Why hasn't the admin completely broken with the Nixon/Reagan/Bush/Bish Latin American policies?

[Ken Burch]

Why is it so hard to say: "Everything this country has done to Latin American was wrong. We won't do any of it any more"?

[safeinOhio]

1. $ N/T

[Go2Peace]

2. You left some typos in your OP

I agree with the general thought though, we need to break from old policies that are not wise, such as efforts in other countries that cause suffering or hurt democracy. We have interfered in Latin America too much.

[Ken Burch]

6. Thanks for the heads-up on the typos

I'm using my "back-up specs" today.

Thanks for the conceptual support.

[Uzybone]

3. why didn't you include Clinton and Carter in your list?

were their policies any different?

[The Northerner]

5. +1

[Ken Burch]

7. No...they weren't...that's part of the problem

I could've thrown in Truman, JFK and LBJ as well.

Part of it was space issues in the title line. Which is a statement in itself.

[FrenchieCat]

4. I thought we weren't into "words" anymore,

and we are all into "action"???

I fear that if Obama says anything these days,
folks will just call it words. So why should he bother? :shrug:


He vowed to reduce the Nuclear arsenal, and that was ridiculed here as "More promises".....


so If I were the Obama administration, I wouldn't say shit.

If some can't discern the difference between this admin and the past ones,
then that's their problem.

[Ken Burch]

8. Words are part of the action in this case

Obama should go to Managua, or Santiago, or perhaps(this would be ballsy)Caracas, and make a great regional address, where he'd say
a longer, more elaborate version of the OP.

A renunciation and apology for all the misery we've brought Latin America and a promise to leave it alone from now on.

It would be simple and no one could stop him.

It could be the Obama Doctrine-replacing that imperialist Monroe Doctrine, which we never had the right to declare anyway, since the Americas belong to ALL the peoples of the Americas, and were never "ours" to dominate.

And, as a starter, he could have backed Zelaya in Honduras and not essentially accepted the legitimacy of the right-wing coup there.

Taking the steps I've outline above would impress everybody, and wouldn't harm this country's "interests" in the slightest.

An abandonment of the "free trade" thing would also help, but I assume you'd agree with that.

[eridani]

9. Because we have been an imperial juggernaut since after WW II

--and changing that is like trying to turn a battleship around with an outboard motor.