“Latin America” on The Daily Caller

CARTAGENA, Colombia (AP) — An embarrassing scandal involving prostitutes and Secret Service agents deepened Saturday as 11 agents were placed on leave, and the agency designed to protect President Barack Obama had to offer regret for the mess overshadowing his diplomatic mission to Latin America. (more)

For almost two hundred years, the Monroe Doctrine has been a cornerstone of American foreign policy. First proclaimed in December 1823, the message from President James Monroe to the imperialist ruling houses of Europe was bold and unmistakable: The Western Hemisphere, including the Latin American colonies that were throwing off European rule, was not open to further colonization, and the U.S. would view any attempts by Europeans to extend their existing colonies into independent American states or to interfere with those states’ attempts to achieve independence as hostile acts against us, the United States of America. (more)

While most American attention to Hezbollah has focused on the Middle East, the militant Islamic group with ties to Iran has been gaining a strong foothold in Latin America, experts said at a House hearing. (more)

U.S. President Barack Obama on Sunday told Brazilians he wants to strengthen ties between the two countries, based on shared values and economic partnership. (more)

The late Sen. Ted Kennedy arranged to “rent” a brothel for a night while on a visit to Chile and other Latin American countries decades ago, according to a 1961 State Department memo obtained and published by the watchdog group Judicial Watch. (more)

A column written by Mark Potok, director of the Southern Poverty Law Center’s (SPLC) Intelligence Project, has found its way into an unlikely place — “People’s World,” the official online newspaper of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA). (more)

Malaria continues to ravage communities and economies and claims the life of a child approximately every 45 seconds. Some progress has been made in recent years, but this could be undone if some UN agencies continue their campaign to stop the use of public health insecticides in the fight against malaria. Unless the donor nations that fund global malaria programs, such as the US, firmly reject the unscientific, fear-based opposition to insecticides, progress against this preventable and curable disease will be lost. (more)

Hugo Chavez, the yanqui-hating dictator of Venezuela, will not accept Washington’s proposed emissary and has dared the United States to break diplomatic relations. It seems Ambassador-select Larry Palmer’s sin is that he did not applaud Chavez when he used his rubber-stamp parliament to perpetuate his dictatorial regime. The State Department’s limp-wristed response was to cancel the visa of the Venezuelan ambassador. That, and silence from the White House, told the megalomaniac in Caracas exactly what the United States will do when Iran finishes building a nuclear missile base in Venezuela — absolutely nothing. (more)

Some folks are alleging that Tehran and Caracas have inked a deal that will establish a joint ballistic missile base in Venezuela, where Iranian missiles, potentially capable of reaching the United States, would be stationed. (more)

“She saw a bullfight in Maravatio, and was sickened by it, but got her sketches just the same.” – from Wallace Stegner’s Angle of Repose (more)

Fans of Hollywood’s imaginative take on American politics may remember the movie Guarding Tess. That 1994 comic hit featured Shirley MacLaine as a former first lady who was being guarded by a Secret Service detachment headed by Nicolas Cage. Tess was something of a composite figure, part feisty Bess Truman, part liberal activist Eleanor Roosevelt, and part small town belle Rosalynn Carter. Of course, Hollywood being Hollywood, no part of Tess could be mistaken for a Barbara Bush or a Nancy Reagan. Even the fictional former first ladies have got to be on the side of the Hollywood donor angels. (more)

“Megamind” is still ruling the world. (more)

With death tolls mounting and institutions under threat from drug trafficking organizations, some Latin American leaders are condemning a California initiative that would legalize recreational marijuana use. (more)

Cuba’s plan to lay off half a million state workers is another bid to save its economy through gradual but strictly controlled reforms that lean toward, if not fully embrace, capitalism, Tracy Wilkinson reports in The Times. (more)

Colombia has been intermittently on and off the Obama administration’s agenda since it took office in 2009. When Hillary Clinton delivered her foreign policy address at the Council on Foreign Relations last week, she remarked that Mexico is “looking more and more like Colombia looked 20 years ago.” Shortly thereafter, President Obama rebuked the comparison in an LA-based Spanish newspaper. The turnaround is characteristic of Washington’s unjustified ambivalence towards one of our greatest and most promising Latin American allies. (more)

First, news rocketed around the Internet that Fidel Castro himself, in an interview with an American journalist, had denounced the merits of communism. Next, his brother and successor to power on the island nation announced that the state would lay off 500,000 workers by next March. If you are able to read this, then apparently the apocalypse is not upon us. (more)

I am a novelist. An observing and curious mind prompts me to look through the lens of “what if” for answers to the big questions of life. Sometimes “what if’s” are long in coming. Other times they smack you in the head before you know what happened… (more)

Townhall, the conservative online and print magazine, just came out with The 100 Americans the Left Hates the Most. Glenn Beck, #1 on that list, has never doubted that the liberal-progressives loathed him, but a recent poll shows that may only represent about 20% of Americans. (more)

Last month, Oliver Stone’s ”South of the Border” made its American debut. The documentary’s focus is Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, who Stone believes has been cruelly demonized in Western media. (more)

Thousands of tourists and scientists got a look at a rare total solar eclipse that temporarily plunged parts of the Pacific and Latin America into darkness on Sunday. (more)