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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Tom Clarke who wrote (80245)	5/30/2000 6:29:00 PM
From: Dayuhan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

I question why the State Dept. voices any opinion at all. For better or worse, we have appointed ourselves as guardians of democracy throughout the hemisphere. If we abandon that role simply because the person who has pretzeled the constitution to stay in power has not been, by our evaluation, a bad President, we can hardly attempt to play that role in other cases. Whether we should have taken on that role in the first place is of course another question. Lecturing people on democracy while they live in huts with dirt floors is astonishingly blind and arrogant. The people we are lecturing do not live in huts with dirt floors. And what about the people living in huts with dirt floors who wanted to bring in an administration which promised to sustain market reforms, but place a higher priority on generating employment, alleviating poverty, and implementing political reforms? What do we tell them, when they look to us for the help we have promised to give wherever democracy is threatened? "Tough titties"? Fujimori was the best choice for Peru at the time. They've come a long way under his leadership, 5 more years just may put them over top. Maybe. Or maybe too much of a good thing is enough, and it's time for a change. We aren't in a position to decide that. The Peruvian people are, but they will not be permitted to choose.