Vicente Fox, dubbed the Marlboro Man and Mexico's answer to John Wayne, yesterday picked up a new title - Senor Presidente.
A former Coca-Cola executive who stands 6 feet 6 inches, Mr Fox (58) beat the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in last July's elections, ending 71 years of one-party rule.
A conservative rancher, President Fox is also an irreverent politician, turning up for yesterday's inauguration in goatskin cowboy boots, a grey suit and a firm belief in his dream of a more just society.
The first item on his agenda was breakfast with Mexican street children, a gesture of solidarity with the nation's poor, estimated at 40 million.
"You are going to see a President that keeps campaigning, that is very close to the people", said Mr Fox. "I need to be close to people in order to maintain that positive energy and sense of hope that came about after my victory in July."
The new President's broad appeal was evident at the swearing-in ceremony where the Cuban leader, Dr Fidel Castro, rubbed shoulders with the Microsoft mogul, Mr Bill Gates, and the Spanish tenor, Placido Domingo, chatted with the Colombian writer, Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
Mr Fox won't be sleeping in the presidential palace in Mexico City, preferring to bed down in a bungalow on the grounds and conduct an informal government, US-style, from his ranch in San Cristobal, northwest of the capital.
Mr Fox, of the right-wing National Action Party (PAN), has won broad acceptance as the man to usher Mexico into the 21st century with a democratic and businesslike style following decades of state terror and corruption under the PRI.
He ran for office under the banner of the Alliance for Change, a broad coalition which promised reform with stability in a pluralist administration. Mr Fox's own party, PAN, is disliked by many for its opposition to divorce, abortion, rap music and mini-skirts.
Mr Fox calculated every cabinet choice with a view to balancing Mexico's fractured political forces, offering three posts to the centre-left Party of the Democratic Revolution. The offer was rejected but diversity prevailed even if the nation's private sector stole the lion's share of the spoils. "A cabinet of brand names" complained one Mexican current affairs magazine, listing a dozen corporations and banks represented in the new cabinet.
Mr Fox also disappointed reformers by choosing a Mexican army general as the nation's Attorney General, further strengthening the military's controversial role.
He has established a commission to investigate a string of political killings, including the assassination of a cardinal in 1993 and the deaths of hundreds of opposition activists over the past three decades.
The nation's tabloids call him Mexico's most eligible divorcee, who boasts 15 pairs of cowboy boots and a mob of admiring women. The clear favourite for the President's affections is Ms Marta Sahagun, just appointed to head the presidency's public affairs division, but his former wife, Ms Liliana de la Concha - divorced since 1991 - reportedly wants reconciliation.
Ana Cristina (21), one of four children adopted by Mr Fox and his former wife, has been pegged as the new first lady, but has embarrassed her father with her radical anti-abortion stance.
Mr Fox's ambitious plan to revitalise the nation's ailing economy involves Internet access for indigenous farmers, micro-credit for the poor, holiday resorts to rival Cancun and a new maquila assembly plant in every town.
However, he faces serious obstacles to reform, as his party lacks a majority in Congress, although he proved a shrewd negotiator while governor of Guanajuato state in the mid1990s.
Mr Fox inherits endemic corruption in public office, powerful drug cartels who have infiltrated every level of government and a $100 billion rescue plan that resulted from the botched privatisation of banks. A master of PR, Mr Fox has raised enormous expectations among Mexicans, hopes that will be difficult to fulfil, given the tight spending restrictions ahead.
He has called for a strengthened North American Free Trade Agreement, called NAFTA-plus, modelled on the EU, involving huge injections of US and Canadian cash to lessen economic disparities between the trade partners.
One of his controversial proposals is that the US drastically increase the number of work visas for Mexicans as a prelude to eventually opening the shared 2,200-mile border.
In the short term, however, Mr Fox hopes to resolve the Zapatista conflict in south-east Mexico by withdrawing the Mexican army to barracks and implementing a peace accord which would grant local autonomy to indigenous communities.