Word: blights
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...economy in the 1990s, Mexico has become increasingly entwined with its northern neighbor, sending the U.S. 80% of its exports, 400,000 migrants and an estimated $30 billion worth of narcotics every year. But in the past 12 months, this special relationship has been seen as more blight than blessing, with falling remittances, tumbling trade and an increasingly bloody war over the north-bound drug business. Many here are looking for the U.S.'s new and novel leader to revive the North American partnership. (See pictures of Obama's trip to Europe...
Martinez is particularly anxious because this means there will be no water in her taps this entire weekend. She is also enraged that the blight is mostly hitting poor neighborhoods like hers. "The rich are still swimming in their pools while we are dying of thirst," she says. Playing up to the class war theme, Mexican newspaper Reforma showed a photo of a woman using a public tap in a poor area next to another woman hosing down her lawn in a rich suburb. (See pictures of crime fighting in Mexico City...
...that of other workers in 2008. In January 2009, a new report said more than half that group reported being worried that their home will end up in foreclosure. Many illegal immigrants are homeowners, and driving them from their houses would be a Pyrrhic victory for any community fighting blight. Salvador's father-in-law Alejandro, an undocumented immigrant who owns a home in St. Helens, says the Anglos who target him hurt themselves. "I own this house and am making my mortgage payments on time," he says. "But what happens if I lose my job? Then the bank takes...
...stands out on a grotty housing estate littered with boarded-up properties. Life on the estate has improved in recent years, he says - still sporting the luminous vest from one of the two truck driving jobs he holds down to meet his mortgage payments - although petty crime remains a blight. The windows of his neighbor's new car were smashed recently. "You can't leave anything inside," Calado says. "Even a GPB 3 pair of sunglasses...
...Back at the ExCel center, official posters tacked near its entrances tempt passers by with the bold words "STABILITY, GROWTH, JOBS". But for anyone looking for a way out of the blight, it's another disappointment. The local footbridge to the center will be shut during the meeting of the world's most powerful. Once again, Canning Town will find itself cut off from what lies beyond...