We Can't Be Trapped by History
Peter Richards
PORT OF SPAIN, Apr 18 (IPS) - President Barack Obama had promised that his administration would be different. His, he said, would be a listening, caring one, even though like previous United States leaders, he came to the Fifth Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago bearing gifts - no doubt hoping for support for his new initiatives.
On Friday night that new policy was tested. Obama and the 32 other hemispheric leaders sat for almost one hour getting a history in U.S.-Latin American relations from none other than Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega, a former revolutionary, even though the host, Prime Minister Patrick Manning, urged that the forum not be used to allow "any one issue to dominate our deliberations."