John Ross tribute

John Ross was a good friend. I had greatly admired his work when I first started reading his scholarly work on Mexico on the wake of the 1994 Zapatista uprising. In 2004 I met him when I was in Oaxaca researching genetically engineered corn. We had lunch and we had a great time talking. We remained in touch until the day he died. I'll never forget his words of encouragement and support to me back in '08 when I was totally discouraged about everything and was telling the whole world to go to shit.

http://www.ips-dc.org/media/tribute_to_john_ross_part_1

Tribute to John Ross; Part 1

February 8, 2011 · By John Cavanagh

IPS’ Drug Policy Project held a brown-bag discussion with the late John Ross on April 21, 2010. This is part 1 of Ross discussing how the militarization of the border has turned Mexico into an annex of "The Wire."

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21:02

24:17

John Ross was a rare human being. He was an incredibly astute analyst of Mexico. He lived and breathed the country and its leaders, its crooks, and its social movements. He understood it better than any other American I know. And, he believed deeply in social justice, so much so that he went on long, punishing hunger strikes when the injustice became too unbearable for his sensitive soul. Saul Landau introduced John to IPS and we were proud to have him as a friend and colleague.

John gave several presentations to IPS over the years. The most recent was in the spring of 2010, when he offered a brilliant dissection of everything that was wrong with the "war on drugs" in Mexico. He died a few months later, and the world is much poorer without him. If you want to hear how a great mind works, listen to these clips.