Clash of visions for Latin America

As a result, Bush may find it hard to win many debate points if he focuses on resuscitating the same free-trade-area (FTA) project first adopted a decade ago as a goal for the region. "There's a reaction in Latin America to liberal economic policies and to anything associated with what many people consider a failed experiment," says Mr. Tinker Salas. "For Bush to propose the same FTA all over again will only revive those old issues and convince people he is out of touch with the reality people have experienced."

What Bush has going for him is that the region's new leaders, though willing to accept help and favors from an oil-rich Chávez, have not rushed to return to the failed models of state-run economies and inflationary spending that prevailed during long decades of dictatorship. Nor do they want to shut the door on the United States.

Take Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. A longtime labor leader, he was expected to turn to heavy government intervention but instead has relied on trade and fiscal discipline to boost the economy and create jobs. He will greet Bush in Brazil after the Americas summit.

"Leaders of the new Latin left have to speak a different rhetoric to very dissatisfied populations, but at the same time they are not straying too far outside the prevailing economic box," says Oscar Raúl Cardoso, a foreign affairs analyst here. "They have to maintain a different kind of bond with the people, but that doesn't mean they are going very far in Chávez's populist direction."

But Chávez is popular in some countries, such as Argentina, and leaders cannot disregard that, Mr. Cardoso notes. In Argentina, for example, Chávez has rescued a number of state-owned factories slated to close, and has breathed life into Argentine shipbuilding - and saved thousands of jobs - by ordering several ships.

"Chávez is having a good moment because he has a hen who lays golden eggs," says Venezuela's Pino. "It's hard to resist that kind of friend."

Latin leaders are not averse to using Chávez as a kind of smoke screen to hide behind. "They are happy to let Chávez do the dirty work they may believe in but don't want to do," says Cardoso. Many governments, he says, oppose a hemispheric free-trade area as envisioned by the US, "but instead of saying so they will point to Chávez and say there is no consensus."

In the end, Chávez may win the rhetorical battle but not many, if any, converts, experts say. "I don't see [the region making] any historic choice between Chávez and the US," says Pino. "But ... governments know they have to act to fill some big holes in the system. That can sound like they are moving in Chávez's direction."

Since taking office in 2001, President Bush has seen three South American nations elect left-leaning leaders, with others poised to do so in coming elections. But some nations in the region are shifting the other way. Moved to the left: • Argentina: President Néstor Kirchner took office May 2003.

• Brazil: President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took office January 2003.

• Uruguay: President Tabaré Vázquez took office March 2005.

Leaning left:

• Mexico: Manuel López Obrador, former mayor of Mexico City, leads in the polls for next year's presidential election.

Moved to the right:

• Dominican Republic: President Leonel Fernández elected August 2004.

• Guatemala: President Oscar Berger took office January 2004.

Closer ties to US:

• Colombia: President Álvaro Uribe took office August 2002.

• Paraguay: President Nicanor Duarte took office August 2003.

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