Mercury Rising

Not surprisingly, PAN is fighting back against Lopez Obrador's video proofs of fraud. In the best defense is a good offense category, they've launched their own challenges of Lopez Obrador strongholds, to which I say "Great!" But this is just for entertainment. It doesn't look good that the National University has just formally disassociated itself from the vote count.. We put together the plan, UNAM says, but we didn't have aaaanything to do with how the election institute implemented it. And, OH NO! Update: The Financial Times thinks they ought to count the votes: "It would be foolhardy for Mexican elites to underestimate the dangers this situation represents...." Translation: "You idiots! You're turning Mexico into the financial equivalent of toxic waste." I would say that was obvious almost a week ago. And, whoops! This update: The White House and Spain just finished uncongratulating FeCal. That can't be good. The basic defense on the very serious charges illustrated by the film is that Obrador representatives signed off on the precinct tallies of precinct 2227 adjacent to Cerro Gordo in the Salamanca district. So, the guy in blue is just relocating ballots to elect representatives that had been placed in the wrong ballot box. Um. That's a few seconds of the video. We also see ballots left on a chair outside the polling place, blank ballots left lying around in the open for anyone to take them, completed ballots left lying around and someone browsing through them, and then this guy in blue. In other words, there are no controls. So, let's lay it out. You're holding the camera showing at the least massive indifference to basic security procedures and much more likely fraud so open no one bothers to hide it. The thugs who are running the precinct ask you to sign off. You (a) make a scene, risking losing the film, or (b) put on your best s#1t-eating grin, sign everything in sight, and run for the exits? Next, there's precinct 740 in the third district of Queretaro. There, the tallies didn't match the number of ballots. So, PAN says, they opened the urn and found that they had counted a mere 200 extra votes for PAN. Of course, the tallies were still off by 20 in a precinct of 200 voters. No harm, no foul, and don't worry about those 3,000 other cases where the tallies didn't match, says PAN. PAN opened those up and found a thousand more votes for itself. Now, I haven't been able to download enough of the film from Queretaro to figure it out, and the audio sounds more like dolphin mating sounds. But I understand that the precinct rep had to be all but waterboarded to get the recount, and that he looks guilty as sin. To be continued.... ________________________________________ * Editor, Department of Obscure Humor: Mexican polling places are called "casillas" or "little houses." "Little House on the Prairie" was an ancient television show from the First American Republic from which many Republican myths of personal virtue and self-sufficiency derive. "Faerie" is also known as "The Bermuda Triangle" and "The Mofo Zone." Lambert is working on a headline that doesn't require footnotes. I hope. ____________________________ Hairy update: Oh-- and the shredders are starting to roll. Apparently-- my translation skills are challenged-- aides to the electoral institute (IFE) are removing documents in Comalcalco, Tabasco, and parts of Puebla, under the claim that the Electoral Court needs them to analyze the claims of wrong tallies. This according to PRD representative Horario Duarte, who is apparently a legislator. They, um, didn't notify the proper authorities they were doing this. In Villahermosa, Tabasco, the PRD was tipped that people had broken the official seals with the intent of altering documents, and were allowed in the IFE offices by the obliging military guards; a PAN truck was parked out in front. It turned out these were local IFE personnel, who argued that the district president Tomás Alfonso Castellanos (note to self: check if TAC is a local cacique) had ordered them to do this. 500 PRDists converged on the offices, made a citizen's arrest (I think) and are presently holding the IFE personnel. The local IFE rep in Villahermosa said he was "surprised" by this report. In Puebla, IFE advisors decided to review the ballot packets without notifying the political parties. The fuse is lit.