COLUMN: LULA IS LIKELY TO WIN IN BRAZIL, BUT THEN WHAT?
With elections in South America's largest country less than six weeks away, there is a virtual consensus among U.S. Brazil watchers that leftist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will be easily reelected, and that in his second term he will move further to the center. Read the entire column here, to find out what we can expect from a Lula II presidency.
posted by Andres Oppenheimer at 8:43 AM
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5 Comments:
Andres, Brasil has enough Japanese, Germans and Italians to be a force on the world stage. If only the Iberians (Portuguese descended in this instance)would get out of the way and let the other three run the show, Brasil will then be a major player in the world.
Iberians only screw up every country they get involved with.
Check out the fatcs, the Latin American countries with the fewest Iberian names are the most relatively successful. Argentina, Chili..........
Paul Thorsen
PThorsen240@aol.com
I still think he's gonna lose.
What's the point? Are you dreaming with a figth of Lula and Uribe against Chavez?
The higgest interest of Brazil, Argentina and Venezuela is to build a South American Community. And they are working together in their integration.
This week, for example, Argentina and Brazil are discussing how to leave the use of the american dollar in their commercial exchange. This is the first step in the cration of a regional currency like the Euro.
The freedom is not leftist, so, this policies will not be changed in Lula's second term.
The conventional wisdom in the US seems to be saying that after winning this election Lula will be "free" to distance himself from Chavez and the so-called Latin populists (see this LA Times editorial today).
But I think this is wishful thinking divorced from the reality of who Lula is and what the PT knows it must accomplish to remain in power. They came into power at a precarious moment, knowing that his words and actions were being looked at under the microscope by Wall Street, at a time when fund managers held the country's fate in their hands.
Today is a different ballgame. Lula has established his democratic bona-fides and now has the freedom to move to the left, where his base is urging him. Post-election, with an more stable (if still lackluster economy), he will have little to lose in embarking on the type of radical proposals in land, housing and education that are needed to begin to dismantle the two-tiered state. The social movements will no longer feel the pressure to defend 'their man', realizing that there must be pressure for there to be serious negotiation.
Many are disappointed in Lula, but that does not mean he has not done a lot. The recent college (making it free for many poor) and drugs legislation (no more jail for posession) are case in points. People have more food security and health care access has improved a lot. But the basic foundations of social justice still distant...
Bad news again,Mr Oppenheimer and
all the latin america bashers
gringos.
Inazio Lula da Silva is here again to stay to work hard for Brasil.
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