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October 2009
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Members : 17360
Content : 3757
Content View Hits : 29521346
Content : 3757
Content View Hits : 29521346
Nine months after President Barack Obama took office, Washington still lacks two of its key Latin America policy-makers. Obama's nominations for Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Arturo Valenzuela, and Ambassador to Brazil, Dr. Thomas Shannon, have been placed on "hold" by Senator Jim DeMint, a Republican from South Carolina, over objections to the Obama administration's handling of the coup in Honduras. 
The complaint one hears most commonly about Brazil from both Brazilians and outsiders regards the country's bureaucracy and burdensome laws and regulations. At first glance, the statutory burdens appear unnecessary at best, and wasteful at worst. But further review reveals the law's apparent intended purposes, and further scrutiny identifies their unintended consequences. 
Recently, the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) held a meeting in Cairo, Egypt, to discuss the importance of Income-Transfer Policies - initiated in 1995 in Brasília with the Bolsa-Escola and transformed into the Bolsa Família in 2004 - in the reduction of world poverty. 
Everybody in Brazil knows that São Paulo state governor José Serra is desperate to become the next President. However, he is playing coy and showing no sense of urgency in gaining the official nomination of his PSDB party. By doing so, he is in danger of losing the big lead he currently enjoys over the likely PT candidate, Dilma Rousseff. 
We continued our journey by night in the long helicopter ride from Manaus to Natal. 'Some purpose I have found,' I thought. 'Now I am running for my life, just trying to survive...' I looked over at Luiz and Emilio, who were sleeping, and reflected back to my arrival in Brazil, my first flight, as we bumped along: