Saturday 4/5/2008 at the Texas State Capitol

Part 1/18: Jack Motley and Friends

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ABSOLUT runs ads celebrating American Southwest belonging to Mexico…

Mexico reconquers California? Absolut drinks to that!

The latest advertising campaign in Mexico from Swedish vodka maker Absolut promises to push all the right buttons south of the U.S. border, but it could ruffle a few feathers in El Norte.

The billboard and press campaign, created by advertising agency Teran\TBWA  and now running in Mexico, is a colorful map depicting what the Americas might look like in an “Absolut” — i.e., perfect — world.

The U.S.-Mexico border lies where it was before the Mexican-American war of 1848 when California, as we now know it, was Mexican territory and known as Alta California.

Following the war, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo saw the Mexican territories of Alta California and Santa Fé de Nuevo México ceded to the United States to become modern-day California, Texas, New Mexico, Utah, Colorado and Arizona. (Texas actually split from Mexico several years earlier to form a breakaway republic, and was voluntarily annexed by the United States in 1846.)

The campaign taps into the national pride of Mexicans, according to Favio Ucedo, creative director of leading Latino advertising agency Grupo Gallegos in the U.S.

Ucedo, who is from Argentina, said: “Mexicans talk about how the Americans stole their land, so this is their way of reclaiming it. It’s very relevant and the Mexicans will love the idea.”

But he said that were the campaign to run in the United States, it might fall flat.

“Many people aren’t going to understand it here. Americans in the East and the North or in the center of the county — I don’t know if they know much about the history.

“Probably Americans in Texas and California understand perfectly and I don’t know how they’d take it.”

Meanwhile, the campaign has been circulating on the blogs and generating strong responses from people north of the border.

“I find this ad deeply offensive, and needlessly divisive. I will now make a point of drinking other brands. And ‘vodka and tonic’ is my drink,” said one visitor, called New Yorker, on MexicoReporter.com.

Reader Paul Green goes into a discussion on the blog Gateway Pundit of whether the U.S. territories ever belonged to Mexico in the first place, and the News12 Long island site invited people to boycott Absolut, with one user, called LivingSmall, writing: “If you drink Absolut vodka, you can voice your approval or disapproval of this advertising campaign with your purchases. I know I will be switching to Grey Goose or Stoli and will never have another bottle of Absolut in my house.

“Hey Absolut … that’s my form of social commentary.”

– Deborah Bonello and Reed Johnson in Mexico City

latimesblogs.latimes.com/laplaza/2008/04/mexico-reconque.html

Washington Times investigator exposes mayhem on the southern border  

Steve Watson

Infowars.net

Thursday, March 6, 2008

An award winning reporter has detailed an ongoing media blackout concerning a major issue of national security on the southern border.

Sara A. Carter, National Security and Pentagon reporter for the Washington Times, spoke to the Alex Jones show today regarding consistent incursions into the U.S. by armed Mexican troops aiding illegal smugglers.

Ms. Carter has won several national prestigious awards for her coverage of border issues north and south, including the 2006 Eugene Katz Award for Excellence in the Coverage of Immigration, presented annually by the Center for Immigration Studies.

“There’s a lot of people who don’t realize how serious the situation is on the southern border.” Ms. Carter said. “Even to the extent when sometimes some of our own government officials choose to ignore it, even though they know it’s going on.”

“This is a very serious national security issue in many respects and it deals with an array from smuggling humans, to smuggling narcotics, and the whole mix up is that there’s many people within the Mexican government and military that have already been bought and sold out to the drug cartels.”

“It’s very difficult to distinguish between those that are really trying to do the job, and those that are sell outs to the drug cartels. I’ve seen it with my own eyes, I’ve been down in many of the same border cities, I’ve spent an enormous amount of time in Mexico working with intelligence officials and others, and I have many Mexican sources who had said ‘please get the truth out’.” Ms. Carter continued.

Ms. Carter pointed out that although such activity has been ongoing for years, there has essentially been a news blackout in America.

“It is a huge story. It is bigger than most of us even know, and people are afraid of covering the story. We hear reports but we don’t see in depth detail.” Carter said.

Aside from Carter herself it has been left entirely to the alternative media to expose the reality of the situation on the border.

We have covered multiple previous incidents of this nature here at Prisonplanet and Infowars:

Former DEA Agent: Mexican Commandos Killing In South West US To Protect Bush Drug Cartel

National Director of Minutemen Calls Southern Border “Warzone”

The Secret Border Wars

Report: Armed Mexican Troops Invade US

The mainstream media cautiously began reporting on the issue two years ago when Sara Carter uncovered Department of Homeland Security documents and maps showing that Mexican military has crossed into the United States 216 times in the past nine years. In the documents U.S. officials claimed the incursions are being made to help foreign drug and human smugglers into the United States.

Many incidents have seen Mexican troops fire on U.S. border agents.

Ms. Carter also exposed how the U.S. Border Patrol is “tipping” the Mexican government as to the location of Minutemen and other civilian border patrol groups participating in apprehending illegal immigrants.

Her award winning articles are grouped together here.

In the following MSNBC report from last year, Sara Carter details how one particular incident saw Mexican troops crossing the border along Rio Grande with mounted machine guns pointing at border patrol agents, deputies and Texas highway patrolmen:

In today’s interview with Alex Jones, Ms. Carter also spoke of shockingly commonplace incidents of Mexican troops are aiding the kidnapping of American citizens across the border:

“Many of those people have not been found, I’m gonna tell you something, I was down in Nuevo Laredo and I was there when Betty Flores was still the mayor, I remember having a one on one conversation with her and I said ‘look, there have been Americans in Laredo that have been kidnapped, and taken into Nuevo Laredo in Mexico and there’s still no sign of them, nobody has done anything about it, what are you going to do?’

“Basically the answer to me was ‘well we believe a lot of those folks were involved with the cartels anyway’. Well that isn’t true.” Carter said.

She also delved into great detail concerning the different drug cartels of Mexico and their activities on the border with Mexican authorities, as well as reports of groups such as Los Zetas engaging in corruption inside the U.S. as far north as Indiana.

Listen to the entire fascinating interview here (begins 30 mins into the hour)

Award Winning Reporter Details U.S. Media Blackout On Mexican Military Incursions