Fifty Shades of Trump
By Elizabeth Drew Elizabeth Drew is a contributing editor to The New Republic and the author, most recently, of Washington Journal: Reporting Watergate and Richard Nixon’s Downfall.
A Trump-Castro encounter may steal the show at the Summit of the Americas
President Trump’s top aides have advised him not to shake hands with Cuban dictator Raúl Castro at the Summit of the Americas, which starts April 13 in Lima, Peru.
Don’t laugh: Trump may not mind a leftist victory in Mexico’s July 1 elections
A joke making the rounds in Mexico says that President Donald Trump has become the de facto campaign manager of leftist populist candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who is leading in the polls for the July 1 presidential election.
Chile could become Latin America’s first developed country by 2025
When Chile’s President-elect Sebastian Pinera told me that Chile may become Latin America’s first developed country by 2025, I was skeptical.
Driverless cars will save many lives … and kill many jobs
When I saw a demonstration of Domino’s pilot program to deliver pizzas with driverless cars last week, I wondered whether governments around the world are preparing for the massive job disruption that this new technology will bring.
Mass shooting coincides with a rise in racism, homophobia and anti-Semitism
Amid the national debate over gun control in the aftermath of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting that left 17 people dead, there’s one detail that has received too little attention: the fact that the mass killer repeatedly made white supremacist and Nazi-like comments on social media.
Who is crazier? The gunman, or those who let him buy an AR-15 rifle?
A senior at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School weeps in front of a cross and Star of David for shooting victim Meadow Pollack while a fellow classmate consoles her at a memorial by the school in Parkland, Florida, U.S.
UK’s Minister of Loneliness is smart move to save money, improve lives
When I read that British Prime Minister Theresa May appointed a minister of loneliness, my first reaction was to laugh.
US insults pushing Latin America into China’s arms
The gloves are off. After decades in which the United States largely looked the other way, the Trump administration has decided to confront China over its growing influence in Latin America.
World rebuffs Venezuela’s plan for sham election, but will that help oust Maduro?
Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro’s plan to convene a sham election before the end of April has been rejected by all major Latin American countries, the United States and the European Community.
Trump’s first year in office was a huge setback for US-Latin American ties
What an embarrassment for U.S. diplomacy!
With a new series of serious blunders, the Trump administration is undoing decades of bipartisan U.S.
Bachelet’s trip to Cuba was shameful, and a blow to Latin America’s democratic left
Outgoing Chilean President Michelle Bachelet’s visit to Cuba last week was a disgrace to her legacy as a democratic leader.
A US- Latin American military intervention in Venezuela? It’s a long shot
One of Venezuela’s most prominent intellectuals, Harvard economics professor Ricardo Hausmann, has just published an article that is raising eyebrows across the hemisphere: He is calling for a military intervention by the United States and other countries as the only way to end Venezuela’s humanitarian crisis.
It’s hard to believe, but Venezuela’s economic crisis will get worse in 2018
I thought that Venezuela’s economic crisis was so acute — with a 12 percent economic contraction in 2017, a 700 percent inflation rate and widespread shortages of food and medicines — that it could hardly get worse.
OK to criticize Venezuela, but turn a blind eye on Honduras? Not really
At a time when the United States should be going out of its way to stop a dangerous regression toward dictatorships in Latin America, the Trump administration — which to its credit has denounced the power grabs by the leftist leaders of Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua — should be equally critical of the slide into authoritarian rule by the conservative president of Honduras.
Trump’s jingoism is hurting US tourism industry, and costing US jobs
When I wrote several months ago that President Donald Trump’s tirades against Mexicans, Muslims and other foreigners would hurt the U.S.
Venezuela close to unleashing Syria-like refugee crisis in Latin America
As Venezuela’s financially strangled dictatorship and the opposition prepare for a possible new round of talks Dec.
Red tape increases corruption in Venezuela
-but it’s far from the only country
There’s a good reason that Venezuela and several other Latin American countries rank very high in world corruption rankings: These nations have so much red tape that people grow up knowing that they have to grease a lot of palms to get almost anything done.
Surprisingly, support for capitalism in Latin America on rise despite leftist leaders
This may come as a surprise, but support for the free market is reaching record highs in Latin America.
Will Venezuela become a new Cuba? Despite recent events, don’t count on it
In the aftermath of Venezuela’s fraudulent Oct. 15 regional elections, the conventional wisdom is that President Nicolas Maduro has closed all avenues to an electoral solution to the country’s crisis, and that Venezuela will become a new Cuba.
Maduro and Putin must be celebrating Trump’s threat to revoke NBC’s license
Late Venezuelan populist demagogue Hugo Chavez must have cheered in his grave when President Donald Trump made a veiled threat to pull NBC off the air for spreading news he dislikes.
This is no joke: Bolivian ruler invokes his ‘human right’ to stay in power
While many of us were trying to absorb the news of the Las Vegas massacre and President Trump’s bungled response to Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico, a growing political scandal in South America went almost unnoticed in the media: Bolivia’s populist President Evo Morales is making an illegal bid to run for a fourth term in office.
Latin America’s political map may change in 2018, but perhaps not for the better
Here’s a fact that few people are taking into account when talking about the Venezuelan crisis or Latin America in general: the region’s biggest countries will have elections over the next 12 months, which could change the hemisphere’s political map.
While Venezuelans are forced to eat rabbits, Maduro tries to fool the world
Facing escalating international sanctions, Venezuela’s autocrat Nicolas Maduro is offering a new “dialogue” with the opposition and national elections at the end of 2018.
Will Miami disappear under the rising sea? Here’s why it won’t
In the aftermath of Hurricane Irma, I have received emails from friends and relatives all over the world asking whether this city will drown under the sea or be blown away by hurricanes over the next few decades.