Hey, here is one way to get more voter support

[kandrathe]

You put it so bluntly: Mexico /can't/ do anything on their own without American intervention. I'd say your the one with rose colored blinders on in case you didn't get what Ochci was implying; they have a choice to reform too. Your so focused on what America can do for Mexico instead of what Mexico can do for Mexico.

Sure they can. They haven't. We can wring our hands at their failure to stop their cops from being druglords, or we can do something about it on our side of the border. Part of wielding power is also understanding your limits. I've spent many a year attempting to push a rope. It doesn't work.

To me, it's like the parents who drill into their kids, "don't do drugs," only, they push too hard and the kids rebel and end up being junkies on the street.

So you are saying we are pushing Mexico too hard to clean up their mess?

Occhi is right that there is a machismo sexist attitude prevalent in most, if not all of Mexico and it's politics. Might the Mexican American war been the catalyst for this attitude? I don't know, but Karma is a bitch. We can revise all the policies here we want in America, but in the end it still solves NOTHING when at the end of the day you still have a country that doesn't give a damn about you or your policies or issues.

Sure, and we put up with Kim Jong Il, Castro, Saddam, Khadafi, Al Asad, etc. etc. etc. I'm not sure how we can take the moral high ground here when our own CIA uses drug smuggling money to fund their black ops. I don't know if PAN can continue to grow, and if PRI(Partido Revolucionario Institucional) were to lose control of the corrupt states, then maybe things can change. Our problems with Mexico are really limited to 4 states (of 32) -- they are corrupt, far from the capital, and happen to border the US.

So the real question is, how do you get Mexico to change Mexico?

And, you are accusing me of rose colored glasses! No, I'm drowning in cynicism. I just take it as a given that Mexico will remain a messed up 3rd world pain in our backside. Anything more, and its a bonus.

Because I have a feeling once their country's attitude changes, things will change for us here too, but without their willingness to alter their path, no matter what we do in our country, no matter how hard we try, no matter what laws we enact, amnesty we give out, or drugs we make legal, nothing will really change the problem of illegal immigration so long as Mexico is unwilling to help its own people become better citizens and improve it's economy so that its citizens don't feel they have to come to America just to make enough money get out of poverty in Mexico (44.2%). Nothing will really change until that happens.

Then we are f***ed.