Nation: To Mexico with Love

Carter seeks friendship, but he will find grievances old and new

Two years ago, President Jimmy Carter raised a glass of champagne in a toast to his first state visitor at the White House, President Jose López Portillo of Mexico. Said Carter: "The proximity to the United States, I hope, will become a blessing and not a curse."

It was not to be. Indeed, there is no border on earth that separates two more widely divergent standards of living, and conflicts over trade, illegal immigration and drug smuggling have soured relations between the neighboring nations....

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