Question:  [trans] Good afternoon, Lyn. I am a candidate for federal deputy with the same campaign as Benjamin Castro, and I'm also a member of the Youth Movement. We are proposing to the people, great infrastructure projects. For example, we are talking about the maglev train from Mexico City to San Antonio, as you are proposing. My question is, we, as a state inside the Mexican Republic--how can we do that? How can we not as a country, but we as a state?

LaRouche: Well, there are certain limitations to what you can do as a state. That's the danger of parochialism. You can not--national projects can not be done as state projects. You have to have a national policy, within which, states, as states, can do things. But, the question of national credit and so forth, these things have to be, essentially--there has to be a national policy basis for it.

So, the thing is, to say--. For example, Monterrey has certain qualities. Monterrey has, and which is the dominant feature--used to be, some years ago, '82, in that period--used to have a lot of industry, which had developed on the basis of an indigenous development around agriculture and beer production, and so forth. That was, to a large degree destroyed. So therefore, in Monterrey, my first impulse, would be to say, "How do we restore this?" You can not reverse history, entirely, but how do we restore this kind of conception. And, to look at that, as a concept, and then fit in, "Now, what must we get the national government of Mexico to see, as the overall umbrella approach to financing of projects, and to coordination of projects among states, which will enable us to do what we should do here?" And, I think it can be done.

I think, at this point in Mexico, I think the crisis that's hit Mexico, and the fact that the United States is collapsing, which is a disaster for the whole dependency on the United States of Mexico, particularly in the northern part, has created a situation, in which the movement in the states, in the political parties, is going to undergo a change, as was reflected in President Fox's shift away from supporting the United States on the question of Iraq. This reflects a mood, throughout the Americas, especially South and Central America--the "surviving states" shall we say, in South American and Central America--a mood, that there has to be a change, there has to be a new approach. I think there are a number of states, which tend to be associated with PRI states--I think this is significant, but I think you're going to find, there's in Mexico, a growing sense, that there has to be a national objective. I think the most effective politician, in a state, is one who can project, in that state, a national and international orientation--especially a national orientation.

And therefore, I think, to say, "We need these projects for here, and for other states." You have adjoining states, which have similar problems. So therefore, the idea that, as a state, that you should only emphasize state projects--no. You should have state policies, on "we must have this"; or "we must do this." Yes, fine. But, on major projects, at the same time, you have to have a vision of a national policy, and the function of a state within a national policy.

Because a nation is not the sum of the component states. The states, rather, are subsidiaries of a nation. And that's the way you have to think about it. So therefore, yes, fine. You need local projects, which are local projects--the obvious ones. But the really decisive things, that are going to determine the future of society, are going to be those undertakings, which require a national will, about the nature of where Mexico is going, and then let each state, like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, fit itself in, into that national picture. Because, then, the reciprocal relationship between the national government and the state governments can then come into play, in an effective way.

-30-