Reply #7: Mexico during the 1970s under the dictablanda run by the PRI

[nadinbrzezinski]

after the student revolt in 1968...

The police recorded calls, especially foreign calls. All currency was controlled and people were afraid to speak in public, especially foreign calls, against the government.

Death squads or the army, your choice, disappeared over 1000 people.

As a kid I learned to watch what I said and to whom.

Years later as a Red Cross worker I heard even worst stories from people coming from El Salvador and Nicaragua...

Those were not dictablanda. Mexico was. We had elections, regular transfer of power and laws in the books guaranteeing freedom of speech. All of this was Ersatz Democracy. Which is pretty much what we have had for now almost ten years. The curtain is now off the wall, to paraphrase pink floyd.