Not good... Oaxaca update...Reporter beaten, one shot... and desperate housewives take control

Dane Schiller, of the San-Antonio Express-News reports from Mexico City:

MEXICO CITY — Tension spiked in the state capital of Oaxaca after masked men armed with clubs searched a luxury hotel room by room, looking for the governor, who was rumored to be there but wasn't.

The state government insisted those who carried out the attack were members of a group of striking teachers and their supporters who have controlled the city's center for months.

...

Activists and police had their biggest clash in months Sunday when hundreds of people marched on the Camino Real hotel, a stone compound built as a convent in 1576.

They surrounded the hotel, and about 40 people entered and searched restaurants, guest rooms and other areas.

The Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca, known as APPO, said on its Web site that one member was shot outside the hotel by police or security agents who fired more than 60 rounds.

...

The group searching for Ruiz on Sunday instead found a nationally prominent radio and TV personality, Ricardo Rocha, who had interviewed two congressmen in his room.

While the intruders, who identified themselves as APPO members, threatened to break down the door, the congressmen hid in the bathroom and used their cellular phones to call for help, said Daniel Robles, a producer who works with Rocha.

The congressmen later escaped out a side door, but Rocha was clubbed, temporarily detained and had some of his equipment and video recordings confiscated.

Daniel Dehesa Mora, a Oaxacan and federal congressman with the leftist Democratic Revolution Party, said the men who entered the Camino Real were disguised state police officers trying to make activists look dangerous.

"You could tell from their military-style haircuts and the tone of their voices," he said. "Also, everyone there knows who is who."

APPO has a "mobile brigade" that patrols the city to ensure government officials can't conduct official business. Members have entered offices and detained people.

The organization operates its own security force and has erected more than 100 barricades throughout the city to control who comes and goes after dark.

NO, it is not ok to beat up reporters, even if they are in the same hotel as shitheads like Ulises Ruiz! I'm appalled that the usual left-wing English-language sources (like Narco News) have yet to comment on this. Even (as U.S. newspapers always call him) "ex-communist Mexico City Mayor" Alejandro Encinas was quick to defend Rocha and was appalled by what happened. Encinas, ironically, was attending a luncheon to honor "Freedom of the Press" when he was informed of the doings in Oaxaca. Ciro Gomez Leveya interviewed Rocha yesterday for Radio Foruma (Real Player video here). And... I am more than a little suspicious that Congressman Dehensa Mora is right. This sounds like Oaxaca... where the previous governor tried to pass off a faked assasination attempt (and got himself actually shot in the process -- the dolt!) as a "extremist plot" to overthrow the state government. The "extremists" tend to be more like these desperate housewives turned TV news anchors and media moguls... Soldatas de la revolucion mediatico? Moms? (Google Videos don't always work, for some reason: if not, here's the link.