Goner

Germán Martínez is out. There's a fine line between aggressiveness and sheer ugliness, and it tends to shift based on your results.* I wonder if Martínez will make the PRI any more willing to deal with the PAN from the outset. His successor will be picked within 30 days. It'll be interesting to see if it's yet another relative unknown lifted from Calderón's inner circle, which could be taken as an implication that Calderón still reigns supreme, or if it's someone with an independent power base like outgoing Deputy Héctor Larios (at least, I think he's considered independent of Calderón), which would likely encourage speculation that the president's lame duckism has begun.

I was thinking about what Martínez's term in office reminded me of, and I thought about Michael Steele, and then Sam Zell, and then the Alabama coach who got fired before ever coaching a game (I think his name was Mike Price, right?). Eventually I decided that Martínez's stay at the helm of the PAN reminds me of nothing so much as Floyd Mayweather's turn as Ricky Hatton's trainer. Both guys are loud and aggressive, both looked good for a while (Hatton over Malignaggi being the equivalent of the PAN's March and April surge in the polls), and both wound up leading their charge into a virtual slaughter (with Manny Pacquiao analogous to the PRI).

*Gancho's first aphorism? Yes it is!

Update: Lots more on Martínez from David Agren.