I hate to be cynical, I really do, but in the NYT editorial I see more a confirmation that (some) foreign capitalists think Lopez Obrador can do a better job managing Mexico for the business class than Calderon can, than a new commitment to authentic democracy by the grey lady.

But unfortunately, plenty of U.S. and foreign capitalists don't even want the Bush administration.  Don't get me wrong, they individually love his near-end of taxes on the wealthiest.  Capitalists surely have absolute faith that no labor, environmental, or economic regulation will cost them a cent in profits so long as Bush's crew are in power.  But there's clearly a nagging sense that global warming and losing wars might be bad for business, to say nothing of the leftward resurgence world-wide that the Bush regime has been unable to stop, in general, even in 'the U.S. own backyard'.

So who will win out in Mexico?  The local big capitalists, at least a few of whom showed their finesse in suing Narco News, seem unlikely to move from their position.  And the Bush regime, likely to be in power for another two years even without another Reichstag fire, would seem to be a more important voice of U.S. capitalists than the New York Times, whatever the majority opinion.

And there's that largely anonymous group of businessmen at MATT.org, which put on such a show of being non-partisan and "diverse" in its opinions in the months since it was founded-- apparently, all so some might find it credible when it came time to show it's true colors, which Giordano pegged cold.  Their headline today (and for all I know, since Sunday) is sickening:

MATT Was First To Predict!
Felipe Calderón
Mexico's Next President
Will There Be Democracy or Revolution?

They have published less than 20 articles since their inception, so their blatant disregard for all that balance they announced in so many words is completely blown away by their behavior now, and if nothing else good comes of this election, at least MATT's credibility is destroyed good and early.

MATT will probably be referred to in propaganda to get the U.S. to accept Calderón as "Mexico's choice" but the real question is who does the the final election tribunal represent, and, therefore, just how ungovernable does Mexico have to become to make them grant a full recount?

AMLO, by tacking very centrist in the last part of the campaign, seemed to want to assure Mexico's (and foreign?) elites that he would be a good steward of their wealth, even while "putting the poor first" rhetorically.  I may be misreading Mexico, and it is conservative enough that moving centrist was a real bid for more votes.  But in the United States Al Gore won in 2000 because in the last two or three days of the campaign he discovered his inner populist, in my opinion.  (That Al Gore won the popular vote and the state-by-state vote is not my opininion, incidentally, it is fact; the "in my opinion" part is that the reason he won is the shift to populist rhetoric.)  Gore won not because he swayed the opinion of people who had already rearranged their schedules to get to the polls that working Tuesday, but because his genuine acknowledgement of the troubles working U.S. citizens faced gave more people a reason to go out and vote for him.

In the same sense, I think if AMLO had given the poor more reason to believe he was sincere about fighting on their behalf (and simply sticking to those original points alone would have helped), he would have gotten many more people to vote for him (those potential voters that aren't cut off at 750 per precinct because they're working far from home, that is).

But winning an election is not, in what was already becoming Bush's America even in Gore's day, the same thing as taking, or keeping, power.

As one donor to the Fund for Authentic Journalism always writes with his check, "to the barricades!"