 Mexican President-elect Enrique Peña Nieto was in Washington this week to meet with President Obama. This is a traditional getting together of two heads of state on the eve of the Mexico's president taking office. The bilateral relationship is going very well in terms of how the two governments are dealing with each other on a range of issues that include economic issues, kind of the continuing evolution of NAFTA, and also the all-consuming drug war issues, the security situation, which entails Plan Merida, which is American support for Mexico's effort to take on the cartels. The war against the cartels was really launched by the outgoing president, Felipe Calderón, six years ago. It's claimed more than 60,000 lives. It has really wreaked havoc in Mexico. And it's something that the American government has expressed solidarity with Mexico on. President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton have said all the right things in terms of we share responsibility in this problem. And if you go to Mexico and you talk to people there, there is a tremendous amount of wariness with this conflict and a sense that why are we Mexicans continuing to die so as to prevent drugs from getting to American consumers? I do think, though, that the new government will reset its priorities and it might not see its mission as eradicating the drug trade for all time, but rather eradicate some of the more spectacular violence associated with the drug trade. A greater challenge beyond the specifics of policy and how the two governments engage I think has to do with how we think of Mexico. And by we, I mean the American public, the American media elites, business leaders. I think we need to have a reset on how Mexico is understood in this country because I think there's a glaring disconnect between the reality and the perception. There was a poll last week conducted by YouGov and The National Journal and others and it showed that only 14% of American surveyed considered Mexico a good neighbor or a good partner. I think it's a good time for Washington to engage Mexico on a broader agenda than simply the security one. And the most promising issue before both governments is that of energy. Mexico has a nationalized state-owned oil enterprise, BMX, which needs foreign capital for investment. And politically, this has always been a third rail in Mexican politics. The PRI itself, when it ruled Mexico in the 1930s, nationalized the oil industry and it remains much more closed off than even some other state-owned enterprises like in Brazil or Venezuela that allow some of the foreign majors to come in under a concession to help with the exploration of the resources. In Mexico's case, oil output has declined about 25% in the last decade because they haven't had the capital to reinvest in the business because Mexico's central budget relies heavily on BMX for about 40%. So something has to give here, there's a real moment of opportunity and the PRI coming back in the form of Peña Nieto offers this opportunity to revisit this constitutional prohibition in Mexico to allowing any private foreign entities to partner up with the Mexican state to drill for oil. And this, I think, is a real moment where we can double down on the North American self-sufficiency. Obviously, this is a boom time for finding energy sources even within the United States but certainly Mexico can be part of the long-term solution to our energy needs.