Tabasco 2007: Will It be New Orleans in 2005, or Mexico City in 1985?

Since that time, Calderon has ordered the suspension of additional military missions and sent more troops to the disaster zone. But given eyewitness accounts, including from one woman who heroically held her three month infant son above her head for 24 hours until she was rescued, there are many more people to be rescued than rescuers. And surely, not all of them will have had the luck or stamina of this determined mother to withstand the floodwaters. Refugees are already telling stories of people who succumbed to the waters while waiting in vain to be resued. If troops had been sent in from day one, this would not be the case. As the saying goes, too little, too late.

Moreover, the daily newspaper La Jornada published an article yesterday condemning the systematic theft of funds destined for dam maintenance and disaster prevention efforts by the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) government of Tabasco during the terms of the State's past two governors, including that of infamous PRIista gangster Roberto Madrazo. And during decades of PRIista rule, the same gang of thugs failed to build any effective levee system.

Also, the United States has just pledged $300,000 in aid to refugees, (which happens to be 0.02% of the budget for the "Plan Mexico" military "anti drug" aid package if anyone had any doubts about the Bush administration's proportionate concern for the well being of Mexico's people.)

It is important to remember that two events are said to have effectively sounded the death knell for the PRI's hold on Federal power in Mexico: The 1994 EZLN uprising, and the 1985 Mexico City earthquake during which up to 17,000 died amid incompetent rescue and mitigation efforts by the government. And just like in 1985, Mexico's people are responding overwhelmingly in solidarity with their brothers and sisters in Tabasco, sending food, clothing, and what pesos they have to collection centers around the country.

Which begs the question: Once the waters have subsided, the dead have been counted, and the nearly one million refugees return to what remains of their homes, will what emerges resemble New Orleans today, or Mexico on January 1st, 1994? And will solidarity turn to rage and political organization, as it did in 1985?

The story continues...