MiamiHerald.com: Andres Oppenheimer

Iran-Latin America links drawing attention in Washington

Sat, 04 Feb 2012 15:23 EST

Latin America rarely comes up as a major issue in U.S. presidential races, but this time it will: There are growing signs that Iran’s rising presence in the region will become a contentious election topic.

Romney’s big win among Florida Hispanics hard to duplicate

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 18:11 EST

A kind word of advice for Republican hopeful Mitt Romney: Don’t read too much into your impressive victory among Hispanic voters in Tuesday’s Florida primary. You will face an uphill battle to emulate it among Latino voters nationwide.

Romney’s ‘anti-immigrant’ label won’t go away

Sat, 28 Jan 2012 19:00 EST

Republican hopeful Newt Gingrich, under pressure from his party’s establishment, pulled a Spanish-language ad in which he had accused his rival Gov. Mitt Romney of being “anti-immigrant.” But was the ad really unfair?

Obama shouldn’t ignore the war next door

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 20:12 EST

In his State of the Union address on Tuesday, President Barack Obama talked about the conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria, but didn’t say a word about a war that is taking place next door, and that is killing more people than the others: the drug-related war in Mexico and Central America.

LATIN-ASIAN TECHNOLOGICAL GAP KEEPS GROWING

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 19:20 EST

Latin American presidents should take a close look at the latest U.S. technological innovation figures: they show that, despite signs of progress in several countries, the gap between Asian and Latin American countries keeps widening.

Panama’s paradox: A boom with gloom

Wed, 18 Jan 2012 21:34 EST

What irony! Panama is expected to be Latin America’s economic star in 2012, with a 6.8 percent economic growth rate and no money woes in the foreseeable future. Yet, many Panamanians are sounding surprisingly gloomy about their future.

It’s time for Obama to look South

Sat, 14 Jan 2012 19:00 EST

It’s no big secret that the United States has lost some economic and political clout in Latin America over the past decade, but United Nations economic projections for 2020 should set off alarm bells in Washington D.C.

Romney will have big problem: Hispanic voters

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 18:06 EST

Republican hopeful Mitt Romney will have two big problems if, as expected, he clinches the Republican nomination for the November election: his business background and Hispanic voters.

Ahmadinejad's Latin America "tour of tyrants"

Sat, 07 Jan 2012 22:47 EST

Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad will be visiting Latin America this week for the fifth time since 2007 — as often as U.S. presidents over the same period, and visiting more countries than them. He must have powerful reasons to spend so much time in the region.

Press censorship makes a comeback in Latin America

Wed, 04 Jan 2012 18:12 EST

It’s hard to believe that this would happen today in a largely democratic region, but the beginning of 2012 finds much of Latin America suffering the worst wave of press censorship since the rightist military dictatorships of the 1970s.

2012 will be anything but boring in the Americas

Sat, 24 Dec 2011 19:00 EST

Every year brings about changes, but 2012 is likely to be an especially eventful one in the Americas: there will be elections in the United States, Mexico and Venezuela, as well as other news events that could change the political map in the region.

Latin America still growing, but fiesta is over

Wed, 21 Dec 2011 20:00 EST

A key United Nations think tank that has been very bullish about Latin America in recent years is sounding a little less optimistic about the region’s economies for 2012. As we have been cautioning in this column for some time now, the fiesta may be over.

Mexico’s drug cartels are no “terrorist insurgency”

Sat, 17 Dec 2011 13:00 EST

Like in every election season, when legislators compete to make headlines, there are some bizarre ideas being discussed in the U.S. Congress these days. One of the craziest — and most dangerous — is a Republican bill that calls for U.S. “counter-insurgency tactics” to combat an alleged “terrorist insurgency” in Mexico.

Cuba asking advice from IMF? Don’t laugh!

Wed, 14 Dec 2011 19:10 EST

An old joke I heard for the first time more than 20 years ago in Havana says that the three biggest achievements of the Cuban revolution are health, education, and low infant-mortality rates, and that its three biggest failures are breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Latin America may split into Pacific and Atlantic blocs

Sat, 10 Dec 2011 22:25 EST

President Barack Obama’s recent announcement that he will seek to create what may be the world's largest trading bloc along the Pacific rim raises an interesting question in this part of the world: whether we will see a de facto split of Latin America into a Pacific bloc and an Atlantic bloc.

Latin America's Pacific bloc may actually work

Wed, 07 Dec 2011 19:25 EST

While Saturday's summit that created a Community of Latin American and Caribbean Countries (CELAC) in Venezuela drew big headlines, a little-noticed meeting of five Latin American Pacific rim countries two days later will have a much greater impact on people’s lives, and on the region’s economic future.

New Latin American group will have no teeth

Sun, 04 Dec 2011 00:00 EST

Contrary to what most headlines suggested, and to Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez’s claim that it’s the most important thing to have happened in Latin America in the past 100 years, the new group of 33 Latin American and Caribbean states created at a Dec. 3 summit in Venezuela will hardly make it into history books.

Latin America is beating poverty - sort of

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 00:00 EST

In sharp contrast to the gloom surrounding U.S. and European economic news, a new United Nations report has good news for Latin America: it says that poverty levels in the region have dropped to their lowest levels in 20 years, and will continue falling in 2012.

Gingrich brings common sense to immigration debate

Sat, 26 Nov 2011 00:00 EST

Finally, there is a voice of reason on immigration among the front-runners for the Republican nomination, who until last week's debate seemed to be competing with one another to see who could take the craziest stand against Hispanic immigrants.

Is Antanas Mockus better for Colombia -- or Finland?

Thu, 27 May 2010 07:36 EDT

Colombia's opposition candidate, Antanas Mockus, who according to the latest polls has the best chance of becoming his country's next president, says he will make education, science and technology his government's top priorities.