editorial

We now know that it will be four more years of George W. Bush running the US government. By now the reins of Panamanian foreign policy have passed firmly into the hands of Martín Torrijos and his team is carrying out his ideas.

All that creates a certain continuity, but nothing is ever changeless.

In the days leading up to the US election, three events highlighted changing Latin American realities. First, Fidel Castro demonstrated his geriatric condition by a sudden fall that left several of his brittle bones broken. Then, on the Sunday before the Tuesday when Americans went to the polls, Hugo Chávez and his followers prevailed in Venezuela’s local elections. That same day Uruguayans turned to the left by electing physician Tabaré Vázquez and his Frente Amplio to run their government.

George W. Bush can now say without dispute that this time around he won the presidency with the backing of most of the American people. However, that does not in itself win him obedience abroad. He has to accomodate himself to political tides which, like elemental forces, might be diverted or to a certain extent resisted but are not ultimately his to control.

Martín Torrijos knows that he’ll have to deal with Bush and his people, but he must also be aware that in negotiating free trade with the United States and at the same time trying to have a Free Trade Area of the Americas headquartered in Panama, he will have to balance a desire to please our powerful neighbor to the north against a desire for closer relations with Latin American neighbors who are alienated from the United States and its policies. It will be tricky.

Latin America was hardly discussed by Kerry or Bush and probably won’t play too prominently in US politics in the immediate future. Plan Colombia, which ought to be debated more fully in Washington, won’t be because the policy is bipartisan. The CAFTA free trade deal with Central America should also be the subject of a huge debate in Congress, but we are likely to see just how weak the American labor movement has become when ratification of that deal comes onto the agenda in coming weeks. It may well be that in his second administration Bush will let the idea of a Free Trade Area of the Americas wither or die rather than compromise with a South American bloc that increasingly has ideas of its own.

Meanwhile, it appears that the countries of the Americas --- especially the United States, where the GOP’s hold on power has depended on the support of anti-Castro exiles --- will sooner rather than later face the knotty problems of a Cuba in transition.

The Cuban government would protest with some justification that this is an affair for Cubans only. The Bush administration has asserted by the practices of its first term that it believes that the United States has the right to intervene in the politics of other countries in the Americas. Such are the seeds of potential conflict.

By many estimates, Fidel Castro’s dictatorship probably lacks the public support it would need to last very long after the caudillo’s retirement from the scene. Beyond this calculation, there is the gut fear that any chaotic change on the island could have far-reaching negative repercussions, of which waves of destitute refugees might only pose one of the easier parts of the problem to address.

Bush may want to put the Cuban-American National Foundation in power in Havana, but Torrijos and other Latin American heads of state should be thinking about more practical and impartial means to help Cuba through what may be a difficult transition.

Panama will have its role to play when Cuba changes, and let’s hope that this country’s function will be more than just as a US acolyte, a Free Zone creditor or a place of refuge for the losing side. Let’s also hope that if political turmoil does force Cubans to flee in great numbers, Panama will be in a position to add to our own economy and culture by taking in the most talented and best educated professionals who apply to us for refuge, and giving them an opportunity to work in this country.

The more immediate challenge for Torrijos and Bush will be the closing of a bilateral free trade deal. Torrijos indicated during the campaign and afterward that he believes some sort of agreement is important to preserve Panama’s standing in the economic world. Panama’s farmers, labor unions, leftists and other social and economic sectors with particular hopes and fears have already served notice of their opposition to a free trade pact. They can be expected to take to the streets when any such agreement is announced. However, the only way that these opponents would be able to block ratification on this end would be if Bush and Torrijos make the nation such an onerous offer that it would be easy to mobilize much broader sections of the Panamanian people to join the protest movement.

Within Panama, we should expect to see the American expatriate community grow, in part through an influx of people who dislike George W. Bush and believe that he is the enemy of freedoms they cherish. The behavior of the second Bush administration will have a lot to do with the size of this phenomenon, but so will the Torrijos administration’s attitudes and actions. Panama can do the smart thing by excluding the hustlers and welcoming those with skills and capital to contribute toward this nation’s progress, or we can continue past practices and apply the opposite policy.

Let’s hope that in both Washington and Panama presidents will realize that their new mandates, plus their parties’ control of their countries’ legislatures, don’t add up to blank checks. A mandate is the right to make certain decisions, but can never include immunity from the natural consequences of the choices that are made.

God is the friend of silence. Trees, flowers, grass grow in silence. See the stars, moon, and sun, how they move in silence.

Mother Teresa

In the shadow of every religion lurks a Torquemada.

Frank Herbert

We must be aware of evil desire, since death lies close to the door of delight; for which we are commanded by Scripture, to go not after lusts.

St. Benedict

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