New trade agreement with U.S. could breathe new life into Mexico's economy

Tijuana, Mexico –

Zonkeys are a unique animal inhabiting this Mexican border town and found mainly along the central commercial drag on Avenida Revolución. A zonkey is a donkey painted white with dark zebra stripes in order to stand out in its unnatural habitat and attract both sober and drunk visitors onto their saddles and into pricey tourist photos. Zonkeys are a symbol of this border town and, like so much else here, appear to be one thing but are actually quite another.

Neo Kounalakis astride an unusual beast with a bit of kick in it.

Tijuana is portrayed as crime-ridden, dirty, impoverished, and a destination for caravanning Central Americans seeking to cross the border into the USA. It is a wall and fence riven city with steel stakes that are piled not only across the polluted, national boundary crossing the Tijuana River but also along streets, onto beaches, and far into the water on the Pacific Ocean’s shore. That is the sight you see when standing on a bridge or in a high-rise building looking north. What you don’t see is actually quite different. READ MORE

Trump’s failed Latin American policy puts Florida in play in 2020

He does business here. He wants to move his permanent residence here. He even tried to bring the G-7 heads of state here. But it is also here, in Florida, where President Trump’s re-election bid faces the greatest danger.

Democrats who want to win the 2020 election would do well to focus their foreign-policy positions both on attacking Trump’s Latin American failures and building their own plans for a prosperous, peaceful and democratic future in this hemisphere.

Ignoring southern and Caribbean basin nations is both bad policy and bad politics. A geopolitically sensitive understanding of Latin America’s importance and opportunities could be key not only to strengthening U.S. foreign-policy interests and extending our values, but to winning Florida’s electoral votes. READ MORE

Americans are real victims of our trade war with Mexico and China

America has declared war on China and Mexico, but it is a new style of warfare. Or at least it seems so. With the latest volley of levied and threatened tariffs on Chinese and Mexican exports, POTUS has thrust the U.S. into a new phase of economic warfare against both competitors and friends.

Americans, however, will end up paying the price.

Modern warfare is no longer just conducted by guns and bombs. Wars today are ongoing and take place during what seems like peacetime. Just because a financial war appears bloodless does not mean it is also harmless or without victims. In fact, the silent, unseen economic warfare Donald Trump is waging — and threatens to escalate — is highly effective at hurting both people and nations. READ MORE

Trump’s foreign policy is all about him. That’s not good for us, or the rest of the world

Snap troop withdrawal from Syria? Overnight decisions for a dramatic military draw-down in Afghanistan?

America’s foreign-policy and national-security establishment is reeling from the rapid-fire changes, declarations and White House edicts. Our allies are shocked, too.

While President Trump’s tweet-from-the-hip policy-making is shocking and shaking-up the world, no one should be surprised.

The truth is, Donald Trump has never lied to us about his foreign-policy priorities. We may not have wanted to believe him, we may ultimately find out that they were improperly influenced, we may even disagree with them. But the reality is that he has not simply intimated or coyly indicated how he sees the world and what he wants to do. He has told us. Repeatedly.

Treaties? Tear them up. READ MORE

Trump’s awful phone diplomacy boosts Russian meddling in Mexico vote

Phone calls are not President Trump’s best tool for international charm offensives. He hung up on Australia’s prime minister a year ago, nearly changed U.S. policy toward Taiwan and China in another conversation when he was president-elect, and, this week, further offended Mexico’s President Enrique Peña Nieto.

The end result of the Feb. 20 call is that Peña Nieto canceled, for a second time, a planned White House visit. It may also have locked in a win for a far-left presidential candidate in the July 1 Mexican national election — an election in which the Russians are working overtime to actively disrupt and influence.

In this photo taken Jan. 28, 2017, President Donald Trump speaks on the phone with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington. Transcripts of President Donald Trump’s conversations with the leaders of Mexico and Australia in January offer new details on how the president parried with the leaders over the politics of the border wall and refugee policy, with random asides on subjects including drug abuse in New Hampshire. Alex Brandon AP

The president’s poor phone etiquette further jeopardizes the already slow progress in the NAFTA renegotiation, adds a new strain to diplomatic relations with a border neighbor, hinders cooperation in combating drug trafficking and makes immigration issues even touchier. And with every notching up of tension with Mexico, the Trump border wall becomes an even harder sell in the nation he insists must underwrite it.  READ MORE