mexican politics

One noteworthy thing on the supposed shut-down of Mexico City's Centro Historico is the utter lack of police, riot police, swat teams. Hardly any anywhere. Yesterday I saw a few, like a busload hanging out in and around their bus, but this is not at all an unusual sight in the center. They are usually sitting in a bus somewhere because there is a demonstration every single day in Mexico City and often there are 2 or 3. Block after block of downtown is basically an information clearinghouse, people asking the courts to allow a full re-count but it is not exactly wall to wall people. If this were taking place in the US there would be jack-booted SS and machine guns on the roofs of every building. Democracy, latin American democracy, is developing into a very different animal.