Another Mexican Political Star

* The Times’ exciting coverage of the election of Vicente Fox as the new president of Mexico included an informative piece (“PAN Pioneers Went From Shadows to Day in the Sun,” July 7) about the dedicated long-suffering of the National Action Party (PAN).

Mexico’s center-right PAN is the sister party of the Republican Party of the United States and the Conservative Party of Great Britain.

As PAN emerged on July 2 from the Mexican political wilderness, what U.S. news coverage failed to give was an adequate picture of the enormous impact of PAN President Luis Felipe Bravo Mena in this phenomenon of democracy. Bravo Mena is a brilliant national leader whose commitment to the rights of mankind is grounded in philosophical understanding and dedication to moral ideas. He is a man who truly believes that ideas have consequence. He has distinguished himself as a member of the Mexican Congress and as an articulate spokesman for the principles of his party. He has been a think tank director and ideological advisor to PAN’s leadership for years.

In times past, Bravo Mena traveled to the United States to study practical electoral politics while he tirelessly continued to wage a war for clean and open elections in his homeland. His personal visits gave him insights to the less glamorous, but essential, elements of free elections. At home, Bravo Mena reached out to women and young voters to build the ranks of PAN. Always, his message was substantive and grounded in a solid understanding of the fundamental nature of man and the proper role of government.

The election in Mexico is being called the Fox Revolution. It follows the Reagan Revolution in the United States. Dynamically charismatic and articulate candidates have led each.

It was an idea-based movement that brought reform to government in the United States under Ronald Reagan, and eventually the end to the Cold War. Similarly, what is happening now in Mexico has at its foundation the substantive ideas of a selfless and principled intellectual architect in Luis Felipe Bravo Mena.

Revolutions don’t just happen. Ideas do have consequence.

THOMAS A. FUENTES

Chairman

Republican Party

of Orange County