Mexico Trucker Online

 

Not much happening in the world on this lazy Sunday evening so courtesy of my friend at The Mex Files, we’ll put this video out there for you to enjoy.

Besides some great sounds by the group Los Felinos de la Noche, it’s got some good behind the wheel video of Mexican highway 57, a road I’ve traveled many times.

You’ll be hard pressed to find the pot holed roads and dangerous antiguated junk trucks you’ve come to believe are everyday sights in Mexico.

Enjoy your Sunday

Border Patrol recruits “Bubba’s” in South Carolina, Georgia

The U.S. Border Patrol brings its hiring blitz South this weekend.

The agency recruits in four locations on Saturday in South Carolina and Georgia.

Two years ago, President Bush said he wanted to hire 6,000 more Border Patrol agents by the end of 2008. The agency needs to hire more than 800 by Dec. 31 to meet the goal.

The agency is responsible for patrolling 7,000 miles of border. Starting pay ranges from $36,000 to $46,000 a year.

In South Carolina, recruiting is set in North Charleston at the Embassy Suites at the Convention Center and at the Embassy Suites in Columbia on Stoneridge Drive.

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SAN CRISTOBAL, Mexico - Eighteen months after leaving office, former President Vicente Fox is taking a page from Jimmy Carter’s playbook and engineering his legacy as a champion of democratic values and government transparency at home and abroad.

In a wide-ranging interview at his ranch near historic Guanajuato, Fox discussed his new projects and chided the United States for abdicating its role as global leader, questioned presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama’s position on free trade and dismissed Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez as “a loudmouth.”

The United States no longer initiates ambitious projects such as the Marshall Plan that rebuilt Europe after World War II or former President John Kennedy’s Alliance for Progress, which spurred economic cooperation in the hemisphere, said Fox, a strong U.S. supporter.

“We don’t see this happening anymore,” Fox told The Miami Herald. “We see walls being built. What is the U.S. afraid of?”

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THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS (MTN) – The International Court of Justice (ICJ) today determined that the United States must take “all measures necessary” to prevent the executions of José Medellín and four other Mexican nationals sentenced to death in the state of Texas. The order will remain in effect until the ICJ resolves Mexico’s request for interpretation of its 2004 Judgment in Avena and Other Mexican Nationals (Mexico v. United States of America).

The Avena case was filed by Mexico on behalf of 51 Mexican nationals who did not receive consular access upon arrest in the United States, in violation of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. In 2004, the ICJ issued its original decision in the case, determining that each Mexican national was entitled to a judicial hearing to ascertain whether he was harmed by the violation of his Vienna Convention rights.

Despite this binding legal obligation, the United States has failed to provide the judicial hearings mandated by the ICJ’s 2004 judgment in the vast majority of the Avena cases. José Ernesto Medellín, one of the individuals whose Vienna Convention rights were denied, is scheduled for execution in Texas on August 5th.

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Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff,  responding to a report today in the WASHINGTON POST regarding border and port security, had this to say!

According to a report in today’s Washington Post, two recent Congressional reports claim that our Department lacks a comprehensive strategy to protect the American people from the threat of nuclear and radiological weapons and materials, and that our efforts to guard against biological threats are poorly coordinated and have “unclear benefit.”

While we welcome Congressional oversight and thoughtful, balanced recommendations and even criticism, these reports and comments widely miss the mark. They are based on outdated and incomplete information.

Far from lacking a strategic plan or clear goals, the Department, in cooperation with federal, state, local, and international partners, has developed and is implementing a comprehensive Global Nuclear Detection Architecture to prevent the entry of radiological and nuclear weapons or materials into the United States. This architecture is intelligence-driven, and built around a multi-layered strategy that starts overseas, continues at our borders, and is maintained within the U.S. interior.

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With the addition of the Mexican state of Coahuila to the list of cleared states on the Center for Disease Controls list of approved retailers, evidence is pointing away from Mexico as a source of the contamination for the recent salmonella outbreak.

Mexico is the major source of tomatoes for US consumption during the winter months. Mexico’s agriculture ministry said Friday that a two-week study of Mexican tomatoes by its specialists — conducted in tandem with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration — has found the tomato crop to be free of infection.

Salmonella Saintpaul is a strain of bacteria carried in the intestinal tracks of birds and animals and can be destroyed by washing or cooking of raw veggies.

Now, for lack of further evidence of tomatoes as the source of infection, authorities have turned to jalapenos, serrano peppers, bulb onions and celantro as possible sources of the infection. All items grown in Mexico and the southwestern United States.

Mexico is the largest grower and consumer of tomatoes in North America. Most tomatoes crops are of the green house variety grown under controlled conditions. Many farms are owned by American Farming Corporations. [ DOWNLOAD USDA REPORT ON MEXICO GREENHOUSE TOMATO INDUSTRY ]

It is ironic, that being the number one consumer of tomatoes in North America, there have been no reported cases of Salmonella Saintpaul in Mexico. My family buys fresh Roma tomatoes at Soriana, HEB or the new Wal-Mart in Nuevo Laredo. We eat in restaurants in Nuevo Laredo, Monterrey and Reynosa on a weekly basis with no ill effects.

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