Obama, the Communicator
by Jorge Vargas
Mr. Obama, President of the United States of America, has taken it upon himself to be a spokesman for peace and understanding in the world.
First, he sits down with an Arab news network. Then, he gives a televised address to Iran. Then he has a question-and-answer affair in Europe.
And now, he has invaded the major newspapers of South America.
His invasion is not the product of the imbecile impulses of Obamamania that have over-taken the European continent. South America's newspapers know well that a new U.S. president does not mean drastic change for the relationship between Iberian America and the United States.
His invasion is altogether different: The U.S. President negotiated with the editorial group that owns many of South America's key newspapers in order for them to publish an address from Mr. Obama himself.
His message is entitled: "For a Better Future in the Americas."
Mr. Obama's message plants two separate options: To work together in order to build a future for the hemisphere or to continue arguing about conflicts from decades prior and remain mired in disagreement.
Mr. Obama, the bright man that he is, opts for the future. Then, he says that the future is about democratizing Cuba, and he calls his pathetic offering to Cuba - an offering which Fidel Castro has already rejected - a sign that the United States is interested in the future.
But first, he tries out his new strategy of pointing out that the United States has made mistakes but the United States feels bad about it, and therefore everything should be okay.
If diplomacy were like dating, then Mr. Obama would have hit upon a pretty good strategy for ending an argument: Say you're sorry and promise to change.
But even in dating, that strategy can only last for so long.
The last time that Mr. Obama admitted that his country was at fault was when one of his aides pointed out that the U.S. was at fault, as well, in the drug trade (when, in fact, most people would have it that the U.S. was mostly at fault, but that's just semantics). But what did Mr. Obama do then?
He started to treat Mexico as if that nation were the United States' play-thing, and he all but militarized the border and spoke of carrying out operations within Mexico without ever pointing out that such a decision would be entirely up to Mexico's President Felipe Calderon and not up to some up-start U.S. demagogue.
And this time, what does Mr. Obama want?
The democratization of Cuba. The right to force Cuba to remain isolated from hemispheric summits simply because of Cuba's type of government.
Was Chile ever banned, by the United States, from hemispheric summits when General Pinochet ruled that nation with U.S. support? Or Fujimori when he dominated over Peru, with U.S. support? Or the Argentine junta of 1980s?
No.
Tyrants have been accepted with open arms by the United States.
So, with what precedent does Mr. Obama still insist on forcing Cuba to sit out of hemispheric summits?
Of course!
International precedent. Wait. There is no international precedent. Cuba is a member of the United Nations, and Cuba maintains every single right as a member state of that international body.
Could it be, then, that Mr. Obama's precedent is based in age-old arguments that he hypocritically has attempted to peg onto South America's leaders in an under-handed manner that is but a show of the cowardice of the United States when it comes to international diplomacy?
To be precise: Could it be that Mr. Obama is defending the still-standing blockade on Cuba simply out of defense of an ideological and geo-political policy that did not make sense in the 1960s and which still does not make sense today, and which he will not dare to over-turn due to domestic pressures and fears?
Could it be that Mr. Obama, despite his recent affinity for self-criticism, represents a nation that, at its core, is unable to admit ever making a mistake and will, because of that fault, not lift the embargo on the Caribbean island today held hostage by the white hegemon?
If that is the case, then Mr. Obama is a liar and a hypocrite.
And his delivery method points to this hypocrisy.
He writes that he seeks for a greater relationship with Iberian America, with a relationship unfettered by distracting interests.
Yet his methodology is one that he employed for other people at earlier moments. First, the Muslim world, then the Europeans. Are we to presume that we are third on his list?
And not even woth a new method of delivery?
Mr. Obama must have advisors who are steeped in ignorance when it comes to Iberian America.
Mr. Obama, first of all, has written an identical message to Chileans as to Peruvians as to Colombians as to Argentines as to Brazilians. Since when did all of those nations respond to the same message in the same way. What prevented him from sending out twelve variants of the same letter?
More importantly, what prevented him from realizing that when the Europeans hear from the U.S. president, they are listening to God, and when the Muslims hear from a U.S. president speaking of peace, they are getting a touch of sun-light in an otherwise darkened room, whereas when South America hears a U.S. president speak of brotherhood and prosperity, the message is more of the same?
No one informed Mr. Obama of the fact that South Americans are, at the end of the day, a proud group. No one informed Mr. Obama that having a foreign leader address us and attempt to paint himself as the "good guy" while making our leaders seem like men mired in history and decadence would not sit well with our public.
No one informed Mr. Obama that South Americans knew, from the beginning, that Mr. Obama would be the same as Mr. Bush just as Mr. Bush was the same as Mr. Clinton and so forth and so on: Just another figure-head of a Yankee Empire that seeks to divide and conquer for profit.
Are we to assume that Mr. Obama's letter was heart-felt? Or are we to presume, as well we should, that it was a manipulative effort to attempt to force our leaders into agreeing to put pressure on Cuba in order to democratize the island-nation simply because Mr. Obama now thinks himself Master of South American Public Opinion?
We will presume the second, even if the first is true.
Why?
Because the public of South America are accustomed and well-trained in the lies and manipulations of politicians. The Europeans, not so much. And the Muslims... It hardly matters - most of them do not live in democracies and their State systems are too strong to be toppled by uprisings and demonstrations.
In South America, the people are accustomed to lying politicians, and the people live in democracies and are able to vote out the powers that be, and if not, the State structures throughout South America are weak enough that they are almost always toppled by popular uprising.
We are trained to not trust people in positions of power. We are trained not to listen. We have learned that believing in power is futile, because power corrupts, and the United States is powerful. Thus, the United States is corrupted. The word of a U.S. President is the word of a liar.
So, we are skeptical, and we read into every word, and where Mr. Obama writes of democratizing, we read about the spreading of U.S. influence, and where Mr. Obama says that he will choose future, we know that he means to imply that our leaders are choosing the past for requesting that the United States lift its embargo.
And Mr. Obama would know all of this if his advisors were better prepared and less ignorant and less arrogant.
And the fact that Mr. Obama has such unprofessional and ill-informed advisors when it comes to South America demonstrates that South Americans are correct in ignoring the words of the U.S. leader.
They are the words of a man who presumes to care about what he never put interest in.
They are the words of a liar
They are broken words.
Shame on Mr. Obama for his blatant lying and hypocrisies.
Shame on the editorial group for accepting the lying words of a demagogue.
And shame on any Latin American leader who yields to the demands of the U.S. leader and puts pressure on an island held captive simply because the U.S. demagogue wrote a heartless letter.
Mr. Obama will offer more aid and assistance, and he will offer stronger climate control policies. In return, we hand over Cuba.
Setting his imbecile letter aside, let us discuss the offer.
Aid and assistance can be received more cheaply from China and from Europe, so let us consider that offer as being without potency.
Stronger climate control. The glaciers in the Andes are melting and water levels in the Carib are rising.
But Mr. Obama is already moving ahead on that. He is not offering it to us. He will do it regardless of the decision on Cuba.
And we have Venezuela to contend with, if Cuba were to come under pressure.
Venezuela is no super-power, and Venezuela is hardly a regional power when compared with Brazil, but Venezuela is a sister nation, and Venezuela brings Bolivia and Ecuador with her, and all three are members of the South American Union (UNASUR/UNASUL).
And therein lies the final fallacy of Mr. Obama's argument.
He writes that he supports a future of unity and brotherhood in our hemisphere.
He implies that anyone who would oppose the U.S. on Cuba does not support such a future.
But we already have a spirit of unity and brotherhood in our continent. Sure, there are still spats with Colombia and Venezuela, and with Chile and Peru, but these spats are minor issues when compared to the older conflicts of decades past. South America has not known war since 1995.
UNASUR is the culmination of this brotherhood.
If Mr. Obama wants that future, then he can request for the U.S. to join this body.
Otherwise, he should not lecture to us about solidarity.
Mr. Obama writes that it is time to stop debating whether the fault is of left-wing insurgents or of right-wing paramilitaries and instead embrace one another before this economic crisis. What Mr. Obama does not realize is that those concerns, though he may think them provincial, are the concerns of South America.
To belittle them because of an economic crisis that the United States caused and which South America has resisted and will continue to resist, is a major folly on the part of the U.S. hegemon, and one will only ignore the insult because of pragmatism, but the insult is there and it will re-surface.
Mr. Obama wants us to forget our problems and be friends and pretend as if all is well.
Perhaps that is how it works in the United States, and this could be why the U.S. educational system is the joke of the developed world, and why Cuba has a better healthcare system than the United States, and why gunmen are shooting up schools, malls, and community centers throughout the United States, and why ignorance is ripe in the hegemony's territory, and why the United States is mired in Iraq and Afghanistan without serious hope of a successful completion of objectives.
But that is not how it works in South America.
No South American leader will presume to tell the United States' citizens what to think and why.
We would prefer it if the Mr. Obama gave us the same courtesy.
We would prefer it if he kept his demagoguery to the lands north of the nearly militarized, walled-off border between Mexico and the United States.
That would be an action of brotherhood. That would be an action of solidarity.
And, Mr. Obama, if you really want to free Cuba, then lift the blockade.
Don't blame South America's leaders for the faults of yours.
And if you want to have a serious discussion about issues and brotherhood, you need to come at us with something more than a letter, environmental policy, and economic assistance.
You want a serious discussion, then bring everything you have and not a thing less.
Until then, as you so eloquently put it, you will remain "bottled in the tried debates of the past."
