Although I'm not prepared to say that Americans are any stupider than the rest of the world, Americans do tend to have frightening tunnel vision that blinds them to situations that are, well, blindingly obvious to others. Let's take the recent example of George W. Bush addressing remarks to South American countries (from The Associated Press):

Eyeing three upcoming presidential elections in Latin America, Bush said citizens must choose "between two competing visions" for their future.

One, he said, pursues representative government, integration into the world community and freedom's transformative power for individuals.

"The other seeks to roll back the democratic progress of the past two decades by playing to fear, pitting neighbor against neighbor and blaming others for their own failures to provide for the people," he said. "We must make tough decisions today to ensure a better tomorrow."

The implication, of course, is that the American policy would be the former, and the evildoer policy would be the latter. Anyone with any sense of American intervention in Latin America would know better. In this instance, I'm not sure that George W. Bush is flat-out lying—although he does lie quite frequently and blatantly. No, it is possible that he is simply ignorant of the policies of his predecessors, and his handlers have seen fit to leave him in blissful ignorance.

Take, for example, American intervention in Nicaragua during the Reagan administration. Under presidential direction, the CIA infiltrated and trained the Contras to overthrow the elected government of Nicaragua. The elected government of Nicaragua at the time, the Sandinistas, came into power when they managed to depose to brutal dictatorship of the Somoza family, which was supported by the United States. See, the thing is, American policy only seeks to support democracy when it works to our national advantage. American foreign policy has no problem backing brutal dictatorships as long as it's good for American interests.

More recently, to bring it home to the Bush administration, was the attempted CIA-instigated overthrow of Hugo Chavez, the democratically elected president of Venezuela. Although Chavez was briefly discomfited, he was quickly returned to power by, of all things, the people of Venezuela who elected him in the first place. Now, who exactly is supporting democracy in Latin America? Certainly not the Bush administration.

Then there was El Salvador. Back in the Reagan years, the government of Jose Napoleon Duarte used death squads to terrorize and murder political adversaries. When those political adversaries decided to fight back, America supported Duarte's military junta and his death squads. Amnesty International documented the political murders. There was no American policy push to establish a democracy in El Salvador—just support for the brutal regime that was friendly toward American interests.

Or how about Chile. The United States was not happy with the democratic election of Salvadore Allende as president of Chile in 1970 because he was more interested in building a strong and independent Chile than supporting US policies. The Nixon administration authorized the CIA to infiltrate and destabilize Chile, as well as support political opposition to Allende. A military coup, supported by the CIA, overthrew the democratically elected government of Allende and installed Augusto Pinochet, who immediately set about performing serious human rights violations to consolidate his power.

Remember Panama? What you probably remember about Panama was that the United States invaded the country and captured its military strongman, Manuel Noreiga. Noreiga was tried and convicted for drug trafficking. Noreiga was not the democratically elected leader of Panama, although he controlled the country. He was also a CIA operative from the 1970s until 1988, when he was instead indicted on drug charges. Noreiga ran his own politically motivated death squads, with American support. He claims he fell out of favor with the US when he refused to support the US-led insurgency to overthrow the Nicaraguan government. Then-President George H. W. Bush of course denied that. Noreiga has been characterized as a rabid dog, but as long as he was America's rabid dog, that was okay. Democracy had nothing to do with it.

The misadventures of American meddling in Latin American affairs has a long and shameful history. Listening to George W. Bush tell people that America's vision for Latin America will lead to democracy and a better way of life is a laughable lie. I'm not saying America is the Bad Guy and everyone else is the Good Guys. I'm saying that America and American interests are most definitley not the only, or most likely best, alternative for the people and nations of Latin America. History bears me out.