Finally, the PRI has changed in two fundamental ways since it last held power. I cannot vouch for Peña Nieto’s democratic convictions, but, generationally, he came of age in a democratic Mexico: he was barely two years old during the old system’s darkest moment, the student massacre of 1968; he was 28 in 1994, at the time of the country’s first semi-democratic election (which even the victor, Ernesto Zedillo, later acknowledged was free, but not fair); and he turned 34 in 2000.