Saturday, July 05, 2008

McCain and Latin America

From the Washington Post: apparently John McCain's foreign policy aides are unaware that there is considerable U.S.-Brazilian cooperation. But they also say he would try to work more closely with Evo Morales. Exactly how that would work is unclear. Also unclear is whether every other "left-wing" government in Latin America will be considered non-democratic.

Scheunemann did point out two areas where McCain would differ from Bush, saying that he would work to engage "democratic left-wing governments" in Brazil, Bolivia and Argentina, and that "in a McCain administration, the most senior foreign policy national security officials, starting with the president, going on to the secretaries of state and defense and down, would have Latin America at the centerpiece of their portfolios, rather than an afterthought."

The latter point is interesting, but Bush appointees like Negroponte and Reich also had Latin American portfolios, so that is not automatically a positive sign.

3 comments:

Anonymous,  10:13 AM  

Your last sentence is where my thoughts fall.

McCain has been the chair of the IRI since 1993.

Its hard to imagine that his policy toward Latin America would be very different or any more positive than the current policy.

If his "wasteful spending" cuts includes the IRI....until then...

Paul 4:03 PM  

I think you're quibbling over the choice of words regarding Brazil here, Greg. At least McCain has come out against the ethanol tarriff and domestic ethanol subsidies. On both issues, Obama takes the sides of the domestic agribusiness/special interests.

Greg Weeks 4:28 PM  

I don't think I'm quibbling. I actually agree with you about ethanol, but right now U.S.-Brazilian relations are pretty stable, so McCain engaging Lula would not mark a change. I am more curious, though, why McCain would choose to engage Evo Morales--I think it is a good idea, but I don't see the points of agreement.

  © Blogger templates The Professional Template by Ourblogtemplates.com 2008

Back to TOP