Some commentators believed Dilma Rousseff, Brazil's first female president, would be more accommodating to US interests than her predecessor [AFP]
Posted on 04/02/2011 2:50:12 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
The bad blood started, or so the story went, when Lula refused to listen to the administration of George W. Bush and isolate Venezuela's populist leader, Hugo Chávez. Before long, Brasilia was opposing or, worse, offering alternatives to Washington's position on a growing number of issues: climate change, opposition to the 2009 coup in Honduras, Cuba, trade and tariffs.
Lula declined to criticise Iran and opened up a separate negotiating channel, outside of Washington's influence and much to its annoyance, with Tehran to discuss Iran's nuclear ambitions.
The former Brazilian president also welcomed the president of the Palestinian National Authority, Mahmoud Abbas to Brazil, leading the rest of Latin America to recognise the Palestinian state and calling for direct talks with Hamas and Hezbollah.
Various explanations were posited in the US press for Lula's behavior, which, for a Latin American leader, was unprecedented considering the historically subservient role Latin America has long played to Washington. At times it was described as a personality disorder, a striving for attention on the world stage; at other moments it was explained away as Lula's need to play to his party's rank and file, which, apparently, always enjoys a good tweaking of the US's nose.
In any case, Obama's visit just after Dilma's election offered a chance for a reset. Rousseff, it was reported, would be eager to use the trip to distance herself from her political patron, Lula. Though she was a member of a Marxist-Leninist guerrilla organisation opposing a US-backed dictatorship during her youth in the 1970s, Brazil's new leader had, according to the Washington Post, a "practical approach to governance and foreign relations after eight years of the flamboyant Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva".
(Excerpt) Read more at english.aljazeera.net ...
Greg Grandin is a professor of history at New York University and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He is the author of a number of prize-winning books, including most recently, Fordlandia: The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford’s Forgotten Jungle City (Metropolitan 2009), which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in History, as well as for the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award.
Some commentators believed Dilma Rousseff, Brazil's first female president, would be more accommodating to US interests than her predecessor [AFP]
In fact, his has LOTS to do with CHINA’S new role in Latin America —China has quickly and dramatically replaced the USA as the top destination of Brazil’s exports.
China often brings up the quesiton of the target country’s policies to the US as a criteria for trand and diplomacy.
Brazil is run by commies these days. Was that mentioned in the article?
In fact, his has LOTS to do with CHINA’S new role in Latin America —China has quickly and dramatically replaced the USA as the top destination of Brazil’s exports.
China often brings up the quesiton of the target country’s policies to the US as a criteria for trand and diplomacy.
By the way ....how’s the Obama (taxpayer) funded oil drilling working out?
Please note that Brazil, India China and Russia abstained to support Obummer's folly in Libya.
It is not very wise to take an action your banker does not approve of.
For a professor of history he sure has a short memory. 0bungle, Hillary and the State Dept. all supported Mel Zelaya's coup on the Honduran constitution. Lula backed Zelaya too.
Yeah, what the hell good are all the payoffs doing? Oh, wait, those are going to Soros.
Former Brazilian President Lula is a COMMUNIST and Represent the São Paulo Forum;
Dilma Roussef, the actual Brazilian President is a Communists and Represents the São Paulo Forum;
The São Paulo Forum is the gathering of all leftists in South America and was founded in 1990 by Lula and Fidel Castro.
The São Paulo Forum actually Stated Purpose is to “Recover in South America what was lost in East Europe by the USSR Fall".
Everything, everything that can be made by this people to undermine, damage and accelerate the downfall of America will be done, believe me... PS: Dilma Roussef is the Guerrila that kidnapped former US Ambassador Charles Burke Elbrick.
Thanks gaijin.
Central and South America is afflicted with “Old Europe Disease”, which is a devolved version of a royal aristocracy.
Typically, a dozen or so wealthy families control most of the nation’s wealth. But unlike far more egalitarian America, where the wealthy don’t mind at all when others become wealthy, in the OED countries, the wealthy strive that there be only two classes: the very wealthy and the peasants.
They do not want a middle class, and they certainly do not want an upper middle class with aspirations to become wealthy, so scheme with the government they control to keep this from happening.
In turn, this builds tremendous resentment among the poor, who gravitate to violent egalitarian movements, often socialist or communist.
Yet with great irony, if they ever succeed in overthrowing the government, the revolutionaries set themselves up as the new aristocracy. This is because the poor, as well as the wealthy, suffer from OED. They neither understand nor appreciate what a middle class can be in a nation.
This is why a crude baboon like Chavez imagines himself as the aristocratic Simón Bolívar, a legitimate Spanish nobleman.
And it is also why central and South America have been afflicted with both pseudo-aristocratic tyrants and violent egalitarian revolutions for hundreds of years.
Take Rio de Janeiro, it is a city with Slums (Fevela's) everywhere; the people in those areas outnumber the ones productive in the city. There are "truces" with the crime leaders, like a pledge not to come down out of the hills and destroy tourism by robbing visitors; and in exchange free electric will flow along with water and other vital resources to keep them "pacified".
A rumor I heard at work (e.g., the consulate) is that some of the employess are considering moving into the fevela's because it is cheaper to live in those areas - maybe not the freebies, but rather that all prices may be less but you are not quite as safe as down along the coastal beach areas:)
I’d like it even better if they didn’t have any more birthdays.
Whoops! Ignore that, it was for a different window. Yikes.
-The real reply begins-
Thanks Jumper, that’s interesting. It’s an interesting way to handle the transition from rural to urban, pre-industrial to industrial, etc. Not too sure I’d want to save the money at the risk that could be involved though. :’)
The Sandinistas did the same thing — overthrew the old regime, then moved into their mansions.
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