Elba Esther Gordillo

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The bride of Chucky sits in a jail. Not a metaphorical opulent palace providing for everything - sans the freedom of mobility - like the beautiful Taj Mahal or even the seat of power, the White House, which has, at times, been referred to by its occupants as something of a prison ("A cross between a nunnery and a penitentiary," remembered Susan Ford, daughter of President Gerald Ford) but, rather, an actual real as hell Mexican jail. Specifically, the weirdly named, Santa Martha Acatitla prison in Mexico City.

An incarceration hole named after a christian saint. Talk about a mind fuck!

Showy, brash, divisive Elba Esther Gordillo, a self-made caricature and political fixture of the country's standard bearer PRI (Institutional Revolutionary Party) forgot two important axioms:

1. She's an ambitious woman in a man's world (not to mention - cough - Mexico!) 
2. Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely

Senora Gordillo also forgot about her people...her humble beginnings as a school teacher...her purported purpose in politics and life: to advance the formal education of Mexican students which, in turn, produces educated & civil members of society. Whether the charges of embezzlement stick are moot.

As the head of the immensely powerful teacher's union for the past 23 years (in October she won re-election to another 6-year term) this lady qualifies as a kingfish; And she behaved as a kingfish. She preferred to enrich herself and cronies, living the life of a big  spender - a celebrity - while her very constituents, teachers, pinch pesos to make ends meet until they can plant enough besos on the right asses to eat from the trough themselves.

I don't know what the state of general education was like two decades ago and I'm sure it has improved since then, but in the many years I've been coming to Mexico I often wonder "Why aren't these children in school?", "Why aren't these children in bed on a school night?" and "Is school attendance mandatory in Mexico?"     

Methinks she looks like the Bride of Chucky. 

Remember the cute but demented murderous doll?