Brazil

Based on last week’s debate, both President Obama and Governor Romney believe that squeezing the Iranians economically is the best way—and perhaps the only way—to end their nuclear-weapons program without resorting to a military strike. Of course, nobody knows if sanctions will actually work. But if the United States is truly serious about crushing Iran’s economy, it must pursue a more aggressive strategy, and it must put more pressure on Iranian trading partners.

Last month in London, Mexico’s Olympic soccer team won gold by defeating its Brazilian counterpart, 2-1. The victory gave Mexico its first-ever trophy in a major international soccer tournament (apart from the 1999 Confederations Cup), and it proved that the soccer gap between Latin America’s two largest countries is shrinking, with Mexico catching up on the region’s traditional powerhouse. The Olympic final also became a metaphor for the recent performance of the Mexican and Brazilian economies.

As Lula da Silva’s handpicked successor, Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff was widely expected to embrace his policies both at home and abroad. Domestically, she has mostly fulfilled those expectations. In foreign affairs, the story is a bit more complicated.

On June 2, the convicted Italian terrorist Cesare Battisti walked out of a Brazilian prison a free man. He did so after Brazil’s supreme court upheld the decision of former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva to refuse to extradite Battisti to Italy. A member of the left-wing terror group Armed Proletarians for Communism (PAC) during Italy’s blood-ridden “years of lead” in the 1970s, Battisti had been on the run from Italian justice for nearly thirty years, since escaping from a prison near Rome in October 1981.

The Brazilian magazine Veja is reporting that al Qaeda members have established an active presence in South America’s largest country, as have militants associated with Hezbollah, Hamas, and other terrorist groups. They are apparently engaged in fundraising, recruitment, and strategic planning.

Amid the crisis in Japan and conflict in Libya, President Obama is scheduled to take a trip to South America this weekend. The President undoubtedly has a lot on his foreign policy plate, but while he's in the region the administration ought to give pay some needed attention to what's going on between Venezuela and Colombia.

Lula da Silva is an international superstar. Foreign journalists and politicians have fawned over his accomplishments and hailed his “transformation” of Brazil into an economic powerhouse. Barack Obama calls him “the most popular politician on earth.”

It is not just age that has mellowed the revolutionary passions of Brazil’s new president-elect, Dilma Rousseff, but also real experience in governance.

Sunday’s presidential election results from Brazil came as a surprise. Pre-election polling had indicated that center-left Workers’ Party candidate Dilma Rousseff, the hand-picked successor of incumbent Brazilian president Lula da Silva, would win an outright majority in the first round of voting.

In recent days, Chile and Mexico became the latest Latin American countries to reestablish formal diplomatic relations with Honduras, which (unfairly) became a pariah after the ouster of President Manuel Zelaya last summer.

Hillary Clinton raised more than a few eyebrows last week, when she aired her own views (and not necessarily those of the Obama administration, she said) on federal tax policy, saying she feels the rich “are not paying their fair share in any nation that is facing the kind of employment issues [like the U.S.] – whether it’s individual, corporate or whatever the taxation forms are.”  CNN reports Secretary Clinton pointed to Brazil, long known for its high taxes, as a model of successful economic policy.  “Brazil has the highest tax-to-GDP rate [35.3 percent] in the Western Hemisphere and guess what – they’re growing like crazy,” Clinton said.  “And the rich are getting richer, but they’re pulling people out of poverty.”

Just when you thought the Iran problem couldn’t get worse, it’s worse.