Revolution of Hope: The Life, Faith, and Dreams of a Mexican President

President Fox is without a doubt Mexico's smartest politcian. He took on the old guard PRI political elite, and the Mexican left and everyone else who does not want Mexico to prosper and won. Where this book fails to do is explain what is painfully obvious. for all the immigration hoopla in both countries, the 20 million or so illegals in the U.S. are in truth Mexico's lost generation of it's best and most industrious blue collar workers, farmers and craftsmen. This for Mexico is national tragedy. The President is correct when he says more prosperity in Mexico will solve the problem as most of these migrants do not want to leave their country. I have been impressed seeing the President often answering insulting questions from ignorant journalists and conducts himself with dignity and grace. In the end we ignore Mexico's problems at our own peril. America spent billions rebuilding Europe after WWII and we have given the red Chinese all our factories. We need some kind of plan for the Americas similar to the Marshall Plan that will work.

When learning a language such as Spanish, it is important to learn the culture of native speakers. Unfortunately, most books on culture are either vague (e.g. Mexicans are macho.) or trivial (such as focusing on a timeline of rulers without making the dates meaningful). Revolution of Hope adds context to Mexican history. When an event happens, the suffering or the improvement of lifestyle of the Foxes is chronicled. Likewise, aspects of culture are illustrated with real-life stories. I do not agree with all of Vicente Fox's politics, but this book is well-written and a great help in my quest to learn Spanish.

Rarely do I read non-fiction cover to cover but I had a hard time putting down Vicente Fox'x well written, candid memoir which enlightened me about the history of Mexico with an important emphasis on the co-dependence of the U.S. Those who wish to understand the important political, economic and social changes that have been happening in Mexico in the past decade will be fascinated by Fox's view. He shares my values, opposing the U.S. invasion of Iraq and championing human rights including the empowerment of poor people and women. I hope many citizens of El Norte will read this imporant book, especially all candidates for the U.S. presidency. I agree with Vicente when he writes that the U.S. building a wall to try to keep out poor, hard-working Mexicans will cause more hardship and suffering for Mexicans and Mexico's economy and, ultimately, our own. Who will pick our agricultural produce and do so many other back breaking, low-paying jobs to maintain American's higher standards of living? Continued exploitation of poor undocumented people above, and below the border, needs to end. As one who loves the Mexican people and hopes to retire in Mexico, I support Mexico's revoution of hope and pray it's current and future leaders will sustain the positive, democratic changes that Fox promoted.

You don't have to agree with former Mexican president Vicente Fox on everything to enjoy his book, which I'm barely fifty pages into and already impressed with its compelling candor and humor. It's easy to see why some Mexicans find him as hard to take as some gringos do. He irritates them by airing such dirty laundry as their culture of bribery and manana tardiness, while bugging us by championing the illegal immigrants who swarm our southern border. But it's hard not to listen to (and like) the fellow who grew up milking cows on the rancho of his Cincinnati-born grandfather, and tying strings to the tails of dragon flies because he couldn't afford a kite. I think he's short-sighted about Iraq, but in his best incarnation, he's a globalist, a capitalist and a free-marketeer whose ideal is the one his Jesuit professors taught him of living "for other men."

After reading this book, I understand more clearly why the left, the opposition, and all those who don't want Mexico to change and prosper hated Fox to his guts. This book explains that the whole country was corrupted with indifference and conformity, and how his revolution of hope sought, with mixed success, to change this. He tried to gave Mexico a purpose, an entrepreneurial spirit, and a commitment. The opposition, on the other hand, only wanted Mexico to recieve what was given to them and not complain. This is his claim and political opinion. It provides incredible insights into the Mexican situtation and his world view. It also provides proof of why integration and NAFTA is the only succesful way to compete agianst China, and recriminates the US for promoting free trade, and then going 180° and locking themselves in. A thought-provoking book, Fox is insulting to those who disagree with him, but only because he is radical enough to propose that commitment, hope, initiative, innovation, and hard work are more important than patrotism, race, conformity and control, and the the key to a country's, a company's or a person's sucess is the former, while the latter can only produce failure.