New poll numbers released this weekend say Brazilian President Lula da Silva’s popularity has hit a record high. According to the polling group Datafolha, 76% of Brazilians see the outgoing government of the charismatic, one-time trade unionist as either “good” or “great.” That’s up three points from a similar poll taken last February. The president credits improved socioeconomic numbers for his ongoing popularity.
That news leads into two Brazil analysis pieces run by the Wall Street Journal over weekend. First, Paulo Prada writes about Brazil’s rise on the world stage—with some analysis of what remains to be still accomplished. “For the past century, Brazil has been a land of great potential—but few results. With runaway inflation and stratospheric national debt, the country was too much of a mess for anyone to take it seriously on the world stage. How times have changed,” Prada begins. Challenges that the next Brazilian government must tackle include “a bloated and corrupt public sector,” crime, a lagging public education system, and infrastructure improvements, the WSJ goes on to write, but the promise outweighs the shortcomings in Prada’s analysis. The paper credits an interesting mix of robust social welfare programs, fiscal prudence and aggressive state development bank policies, which have opened up new lines of credit for Brazil’s boom, even through the global recession of the last two years. Looking forward, the Journal quotes Lula himself who compared past and future in a speech in late December, “If the past year was about measures to stimulate consumption, now our emphasis is on reinforcing investments and thereby making the wheel of the economy roll in a healthy and sustainable way.”
A second WSJ piece by Antonio Regalado focuses on Brazilian electoral politics, arguing Brazilians will be looking for more of the same, not change, when they head to the polls later this year. “Brazil has never been so good as now,” says Jesus Dias Ferreira, a 62-year-old resident of Rio de Janeiro. “There is a soccer saying, ‘If a team is winning, don't change it.’” But it remains to be seen whether Lula’s handpicked successor Dilma Rouseff or center-right Sao Paulo Gov. Jose Serra best represents voter views of continuity, the paper maintains. In particular contrast to Lula, neither marshals the charismatic image that the outgoing president has used to unite the country behind his political program. Interestingly, Michael Shifter of the Inter-American Dialogue argues that the many believe the biggest difference between a potential Rouseff and Serra government would be in foreign policy. Some say that “if Dilma wins, it is a huge setback for Washington,” Shifter says. That opinion may be misplaced, however. “Brazil sees itself as an important power that is a counterweight to the U.S. in the Western hemisphere” and a crucial player in trade and political alliances among the so-called BRIC nations of Brazil, Russia, India and China, Shifter contends. “That shapes their identity and is the role that they want to play in the world.”
In other Brazil news this morning, EFE also has a piece on another major development of the last year: the country’s rising military budget. In the coming days it is expected that Brazil will announce the purchase of 36 new fighter jets. Brazil also recently purchased some 50 new military helicopters and five new submarines from a French military manufacturer.
On to other major stories from this weekend:
· The Economist this week looks at the new look of US-Mexico drug war cooperation, saying Sec. of State Hillary Clinton and her Mexican counterparts sought “more than soaring rhetoric” during last week’s high level meetings. A broadened counternarcotics strategy is the talk of the day in Mexico, including an increased focus on social development, organized crime, and intelligence sharing. This latter novelty will apparently occur through something the magazine calls “fusion centers.” That is, embedding American intelligence agents with Mexican analysts. The magazine continues, arguing such an increased American presence would have irked many the Mexican nationalist before, but in the words of Denise Dresser, professor of political science at ITAM, “the situation has gotten so bad that you’re starting to see a wearing down of that reflexive, historical anti-Americanism.”
· Also, on Mexico, the drug war, and its related effects, the New York Times notes that $85 million in illicit cash was seized by custom authorities on the Mexico border last year—a 22% increase over the prior year. The seizures come as part of a pumped up US effort to check traffic going south into Mexico. On Sunday, more than 7000 marched in protest against a recent wave of violence in Monterrey. Just hours later, two soldiers and one civilian were wounded in a shootout in the city. Also Sunday, an interview with President Felipe Calderon was aired on Fareed Zakaria’s news show, GPS. There Calderon said US gun lobbies are blocking the implementation of tough restrictions on assault weapons sales in the US—weapons which often make their way into Mexico and have fueled drug war violence. Calderon also told Zakaria it would not be useless for Mexico to “legalize” drugs without the US also doing so (note: Calderon uses the word “legalize,” rather than “decriminalize”).
· And the Wall Street Journal reports that US customs officials are no longer deporting Mexicans charged with various crimes in the US to Ciudad Juarez. “‘Starting March 4, Mexicans who have served time for crimes in the U.S. and who were set to be deported into Juárez, the Mexican city next to El Paso, Texas, have instead been transferred to other entry points into Mexico, including Eagle Pass, Laredo and Del Rio, Texas, according to a law-enforcement official in Washington who wasn't authorized to speak about the changes publicly,” the Journal reports. ICE deported 136,126 “criminal aliens” last year. More than two-thirds were apparently sent back to Mexico, according to the report. Juarez mayor José Reyes Ferriz has also been lobbying the US on this point for some time it seems. A study by Juarez city officials last year showed that about 10% of those killed in the city were former deportees. Read in conjunction with a disturbing weekend Washington Post piece on ICE deportation quotas for undocumented immigrants, this news may decidedly mixed in the grand scheme of things.
· The US Justice Dept. released late last week its 2010 National Drug Threat Assessment which looks at trafficking and drug abuse trends within the US over the last year. Many of the trends, as one would expect, are explicitly connected to the situation in Latin America, according to the report.
· On Haiti before this week’s donor’s conference in New York, the New York Times reports on how January’s quake accentuated social inequalities in the country. The piece is somewhat disturbing, discussing “revelry” at nightclubs in wealthy sectors of the city being “as loud” or “louder” than before the quake. The whole piece is recommended, but here’s an excerpt:
“People in tent camps reeking of sewage are living in areas where prosperous Haitians, foreign aid workers and diplomats come to spend their money and unwind. Often, just a gate and a private guard armed with a 12-gauge shotgun separate the newly homeless from establishments like Les Galeries Rivoli, a boutique where wealthy Haitians and foreigners shop for Raymond Weil watches and Izod shirts.”
· The Miami Herald reports on how the recent attention on rights abuses in Cuba may derail congressional action to ease trade and travel sanctions. In the New York Times, meanwhile, Marc Lacey looks at how some business groups are “dreaming of profits in post-embargo Cuba.” The report comes out of a conference last week in Cancún which brought together American travel industry executives and Cuban government officials to discuss the future of US-Cuba business relations.
· More on Venezuela this weekend as another Chavez opponent is in the news for allegedly “striking a police official.” The lawmaker, Wilmer Azuaje, was subsequently barred by the Supreme Court from talking to any media outlet about the case. Azuaje says the charges leveled against him are false and politically motivated. Venezuela’s National Assembly removed the legislator’s immunity in the case last week, opening the door for prosecution.
· The Economist reports on the growth of organized crime—particularly related to financial crimes—in Ecuador. The paper maintains that “…whereas violence has declined in Colombia and Peru, Ecuador has acquired a reputation as a new capital of financial crime.” “The Financial Action Task Force, an inter-governmental body, [last month] declared that Ecuador has not shown ‘a clear high-level political commitment’ to address its ‘strategic deficiencies’ in fighting money laundering and the financing of terrorism.”
· Finally, wrapping up with opinions. On Haiti, Ban-Ki Moon in the Washington Post and editorials in the New York Times, the Post, and the Herald. Sen. Chris Dodd, also in the Herald argues not for US occupation of the country but for Haiti to be placed under some sort of informal UN international trusteeship. On Mexico, Andres Oppenheimer says the country is fighting six wars, not one, facing challenges ranging from oil to water shortages to education and beyond. Steve Chapman, at Real Clear World, calls on Californians to legalize weed as a means of fighting drug traffickers. And on Honduras, Mary Anastasia O’Grady in the Wall Street Journal continues to hammer on US Amb. Hugo Llorens and what she calls the United States policy of “dividing Hondurans” while “strengthening the hand” of chavistas.
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