Illustrative image.  Antony Blinken, Washington D.C., February 26, 2021. (Photo: AFP)

By Guillermo Alvarado

Without commending himself to God or the devil, U.S. Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken, published on social networks a criticism of the Mexican government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador for the number of journalists murdered in the Latin American nation.

Textually, the senior White House official said that "I join those calling for greater responsibility and protection for Mexican journalists. My heart goes out to the loved ones of those who gave their lives for the truth."

The first thing that crossed my mind when I read that text was that Blinken would have done himself a great favor if he included in his "prayers" the dozens of communicators from various countries around the world who lost their lives in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, organized precisely by his country.

I am thinking, for example, of the Spanish photojournalist José Couzo, killed by a missile fired from a U.S. tank during the attack on the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad in April 2003.

Blinken could also have explained that the journalists murdered in Mexico are a consequence of the absurd war against drug trafficking, imposed by the White House under former President Felipe Calderón Hinojosa.

It is true that during López Obrador's term several press professionals have fallen under the bullets, but the real causes of these lamentable facts must be sought in the ten or fifteen years prior to his government.

It is striking that the words of the Secretary of State are almost a repetition of those expressed a few days ago before Congress by the Republican Senator Rafael Edward Cruz, better known as Ted Cruz, one of the least prestigious and respected politicians in the northern nation.

Is Blinken trying to sound like Cruz?  In any case, it is good to remind him that the only success of that legislator for now is to arouse towards his figure the generalized contempt of his 99 colleagues in the U.S. Senate.

In 2016 he starred in a tumultuous Republican primary with Donald Trump, where they exchanged all sorts of insults and even went so far as to seriously offend their mutual wives. Today Cruz is a fervent supporter of the former president, because he knows he is his only political oxygen.

What are these two representatives of the same system, one from the Democratic side and the other from the Republican side, doing attacking López Obrador on the painful issue of murdered journalists?

With accurate and harsh popular language, the Mexican president recalled that the United States has always liked to be "the lamp in the street and the darkness in the house", a very accurate figure of reality.