Supporters of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador in another protest.
Source: The Scotsman

Defeated Mexican presidential candidate, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, is not going down without a fight. He refuses to accept the results of the July 2 election. It was a hard fought presidential race and he lost by a narrow margin, which has got to be tough, and now he is charging wholesale fraud in a desperate effort to turn the result his way. Knowing his peje character, it’s probably not surprising that he would react this way. A peje is a barracuda-like fish that swims around in AMLO’s native Tabasco state’s waters and is known for its ferocity. Heck, the guy is from Tabasco, does that say anything to us just in itself?

AMLO’s used street demonstrations to good effect, as Evo Morales did before him, to the end of achieving his political will. Now, he’s going full blast with them as one of the few remaining tools he has left in the wake of an overwhelmingly free and fair election held in Mexico on July 2.

Many Mexicans are bracing for a long struggle over this. El Peje accepts nothing but victory, and it would not be out of character for him to prefer destroying the entire democratic electoral system before he accepts anything so ignoble (to him) as electoral defeat. That’s bad news for the majority of Mexico’s voters who had seen something in him they decided they didn’t like and didn’t vote for him.

Today he called together about 10,000 thousand of his supporters for another big demonstration in Mexico City. Some came from the hinterlands, places like Monterrey, but the bulk of them came from the areas around Mexico City, where his political base is.

AMLO’s rival, Felipe Calderon, called for calm ahead of the protest. Mexican markets fell 0.77%, actually less than U.S. markets did on this big selloff day in the stock market.

Looking at the pictures of the rally – see the slideshow here – I am a little skeptical that this is actually going to amount to anything. Look at how SMALL the crowds are, in all of them. Check out how sparse the crowd in this shot is below, in Calderon stronghold, Baja California:

AMLO’s supporters march in Baja California on Wednesday
Source: El Universal

Meanwhile, here is a supposedly larger demonstration, in Mexico City:

AMLO’s voters in Mexico City Wednesday – note how old and dour they look
Source: El Universal

The media coverage has been notably biased. That shot of AMLO supporters in Mexico City may be deceptive in itself because it doesn’t give a true feeling for how big (or small) the crowd is, but since this is government-linked El Universal, I’m not going to jump to conclusions. Daniel in Yaracuy has often pointed out tricks of the camera for making crowds seem bigger and that looks like what might have been employed here.

Much worse is the coverage of the Los Angeles Times which is openly printing threats from AMLO supporters, warning of “war” and violence if they don’t get their way. An experienced news journalist, who read the story, explained to me:

That LA times story is crap. Then he ends it with the testimony of people gathered by the PRD! At least he was honest in mentioning that, but that’s where the honesty ended.

Knowing how things work in Mexico, you can be pretty sure the angry witch who made the comments at the tail end of the story may have rejected the PAN’s roofing materials (truth of this is doubtful), but she probably accepted something else from the PRD in the good ‘ole PRI (where the PRD came from) style. It was pretty unprofessional and especially irresponsible for the Los Angeles Times to include the comments of a highly ignorant person controlled by a political party as threatening war. In my LA reporting days, we were forbidden to name street gangs by name when we put them on the air, and airing threats was unthinkable. Similar rule applied in other countries.

This piece was yet another example of how the mainstream world media did not care enough about this story to send their better correspondents. Remember the BBC correspondent who said “Mexico has never had a leftist president”?

Meanwhile, here is an exquisitely distorted piece of reporting from Greg Palast who cites several days-old newswire copy as reason to believe fraud has been committed in this election. He bills himself as an ace investigative reporter, but what he’s citing is stale news that has long since ceased to be an issue. The guy obviously is a charlatan seeking to goose the vote for AMLO in the name of beating back Bush. Amazing!

But there is more than media bias at work on AMLO’s behalf.

There are groups that are feeling the heat from the AMLO groups and some are starting to crack.

Here, an NGO called Civic Alliance, which is has taken money through the U.S. National Endowment for Democracy via the Democratic Party’s National Democratic Institute, has called for a ballot by ballot recount of the election, saying it’s the only way to really be sure and to placate AMLO’s supporters and restore their confidence in the system. I find it oddly naive that they think AMLO’s supporters can be placated by anything except victory, because they aren’t using much in the way of reason right now. Their beef is the result. Nevertheless, the group looks legitimate. Agencia EFE has their story here.

The problem with recounts is that the result is already known. That means that some people – that would be AMLO supporters – doing the counting have an incentive to alter the result by a certain percentage. If they didn’t know the first result, they would not have that incentive. On the other hand, this was close and if it was as clean as the European Union says it was, it should not be that big a deal to recount. But when there are vast numbers out there to be recounted, the possibility of altering the total presents a terrific new opportunity to commit fraud in some very small places. Unless yet another recount is done. The odds of fraud in a second recount are every bit as high, if not higher, than in a first counting. It’s a hideous debacle, very Florida indeed. Maybe recounts could be done in the future only by people who do not know the result of the election or who is requesting it. It’s a tough issue.

Here, IFE, the Mexican electoral authority, has just announced that they have no intention of recounting every single paquette (which is the sealed results of all the precincts from a certain number of polling stations.)

Calderon’s PAN Party is warning that if there is any violence, it will be the responsibility of AMLO and his party, so it’s up to him to keep his supporters in line.

Mark at Mark in Mexico has a good essay about how AMLO is beginning to perturb some of his supporters with his wild claims. Mark writes:

It is begining to look like AMLO has some serious personal issues with losing at anything.

The rest of his post is here.

Meanwhile, Michael Barone, on his elegant Michael Barone blog, has non-pareil coverage, describing the regional breakdowns in Mexico as this election carries on. He’s got a stunning piece on the red-state divides forming in Mexico, as they already have in Canada and the U.S. It’s a must-read here. And now he’s got some discussion from ChicagoBoyz blog in this post here. And I love this vivid post about the NAFTA dividing line, at Queretaro state, in this post here. Michael’s hot, no two ways about it, in a league with Steyn and Krauthammer and Montaner, truly a great columnist.

Yahoo! Mexico has another photogallery of the marches today in Mexico, here.

UCSD political scientist Matthew Shugart at Fruits and Votes has a new item on the significance of Mexico’s congressional race, with lots of details about how governable Mexico will be once Calderon takes office, and how the system works. It’s a very good post and can be read here.

Georgia Tech political scientist Michelle Dion at La Profesora Abstraida has a couple of excellent items, one discussing the allegations of ballot box stuffing, made by the AMLO camp regarding a fuzzy film that can be interpreted many ways – and indeed, by some news accounts, has already been discredited as a source of fraud. Her post on this can be read here. She’s got another good post on AMLO’s actual beefs to the electoral officials in this item here.

Fausta at Fausta’s blog has an item linked about the prospects for a North American Development Fund, as if public spending (instead of PRODUCTION OF VALUE!!!) would in and of itself yank Mexico out of poverty. If it’s spent right, I suppose it could, but it’s got to compete with remittances, she acidly notes. Read the whole thing here.

The American Thinker has a link to another news editorial about the red-state phenomenon in Mexico and the rise of the long-disdained northern Mexican states, who are beginning to convert their economic power into political power, which is a key reason why Calderon won in this close election. The rise of Carne Asada Cowboy Mexico is the secret weapon in the ultimate destruction of Hugo Chavez and all his populist promises, turning back the red tide. That’s right: Red States are now turning back red tides! It can be read in this post here.

Alvaro Vargas Llosa has two brilliant essays on the state of affairs in Mexico on El Independente in these posts here and here.

UPDATE: Bloomberg reports that AMLO is charging big business with illegally helping Calderon’s campaign through advertising. PepsiCo and Jumex are the companies named. The item is here.

UPDATE: Famous Mexican leftist Jorge Castaneda tells El Universal of Venezuela that he voted for Felipe Calderon, and Hugo Chavez had a lot to do with why AMLO lost. It’s one heck of an entertaining interview with Roberto Giusti here.

From Wall Street, Goldman Sachs has this to say Wednesday:

AMLO Non-Committal Whether He Will Accept an Unfavorable Electoral Court Decision; Calder????n Names Transition Team

Local markets remain jittery as there is no indication that L????pez Obrador and the PRD would accept any electoral result that comes out of the Electoral Court that does not attribute the victory to AMLO.

An AMLO aide warned of a serious crisis if the Electoral Court does not respond positively to the challenges. In a TV interview yesterday night AMLO was aggressive and confrontational, restating that he won the election while calling President Fox a traitor to democracy.

Furthermore, although he has said in the past he is seeking just a full recount of the ballots and not the outright nullification of the election, he said yesterday that “if the anomalies the Electoral Court is going to find prevent the election’s validity, the procedure would be to cancel the elections.”

AMLO also criticized the foreign observers’ certification that the elections were clean and transparent by saying that they “observed but did not see” the fraudulent acts.

Several of AMLO’s allegations of fraud have been demonstrated – by the PAN, officials from the IFE, and even by members of his own party, the PRD – to be baseless assertions. For instance, the data show that, contrary to AMLO’s initial assertions, there were indeed more votes for president than for the Senate or Lower House.

The Electoral Court stated that it had received 355 election-related petitions, of which 255 from AMLO’s party coalition, 129 from the PAN, and one from the PRI. The court has until August 30 to review these challenges and order eventual investigations. The election and the winner must be certified by September 6.

In the meantime Calder????n is putting together a transition team (which among other things will work with current government officials in the preparation of the 2007 budget) but will delay the naming of his cabinet for two to three months in order to reach out across the aisle to co-opt opposition legislators and governors.

Calder????n seems ready to give cabinet seats to the opposition in order to build a congressional majority that could improve overall governability conditions and further his legislative reform agenda.

Today, AMLO’s supporters initiated marches across all the 300 electoral districts in protest against alleged electoral fraud (the remedy sought is a full nation-wide recount of all the ballots) and in defense of democracy. The marches will converge on a big rally on Sunday at Mexico City’s main plaza (El Z????calo) where AMLO will address the crowd.

As of Thursday, Goldman Sachs doesn’t like the looks of what’s going on now. They write:

Focus: Mexico
AMLO’s Campaign Escalating and Broadening the Accusations of Electoral Frauda

AMLO’s supporters initiated moderately attended marches at 27 different places across the country. These marches will converge on Mexico City’s main plaza (El Z????calo) on Sunday when AMLO will address the crowd.

In the meantime, AMLO continues to challenge the vote tally of the Federal Institute (IFE) and has threatened to sue its representatives. Ad-hoc circumstantial evidence of alleged vote fraud has been released by AMLO’s campaign office.

Over the last couple of days AMLO and some of his closest advisers have been radicalizing an escalating the level of challenges to the whole electoral process (before, during, and after the votes were cast) which suggests that there is a serious risk that they will fail to recognize an eventual decision by the Electoral Court that does not certify AMLO as the winner.

Furthermore, today several unions and farmer associations threatened with demonstrations and civil resistance if the Electoral Court does not order a full recount of the ballots.

The broad nature of the challenges submitted to the Electoral Court suggests the end game could to be to repudiate the whole election, alleging that the playing field was uneven from the outset and that the main institutions (IFE, government, media, etc.) were biased against AMLO.

At a news conference where video footage of alleged ballot over-counting favoring Calder????n was exhibited AMLO stated: “I won the presidential election, I am more and more sure of that.” We see a risk that AMLO’s exaggerated rhetoric while the legal challenges are being reviewed could degenerate into disruptive protests.

Felipe Cald????ron stated that we would accept a partial recount of the ballots if ordered by the Electoral Court and was backed by the electoral law but would not support a full recount because it is “absurd and illegal”.

Seventeen PRI governors seem ready to sign a manifesto in which they commit to and urge adherence to the rule of law, acceptance of the election results, and respect for the electoral institutions of the country. Furthermore, they do not see as necessary and convenient for the country another full recount of all the ballots and consider that questioning the integrity of the whole process and the electoral authorities is unwarranted and gratuitous. This was seen as tacit support for the view that the elections were by and large clean and transparent and that the rallies being prepared by the PRD to challenge the results are polarizing the electorate, undermining the institutional backbone of the State, and challenging the legal framework of the country.