More than a few viewers were caught off-guard Wednesday night when Lou Dobbs announced the broadcast would be his last on CNN. The self-described “defender of the working man” has been a vocal critic of Hispanic immigration and international trade since 9/11. Instead of informed analysis, Dobbs’ commentaries often reverted to racism and showed an abiding ignorance of economics. What follows is a list of some of Mr. Dobbs more outrageous assertions:

1) In 2005, Dobbs claimed that Hispanic immigration was responsible for the spread of more than 7,000 cases of leprosy in America. When experts pointed out 7,000 was the total registered cases of leprosy over the previous three decades Dobbs labeled his critics “commies”, “fascists”, and a “wackjob.”

2) Dobbs repeatedly argued that NAFTA resulted in the loss of American jobs. This isn’t a new charge, in fact it was a pillar of Ross Perot’s 1992 presidential bid (see “Giant sucking sound”). Intuitive logic—in this case, the lower wages paid in Mexico—makes for a shoddy conclusion. Talk of job “loss” ignores the reality that the Federal Reserve manages the unemployment rate in the United States through its monetary policies. Now the data: in the decade after passage of the NAFTA the unemployment rate averaged about 5%, the lowest rate of any period in US history. Furthermore, NAFTA bashing overlooks the fact that the downsizing of United States’ manufacturing sector was underway decades before NAFTA became law in 1994.

3) Car plants in Mexico killed Detroit. Actually, total employment in automobile manufacturing has remained surprisingly high in the US over the past two decades. It’s just that high labor costs, primarily due to sagging productivity, aging pensioners, and union contracts have killed Detroit. Car factories in Alabama, Indiana, South Carolina, and elsewhere are doing quite well.

4) Dobbs liked to claim “a third of our prison population” are illegal aliens. The US DOJ asserts about 6% of state and federal inmates are non-citizens. As an ethnic population, Hispanics are less likely to break the law than Caucasians because of the general fear that increased attention on them and any undocumented persons in their company who would be subject to deportation.

5) More generally, Dobbs’ criticism or America’s “broken borders” has involved guests with ties to White supremacist groups and utilized similar groups for data.

Having said that, Dobbs deserves kudos on one accord. To his credit, Dobbs was a trenchant advocate of the US border patrol officers who were imprisoned for shooting a known drug trafficker as he tried to cross the border. Their sentences were commuted as President Bush left office in January 2009. For three years Dobbs kept the story alive, mentioning their plight several hundred times. Well done. This still makes him accurate less often than my catatonic, Chinese-made Timex.

I doubt Dobbs will stay off the set for long. He quit CNN once already, only to return a year later. This time around, I suspect Dobbs will pop-up on another major media outlet—Fox News. In following the Glen Beck model of a shameless embrace of hysteria in exchange for ratings, don’t be surprised when Dobbs resurfaces, less governed by fact than ever.

Two trends converge along Mexico’s southern border. One concerns the US recession, which has shocked the Mexican economy. The peso’s buying power is greatly diminished. Capitalizing on the peso’s decline against the Guatemalan quetzal, Mexican migrants flock south to sell toys, clothes, and foodstuffs. One popular route stretches from Cuidad Hidalgo, a city in the state of Chiapas, to Tecún Umán, a Guatemalan village with a bustling market.

The police chief of Tecún Umán turns a blind eye: “It’s illegal, but it’s a job for these people.” When it comes to breaking the law, arbitraging trinkets is a benign offense. Most of the estimated 5,000 smugglers return home soon after hocking their wares, and they aren’t known to bring drugs or guns with them.

The second trend is the realignment of drugs routes over land. As the US cracked down on transit routes in the Caribbean, trafficking operations shifted, pushing Colombian-made cocaine up through Central America en route to the US.

As a result, the 600-mile border between Mexico and Guatemala is now “a no-man’s land, a wild frontier,” according to a Mexican naval commander. The border is remote and rugged, part highlands, part jungle. The Mexican government has sought to impose a “vertical border” of police checkpoints spaced 25 km apart. To avoid being caught, migrants take to the hills.

Enter Los Zetas. Drawing their lower ranks from discontented youth in Chiapas, the Zetas leadership is a motley stew of former Mexican and Guatemalan special forces. While drug trafficking is the primary enterprise of the Zetas, over recent years the gang has diversified operations to include kidnapping. Migrants make easy prey. Men crossing the nether region between Mexico and Guatemala are tortured, women are raped, and ransoms are demanded from relatives living in the United States.

Mexican officials are aware of the problem along the southern border, and reform is underway. Former governors and prosecutors in Chiapas have been arrested on corruption charges. Police forces have been beefed up. But the Zetas have hit back, assassinating high-level bureaucrats. In a country where jobs are needed the Chiapas police have 300 unfilled vacancies.

Given American pressure for serenity along its border with Mexico, the cauldron of anomy in Chiapas receives comparatively little attention. It’s easy to advise a less gringo-centric strategy. The more fickle reality is Mexico’s drug gangs are a transnational threat. When the Zetas are under attack they flee across the border to Guatemala. For crackdowns in Mexico to have more than a temporary effect, law enforcement across all transit points—from Colombia to Canada—will have to raise the heat, and keep it up, in tandem.

The Economist reports that Mexican business leaders envy Brazil. Mexicrats must have been miffed when Goldman Sachs anointed the ‘BRIC’ without including a ‘M’. At the time (2001) there was reason to protest. In the previous half decade Mexico’s GDP growth more than doubled Brazil’s: 4.5% versus 1.9%. Mexico had just joined Chile as the only Latin American nations with an investment-grade credit rating. Furthermore, each nation had a tumultuous past, riddled with debt and currency crises, Brazil more recently than Mexico. And Mexico seemed locked-in to stable growth thanks to preferential trade ties with the US via NAFTA.

Fast forward to 2009. Brazil is the first Latin American nation to exit recession. Mexico is still under water, and likely won’t gasp its first breath of recession-free air until mid-2010. Strangely, according to key indicators, not so much changed between 2001 and the “Great Recession.” GDP growth between 2002 and 2007 was about the same for Brazil and Mexico. Each nation enjoyed low inflation, both nurtured formidable MNCs, and both continue to struggle with corruption and drug-related violence on a grand scale.

What’s going on? Currency provides great insight into the shifting fate of each nation.

Currency strength reflects current macroeconomic health and outlook. The Brazilian real now sits near pre-recession levels, about 1.75 reais to the dollar. Despite a recent rally the Mexican peso is far from recovering its pre-recession valuation, down over 20% vis-à-vis the dollar.

Beneath the data sets of recent years, Brazil’s economy has been driven by demand for its commodities from China, India, and elsewhere. Additionally, Brazil has distinguished itself in emerging niche markets, such as aircraft production and biofuels. Dynamic trade buoys the real. Meanwhile, Mexico has kept to traditional strengths: oil, tourism, and manufactures for the American market. Oil is down 50% since last year, tourism has dropped off a cliff, and cheaper Chinese goods fill Wal-Mart, pushing out Mexican trinkets. Reliant upon consumption in America and lacking innovation, Mexico just doesn’t offer the prospects of Brazil.