In Mexico, Junkyard Dogfight for Presidency

The result of too much negative campaigning, said the political commentator Gabriel Guerra Castellanos, is likely to be negative voting. "People will not vote on who they want to be president, but rather on who they don't want to be president," he said.

In the working-class Mexico City neighborhood of Tlalpan, a recent dinner-table discussion with two families suggested both the divisiveness of the upcoming election and the broader disenchantment with politics expressed by many Mexicans. In 2000, everyone in the Lucio and Santiago families voted for Fox in hopes, they said, of breaking the PRI's grip on power. Now, they are casting in all directions.

Griselda Santiago, 58, said she would continue to support the PAN, Fox's party. She worries that Lopez Obrador is too far to the left, comparing him to Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez, an acolyte of Cuba's Fidel Castro. But she doesn't really care who wins, she said, "as long as it's not the PRI."

Her daughter Laura, 36, said she planned to vote for Lopez Obrador as the antidote to Fox, while two Lucio sisters said they were so disenchanted with the PRI and the failed promise of Fox that they might cancel their votes by checking off all the candidates on their ballots.

"I voted for Fox with the idea there would be changes," said Alejandra Lucio, 42. Her sister, Margarita, 44, praised Lopez Obrador for giving the elderly monthly subsidies of $65 when he was mayor, but then added, "We don't believe in any of the three. It doesn't matter what we do. People are very disillusioned with politicians."

The main issue the candidates must confront is the same one that bedeviled Fox: the need for economic reform. One evening last month, when all three appeared at a forum sponsored by the American Chamber of Commerce in Mexico, they were grilled on how to spur economic growth, how to make the country more competitive globally and whether the state-run oil and electricity industries should be opened to foreign investment.

"The main problems that Mexico faces are related to poverty and corruption," said Lopez Obrador, whose campaign slogan is "First the Poor." He said that he opposed foreign investment in energy and that the government should focus on improving education and reforming the tax system, which 40 percent of the population simply evades.

Lopez Obrador's most ardent supporters are found in Mexico City, which he ran for five years. Folksy and blunt, he lived in a modest apartment, drove to his office in an old sedan and worked from dawn until well into the night. He initiated cash subsidies for the elderly and disabled, offered free health care and school supplies and spearheaded large public works programs that generated jobs.

His detractors decry the public debt his projects created and liken him to the fiery Chavez. But one U.S. official here disputed the comparison, labeling Lopez Obrador more of "an unknown" in terms of his world vision and national leadership potential. Lopez Obrador has pledged that if he is elected, he will halve the $173,000 presidential salary and eschew the presidential palace for a smaller house.

Calderon, who said he favored foreign investment in oil and power industries, said Mexico needed to institute a flat tax rate and free-market policies. "Investment that comes in will be welcome, well-received and will be safe," he told the business executives attending the American Chamber conference.

In a separate interview, Calderon said that in the 2006 elections the challenge for Mexicans was "deciding between the past and the future. The PRI is obviously the past," he said. But he added, "Lopez Obrador personifies the vision of the past that caused Mexico to fall into various economic crises" that left the poor even poorer.

Madrazo told the American Chamber audience that Mexico's competitiveness in the world market had suffered because of high energy and transportation costs, a poor education system and growing crime. He skirted the question of whether foreign investment should be allowed in the oil and electricity industries.

"The important thing for this country is how can we be better placed to be able to improve the social standing of our inhabitants," Madrazo said, sounding a lot like Lopez Obrador. Then, in an unusually magnanimous comment for a race already sullied by charges of corruption, he said the real issue for 2006 was "not which party is going to win, but how we can put Mexico in the forefront."