Crappy US Foreign Policy

The Bush administration has openly warned voters in Nicaragua not to elect Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega. The Latin American leaders – Chavez, Lula, Eva Morales and Castro have struck to their election promises in the past and have delivered to their people which makes them extremely popular in the region and the world. Some critics point out that leaders like Chavez are authoritarian. I tend to disagree. Chavez supports the free press. Though Chavez has the money and the power to interfere with the working of the Venezuelan press (a heavy critic of his administration) he does not refrains from doing so.

The US foreign policy is a representation of the country’s leaders being insecure. In the recent times, the country’s foreign policy has been interfering with everything from a rotating Security Council seat to mammoth wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Why can’t the States take care of its fiscal and monetary deficit (the United States borrows close to $3 billion a day !!!) before interfering the affairs of smaller and weaker countries?

The fiscal deficit has been conveniently blamed on China undervaluing its currency. This is totally baseless. Even if China revalued its currency, the US would move on to textile purchases from countries like Vietnam/ Thailand which are havens for cheaper imports. Also, the deficit is so huge that even if China revalued its currency, the deficit would decrease but there would not be a significant improvement in the situation

The Bush administration has to take a majority of the blame. But, I seriously believe that even if the Democratic Party comes to power, there would not be any major changes in the country’s stand on issues like environmental catastrophe, Kyoto protocol or global terrorism. The solution is the rise of the developing world and it has to be pioneered either by the Indo- China region or the Latin American Bloc