Bush and Latin America: Bottomless Hypocricy

Bush is about to tour Latin America, and according to Dan Froomkin, has been trying to out-Chavez Chavez with faux-populist rhetoric of the kind he wouldn’t ordinarily be caught dead using here.

Just before heading off for a six-day visit to Latin America, President Bush yesterday attempted to co-opt the populist rhetoric of his hemispheric arch-nemesis, President Hugo Chavez, of Venezuela.

Speaking to the “tens of millions in our hemisphere” who “remain stuck in poverty, and shut off from the promises of the new century,” Bush said: “My message to those trabajadores y campesinos is, you have a friend in the United States of America. We care about your plight.”

But if you think Bush has a credibility problem in his own country, it’s even worse south of the border — especially when it comes to issues of social justice.

Let there be no doubt about this: Bush’s attempt to persuade Latin Americans that he is the champion of the poor — given his pro-business bent and six years of an almost exclusive focus on free trade and terrorism — is utterly doomed. Almost laughably so.

Bush leaves for Brazil on Thursday, then travels to Uruguay, Colombia, Guatemala and Mexico. Here’s the text of his speech to the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce yesterday. Startlingly, it contains the phrase “social justice” fully five times.

“Social justice” and Junior Bush? You might say that’s the textbook definition of “cognitive dissidence”.

But believe it or not, it gets worse.

The Globe and Obama’s Parking Tickets (Updated)

One of the nicer things about living in Mass is that the Globe knows its audience and doesn’t pander to the right in anything like the same degree that the NYT, its owner, is infamous for. But that may be changing. I get the Globe newsletter emailed to me – it’s one of 5 papers I go through every day – and this idiocy was one of their lead pieces.

Obama paid late parking tickets
Racked up penalties while at Harvard

What?!

Two weeks before the US senator from Illinois launched his presidential campaign, he paid parking tickets he received while attending Harvard Law School, officials said yesterday.Obama received 17 parking tickets in Cambridge between 1988 and 1991, according to the city’s Traffic, Parking & Transportation Department.

Of those tickets, he paid only two while he was a student and paid them late, said Susan Clippinger, the office’s director.

This is a major story you highlight in your newsletter??!! PARKING TICKETS???!!!