Bush Tries to Mend Ties With Mexico

NewsMax ^

[Happy2BMe]

MONTERREY, Mexico – President Bush and Mexican President Vicente Fox, their relationship strained by tensions over immigration and Iraq, met privately for talks on a range of issues Monday as a prelude to an international summit meeting of 34 Western Hemisphere nations.

The Bush White House saw the face-to-face meeting not only as a chance to mend ties between the two countries, but also to earn political capital for a president who wants a second term.

Bush arrived in this industrial city at midday at an airport where gun-toting troops in green fatigues and security officers roamed the grounds. He and his wife, Laura, walked down into a phalanx of Mexican officials, all men wearing dark suits.

The couple were followed in the procession of greeting by Secretary of State Colin Powell, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice and White House chief of staff Andy Card. Once in his motorcade, Bush passed large expanses of brush and cactus- covered land. Men digging ditches alongside the road stopped and leaned on their tools to watch him pass by.

On a 90-minute flight here from Texas, Bush got a briefing from Rice and Powell on the summit, said his press secretary, Scott McClellan.

In his meeting with Fox, the spokesman said, the president was expected to discuss his new, more open immigration policy, strengthening border security and free trade. McCellan dismissed talk of the meeting as an opportunity to air grievances.

"We have a good relationship with Mexico, and President Fox is a good friend of the president's", McClellan said. "Whatever differences we had in the past, we have a lot of common challenges that we are working closely together on."

Sorry, Castro

Bush annoyed Fox when he put changes in immigration on the back burner after the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks. Their relationship further soured when Mexico failed to back the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. But the two were expected to be smiling, at least for the cameras, at the summit of freely elected leaders. Cuba was not invited.

"Fox has an opportunity to hail the Bush immigration proposal as a political victory, given that he has been asking for an immigration agreement since day one," said Armand Peschard-Sverdrup, director of the Mexico project at Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. "I think to some extent, Bush will use it as a photo op for reaching out to the Hispanic voters."

Amid the congenial handshakes will be disagreements. Latin American nations butted heads with the United States until nearly dawn Sunday in failing to agree on several points of a draft document to be debated at the two-day summit.

Bigger Than NAFTA

The United States wants the draft to call for re-emphasizing a 2005 deadline for finishing negotiations on a Free Trade Area of the Americas, a hemisphere-wide trade zone that is one of Bush's top policy goals for Latin America. Brazil and Venezuela say the summit is not the place to discuss it.

The United States also wants to kick corrupt governments out of the Organization of American States, a move opposed by several Latin American nations.

Other discussion topics at the summit, held in Mexico's third-largest city, 150 miles south of the Texas border city of Laredo, include strengthening free republics, ending poverty, security and helping small businesses with low-interest loans.

Argentina's President Nestor Kirchner is upset about recent U.S. criticism over its warming relations with Cuba. U.S. officials privately worry that President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, who warned U.S. officials on Saturday not to "stick their noses" in his nation's affairs, is working with Cuba to oppose pro-American republics in the region.

200 Million More on the U.S. Taxpayers' Dole?!

Some Latin American leaders accuse America of being heavy-handed. They argue that the United States has neglected social issues, such as raising the standard of living for 200 million people, nearly one-half the region's population, who live in poverty.

Between bilateral meetings Monday with President Ricardo Lagos of Chile and President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil, Bush's schedule called for his speech at the summit's opening ceremonies. He planned to promote free trade, open markets, clean elections and anti-corruption steps to help strengthen freedom in the hemisphere.

An administration official said the United States also planned to announce it would return to Peru $20 million allegedly stolen by Vladimiro Montesinos, a former Peruvian intelligence chief, and stashed in American bank accounts.

© 2003 Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

[hedgetrimmer]

Fox is speaking now at the summit. Any spanish speakers willing to translate?

http://www.oas.org/OASpage/live/oaslive4.asp

[navyblue]

Bush is speaking right now to the "citizens of the world" attending the summit, saying there is a consensus to bring all of the hemispheres people into the terms of the Monterrey consensus.

Bingo! One worlder!

[Merdoug]

The disgusting thing is that Bush DOES NOT CARE that you will not vote for him: for every one of us, he's got five Mexicans who will vote for him. He does not NEED our vote.

[dagnabbit]

Fox is speaking now at the summit. Any spanish speakers willing to translate?

Bush is speaking without notes! Any incoherence speakers willing to translate?

[Peace will be here soon]

Sod off.

What is that ?

[dagnabbit]

Dear Mexico:
Keep him.

[varon]

In his meeting with Fox, the spokesman said, the president was expected to discuss his new, more open immigration policy, strengthening border security and free trade.

"More open immigration policy"...........for God's sake, how much more open can it be? They are swarming across our borders by the millions already..WTF?

[DLfromthedesert]

I saw the impressions of Bush's lips all over Vicente's butt.

[WHATNEXT?]

Right! As Pres. Bush said, "You are either with us or against us." Mexico in every way is against us.

[yarddog]

I was listening to the G-man this morning and he mentioned something about what in the world is Bush doing in Mexico, "kissing Fox's butt".

I think that is an exact or nearly exact quote. Liddy has been a strong supporter of Bush too.

[Caipirabob]

Oi, Brasil - 'ta bom ti ver de novo.

Hey Martin, yet another kindred spirit.

Brasil, are you still overseas or did you come home? Haven't seen you post in a while. I used to be "Yakboy". I decided to stay in the states after all, and seeing how Lula's in control now, I made the right call!

[hosepipe]

[ Bush Tries to Mend Ties With Mexico ]

Mexico is run by a mafia like cabal of drug dealers..
so.... whats goin on here.. whats to mend.. UNLESS this meeting is openers just before a wall is built between Brownsville and San Diego... with a major highway built behind it.. with security personel housing and wetback and dryback stations along the way to house illegals bring shipped from all over the US.. before deportation...

Going to the Moon and Mars is ridiculous... otherwise

[My2Cents]

"Sod off."

It's British for "go pound sand."

[45Auto]

...corrupt governments out of the Organization of American States

Like, Mexico?

[Happy2BMe]

" Liddy has been a strong supporter of Bush too."

As have we all.

[My2Cents]

It's interesting that those who oppose Bush's initiative the most vociferously are those on the extremes -- those on the right whose practical solution to illegal immigration seems to be to machine-gun anyone who dares to step across the border, and those on the left who think the entire concept of "citizenship" is oppressive in and of itself and who think foreigners should be able to live here without any effort to actually become "Americans."

[Happy2BMe]

We R N TRUBBEL

[Happy2BMe]

"Their el presidente' lives in Seattle anyhoo."

I knew Patty Murray was up in that neck of the woods.

Vincente Fox too?

[Labyrinthos]

What do they have that we need so much as to cause us to cater to them?

I can think of two things with out much of an effort: Oil and cheap labor.

[Major_Risktaker]

This makes me want to PUKE!!!________________________________

Welcome illegal immigrants

for Mexican OIL!!

Or WE WALK!!!

An Energy Overview of Mexico

________________________________

Our fellow very wealth American citizens are selling us out to get first crack at PEMEX stocks (an ipo or something like it).

Fox is telling Bush, if you want PEMEX reform/stocks, I what to get rid of Mexico's poor and keep the oligarchy in place.

QUID PRO QUO!

Think about it..

________________________________

From the link...

The two-year-old administration of Mexican President Vicente Fox has not yet succeeded in implementing promised free market reforms in the energy sector. The centerpiece of these planned reforms would be the privatization of PEMEX.

Mexico is the second-largest supplier of crude oil to the United States, behind Saudi Arabia.