Obama, Amigo

“Of all the regions in a dangerous and intractable world, forgotten Latin America might paradoxically offer Barack Obama the best opportunity to influence events so that the “hope for the future” embodied in his recent Nobel peace prize becomes a reality,” writes Ariel Dorfman of The Guardian. “Lifting the senseless blockade against Cuba, followed by full diplomatic relations, would be a good beginning. Another sore spot is Honduras, where the US has not done enough to isolate and punish the de facto government, which stubbornly clings to power after having ousted the legally elected Manuel Zelaya. And Obama should rethink his approach to continental security (cancelling, for instance, Plan Colombia), as a way of defusing tensions in a Latin America threatened by a new arms race.”