The Mexican Revolution produced the 1917 Constitution that promoted the ideals of democratic principles and opened the space and opportunity for change. However, corruption, one of a long time mainstays previous to the early 20thCentury convulsion, has noticeably remained to this day.
It is said perhaps as a joke that Mexican President Alvaro Obregon (1920-24) who had lost an arm at the Battle of Celaya in 1915 once remarked that Mexico was lucky that he lost that arm because it meant that he could gather only half as much money from being President as otherwise. Over the years, several Presidents, with notable exceptions, walked away much richer than when they came into power.
There are several definitions and kinds of corruption, but generally it is about fraudulent conduct by those in power and that have the authority to influence actions for personal benefit, a third party, or both. Also, if a person is corrupt as a private citizen, there is an excellent chance that the person will be corrupt as a public official.
Over the years, I spent a lot of time in conversations with friends in Mexico talking and joking about corruption in the country from the couple of pesos paid to a policeman to get off the hook on a traffic citation to the fiscal cooking of the books to allow high officials to walk away with national patrimonial goods. But never again.
The tens of millions of dollars that Mexican political leaders have taken in the past is peanuts compared to the alleged raw misdeeds in this area by President Trump and his associates. We are talking about apparently billions of dollars Donald Trump, his cabinet, his family and his rich friends are privately enjoying as an outflow of being in office.
Trump and his obsession to be among the top billionaires in the world seems to have no limit. As a businessman this fixation led to 6 bankruptcies, major tax issues that even auditors could not unravel, at least 3,500 lawsuits involving creditors and providers his company refused to pay in full and 34 felony convictions for doctoring financial books among others.
President Trump seems to have already made billions for himself, his family and his friends beginning with a 1.4 billion dollar windfall from Cryptocurrency. Access to the President at home and abroad is being sold at a premium by his family and those around him.
Some believe that conflicts of interest rules do not apply to him because he is not hiding his actions and because the Supreme Court said so. Whatever the legality, there is a sense of sadness around the fact that many around the world see these as the actions of a corrupt America diminished and not worthy of its creed.
Other examples include a gift by Qatar of a 400 million dollar plane that the President may think he can keep and that has proven to be insecure transportation when international danger is at hand. Also, the embarrassment around his call to FIFA President Giani Infantino to challenge transplanted American player Folarin Balogun’s red card suspension caused counter protests by other associations and possibly led to a deflated national team that played horribly losing the match with Belgium.
We can accept the fact that we have an America divided by political interests, race, color, national origin and by generational outlooks. What we should not accept is the possibility that this state of affairs is becoming an excuse for fraudulent conduct and corruption in America.
The views expressed by David Conde are not necessarily the views of LaVozColorado. Comments and responses may be directed to News@lavozcolorado.com.
