 Good morning everybody. I want to welcome you to CSIS here to the America's program and I want to thank you particularly for coming in this really cold morning. I know for some people cold is a deterrent, but thanks nevertheless. So I'm thrilled that you could all make it to this event that we're doing today entitled Mexico's Fading Moment with a question mark. Violence and security in the future of the Mexican state. As you all know, 43 Mexican students disappeared in September in Iguala, a city in the state of Guerrero. In the weeks that followed their disappearance, lots of information, true and false came out. It was interesting this morning how in the Washington Post you had as a headline outrage in Mexico that was focusing on some of the issues that have come about as a result of this issue. As those searching for the students uncovered mass graves, the students were declared found and then subsequently unfound repeatedly. The mayor of Iguala who has since been taken into custody and is awaiting criminal trial and his wife are linked to the disappearances, allegedly connected to the violence and violent cartels that still control segments of Mexico's territory. I don't think that this is, and we've had conversations Duncan, I don't think that this is the only sort of piece of information or news that is coming out of Mexico. Obviously this has gone down in the midst of Mexican President Peña Nieto's ambitious and impressive agenda of economic reforms. He's already passed education, telecommunications, tax and energy reforms, which are pillars of his agenda. And his administration has justifiably touted those achievements promoting the idea that this is Mexico's moment. And I can't stress that in so many ways this idea is true. There's a lot to celebrate in Mexico, economic growth, political expediency, forward thinking reforms. These are all great achievements, but the past two months feel way too familiar. And serve as a reminder that what we've had or what we've seen recently in Mexico is always sort of tempered by what we've always seen in the past and these issues coming back with insecurity, with challenges to human rights, transnational crime, drug violence, impunity and corruption. That this is still very much a part of Mexico's present. And this is perhaps most apparent in Mexican public reaction to this. The protests continue through Mexico. The demands that those responsible be punished and that corruption be rooted out of the government is all sort of becoming louder and louder and louder. So today's event is particularly relevant and I think we have two of the probably the most informed people and most qualified people to talk about this today. We're going to explore what will the president do, how will he manage this crisis of public security and public confidence in his administration and how will he balance these priorities with his existing agenda and reforms. And as I mentioned, the two people that are sitting next to me are the most qualified to talk about this. Duncan Wood is the director of the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. He has a wealth of experience in these issues, including 17 years living in Mexico where he was at Itam. I'm so happy that you're here. I know that people are probably calling you from different sectors from different corners asking for your advice. You have a meeting with the governor of Chiapas after this so we're going to make this right to the point. So since you're in high demand and my good friend Jaime Hernandez who has been a regular here at CSIS on Mexico issues but also on regional issues in general. So I'm super happy to have both of you here and I'm going to cut right to the chase. I'm going to go right into this event and to the themes that we're going to highlight today. So did we speak a little too soon about this being Mexico's moment? The theme here is if Mexico's moment has faded. Was there too much hype? Could we sort of overrule or ignore sort of that constant issue that we're dealing with with public security and sort of gloss it over with the huge reforms that are happening at the cost of dealing with these core issues that are still unresolved? Duncan. Thanks Carl. And thanks for inviting me. I wish it was under happier circumstances and let's just begin by recognizing the scale of the human tragedy and the outpouring of emotion in Mexico. I think it's one of the things that now is coming to the fore in the international coverage of this. But I think before it was more a question of oh no another terrible thing has happened in Mexico and now we're beginning to see the depth of feeling in Mexico which is driving a lot of these protests. Is Mexico's moment fading? You know a few weeks ago when this first happened I was talking with Josefina Vasquez Mota, a former presidential candidate. She said look you will be able to define Pena Nieto's presidency both in two stages before this incident and after it, before Igüela and after Igüela. And I think she's absolutely right on that. And the question is is that you know we've had these two years where the international press has you know I think justifiably recognized the achievements of this government. But perhaps they wanted to forget all too quickly about that other side of Mexico. And now we've got this moment where we'll see how the government reacts and thus far and we'll talk about the reaction I'm sure a little bit later on. Thus far we haven't seen a strong enough reaction from the government. But this is an opportunity for Pena Nieto and his government to really show leadership and to address some of the underlying foundational problems of Mexican society. Now did we go too far in the other direction beforehand? I think absolutely we did. Of course there were lots of us out there who said you know it's great that we're beginning to have a more balanced perspective on Mexico. During the Calderón administration it was far too much of the violence and the insecurity and not enough about the economic good news that existed in Mexico for a number of years. Then we all got excited about the economic reform agenda and in particular about the energy reform. And I think there was a risk, a temptation to forget about the other side of Mexico. But it was always there and for those of us who spend a lot of time in Mexico and travel there frequently, you can't avoid it because you meet people, you talk to people and the conversations that you have over dinner. In addition to saying this is exciting stuff that's happening, people were fully aware that the problems of security had not been solved. There were some impressive achievements in lowering homicide rates. But one of the underlying trends throughout all of this period has been rising kidnapping, extortion rates. And there were incidents of course before this that didn't receive such wide coverage. And so I think that one of the dangers that we face as international observers of this is that we need to keep the pressure on the whole time, not just on economic reforms, but on the basic reforms that affect citizen security in Mexico. Justice reform, police reform, strengthening institutions. And Jaime, who I should have introduced you with your proper title, not just as friend, but you're the Washington correspondent for the El Unirual Mexico's leading journal daily. How do you see it from the Mexican perspective? I mean, what Duncan is saying is very clearly necessary, keeping an emphasis, keeping a focus on some of these issues that are unresolved. There's obviously an interest in this country, this connection that we have with Mexico, not just issues having to do with immigration, issues having to do with energy, but also these cultural issues that we have that we share a lot of history and a lot of culture, and especially the states that are bordering states with Mexico see this and say, oh, there might be spillover with some of this violence into the states that Texas, New Mexico, Arizona. But that's our perspective. How do people in Mexico see this? Well, I agree with Duncan. I think he's right. Just we have to remember right now that next Thursday it's going to be the 104th anniversary of the Mexican Revolution. Since then, you know, the Mexican state has been working very hard. And that promise of the 104 years ago that people could reach, you know, a place, a country with peace, development, education. Everybody was expecting that. And now I think that we are in the worst crisis since then. I think that we are in the middle of the political earthquake. I think that all the political spectrum is right now trying to figure out what can they do in the middle of these circumstances. I don't remember, frankly, something like this, since the 68th with the Tlaterolco. And now everybody is wondering what are we going to do? The parties are talking right now, well, we need to do something against the corruption, against the collusion of the political parties with organized crime. We have to do something to develop, you know, it's so sad for me to see this huge manifestation where you can see the students. Most of them are, some of them are in the universities, but a lot of them, they don't have any education. They are out of the system. And we are right now paying a very high price of these long years of collusion between the political power and the unions, like Sente, the teacher, the teacher, the teacher, the teacher. And we have right now students that they don't can either articulate an idea intelligent about the future of his country or the country. Instead, they, you know, they buy, they really anger. And you have also 50 million of people, poor, 50 million of people poor. And at the same time, you have stories like the ones that we saw the last week with this story of the wife of President Enrique Peña Nieto, Angelica Rivera, with this huge house, white house. And regardless the legal aspect of this story, and the president has told that he's going to present evidence and everything, blah, blah, blah. I think that in this moment, Mexico can afford more privileged governments. We can afford it maybe in the years of José López Portillo, one of the most privileged presidents in the story of Mexico. But right now, in the middle of this crisis, I think that that's why the people is so angry. And finally, I think that since this tragedy in Ayotzinapa and Iwala. Finally, the political parties, including the PRD, PRD, are talking about, well, we need to do something. We have to create a new attorney against the corruption. I mean, everybody knew that, and the president, he promised to do something like this. And he never did it. I think that it's a very good opportunity, as you can say, to do something right now, because I really believe, maybe it sounds very pessimistic, but I really think that we are in the middle of a very dangerous situation. I think that the viability of the system is at risk. And I think that the president has to do something, something, maybe change in the cabinet. Something is talking about the possibility of the changing minister of interior. I don't know. I suppose that the president is going to be something. Maybe he's going to do something on December the 1st. But to try to answer your question, I think that we are in the middle right now of the political earthquake, and the Mexican has to do something, has to go out and do something, because right now it's in the middle of very dangerous paralysis. What could this look like? I mean, we saw what Calderón was an offensive that produced over 50,000 dead people. People that were onlookers, as well as people that were targets, because of their illicit activities, as well as people that were in the security forces. That wasn't the solution. There has to be changes that occur in the judicial system, changes that occur with police. I mean, when I used to be on the Foreign Relations Committee, we'd go to Mexico on these congressional delegations, and it was always the same concern with the police, right? You had the federal police, the state police, the municipal police, and the corruption that existed more so in the municipal than in the others, but there was always this desire for reform. So that's one aspect. What else are we talking about here? And the record that President Pena Nieto has is excellent. I mean, the things that he's been able to do in this short period of time, major reforms on issues that people thought were unlikely on the energy side. I remember we would have conversations, and it was always touch and go, but he was able to do it. And now you have this very big challenge in security and corruption, and as you say, the issue is really sort of at a tipping point. So what more can they do? Or what should they be thinking about to deal with these issues? So I mean, I think it's very important right now to keep perspective, the capability of folks in the think tank community to maintain a balanced perspective on things. First of all, let's remember that the Mexican political system is incredibly resilient and has shown a capacity over the years to react in ways that keep it going. Whether it is the Paisal Christ of 1994, the political assassinations of that same year, the gradual transition to democracy, an imperfect democracy, of course, up to this point. But we have to recognize that there is a long-term evolution of the Mexican political system. And this crisis, although it's a very grave crisis, I would say, I would argue that Mexican political institutions do have the capacity to respond to it. Now, this becomes a test now of political will. And we have to ask the question, is the Mexican government, or more importantly, I would say, are the Mexican political elites? Because it goes way beyond the government, it goes beyond the parties as well. And by the political elites, I mean both those who are officially in politics and those who are opinion leaders, those in the elites of the private sector as well. Are they willing to now double down on the efforts which are already there? There's justice reform, there's police reform. Mexico introduced a new criminal code this year that produces a criminal code for the entire country. Remember, we had a political reform at the end of last year, which centralized power over elections into the National Electoral Institute, as opposed to having it divided up amongst state electoral institutes. A lot of the machinery that you need to actually deal with this problem is there. But now you have to commit real resources and most of all political will to make it happen. And so I think one of the things that's been most disappointing in the first two years of this government has been the lack of progress on justice reform. A very, very important justice reform was passed in 2008, and this government has recognized verbally, over and over again, how important that justice reform is, but we're fast approaching the deadline for implementation and we're not going to make it. Now that's fine, deadlines are there to be pushed back and to be flexible as an academic, I understand that entirely. But the most important thing is that it's done right. But what we really need to see right now is that the federal government is applying pressure to state level governments and to itself to make sure that justice reform takes place. The reason why is because that hits at the very heart of impunity. If you don't have a functioning justice system, if you don't have functioning courts, if you have corrupt judges or ignorant judges or just ineffective judges, and if you don't have any kind of monitoring of the justice system, then, you know, how are you going to possibly put people in jail? And we can look at the examples that exist in Mexico where there has been a successful transition in the justice system. Look at the examples up in Baja California. You know, you go to a courtroom in some places in Baja California and it's like walking into a room like this. It's brand spanking new, it's all glass fronted, so everything is transparent, the judge sits up at the front, the lawyer says there's no jury, of course, different legal system, but it's now oral trials and everything is video recorded. That's a huge step forward, whereas before, judges would make their decisions behind closed doors. That's what the government has to seize on right now and to say this can be done in Mexico. Mexico is not a lost cause, and now we have to do this throughout the country. Yeah, but do you think that these reforms risk or the will to do these reforms, implement them, do they risk sort of an interest fizzling out of the government unless the protesters continue protesting, continue talking about these issues? I mean, some of the things that we're hearing about what's happening in different parts of the country are very disturbing, that there's an outrage, there's a serious sense of outrage. Do you think that that will produce some changes or do you think that this is likely to fizzle out and people go, you know, this has happened in the past, government, you know, you talk with a lot of Mexicans, you know, government's really not going to change, this is what we have, and, you know, so be it. But do you really think that a change could come as a result of this? I was listening to Duncan when he was talking about this resilience of the institutions of Mexico. And I remember this same discussion 20 years ago. You know, at that time, when we had, because we always have had problems in the past, we always said, no, take it easy. We have very strong institutions. Now I'm not so sure about this. And I agree in most of the part with Duncan, but at the same time, I have to say that when, if you want to try to find a solution in Mexico, you have to keep in mind that Mexico is a country that is always working at different levels and at different speeds. It's not the same thing, for example, in the case of Baja California and the case of Guerrero in the south of Baja. Let me put an example. Las Escuelas Rurales, the rural schools, was a fantastic project that was envisioned since the 20s and 30s with Jose Vasconcelos that was the Minister of Education. The main purpose of this project of the rural schools was, you know, it's a kind of redemption of these indigenous people, the rural communities. It was a fantastic project. Now these projects are, you know, it's amazing. All these politics in states like Guerrero and Oaxaca, they took all these schools because right now, for example, all these schools, in the case, for example, of Ayotzinapa, they depend from Mexico City, right? But the people that are responsible for all these areas of the rural schools can do nothing about Ayotzinapa. Why? Because in that school, the last work is always the mayor or the state governor. And for example, nobody knows exactly what is the budget of that school. Nobody knows. And in the first year of these students, they don't take classes. They work as, they call them perros, dogs. And they use them to clean, you know, the things, the school. And they send them to go, to take buses, to stall and things, a lot of it. And this is, well, gosh, how are these projects so fantastic? And now it's becoming like this. When you go to Ayotzinapa in the rural schools, you can see the Che Guevara in the school. And in some way, you know, some of these students, a lot of students, they think that they are some kind of avatars, avatars of Che Guevara. So that's why I think that right now we are paying a very high price of this collusion between the unions, the political parties. You know, we have to find a new, the reform and justice system, but always also in the educational system. With that kind of, if you can solve that kind of problem, you can solve nothing, you can see ahead for a better country. But that collusion, let's talk about that a little bit, because, you know, there's a framework and a context and a culture that needs to sort of change when it comes to some of these issues and attitudes that exist between these different, you know, stakeholders. How does the political class or how does the President as a reformer deal with that? I mean, what would he have to do? What is the blowback? The succennial has a different sort of balance than what we have here in the U.S., right? We have basically the President for two years has time to make some reforms and then he's running for president again in the same duck or whatever. But how does this work within the political framework in Mexico? What would he have to do to change some of these attitudes? Is it like? Well, right now the PRD is proposing a new kind of, a new sort of protocol to fight the corruption, the collusion. And I wonder if in the middle of the huge crisis where is the PRD can do this? Right now they are fighting between each other. You know, the chuchos. That's why I think that I'm so pessimistic about all this. I mean, maybe I'm watching this from the very pessimistic point of view, but I know I don't like what right now is doing the political class, the political elite. I don't like it. And I think that they have to find a way because, for example, the case of the mayor of Iguala, José Luis Abarca, is an example of what can happen even with the party of the left. So they have to do something in that sense. I mean, I think there's so many things that could be done at this point in time. And in fact, we have examples of what can be done already. During this administration. Remember the incident where the daughter of Profeco went into a restaurant and she didn't get the tail she wanted, so she kicks up a huge fuss. She calls her dad, tells him to shut down the restaurant. He does that. What does the president do? The president reacts by firing him. That was a great symbol to send a letter on. Why did he do it? Because everybody recorded this incident on their cell phones. That technology exists and we're seeing it now on social media throughout the country. For good and for bad, the things that are happening. The evidence is there. Now it requires applying the political will and the resources to act upon it. With regards to education, you're absolutely right. The education system is broken, needs to be reformed. The reforms of last year were an important, albeit a small step in the right direction. But it showed the political will to go up against the union or at least the union leadership whilst recognizing that one million teachers make a huge difference at election time. So you have to handle that. If you're a political party that wants to win power or sustain power, you have to handle that very delicately. Applying the resources that the government is clearly using right now to sell its reform agenda, now applying some of those same resources to the justice system, to police reform, etc. Whilst recognizing that, of course, there is a constitutional division of powers in Mexico because it's a federal country and there's only so many things the federal government can do. But what the federal government, in particular, the president can do, and this is drawing a tactic out of the old pre-playbook, of course, is that you apply pressure directly to the governor. It's no coincidence that the governor of Guerrero took a leave of absence. I mean, obviously he was pushed out. We all understand that. The president has to be willing to use all that kind of pressure against governors of states where things are not working in the way that things used to happen in Mexico and it may not be as strictly following the rules. And this leads us to one of the fundamental questions, is has Mexico changed as a country over the last 20, 30 years? And the answer is yes and no. What I think is fundamental to understand that right now, and we see it in the reaction of Mexican societies, the Mexican society has changed. Mexican society has access to much more information. They're more globalized. They see what's happened in other countries around the world. They use social media to mobilize. And I'm not making a comparison here with the Arab Spring before anybody jumps to that conclusion. But there are important lessons there. And Mexican society has said we don't have to stand for this anymore. Now, what we're seeing, I think, in the depth of the protests right now is that it's a lot of people who are disenfranchised, disadvantaged, who are taking to the streets in the early stages of the protests. We saw a lot of middle class, upper middle class people on the streets as well. That's the crucial element in my opinion. If we don't see any sustained effort by those people, then there is a real danger that the political momentum will dissipate. And I was in a conference yesterday and I made the point that, you know, we've got a crucial date coming up in Mexico, which is the 12th of December. You know, 12th of December, the Christmas festivities really begin and people become distracted. People go home, they're with their families. The government has until the 12th of December and then from the 12th of December through to more or less the 15th of January to come up with a solution or at least a strategy to attack this issue because they're going to get a breather in that Christmas period. The middle classes will be focused on other things. And that's their real opportunity, I think, at this point. I agree. But let me go a little deeper on the use of maybe the judicial proceedings, let's say, involved in this to sort of send a signal that it's not business as usual anymore and that they're willing to make reforms. Do you see it as likely that the government will see it that way and be able to send a clear signal that they will hold accountable the people that have committed these atrocities? Or is that really up to the students that are out in the street pushing for these issues? Is there will within the government to really use this as an agent to make change? I hope so. I really hope so because I don't see any other option. The Mexican government and the president, who has a big problem right now, he has a problem of credibility and the state also. You know, the last week I was in Colombia in Bogotá. I was with the president, Juanel Santos, that right now he has another kind of problem. But I was the president, Santos, and I asked him, well, what do you think from the perspective of Colombia? What do you think of Mexico? We are now in a very chaotic situation. He told me, well, I think that you're going to see the light at the end of the tunnel. But most of all, I think that the most of the Mexicans has to be clear that the main, the enemy are the criminals. And I think that the Mexican society has to be very clear with that. But at this moment, the people are so angry that they are fed up and angry with the government, not the criminals that killed the 43 students. And that's why I think that the Mexican government has to do something, he has to regain the terrain, credibility, and especially in the justice system, there has to be accountability. Otherwise, I think that will be a very good opportunity to regain terrain and regain credibility. I think that you mentioned Colombia. I mean, a lot of people would say that it's more Colombia's moment than it is Mexico at this point. How do you see that? Were you able to talk to him about that a little bit? Yes, I think that it was interesting to see how the people, everybody was asking me, oh, come on, 43 students. It was incredible. We didn't even commit these kind of crimes during our war. It was impossible. I don't know what's hard, but at the same time, the lesson of Colombia is that they, in all the sectors, the journalists, the professionals, the political elite, they understood they have to do something, the political will that they can say. They understood that it's very important, the political will, whether or otherwise, you know, you can get it. You can get it. Let me just sit down here, because I think that it's intriguing to look at what's, to speculate about what's going to happen next. President Peñanato has his legacy issue already. He's opened up the energy system. That's one of the things he'll always be remembered for. This becomes the second legacy, and whether it's a positive thing or a negative thing, depends upon the political elites at this point in time. Now, you also mentioned culture earlier on. I've always been skeptical of whether there is a particular cultural disposition in Mexico towards corruption. I believe it's all about incentive structures. When I was in Mexico, I would use a red light as a stop sign, just like everybody else. When I come to the United States, I follow the rules. Why? Because the incentive structure is there. It's not that there is necessarily a culture of corruption. It's that the incentives are out of whack. Disincentives or disincentives, I would say, is the fact that you don't have a justice system which works. If you have a 3% chance of going to jail for committing a murder, it's not much of a disincentive if you want to commit murder. These things are going to happen. If you have almost zero chance of being caught for stealing something, you're going to steal things if you need to steal things. What the government needs to do in this particular case is it needs to make sure, because these are federal crimes, needs to make sure that once the people have been identified, that it does a damn good job of gathering the evidence, because the worst possible thing at this point would be to get these people into court and then to find that you have not gathered enough evidence or the evidence has been mishandled and a judge legitimately says, I can't convict these people. Which would show that the Mexican justice system works, but these people go free. The Mexican government has to make sure they do their homework extremely well. That's one of the areas where this government and previous governments have failed in the past. They haven't been professional enough about gathering evidence and making sure that all of the procedures and protocols have been followed. That's one thing that the government can do at this point in time. They have shown with the arrest of some high level cartel figures such as El Chapo, that they're able to do that kind of thing. Before I open it up to the audience a little bit, I want to ask one last question. How is this going to affect things like Pacto Podmeki? How is this going to affect the agenda that the administration might have in foreign affairs issues? Because they were also looking at different things, not just in the region, but internationally. Things like the Alliance for Progress. I'm sorry, for the Pacific Alliance. Things that sort of put Mexico in a global context, right? So we return again to the domestic stuff, but how is this going to affect the domestic political framework and how is it going to affect the president's international agenda? I suggest that maybe it's time for another Pact. Pacto for Mexico specifically to combat the corruption more efficient justice system. I think that the president has to once again, I think that Duncan is right, I mean President Peña Nieto right now his legacy is huge, what he has done. But he has to understand that now that is in a big risk. If he isn't capable of complete this process, the political reform, the justice reform, the fight against the corruption that is the worst enemy I think, I think that his legacy is in danger. I think the chance of getting another Pacto for Mexico or Pacto for la Seguridad la Justicia is I mean it's very slight probability we're going to see that. Simple reason being that the PRD is tearing itself apart the pan is still suffering after its leadership battle earlier on this summer and so you have an ineffectual opposition at this point that isn't in a position to demand anything from the government. The PRI is the only party which up to this point has maintained that kind of unity that you need. Now for the Pacto for Mexico, going back to December 2012, because of the underlying rifts within those two opposition parties, the leaders of those parties were willing to work with the government. At this point with the PRD going through this I mean absolute nightmarish situation, I don't think they're in any position to negotiate they're going to be focused on internal issues. The pan has an opportunity to reform itself, but the wounds there are very very deep. Now, does this distract the government from its domestic agenda? This is the domestic agenda from this point on I think, at least for the next couple of years. They have to deal with this. And yes, they need to continue implementing the economic reforms etc. but this becomes the issue. In terms of the international agenda, I think this is a huge threat. They're going to become horribly distracted, but necessarily distracted by this. And in the past I think we've seen that under the Calderón administration, although that he can be critiqued for embracing security and justice too too closely, it did give him a certain legitimacy when talking about these issues internationally. And by saying look, we're suffering, we need international cooperation to overcome this challenge. Maybe that's something that Mexico now has to offer in a similar way that Colombia has come to be seen as an authority on this. Alright, well I'm going to open it up to folks in the audience if you have questions. Why don't we start with the gentleman here, if you could identify yourself and ask your question. Rafael Bernal with the UPI I was in Mexico last week and I heard something that I found pretty entertaining. They said Peña Nieto was a sort of a mirror image of Calderón. Calderón being a very capable president with a very incompetent cabinet. Of course the opposite seems to be true. All the challenges you're presenting here reforming the judicial system is a massive undertaking and what you were saying about the PRI being very strong. Peña Nieto does have very capable leaders in his government. But my question is do you think he's capable of managing very capable leaders? My argument up to this point has been that Peña Nieto's greatest strength has been to balance those two sides of his cabinet the political against the economic and to recognize the division of responsibilities between them. Whilst also recognizing that at the top you've got two people Miguel Angelos Soryochong and Luis Virigray who both have very high political aspirations and to recognize that in some way they're in competition with each other but also to make sure that neither of them gets too far ahead of the other one. Now at this point in time of course the political side has taken a very very big hit and so Jaime was speculating is somebody going to be forced out at some point? Well that may well happen but remember that Soryochong is a very powerful political figure in Mexico. He has a lot of support at the local level. Is Peña Nieto the mirror image of Calderón? No, I think they're two completely different people and not in sort of direct opposites. I think he is a capable politician. One of the greatest myths that people wanted to believe about him was that the fact just because he doesn't read books and just because he makes a lot of mistakes in his speeches that somehow he's an idiot. You don't become governor of the state of Mexico or president of Mexico if you're an idiot that's clearly not the case. Is he surrounded by competent people? He's surrounded by a lot of people. Are they creative? That's I think probably the most important question at this point in time. Calderón was surrounded by people who were very very creative, who came up with new ways of addressing things. I'm not sure that we see that same kind of creativity particularly on the political side and that's what it's going to take at this point. It takes somebody to come in and say, you know what, we haven't thought about it from this angle. We've got all of these mechanisms in place. A point that I've been making recently is if you've got this centralized, you know, electoral institute now, why not use that to vet all candidates at the political and state levels? Avoid this kind of problem and people come back and say, well once they're in office they can be corrected. Of course they can but at least you eliminate those people who you know have ties to organized crime beforehand. Now that's not particularly creative if somebody like me can think of it. But you know, it's something that can be done. You need to have some of those great minds being brought in to, you know, surround the president and say this is what we need at this point in time. I just add that everybody knows that right now the system, the government is under a lot of pressure and there are stories of internal fights between this and that in the cabinet and I think that they are really very capable men and I think that they have to put aside their fights and also their ambitions because everybody knows that as you can say that Osirio Chung and other guys, they want to be the next one. So they have to put that aside and the president has to put an order to see because right now the crisis is really very dangerous. I think right now the domestic agenda is, now the domestic agenda is this. If they don't solve this I don't know, I don't know. And it's intriguing isn't it because throughout the hype about Mexico's moment and the reforms speaking to Mexicans they say yeah that's all great but are we seeing economic growth and is the security situation getting better? They knew what the reform agenda, sorry what the agenda, the domestic agenda has been all along. If you don't make people happy and if you don't make their lives better then they're going to pay you back and you know for years living in Mexico City you know you take taxis and the conversation you have with your taxista is you always get that same question do you think that your kid's life is going to be better than your own because if you don't then you're going to be very very unhappy. You're willing to suffer yourself a little bit as long as you think your kids are going to do better than you and for years people in Mexico have been saying no actually I think that my kids are going to have it tougher. And this issue that you raised earlier on of the ninis, you know the people Nicarajan and Estudian people are sort of the political powder keg in Mexico right now and we've been talking about them for years and we should have recognized you know from the moment that we had the Yosso 132 movement during the election this government more than anybody should have recognized the political power of those in a media savvy age. We've seen this in the past. I'm just going to be the devil's advocate. We've seen this in the past. We've seen the protests. We've seen people sit in the cellar for months. What's going to make this different? I don't know. I think though I wonder that if you see the level the level of the contradictions are huge right now is you know I mean I'm a journalist and I've been covering a lot of places with civil wars and wars and most of the time when I see this kind of things you know it's like a chemical process sometimes it's so quickly you didn't even notice. Wow that's the case for me in this case of Mexico if you don't do something if you try to alleviate the situation of this middle class it's true what Duncan said look at the fathers for example in my case I have a son he's a doctor every day in the night I call him how are you? You're right fine you're safe well and two days ago he called me he sent me a text from the road that is to Cuenabac. I'm trapped you know I have a here young girl is fighting for his life I can go through this blockade and what can I do? Disaspirated the people really is angry it's the cows that's why I'm so worried and this is different this time is different because you know when you see this kind of young people that they don't have any future for me I call them it's like you know like these films of the orcos they don't think they really angry that's why I think the Mexican government has to do something quickly let me get the microphone one second Hi, Craig Deere from the National Defense University so I'm not guilty of being the first guy to raise the Columbia comparison I want to do that very different cases but as I recall what really made the difference in Columbia was that the population and the elites finally they touched bottom and so they were willing to pay the additional tax and do what needed to be done so that case and the famous Rahm Emanuel quote never let a crisis go to waste and I was really taken by your point that the crisis is worse than Dr. Lorco it's back to the revolution is this an opportunity for the president does he have the skills to rise above political parties no pacto por México but this is a non person in a political sense but to lead these dual sides of justice and police reform you can't do one without the other but it is it's like tuning a car at 80 miles an hour how do you do that because you have to continue to maintain security so and I've you've talked about it but I just need to reinforce that is the crisis that bad and I sense it might be because I was someplace recently I focused more on defense issues when I heard Mexicans in the north of Mexico saying that they would be willing to accept U.S. troops I mean I didn't say it Bruce Bagley went freaking nuts when he heard it I said I didn't say it he said it the Mexicans are saying this is the crisis that bad or is there still room to go further before you touch bottom and that may be and before you answer that and I think it's a great question the timing of this in Mexico and the timing of discussions in the United States about immigration reform it just makes it a very sort of toxic mix you know interests and reforming the border because of insecurity having to do with Mexico and having to do with narco-trafficking and I think that we're doing the wrong thing if we just talk about it as if it's only a Mexico issue because this wouldn't be happening if you didn't have corruption you didn't have these threats on both sides of the border but for this to come up at this time when we're sort of going through our throws within the immigration discussion in this country or non-discussion really adds a different kind of element to this so I just wanted to add that because I think it's important we've talked about Mexico a lot and there is an interplay that has to do with what's happening in Mexico the bilateral relationship and the issues that are relevant to this relationship I think trying to answer your question I think that indeed there is a room I think the room to regain the control to regain the credibility but he has to I think that he has to put order in the cabinet and no more stories of his wife in the front page of the house please don't that's the worst thing that you can do and I think that is enough room because I know a lot of people in Mexico in politics I mean I know a lot of academics professionals doctors engineers there is amazing people and I'm sure that the Mexico has the resilience enough strength to go ahead but the president has to take the Toro por los Cuernos and do something, but quickly and the question of the immigration I remember a conversation with we were talking about when is the the good time for discuss their immigration reform and he told me well the rate that Mexico is in peace and maybe that will never occur come on and this is going to be a huge excuse for the republican party to once again say well we need to secure the more than ever it should fuel the discussion I'm getting a tick that we have a tweeted question so I want to take that can I just quickly response to this? I mean there's two arguments here you asked the question have we touched bottom yet basically in fact I think in the Colombia case it was when things really began to hit the heartland it was when they got to Bogota that's when people began to say yeah exactly and I think that's a reason why perhaps we haven't touched bottom yet Mexico City is still a safe safe area, you know I mean the violence is getting is closer, they're rising kidnapping rates, extortion rates but Mexico City remains relatively safe and that's because even though they're not completely clean it has police institutions that actually work and you have sufficient numbers of police on the streets to keep the streets safe now a reason why we may have touched bottom is because these protests are so violent they just sit-ins in the Zocalo I mean you're seeing the doors of the national palace being set on fire you're seeing attacks against government buildings throughout the country, you're seeing a very well mobilized if not well organized youth that is rising up here and that should be enough to make the government sit up and take it take action and for the bilateral agenda, I mean you talk about immigration but let's not forget that we also have on the bilateral agenda a mechanism in place the Merida Initiative which touches on so many of the issues that are fundamental here in fact that agenda doesn't need to change at all, we need to double down on institutional strength things to double down on resilient communities, double down on police training, double down on justice reform all the things that are in Merida are doubly relevant today as they were when it was first created and on that issue I think again it's interesting that the timing of this discussion is occurring right now because if I'm sitting in Congress I might say well why aren't we putting more money into dealing with root causes of some of the issues that are happening in Mexico and you know we can have the immigration discussion at a later date, maybe we deal with some of the issues now but maybe we need to deal with root causes of what is happening in Mexico, which again will delay once more dealing with this mammoth of an issue that we've sort of kicked the can down the block for so many years and is necessary that we deal with it but let me just take a question a tweeted question and then we'll come up here up front, but chill what's the best case scenario for the president's agenda in Mexico, what's the worst what's the role of the United States okay the U.S. president or Mexican president Mexican president what's the worst scenario and then for the bilateral relationship I think that right now the business scenario I think that president Peña Nieto has to take this crisis as opportunity and I think that even when the PRD is in the middle of the war and the pan also I think that the political elite is really afraid really afraid of what's going on and I think that the president has the opportunity to talk about to talk to this political elite and I think that the best scenario is that the president can command this take the control of the situation the worst scenario is that all the political elite can find this can some of them are thinking right now in a kind of impeachment destitution of the president I think that someone is talking about doubt that's the worst scenario between all of this all depends on the president Peña Nieto and for the bilateral relationship I think that the what we need to focus on here in the United States and particularly in Washington great things have happened in Mexico none of that story of the first two years was a lie it's all true and now we have this risk that we're going to forget all about it we can't do that the US and Mexican economies are more closely integrated than ever before they depend upon each other for their integrated production systems they depend upon each other for trade etc etc and they need each other and we can't forget about that immigration reform is as important as it ever was before to provide stability to migratory flows of people and to try to reestablish some kind of circularity of migration between Mexico and the United States so maintaining that perspective is crucial whilst at the same time recognizing that Merida should not be seen as a one-time deal but this should be an ongoing part of the relationship so that we make security the focus disproportionately and ignore some of the gains and some of the positives that are involved in this bilateral relationship we talk about the trade aspect I mean that 30 to 40% of goods that say made in America have passed through Mexico there's a relationship there that's very clear and very important we also talk about the energy relationship that is only becoming enhanced right now so it's important not to lose sight of how broad this relationship is yes my name is Vladimir Yakovlev I've been here I see this session as a contrast between what happened on Friday at the Wilson Center there I felt an upbeat there was a tremendous enthusiasm not only from the Mexican speakers which by the way I was very much impressed this let's say both very easy to express their enthusiasm to express what they're doing create a very very expected of things to happen here we are talking about the difficulties that I have a reason just at the same time probably although I do feel that you have some although you have some doubt but you have ideas that this could be solved Mr. Nander just said that President could see this as an opportunity to do this Mexico is very peculiar in Latin America in the sense that the Mexican president once elected he has a tremendous power including the famous next election the tapado where he can select practically who is coming next that doesn't happen in all the other countries or in any country how difficult although he has done he has surprised his own party by pushing through this reform and energy particularly in Congress how difficult will it be for him to try to solve some of the problems you have been discussing in Congress are they going to follow his lead as is traditional in Mexico that the president in his term after six years he disappears but the six years he has a tremendous power so this is a little bit about could you comment on that I mean I think that you know it's true that the Mexican president has a lot of power but let's not forget that the power of the president is radically different to what it was 20 years ago now you have the possibility and the reality of having a Congress which actually could vote against the president that wasn't ever a possibility before now this is where the interim elections in July of next year become doubly important and it's the reason why the pre must be thanking his lucky stars that the PRD and the Pan are in such a mess because otherwise the pre would be punished at the polls but the other two parties just can't seem to get their act together so the president does have power but I think his power at the moment is a leadership power it's the ability to pull political forces together and to move forward the other great restraint on the president's power course has been decentralization in Mexico and the fact is that governors have a lot more power than they used to they have much bigger budgets than they used to without any subsequent increase in accountability and transparency and that's something which needs to be addressed and I'm not talking about a need to decentralize power I'm talking about a need to improve standards one of the things about the federal government in Mexico I think over the last 20 years it has improved we have to celebrate that as well don't forget that it was only 12 years ago that you had the drugs are in Mexico being directly linked to organized crime that doesn't happen today now what we need to do now is to take these advances this progress at the top level and bring them down and that's why vetting becomes such an important thing and what I don't understand is why people don't talk about it more about police units and other people who are on the ground but why not bringing vetting for politicians in a meaningful way well because the politicians don't want it that's the real reason but you need to have something like that the private sector does it all the time they vet their people before they hire them particularly before they get into positions of importance need to have some kind of transparency now about who politicians are in Mexico the only thing that I could add is that right now if you compare with 20 years ago or 30 years ago the people the society was not so important now is really agent of change the people in the streets is very important so we are now in a new Mexico and that's why the government has to be very attentive to the people in the streets and what are they saying trying to solve their problems and that's the new reality and that's the reality that Peña Nieto has to confront they have to listen to the people they have to solve their problems because the power of the provincial power has been incoherent shrunk so look, we could go and go in and I think this has been a very good useful enlightening session I take pride in providing a bit of nihilism in contrast to our friends at the Woodrow Wilson Center I would offer that this was sort of the dark side of the discussion but I think it's necessary maybe we should put them together on the website as a yin and yang but I just want to thank both of you this has been really great, very timely the lights are going out that means that our time is up anyway, I want to thank you thank you good night