Obama and Latin America

The United States’ influence in Latin America seems to be waning, but relations south of the border under the new administration of President-elect Barack Obama, may continue to stagnate. Obama supports lifting travel restrictions to Cuba for family members and permitting remittances to be sent to the embargoed country, ‘right away,’ but that will be all of the immediate attention purposefully paid to Latin America under the new presidency. While campaigning during the primary, Obama spoke his plan to allow illegal immigrants to obtain legal status; we’ll see if he remembers what he said. Oil reserves in the Gulf of Mexico, much larger than previously imagined, may force the president to deal with Cuba sooner rather than later. Of paramount importance: two wars, one in Afghanistan and another in Iraq, being wagged behind an economic crisis, will employ the majority of President-elect Barack Obama’s first years in the White House.
Read the BBC article outlining the issue: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/us_elections_2008/7710855.stm