LINDA ELLERBEE IS ON MY A+ LIST

Please take the time to read this truthful, and at times quite moving article she wrote on Mexico:

One Journalist’s View
By Linda Ellerbee

Sometimes I’ve been called a maverick because I don’t always agreewith my colleagues, but then, only dead fish swim with the stream allthe time. The stream here is Mexico.You would have to be living on another planet to avoid hearing howdangerous Mexico has become, and, yes, it’s true drug wars haveescalated violence in Mexico, causing collateral damage, a phrase I hate. Collateral damage is a cheap way of saying that innocent people, some of them tourists, have been robbed, hurt or killed.But that’s not the whole story. Neither is this. This is my story.

I walk the streets of my Vallarta neighborhood alone day or night. And I don’t live in a gated community, or any other All-Gringo neighborhood. I live in Mexico. Among Mexicans. I go where I want (which does not happen to include bars where prostitution and drugs are the basicproducts), and take no more precautions than I would at home in NewYork; which is to say I don’t wave money around, I don’t act the Ugly American, I do keep my eyes open, I’m aware of my surroundings, and I try not to behave like a fool. I’ve not always been successful at that last one...It would be nice if we could put what’s going on in Mexico inperspective, geographically and emotionally. It would be nice if we could remember that, as has been noted more than once, these drug wars wouldn’t be going on if people in the United States didn’t want the drugs, or if other people in the United States weren’t selling Mexican drug lords the guns...Most of all, it would be nice if more people in the United States actually came to this part of America (Mexico is also America, you will recall) to see for themselves what a fine place Mexico really is, and how good a vacation (or a life) here canbe. So come on down and get to know your southern neighbors. I think you’ll like it here...

For the full article, email me: mynparty@yahoo.com.mx