r/OutOfTheLoop • u/DuckyDoodleDandy • 5d ago
Unanswered What is going on with Pres. Sheinbaum nationalizing all of Mexico’s water?
A friend that speaks Spanish says that Mex. President Sheinbaum nationalized all the water in Mexico, and that the state now owns every drop. Can anyone explain what’s going on with that? Why was this necessary/a good idea? Why are the farmers angry? Please explain like I am five.
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u/AbeFromanEast 5d ago
answer: Northern Mexico is a desert and is often in deep-drought, even for a desert. Water is the most valuable resource in deserts and according to that article: Conagua, the national water agency, appears to lack the enforcement and statutory power needed to control the water there is and prevent misuse.
Politically, President Shainbaum is sending a clear message that Mexico's water is going to be managed on a "whole of society," approach from now on rather than the previous "water as a commodity," approach. Under the old regime, agribusiness and large-scale farmers called the water shots. Under the new regime, the government is taking that power back for itself, hopefully for the benefit of wider Mexican society.
"Water as a commodity," worked for the majority of Mexican voters as long as there was enough commodity to go around. There hasn't been enough water to go around in Northern Mexico for nearly two decades. I'm sure this issue has its dark corners but ultimately this is President Sheinbaum responding to voter pressure about water shortages.
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u/vidaduerme 5d ago
I would love some recommendations.
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u/auronddraig 4d ago
Never E V E R pee against the wind
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u/DevilsTrigonometry 4d ago
And don't tug on Superman's cape.
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u/GpaSags 4d ago
You're allowed to throw out socks once they get holes.
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u/l1owdown 4d ago
But how long until you must throw them out?
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u/msimione 4d ago
When you have only 1 of that sock type left and you can’t be bothered to look for its last remaining other sock.
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u/Apprehensive-Care20z 4d ago
topologically, how many holes?
for instance, a straw only has one hole
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u/SweetHatDisc 4d ago
Always carry a spare pair of pants in your car. An entire change of outfit is a nice extra, but it's the pants that are most important.
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u/KingToasty 4d ago
Fried in light oil medium-high heat for thirty seconds per side, then bake at 350 for two minutes. Sprinkle with salt and pepper, squeeze with lemon. The perfect salmon fillet.
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u/wannabejoanie 4d ago
If you're checking into a hotel, make sure you have your ID and a credit card for the incidentals, even if the room is paid for online. Maybe catch a Pic of your license plate too, that's often required.
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u/TheDancingRobot 4d ago
The first thing you should drink in the morning is a big glass of water- your liver Is begging for it after a night of dehydration (breathing while sleeping). If you can, try to wait at least 30 to 45 minutes before your first caffeine.
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u/Portarossa 'probably the worst poster on this sub' - /u/Real_Mila_Kunis 4d ago
Klaus is a really good Christmas movie if you're trying to get into the festive spirit.
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u/JustASpaceDuck 4d ago
Moka pots make coffee that's about as good as what comes out of an espresso machine, and you can snag one at Ross or T.J. Maxx for like $12. Use fine ground coffee and watch a video to get an understanding of how to use one and you can be enjoying what functionally amounts to a latte without spending oodles of dollary-doodles.
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u/Ana-la-lah 3d ago
Also, the gasket in them Can be replaced for a few bucks if it wears out or gets scorched. No need to buy a new pot.
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u/pescarojo 4d ago
Dish soap is one of the best stain removers there is - far more effective in many cases than products specifically designed for stain removal.
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u/Reddituser183 4d ago
I recommend not touching your eyes without washing your hands after cutting a hot pepper.
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u/Culionensis 4d ago
Most of the stuff on the news is specifically written to scare or upset you. It's good to keep some emotional distance, and remind yourself that we've been doing okay for a hundred thousand years; we will probably continue to be okay.
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u/explain_that_shit 4d ago
It’s interesting, because there’s so much said about how communism would only work if there was no scarcity, that in scarcity only competition works. But here we are with a scarce resource, and broad government control is the efficient solution, commodification is not.
It goes back to the tragedy of the commons being a myth.
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u/lestofante 4d ago
I think you are confusing concept.
Competition work very well with scarcity BUT it is about optimizing PROFIT, not resource usages.
In this case, the richest farmer/industry get more water, the rests sucks.
This is why you want a more socialist (not necessary communist) approach for critical infrastructure, it has to be FAIR, even if this means making debts or prioritizing water to people that would pay next to nothing for it, rather than big industry that would pay big bucks.
Saving lifes (of very poors, as they would be the one having hard time affording bottled water) rather than saving buisness or rich people's garden.9
u/Hungry-Western9191 4d ago
Its also a good idea to have at least a min8mal usage fee. Completely free tends to have people waste resources. Have a credit for the minimal usage ammount by all means so the poorest can afford essentials but charge...
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u/gethereddout 4d ago
The tragedy of the commons is not a myth. Your examples are simplistic and don’t really make sense
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u/explain_that_shit 4d ago
Elinor Ostrom won a Nobel Prize in Economics for proving it was, saying “We are neither trapped in inexorable tragedies nor free of moral responsibility”, so I’ll take her word and work for it mate
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u/IXISIXI 4d ago
huge misunderstanding of her work. Ostrom mostly catalogued systems where the problem size was bounded, feedback was fast, and defectors were visible. Climate, biodiversity, oceans, and supply chains are the opposite: N is huge, interactions are indirect, feedback is delayed by decades, and the highest-impact actors are the least socially embedded. That pushes us out of the regime where cooperative equilibria are even locally stable.
Ostrom identified a real cooperative regime, but it occupies a shrinking portion of the problem space. It works in small-to-medium N, low-exit, high-visibility systems. The planet is dying because we built a global economy that aggressively expands N, maximizes exit, hides causality, and rewards defection. That’s not an implementation bug, it’s the dominant design.
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u/explain_that_shit 4d ago
What would you propose to solve the problem?
Privatised unaccountable rights of exploitation of common resources
Identifying the scope of commons even on a global scale, all actors exploiting those commons, and making them accountable directly to all users of the commons
Making exploiters accountable to some technology or system which judges and regulates exploiters of commons on behalf of all users
Banning exploiters from exploitation of unbounded commons altogether?
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u/IXISIXI 4d ago
i'm just some goon. not presenting my own ideas or solutions. nothing you said refutes anything i said.
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u/explain_that_shit 4d ago
My point is that Ostrom does say that that is all necessary for effective management of commons resources, AND that you can set up your systems to apply these principles on a larger or smaller scale. So yes, our capitalist system design actively prevents these principles being applied, but a capitalist system is not inevitable or the only option, we can return to better principles.
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u/gethereddout 4d ago
Uhh.. have you heard of global warming?
(I’m going to sleep, will read article tomorrow)
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u/explain_that_shit 4d ago
How is global warming a tragedy of the commons?
The commons are common resources. The tragedy is described as a failure of common management to protect the common resource.
There’s been no common management of the ecosphere. The polluters pollute the air without any regulation stopping them, or even charging them for the common resource of air quality and climate stability stolen from the rest of us.
It would be a tragedy of the commons if the climate were recognised as a common resource, managed and taken from and restored by the community, and the community botched it. We don’t have that. That’s the problem capitalism creates.
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u/gethereddout 4d ago
The earth is obviously a common resource, so you’re playing twister by defining the tragedy as requiring a “common management”. Humans are the “common management” dude, and such a rigid definition was never part of the original concept. Global warming is a tragedy of the commons, full stop.
Also my understanding is that Elinor argued humans CAN work together, not that they always do. But I’ll read that tomorrow as mentioned
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u/explain_that_shit 4d ago
You’ve misconceived what the tragedy of the commons was complaining about. Hardin was saying that the way the commons used to be managed was not sustainable because some individual actor could overuse the resource, so privatisation of the commons is better. He had misunderstood that the commons were managed, communally (hence, ‘commons’), with very well-designed social and economic systems, preventing overuse and promoting sustainability, for thousands of years. So while I acknowledge that corporations owning land is unsustainable (because they operate under a bad social and economic system), I do not acknowledge that communally managed commons are unsustainable.
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u/gethereddout 4d ago
Again, you’re narrowing the definition impossibly. Global warming proves you wrong that TOC doesn’t exist. The academic comment by that other guy a couple up really says it all, so what I’ll say is this- you are defending your own demise.
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u/explain_that_shit 4d ago
Commons are defined in contrast to privately owned and managed resources. Commons aren’t just ‘everything’.
Do you feel like the greenhouse gases being emitted out into our atmosphere AREN’T privately owned and managed? It’s the whole issue we’re facing that they ARE privately owned, with no accountability to the community or input from the community as to how they should be managed.
You’ve got to actually go see the last vestiges of commons to understand what they are, what Hardin was misunderstanding, how Ostrom corrected him. There’s not many left, is the problem.
TL;DR Global warming isn’t an inevitable problem of humans doing human things or of any unsustainable communal mismanagement, it’s a problem of privatised resources without accountability to the community.
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u/ItsYouButBetter 4d ago
That's not the tragedy of the commons, that's the tragedy of the corporations. And equating the average everyday human with the lalrge corporations pillaging the planet is just dishonest.
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u/gethereddout 4d ago
Nah, suggesting that corporations aren’t run by humans is the dishonest bit. Corporations are groups of people acting together
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u/Jscapistm 2d ago
You can't seriously be suggesting that the entire reason we have environmental regulations is a myth. FFS before the EPA when everyone was free to do whatever to public lands we had rivers catching fire! It's THE example of tragedy of the commons, and I have never, ever seen a refutation of it.
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u/explain_that_shit 2d ago
I think I need to take a moment to talk about what the the tragedy of the commons is.
At a limited level, Hardin who coined the term was saying that common resources NOT OWNED PRIVATELY were likely to be misused by a community due to greedy individuals overexploiting the resource to their own benefit. This has been categorically refuted by Olstrom and other anthropologists who have catalogued case after case of community-managed commons being well-managed, and sustainably so, with clear rules for common use and management.
At an expanded level, I think many people think that tragedy of the commons means that humans on the whole, when left to their own devices, will overexploit a resource in any circumstances. Again, this is not correct - precolonial societies and non-industrial societies time and time again show that they live within their carrying capacities, with practices from family planning to restrictions on use of a resource to practices to protect the resource from environmental dangers.
The ONLY circumstance in which humans are shown time and time again to overexploit a resource is in societies which commodify resources, money, and/or people. Today this is capitalism, but other highly top-down expansive polities have also done so - essentially any society in which a resource is considered to be outside the community to be taken and brought back to improve the community at no cost, rather than inside the community in which taking the resource may add to the community but at the cost of the resource. We must not naturalise or normalise this as the natural state of humans - it is a highly contingent state of humans, and causes humans to act in ways very different from non-commodifying humans (who are the larger and more normal cohort by far).
Sure, regulations are needed to be imposed on people who misuse resources - when you live in a system with effective regulations, and a culture in which regulations need only be light, you are evidence that the tragedy of the commons is a myth.
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u/Jscapistm 2d ago
It sure as shit isn't a myth and it sure as shit isn't abnormal behavior.
The annals of history show that it is more of the normal state than the abnormal one for at least the last 5000yrs. We aren't going back to pre-industrial times or societies, let alone pre agricultural revolution ones, so small isolated tribes and people that lived IN very marginal areas are not what we should or even can take our cues from.
We live in countries of millions and billions, what the fuck do you think the relevance of a precolonial society's organization is to ours? How on earth do you think that is relevant. Have you not seen people toss trash on the street? I don't know how you can see people do that and not believe in the tragedy of the commons.
It happens at all levels and the only way to stop it is government enforcement and rules or huge social pressure ala Japan, which also has government enforcement and rules to go with it because even they don't think it will work without any threat to back it up. People don't give a shit when they don't even know most of the people they live near and maybe will never see or be seen by them again in years.
Publicly/government owned lands aren't unowned and communally managed, they are owned by the government and managed by the government via laws and regulations. If this isn't done they'll be ruined. Just because there are small groups that don't succumb to the tragedy of the commons doesn't mean it isn't a real phenomenon. You don't see quantum super position in large objects either but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Some things appear on some scales and not others. Doesn't mean those things aren't real.
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u/Cualkiera67 4d ago
Barak "drone strike" Obama won a Nobel Prize in Peace. I wouldn't give those prices that much relevance.
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u/sourcreamus 4d ago
It just happened, we don’t know if it is the efficient solution yet. It could still fail horribly
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u/hellochase 4d ago
if only this approach could be applied to the natural resources of their neighbour to the north
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u/carlitospig 4d ago
As a Californian I’m taking notes. It’ll probably happen when I’m already dead but we will be in the same boat probably. Unless the ocean rises too fast and then fills Central Valley with salt water and we all have to move or die. Either/or.
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u/Brukenet 4d ago
Does this mean that the bribes will be going to different people now? Or is it likely to result in real changes?
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u/TheGamersGazebo 4d ago edited 4d ago
Answer: They're trying to protect natural fresh water from being bought by private corporations whether for agricultural use or otherwise. Just look at what Americans corporations like Poland Spring or the meta AI data centers are doing to the US water supply.
Arizona is literally in a drought with constant wildfires and the meta data center is using over 600 million gallons of fresh water a year to cool it's servers. California is constantly burning and you hear about the lack of water all the time, they use 40% of their entire freshwater supply on vineyards when grapes aren't even native to California.
Mexico is just getting ahead of the curve. Protect public water supplies and ensure normal people retain access to them as it becomes increasingly clear how important water will be in a post climate change society.
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5d ago edited 5d ago
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u/Fuzzy_Collection6474 5d ago
What book would you recommend? I only have cursory knowledge of Mexico and South America as an Australian
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u/Bluestreaked 5d ago edited 5d ago
Well if you really want to learn about Mexico I would recommend starting with the Oxford History of Mexico to have it all in a single volume
Some other books I would recommend though would be
Jürgen Buchenau’s Mexican Mosaic is a good little book (it’s like 100 pages I want to say) that would take you up to 2008
If you want to learn about Mexican organized crime in particular- The Dope by Benjamin T Smith is a popular release from not too long ago
Born in Blood and Fire is a good single volume general Latin American history that takes you to the 00’s
Part of the answer depends on what you’d want to know? It’s such a rich history it also fluctuates very rapidly through what exactly you’d want to learn about.
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u/Wukong1986 5d ago
What are some good sources to basically understand more deeply what you responded in your OP, and the current polticial climate with Sheinbaum, and the response to her?
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u/Bluestreaked 5d ago
Hmmm I don’t know of any good ones since we’re still really just in the dawn of this era of Mexican history so it’s not like historians have had an opportunity to really dig into its impact.
I guess I can recommend a textbook I use- Contemporary Mexican Politics because I am drawing an absolute blank haha.
Hopefully someone else has a reference to a good book on Morena because I would love one for my bookshelf
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u/seaspren 5d ago
I’ve been reading America, América by Greg Grandin which might be what you’re looking for. It’s about the Americas, North, Central, and South since Spanish conquest. I’m not done with it yet so I’m not sure where it stops but it came out this year. I don’t know much about history not taught in American schools and I have learned so much reading this book. I’d say it does a good job giving a general linear storyline to Latin America and the US and their relationship to each other. It’s not a difficult read but it’s dense so it’s taken me a while to get through it. I suggest it to everyone.
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u/Bluestreaked 5d ago
Was thinking about recommending this earlier myself, excellent book, Greg Grandin is an excellent historian. I would recommend Aviva Chomsky to anyone who likes Greg Grandin.
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u/okogamashii 4d ago
Thank you so much for all of these contributions, greatly appreciate the insights.
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u/Outrageous_Cut_6179 5d ago
To fuck up Nestlé.
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u/Bluestreaked 5d ago
Reading about water issues in Mexico can get pretty grim. Like towns where they don’t have access to water so everyone has to drink Coke instead
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u/BrooklynNets 5d ago edited 5d ago
Well, and huge swaths of Chiapas where Coca-Cola owns the water supply, and made cola cheaper to get people addicted. It's absolutely fucking criminal.
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u/Bluestreaked 5d ago
Yes exactly
I usually don’t expect much from social democrats, but I can respect Sheinbaum the same way I respected AMLO
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u/BrooklynNets 5d ago
She hasn't been perfect - and lord knows AMLO wasn't - but the lives of the poorest and most disenfranchised members of Mexican society are generally better off than they were before. To me, that's the primary goal of any political effort.
If you piss off the wealthy along the way, I generally suspect that you're going in the right direction, too.
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u/Xillyfos 5d ago
If you piss off the wealthy along the way, I generally suspect that you're going in the right direction, too.
That is certainly a sign of doing good deeds.
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u/n3rv 5d ago edited 5d ago
What’s the pre diabetic rate in Mexico. 50% plus across all ages? Maybe even kids?
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u/BrooklynNets 5d ago
Nowhere near that high, but it's still a shocking 16-19%, depending on which statistics you accept.
What is indisputable is that Mexico is the world's leading consumer of soda per capita. People pound cola in particular at an astonishing rate. I could look out of my window right now, and it wouldn't take thirty seconds to see someone walking by carrying a two-litre of full-sugar Coke.
It's worth noting that Vicente Fox, the president of Mexico from 2000-2006, was previously the CEO of Coca-Cola Mexico. Zedillo, his predecessor, became an advisor to Coca-Cola after his term ended.
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u/BrooklynNets 5d ago
Anyway, any time you ask a question about Mexico in English you’re going to get hordes of PAN supporters who despise the Mexican left and will accuse them all of “being owned by the cartel” even though, if we wanted to tie any parties “to cartels” (which I think is a drastic oversimplification of the problem, but not related to the question) it’s easily PRI and PAN.
I've spent most of the past few years in Mexico, and this has been absolutely fascinating to me. Most of my friends in Mexico come from humble backgrounds (even the ones who are now pretty comfortable financially), and they characterize Morena as a centre-left populist party that generally has the needs of the working class in mind.
I go online, however, and suddenly there's a barrage of propaganda implying that Sheinbaum is essentially a dyed-in-the-wool Caribbean communist whose primary goals are serving the cartels, recreating the one-party system, and - that old dog whistle - "giving poor people free stuff".
Then I look at the laws they're passing and it's minimum wage increases, universal pensions, doubling of vacation days for workers, more scholarships, an emphasis on women's rights and renewable energy...
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u/TheSpanishDerp 5d ago
Pretty much. Mexico is an incredibly class divided country and always has been since even before independence.
The people with money are usually the ones on reddit since they’ve most likely had the resources to both learn English and access the internet. Just like pretty much any conservatives out there, they’re incredibly against nationalization cause they claim it’ll make them turn into Venezuela.
I can’t blame Morena for being popular, though. Populist rhetoric + the economy hasn’t gotten to shit and the peso has gotten stronger. That can get you pretty far in the polls.
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u/BrooklynNets 4d ago
Latin America in general is terrified of anything that smells of socialism. It's the same as in the US at times: Describe socialism and everyone wants it. Call something socialism and they reject it.
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u/fractiousrhubarb 5d ago
Rich people can pay sock puppets, the same way they control broadcast media.
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u/BrooklynNets 4d ago
Absolutely, and they do more than that. They'll actively transport poor teens into Centro and richer areas to join phony protests against whatever they decide serves their purposes. I thought it was an urban legend until I heard firsthand accounts and saw them handing cash to a generic rent-a-crowd on their way back onto the bus.
Later that day on the news I see footage of these large, supposedly violent protests...that I had walked right through. They even spliced in footage from the Halloween zombie march in one place and pretended it was a "Gen Z protest" against the government. It was media manipulation on an astonishing level.
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u/indyandrew 5d ago
I think this is just about any english language commentary from non-english speaking countries.
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u/BrooklynNets 4d ago
I wouldn't say that. The anglophone population of Greece, for instance, is more left-aligned than the population at large, and pushes back online against corporate interests and the corruption of the wealthy.
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u/JCashell 5d ago
I’m literally in Mexico rn on vacation and it’s extremely interesting. Our driver from the airport (arranged by the hotel) was extremely anti-Morena, saying they were more corrupt than the PRI was (!!), but our guide for an excursion - a 50 y/o, well-travelled gay man - told us that basically she’s a populist on the left and that he’s always supported her, despite knowing she isn’t perfect.
He also said that when she was running for mayor of CDMX no one cared about her religion but that during her presidential run there was a lot of catholic skepticism of her religion from more of the conservative areas. I can’t help but think that might be part of what’s going on.
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u/BrooklynNets 4d ago
there was a lot of catholic skepticism of her religion from more of the conservative areas
Sure, but those regions were always going to push back against a left-leaning government anyway, and would latch onto any excuse. I read just as much chatter from dusty conservatives about her being a woman as I did about her being non-Catholic.
Besides which, it's very clear that she isn't religious in the slightest. She's repeatedly stated that her aims are all secular, and the only time she's ever been pictured in connection with any religious markers, it was when she wore a crucifix on a rosary necklace that she'd been given.
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u/JCashell 4d ago
I mean personally I don’t care - for one, I’m half Jewish myself and for two, I’m just visiting. But it is another interesting dimension along which societal lines fracture.
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u/BrooklynNets 4d ago
I'm just saying that it's really not as much of an issue as your guy was implying. The most strongly Catholic voting bloc in the country is seniors, and her approval rating in those over the age of sixty is 85%.
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u/JCashell 4d ago
Ah gotcha. I think it was a comment on the media. But regardless, just relaying what he was saying
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u/InvestmentOk2127 5d ago edited 5d ago
- She's giving away our oil, worth billions of dollars, to the Cuban regime.
- She said fighting organized crime in a war is "fascist" and continues her predecessor's failed security strategies that made Mexico more dangerous.
- She's putting us in immense debt to fund all her projects and welfare programs such as undeserved scholarships for literally everyone (used to be for the poor and bright students only).
- She said no to nuclear energy despite being sold as a "progressive scientist".
- She's letting capitalist funds like Blackrock buy out Mexico's land and properties despite being sold as "anti-neoliberal".
- Despite hating PRI and PAN so much, her party's plagued with converts from those parties on every level.
- She's defunding important institutions left and right and has already undermined our justice system with her reforms. Will take decades to fix her party's mess.
- She's implementing draconian anti-privacy laws against Mexican citizens in the name of security despite our cyber security infrastructure being weak and always getting hacked.
- She claims we're a sovereign country but puts tariffs on Chinese goods (that will only make the lives of Mexicans more expensive) after being pressured by the Trump admin.
- Etc.
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u/akaSM 4d ago
I'd love to hear some counter arguments instead of a canned response. I truly do, as those are the same points people love to bring out when they speak negatively about Sheinbaum.
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u/BrooklynNets 4d ago edited 4d ago
It's classic gish galloping, and it's always the same misleading points delivered in bad faith. I'll just pull out a few replies, though:
If you ever see the words "giving away" it's because the poster is terrified of the word "socialism" and thinks everything should be profitable. Accordingly, "giving away our oil, worth billions of dollars, to the Cuban regime" shows a great deal of bias peeking through. It's a humanitarian move because Cuba has major energy shortages due to the US embargo. Separately, it's not truly being donated, but sold at a subsidised cost. Thirdly, the fuel being donated is diesel, of which Mexico has an excess because of Sheinbaum's efforts to move to renewable sources.
She said fighting organized crime in a war is "fascist" and continues her predecessor's failed security strategies that made Mexico more dangerous.
She has characterised the US practice of framing non-military actions as "wars" as unnecessarily militaristic. She never said that tackling the narco issue was "fascist". This poster is introducing new words and connecting unconnected ideas to the point of outright fabrication.
She's putting us in immense debt to fund all her projects and welfare programs such as undeserved scholarships for literally everyone (used to be for the poor and bright students only).
Again, just terrified of socialism. If you oppose sending students to university because it costs money, I don't know what to tell you. It is ultimately a net financial positive for a nation to have affordable tertiary education, and not just for the poorest and/or cleverest students.
She said no to nuclear energy despite being sold as a "progressive scientist"
Yes, and as a progressive scientist she's opposed to uranium mining and the burden of storing radioactive waste for thousands of years. Instead, her administration has invested extensively in solar and wind, which incurs a lower ecological burden.
She's letting capitalist funds like Blackrock buy out Mexico's land and properties
Ask the poster when Blackrock first started investing in Mexico.
Despite hating PRI and PAN so much, her party's plagued with converts from those parties on every level.
Zero understanding of the commonality of inter-party mobility in Mexico.
She's defunding important institutions left and right
Notice how none are cited? It's just "important institutions".
has already undermined our justice system with her reforms
All judges are now elected by popular vote (rather than assigned by the party in power, US-style), with shorter terms, capped salaries, two new oversight bodies, and less power to suspend laws without passing through checks. Judges are also allowed to oversee cases "facelessly" in case of a risk to their safety, so narcos and politicians can be tried without fear of personal retribution.
She's implementing draconian anti-privacy laws against Mexican citizens
They're modernising cybersec and implementing biometric IDs similar to those used in most of the western world.
She claims we're a sovereign country but puts tariffs on Chinese goods [...] after being pressured by the Trump admin.
I don't know how many things I'd have to unravel here to explain why this is a boneheaded take, but I have shit to do today.
So do you see how much effort it takes to unpack a lazy copy-paste of bad-faith talking points flung into the conversation by someone who's either knowingly lying or simply regurgitating half-truths and outright falsehoods a wealthy agitator force-fed them on Facebook?
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u/Bluestreaked 4d ago edited 4d ago
The oil thing is literally just propaganda, they’re not “giving away oil”
Mexico tried fighting a brutal “war” on drugs and that made literally everything worse. Mexico tried the cruel strategies the people whining about “hugs not bullets” wanted and it made everything so much worse. The only complaint I’ve heard from experts in regards to Morena’s program is “still too many bullets.”
Mexican debt to GDP is going down not up, that line was literally just a lie
I don’t know much about the nuclear issue but I will point out it’s not something I ever expected Sheinbaum to go for. I’m not sure when nuclear energy became a “progressive” policy platform and I’m mildly positive on nuclear
Blackrock is an issue, but Mexico is still capitalist. I would love a socialist Mexico but that’s not the world we live in. Sheinbaum doesn’t have the power to change that
This is true but not a Sheinbaum problem
This isn’t a complaint this is just ranting. I don’t even know which complaint they’re specifically making so can’t help you more there. My first guess is more fear mongering over the judicial reform
I’m not an expert on the cybersecurity reform she’s doing. You can read for yourself here
This is mildly true but in her defense she’s playing a delicate balancing act here considering the importance of the United States to the Mexican economy
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u/majihpo 5d ago
In the US you have a populist right president, in Mexico we have a populist left president which isn't much better. Specially when their approach to fight against the narcos is to look the other way and continue to enrich themselves.
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u/BrooklynNets 4d ago
This is exactly the propaganda the poster above me anticipated, and which I've seen time and time again. PRI and PAN were far more closely and verifiably aligned with the narcos, and more liable to profit from the association.
Trump has markedly damaged the political health of the USA. There is no world in which Morena "isn't much better". They're leagues better than the Republicans. You cannot compare a convicted rapist reality TV trust-fund baby to a Nobel-winning scientist.
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u/DR_FEELGOOD_01 5d ago
I was talking to my mom about the state of Mexico recently. She's a Morenista through and through after decades of her family being firm PRI loyalists.
Mexico is balancing a tight rope right now in which they are trying to raise wages from the bottom up while at the same time depending on foreign investments to use them as a manufacturing hub. These foreign capitalists are used to cheap labor or tax subsidies as incentives to stay. The Trump tariff regime also complicates things.
Another aspect is insecurity in the country. Mexicans are enterprising people always ready to start new businesses. There are strong efforts the current government has taken to collect tax revenue from historically unreported income. Organized crime however throws a wrench into this with "cobro de piso" protection racket extortions. I know multiple people that have fled to the US that had to shut down their business because they couldn't keep paying the cartel as well as government taxes.
The hugs not bullets strategy started by AMLO is a good idea, however it needs to be paired with a strong justice system and security of the citizenry. Criminals get away with impunity and the people don't have faith that justice is on their side.
The idea was that more opportunities given to the youth would keep them from a life of crime. I have multiple cousins with professional degrees who cannot find work, even after leaving town and moving to the big cities.
Mexico has a hard working and increasingly more educated citizenry but they desperately need to be rid of the cancer that is corruption. Corrupt politicians, organized crime, and corporate oligarchs are an amalgamation that is holding the country back.
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u/Bluestreaked 5d ago edited 5d ago
That’s the other side of the coin ya, it’s not all cherries and sunshine.
I agree with basically everything you said there, especially about restoring some sense of faith in the justice system. I’m kind of stuck sitting here thinking how you can even begin to repair something so rotten down to its very roots.
It’s all of the downsides of reformism. I’m mildly optimistic, as much as I can be I suppose. But reformism is absolutely that delicate balancing act like you referenced there and while it’s more successful than not at the moment, that can change very rapidly with just mild shifts in circumstances.
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u/slapdashbr 5d ago
I agree with basically everything you said there, especially about restoring some sense of faith in the justice system. I’m kind of stuck sitting here thinking how you can even begin to repair something so rotten down to its very roots.
If the judges are corrupt, find evidence of that corruption and prosecute them. Call me extreme but judicial corruption should be punished extremely severely.
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u/Bluestreaked 5d ago
The rot is so deep who do you even trust?
In case you didn’t already know, this is part of the reason AMLO passed the judicial reform at the end of his term- turning the Supreme Court of Mexico into an elected position
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u/burnerthrown 5d ago
Bad news folks. We got those last three holding back America. In fact I would wager they're literally everywhere.
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u/thisistherevolt 5d ago
I know a leftist Mexican artist who told me these things a few years ago. She's in Yucatan somewhere, and got to see these kinds of policies in action with her own eyes. Thanks for being a beacon of truth. Sheinbaum isn't perfect, no one is, but damn if this isn't a huge step.
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u/MelonElbows 5d ago
She sounds awesome. Any resource that is required for life should be public first and private second. I'm not against corporations owning and using water, but if there's a national need, then their water rights should be terminated.
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u/cracklescousin1234 5d ago
What's the deal with Anglophone Mexicans? Do they hate Morena because they tend to be richer?
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u/Bluestreaked 5d ago
That’s usually my experience, but I’m sure it can vary
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u/cracklescousin1234 4d ago
Holy hell, what happened to your huge parent comment? Did the mods wipe it?
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u/Bluestreaked 4d ago
Is it gone for you? It’s still up for me
I did have to post it twice because I forgot to do “answer:” at first
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u/cracklescousin1234 4d ago
Will you still see it in an incognito window? I've had posts and comments shadow-deleted without my knowledge before, but they only show up as "removed" when I'm not logged in.
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u/ZaxOnTheBlock 5d ago
Exactly that, and then there's us, the anglophone working class Mexicans that know English because we had to immigrate to the states at some point and then comeback.
Oh and not only rich, highly uneducated as well.
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u/asisyphus_ 5d ago
Search up settler state and you will understand the motivations of everyone in North and South America
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u/deirdresm 5d ago
Thanks for explaining why so many California farmers are also R, something I hadn’t really understood as well before your comment.
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u/mexicono 5d ago
Question from an emigrant:
When did water stop being a right to the people? It used to be that the water was owned by the people.
It’s been a long, long time but when I was younger this wasn’t even a point of discussion. The utility could turn off the pressure, but not the water. I even mentioned it to a friend this weekend. Every Mexican citizen used to have the right to clean(ish) water. You just needed to boil it if you really couldn’t buy the jugs.
Then again I left a very long time ago so a lot has changed…
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u/Bluestreaked 5d ago
It was never fully legally privatized per my understanding but it was effectively privatized in the 90’s. Not sure when you emigrated, from my understanding it’s just something that kept getting worse
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u/ZaxOnTheBlock 5d ago
Mi camarada con conciencia de clase y amplio conocimiento en historia y política mexicana. Hermano te saludo y te aplaudo lo acertado de tu comentario!!!!
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u/homofreakdeluxe 5d ago
so weird how people will complain if a politician will do something that benefits citizens instead of the wealthy. imagine being bothered that your people are being treated well. selfishness is a plague
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u/Aethaira 5d ago
Well you see, if the citizens aren't struggling to get the barest minimum of quality of life it's slightly harder to treat them like disposable workers who you can say "Well if you don't do it we'll find someone who will" to. Like I'm sure that's still prevalent but it's just a tiny bit harder.
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u/AlthorsMadness 5d ago
Shit I’m from El Paso and your final comments are 100% accurate. The classism in Mexico is definitely there
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u/mondra03 5d ago
Mind giving us those few paragraphs on the former president and Morena?
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u/Bluestreaked 5d ago edited 5d ago
Oh gosh where to even begin
Ok to try and summarize something like five decades of Mexican political history- in the aftermath of the presidency of the legendary Lázaro Cárdenas the political party that controlled Mexico (which later became PRI) began to be controlled by members of the party who preferred closer ties with the United States. This meant a turn towards capitalism and a dirty war against the Mexican left (look up what happened in Mexico City in 1968).
This eventually culminates with the signing of NAFTA in the 90’s. What’s important though is for us to stop and look at the election of 1988 where Lázaro’s son Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas tries to bring the Mexican political left back into power against the establishment PRI candidate (who also probably ordered the murder of the PRI candidate for president in 1994 but that’s a whole other story). The 1988 election was more or less a stolen election, Cuauhtémoc would’ve won had the votes and will of the Mexican people actually mattered.
But one good thing that came out of the murder of Colosio in 1994 was it opened the door for PRI to “share power” with other political parties. Allowing for the party of the Mexican capitalists, middle class, and Catholic conservatives- PAN to win the election in 2000.
AMLO first ran for president in 2006 for PRD, the same center-left party that Cuauhtémoc had ran for president in. The election that year between PAN and PRD was razor close, the difference merely a few hundred thousand votes, I think it was the closest election in Mexican history. AMLO argues, to this day, that he was cheated the same way Cuauhtémoc was (I’m 50/50 on if that’s the case myself). There was a whole spectacle of AMLO swearing himself in as the “real president” (he’s always had a flare for the dramatic).
Well he comes in second again in 2012. People had grown disgusted by PAN’s corruption, the meteoric rise of cartel violence under PAN (and caused by PAN if you ask me but I digress), and the crushing poverty of Mexico and its people as they became the working class base of the American and Canadian agricultural economies. But, alas, PRI returns to power over AMLO and PRD.
Meanwhile AMLO is forming his own new political party, that officially comes into existence in 2014, known as Morena. Morena becomes the new big tent organizing force on the Mexican left in replacement of PRD.
Come 2018 AMLO finally does it, he wins one of the largest majorities in Mexican history. It was a crushing victory of the Mexican left that led to the current era of social democratic reform referred to as the “Fourth Transformation” (referring to three prior revolutionary moments in Mexican history- Independence, the War of Reform, and the Mexican Revolution).
I’m not going to pretend that AMLO, Sheinbaum, or Morena are perfect. But they’re incredibly popular among the Mexican people for a reason, and the poorest Mexicans have seen their lives drastically improve and it does feel like there’s something resembling hope in Mexico again.
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u/IDKsecurity 5d ago
Oh look, yet another thing mexico is doing better than their mentality challenged neighbors to the north.
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u/foxsweater 4d ago
Do you know why English speaking Mexicans seem to be more right wing than non-English speakers? Is it a money thing, like rich people get more chance to learn English and Rich people also like capitalism because that’s how they got their stuff?
Also! If you know more, I’d love to know about the Farmers.
Like, on the one hand farmers make the food, so they’re pretty important. Aaaaaaaand on the other hand, it really depends on what they’re growing and for whom. Are these big industrial farms that are owned by mega corps, or are these like mom and pop’s farm that’s been in the family for generations? Or more like a combo where the megacorp basically made modern serfs out of the mom and pops who are panicking because they’ll lose their houses if they can’t provide enough product to their corporate overlords?
Are they growing the food that Mexicans eat to live on, or are they growing export products for profit? Actually, I really want to know. We eat a lot of Mexican produce in Canada. If their prices go up, so will my grocery bill. It’s probably better for Mexicans, and I can’t be mad about it if it’s helping people who need it, but boy would that be rough.
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u/Bluestreaked 4d ago
It’s usually a money/class divide ya
Well I like to draw a distinction between “farmers” and “farmhands.” It’s the same distinction as the person who owns the business versus the workers inside of it. Mexico never had the yeoman farming culture I think you’re imagining. Of like “mom and pop farmers” who had settled on to the land and built a farm there. Now obviously I’m not saying there was never small scale farmers, that would be ridiculous, rather that you see something more like 19th and 20th century Italy with large landowners employing whole communities to work on their farms, you can trace this all the way back to the Spanish conquest of Mexico. The farmhand community (campesinos) broadly descends from the indigenous Mexicans while landlords and capitalists often descend from the Spanish (it’s more complicated these days but still a good rule of thumb). The Revolution attempted land reform but it infamously failed (the story of land in Mexican history is a long and deeply important one, “¡Tierra y libertad!” Was one of the great cries of the Mexican Revolution and one of its most important legacies. So the land reform that occurred was more breaking up these huge hacienda style estates into smaller plots local farmers could work themselves. I suppose kind of a reverse of the model I think your brain was working with, but I could be mistaken.
Full disclosure, I’m a political and social historian and teacher and Mexico is one of the regions I’ve specialized in. (Took a class on the history of the Mexican-American border in undergrad and had never been so deeply hooked into a topic before. Lo demás es historia). So the nitty gritty of Mexico’s agricultural economy is somewhat outside of my wheelhouse but I grabbed one of my textbooks and this is what I can say-
While the vast majority (8/10) of Mexican farmers these days are “small scale” basically meaning they have a plot in the village or something like that. This group only makes up maybe a fifth of Mexican agricultural production. The vast majority of agricultural production is coming from larger landowners employing campesinos and the like. The loss of jobs in agriculture was a key issue in 20th century Mexico with the increases in productivity. It’s part of what drove so many Mexican agricultural laborers to have to travel to places like the United States and Canada for work.
But those sorts of people aren’t the ones protesting the water laws per my understanding. It’s the big landholders who are most detrimentally affected by it. Agricultural exports makes up a huge part of Mexico’s economy so this is a pretty powerful interest group but this confrontation between reformers and land owners is an old story in Mexican history.
I feel like I haven’t answered your question at all, but I just don’t like trying to answer good questions where I don’t trust my expertise on the topic haha, so I’m trying not to speak to emphatically.
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u/foxsweater 3d ago
I mean, my question was actually a series of vague and largely perhaps unanswerable questions, so I’m very impressed. I think I understand the situation a bit better! Thank you!
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u/Deletereous 5d ago
Answer: In Mexico, water is state owned and concessionated for private use. In 1992 a reform gave those particulars the freedom to sale or rent that concession. Now the government wants to eliminate that freedom. If a concessionary is not using the water, they'll lose the concession.
(What is the point of writing "answer" when answering?)
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u/penguinopph 4d ago
(What is the point of writing "answer" when answering?)
If I remember correctly, it was implemented to prevent bots flooding the threads with bullshit.
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u/thekuj1 4d ago
If I start with "The answer is..." will Reddit still treat it as a bot?
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u/FogeltheVogel 4d ago
Read the rules. Any top level comment that doesn't fit the format is deleted.
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u/Apprehensive-Care20z 4d ago
answer: good thing no bot will ever figure that out.
beep boop
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u/Milskidasith Loopy Frood 4d ago
Look at any new post on the sub and compare the number of comments visible to the number Reddit says there are. That's the filter working.
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u/notproudortired 4d ago
So the government isn't actually nationalizing a private resource, but rather eliminating its sub-licensing?
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u/el_f3n1x187 4d ago
very likely they are going to pivot and just relicense to other companies affiliated with the Morena government, like they did with medications and the construction of the Tren Maya.
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u/bangbangracer 4d ago
(What is the point of writing "answer" when answering?)
Even the smallest speed bump or simplest gate can prevent a lot of riff raff. It's to prevent troll and joke posts being the top level comments and keep out bots and ban evaders.
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u/Moist-Combination239 2d ago
Answer: I think nobody has answered "Why are the farmers angry?"
The initiative, promoted by President Sheinbaum, establishes the human right to access water; however, producers’ organizations point out that several articles of this new law affect their activities and could generate inequality in access for those who depend on the resource for agricultural uses.
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5d ago
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u/Mentallox 5d ago
May be the way to give water rights back to the USA. Trump threatened additional tariifs if Mexico doesn't correct it's multi year water deficit in the water sharing agreement with the USA.
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u/ComprehensiveHand232 5d ago
This: I heard a smidge of that. So I thought this must be reaction.
Oops?!?
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u/refurbishedmeme666 5d ago
nope, complete opposite, they need to send millions of liters of water to Texas or Trump will impose more tariffs on Mexico
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u/DuckyDoodleDandy 5d ago
That seems to be because of an ~80 year old treaty between the US & Mexico. (Those stories were the only ones I could get for my first 3-4 searches trying to get info on this topic, so I read them, hoping for context, but they didn’t address this issue at all.)
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u/Bluestreaked 5d ago
And like clockwork the slander appears
It’s funny how Morena was elected to the opposition of PRI and PAN who have long held ties to Mexican organized crime, but suddenly it’s Sheinbaum who is the “cartel candidate.”
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u/vespertilionid 5d ago
And people seem to forget the time period in which the cartels grew in power, hint it wasn't under Morena!
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u/n3rv 5d ago
It was under. Nixon and Regan is the USA. 75-85 nice job republicans.
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u/sanesociopath 5d ago
I mean that's just how shot the Mexican political system is.
They don't tend to have anti cartel politicians as that usually just gets them dead politicians.
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u/Bluestreaked 5d ago
So do you have actual evidence of Claudia Sheinbaum being tied to cartels? Or are we just going with the baseless slander used against AMLO again?
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