Will Decriminalize Some Drug Use
Tracy Wilkinson - Los Angeles Times
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June 22, 2009


	The important thing is ... that consumers are not treated as criminals. - Rafael Ruiz Mena

Mexico City � Could Mexican cities become Latin Amsterdams, flooded by drug users seeking penalty-free tokes and toots?

That is the fear, if somewhat overstated, of some Mexican officials, especially in northern border states that serve as a mecca for underage American drinkers.

The Mexican legislature has voted quietly to decriminalize the possession of small amounts of pot, cocaine, methamphetamine and other drugs, an effort that in the past has proved highly controversial.

There has been less protest this time around, in part because there hasn�t been much publicity.

Some critics have suggested that easing the punishment on drug possession sends the wrong message at a time when President Felipe Calderon is waging a bloody war on major narcotics traffickers. The battle between law enforcement authorities and drug suspects has claimed more than 11,000 lives in the past 2.5 years.

But it was Calderon himself who proposed the decriminalization legislation.

His reasoning: It makes sense to distinguish between small-time users and big-time dealers, while re-targeting major crime-fighting resources away from the former and toward the latter and their drug lord bosses.

�The important thing is ... that consumers are not treated as criminals,� said Rafael Ruiz Mena, secretary general of the National Institute of Penal Sciences. �It is a public health problem, not a penal problem.�

The legislation was approved at the height of a swine-flu outbreak in Mexico that dominated the world�s attention. Meeting at times behind closed doors � the better to prevent the spread of disease, officials said � the lower and upper houses of Congress passed the bill on the last days of April. It awaits Calderon�s signature.

The bill says users caught with small amounts � five grams of marijuana, 500 milligrams of cocaine � clearly intended for �personal and immediate use� will not be criminally prosecuted. They will be told of available clinics and encouraged to enter a rehabilitation program.

As many as 40 milligrams of methamphetamine, a synthetic and especially harmful drug, are permitted, as are as many as 50 milligrams of heroin.

In May of 2006, then-President Vicente Fox, from Calderon�s right-wing party, vetoed a similar bill Congress had approved and that he initially supported. He backed down only under pressure from Washington, D.C., where the Bush administration complained decriminalization for even small amounts could increase drug use.

Political implications

But with less than a month to go before critical mid-term elections in which his party is struggling to maintain control of Congress, Calderon cannot afford to be seen as bowing to the U.S., analysts say. Already under intense criticism for the drug-related violence terrifying parts of the country, Calderon needs to maintain good relations with Congress, where much of the opposition voted in favor of the decriminalization initiative. He can�t suddenly go back on his own bill.

And so, political observers say, he probably will sign it into law. Calderon�s office did not comment for this story.

So far, the U.S. government has not publicly objected to the bill. Michele Leonhart, acting director of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, however, said in April that legalization of drugs �would be a failed law enforcement strategy for both the U.S. and Mexico.�

Mexican government officials stress they are not talking about legalization, but decriminalization. Until now, courts decided on a case-by-case basis whether and how to punish first-time offenders. And standard criteria for quantities hadn�t existed.

Mexico is woefully underequipped to handle a booming drug-abuse problem. Recently, domestic consumption has soared. A 2007 study by the government found the number of �addicts� doubled in the previous five years.

Critics cite violence

The decriminalization legislation has received criticism from several officials of northern border states, who fear so-called �drug tourists� will flock to towns and cities already besieged by violence.

�Allowing the carrying of certain amounts of drugs will create more consumers,� said Oscar Villalobos Chavez, social development secretary for the State of Chihuahua, which borders Texas.

Mary Ellen Hernandez, director of the Rio Grande Safe Communities Coalition in El Paso, across the border from blood-soaked Juarez, said she worried decriminalization would lure Americans into a drug world they aren�t prepared for and increase violence on both sides of the border. �Already, the drugs that don�t come over into the U.S. are being handed out by dealers to younger and younger children (in Mexico), 8-, 9-, 10-year-olds, hooking them,� said Hernandez, whose agency specializes in drug prevention. �And then (the youths) steal to feed the habit.�

Nayarit, "Exploring San Pancho"

Produced By redguide.com May 27, 2009 - 13:38

San Pancho, aka San Francisco, is just north of Sayulita on the Nayarit coast.

San Pancho has a dream beach surrounded by a jungle of dense palms. The town is modest but colorful. It happens to have one of our all-time favorite restaurants.

San Pancho is on the same gentrification trajectory as Sayulita, though slightly behind thanks to the few extra miles buffering it from Vallarta. Many people who originally "discovered" Sayulita have migrated up to San Pancho to flee the Sayulita scene and find real estate bargains.

We've heard about water issues that may constrain development here. We hope there are sustainable solutions so others can appreciate this treasure ... without ruining it.

This content was originally published on redguide.

Birthday Greetings to Mimi

(Please submit your birthday amigos dates and pictures to Tara Spears tara.sprs@hotmail.com)

Mexico: Alone with the Aztecs
Mark Hudson - Los Angeles Times
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June 20, 2009

What a difference a month makes. It's just 38 days since my visit to Mexico City was cancelled, with the world staring into the abyss of a global pandemic and the expectation that no one would be visiting Mexico � without urgent cause � for a very long time. And now here I am powering into the heart of the world's third-largest city as night falls, along a dead-straight and apparently endless boulevard, past a great jumble of baroque churches, futuristic tower blocks and battered, low-level ribbon development, with the statues of Aztec emperors and revolutionary heroes looming out of the darkness at every intersection.

There's a definite buzz in the air, a mixture of the adrenalin generated by the lawless, interweaving traffic, the breathlessness caused by high altitude (Mexico City sits on a mountain plateau) and a brownish, burned tang that may be a product of the great lid of pollution hanging over the city or just the dodgy electrics of this vehicle. As we stop at a red light, a dwarf juggler appears out of nowhere, performing a brief routine, then disappears just as quickly, as our driver, heedless, prepares to plough over him.

Swine flu may be a serious cause for concern in Britain, especially following the death of the first victim this week, but it is difficult to detect any sense of emergency on arriving at Benito Juarez airport in Mexico City. A perfunctory form listing possible symptoms is handed over with (almost) ostentatious indifference. The place swarms with uniformed officials, many with no clear purpose, but the mood is relaxed and affable in a way I will come to see as entirely typical of Mexico.

Indeed, while a brutal drug war rages in the north of the country and the economy is in a state of collapse, it occurs to me with increasing force over the time I spend here that this is far from being a bad time to visit Mexico City. I am here with a party organised by the British Museum to look into the background of a forthcoming blockbuster exhibition, Moctezuma � Aztec Ruler. And if the subject of Mexico's last indigenous emperor and his tragic encounter with the Spanish conquistadors might seem a touch rarefied amid the largely modern sprawl of present-day Mexico City, evidence of the country's ancient past and its relationship to its troubled present is everywhere around, even in the city centre.

Mexico City revolves around the Plaza de la Constituci�n � known universally as the Z�calo � one of the largest and most impressive squares in the world, surrounded by magnificent colonial buildings and racetrack boulevards, and dominated by the city's vast baroque cathedral. While the impact of the Z�calo's grandeur is marred by the modern exhibition pavilions currently taking up at least half its area, the resonances of this imposing urban space strike deep into the ancient past.

That the cathedral and adjacent Palacio Nacional (seat of the federal executive) were built with the rubble from the demolished Aztec city of Tenochtitlan is long established fact. But the precise location of the Great Temple, the pyramid that dominated this ancient metropolis, remained a matter of conjecture until 1978, when a vast stone showing the dismembered body of the goddess Coyolxauhqui was stumbled upon by electricity workers at the south-eastern corner of the cathedral.

Aztec pyramids were constructed in layers, with each new superstructure dedicated to the gods through the sacrifice of captured warriors. You can now walk through the layered foundations of this vast building and see one of the jutting upright stones over which captives were sacrificed � as many as 20,000, it is estimated, in one four-day ceremony in 1487 � their hearts torn out by the priests of the consecrating deity.

But excavations into what may be the most dramatic discovery on this site only began in 2007. Beneath a 20-ton slab showing a terrifying image of the earth goddess Tlaltecuhtli a pit has been opened up � into which we were given a privileged glimpse � beyond which a sealed chamber may contain the first tomb of an Aztec ruler ever discovered; the resting place, possibly, of Moctezuma himself.

While the secrets of this chamber will only be disclosed after further excavation, 15 golden objects found among a wealth of other sacrificial offerings will be seen in public for the first time at the British Museum in September. Further excavation is inhibited by the fact that this is Mexico City's most historically important area, a dense grid of narrow streets, studded with ancient churches, religious foundations and magnificent colonial mansions. Most of the latter are crowded with poor families, but some have been handsomely refurbished, among them Las Sirenas, one of the most romantically evocative restaurants I've ever entered � all old, dark wood, with cabinets of antique china and light flooding down onto the yellow walls of the central well. On the rooftop terrace overlooking the cathedral, a squat woman cooks up tortillas and quesadillas larded with guacamole and dark bean paste � a form of cuisine that is little changed since the time of the Aztecs.

While Mexico's indigenous population, the descendants of the Aztecs, Toltecs and other mythic peoples of the past � who must under no circumstances be called Indians � are often talked about as a kind of disenfranchised minority, it soon becomes apparent that most of this city's inhabitants have some indigenous blood. Yet if indigenous culture has been claimed as the essence of Mexico by every political movement since the 1810 revolution that secured the country's independence from Spain, the impoverished mass of the country's indigenous people have yet to see their lot improved.

Filling the wall above the main staircase in the Palacio Nacional is Diego Rivera's gigantic panorama of Mexico's turbulent history (painted 1929-30), a mass of incidents and personalities � from the Spanish invasion through the subsequent revolutions and counter-revolutions � so tumultuous and so densely packed that you feel the whole lot could come tumbling out of the wall on top of you. But then this sense of teeming profusion feels an essential aspect of Mexico, from the wild ornateness of church altars to the seething culture of the streets.

Ten years ago the city's downtown was a virtual no-go area, but following a programme of regeneration, a walk around Mexico City's historic heart is now an invigorating experience � particularly in the late afternoon when the energy of the rush hour starts to build. Great waves of heat come billowing along blackened pavements crowded with phone-card hawkers, people handing out fliers for everything from adult education to love potions.

Six weeks ago these streets were all but deserted, with soldiers at checkpoints handing out masks to the few who ventured out. But all restrictions relating to the disease were lifted on May 22 and, despite more than 140 deaths, it is difficult to find anyone who believes that swine flu ever posed a serious threat. "I've never met anyone who knows anyone who has had it," a young man said. "For most of us the emergency had an air of complete unreality." Far more worrying for most people is the ever-present threat of drug-related violence and crime in general.

While we have been advised not to stray into the area behind the Palacio Nacional � and certainly not at night � it's necessary to cross a corner of this area to get to the Colegio de San Ildefonso, an arts centre with magnificent murals by Diego Rivera's rival, Jos� Clemente Orozco. As soon as you enter these streets, the atmosphere feels hotter, less European, with more of a sense of life lived on the streets.

I see barely a handful of face masks during my week in Mexico. Antiseptic hand gel is offered in some shops and tourist sites, but no one seems to use it. Meanwhile, foreign visitors are scarce. The National Museum of Anthroplogy, a spectacular modernist building housing the world's greatest collection of ancient Mexican art and artefacts, is practically empty. At our hotel, the Cortes, housed in a colonnaded former monastery, we are virtually the only guests. At Teotihuacan, Mexico's most visited ancient site � 90 minutes out of the city � where we head at dawn to see the sun rise over the pyramids of the sun and moon, there are only a handful of visitors. There are even fewer at the mountain temple of Malinalco.

The proprietor of our hotel in Teotihuacan, a beautiful hacienda-style establishment, tells us that the paintwork in traditional colours � turquoise, earth red and lilac � is fresh simply because he had to give his staff something to do; there had been no visitors in months.

While this is a disaster for the individual proprietor and the country's vitally important tourist industry, the current situation gives the visitor a privileged glimpse into what travel was like in the days before mass tourism; the opportunity to wander over the most glorious ancient sites in virtual solitude, to be pampered by entire complements of hotel staff. This won't be to everyone's taste, and you will have to make your own decision as to how safe Mexico is. But be assured, it won't be this way for long.