Outside the Beltway

He is seeking a new regional consensus.

The first of a potential three rounds.

A novel concept. Will it catch on?

Some quick hits.

The first round produced two very different candidates.

No, presidentialism does not lock us into two parties.

A possible murder plot in Colombia embedded into a problematic multi-decade narrative.

The Biden admin is about to take a demilitarized group off the terrorist list and some people aren’t happy about it.

Part of a disturbing trend.

SLT talking Colombia.

A problematically wide-open election in difficult times.

Most leaders ring up Joe.

Pondering lack of US interest in our friends to the south.

The pandemic is having serious effects in the region, and they will persist for some time.

Clips of recent police behavior reminded me far too much of scenes from authoritarian Latin America.

In recent weeks the US has ramped-up pressure on Maduro.

Thanks to a ruling by the Puerto Rican Supreme Court, the island Commonwealth has its third Governor in less than a week.

Embattled Governor Ricardo A. Rosselló has stepped down but succession issues surround the man who took the oath of office late yesterday.

Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rosselló is set to leave office on Friday, but his designated successor doesn’t want the job.

After weeks of protests and years of frustrations, Ricardo Rosselló, the Governor of Puerto Rico, announced last night that he will be resigning from office.

One photograph that has gone viral is standing as a visualization of the Trump Administration’s inhumane asylum policies.

This time on Venezuela

With his attempt to overthrow the government clearly a failure, Juan Guaidó is back to calling for foreign military intervention in Venezuela.

With the apparent failure of the coup attempt in Venezuela, what happens next?

Lacking any real support from the military or police, the attempted coup against Nicolas Maduro has predictably failed.

While street protests continue, the efforts to get the Venezuelan military to oust President Nicolas Maduro appear to have failed.

The ongoing apparent attempted coup in Venezuela is already leading to talk of American intervention in the event of a crackdown. That would be unwise and unjustified.

More pressures on a region already struggling.

Note to the folks at Fox and Friends: Central America is not part of Mexico.

Trump declares he will end aid to Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador.

The key remains the military.

He conjures the imperialist past with such comments (and he doesn’t even use the term correctly).

American military intervention in Venezuela would make the situation in that country worse, not better.

And if you don’t know, now you know.

US policy is creating nonconstructive confrontation.

The self-appointed Acting President of Venezuela has said he doesn’t rule out the idea of American intervention in his country, but we should rule it out immediately.

The President is an ignoramus and a blowhard and a petulant child but he’s operating within the Constitutional limits of his office.

Having two presidents sounds like a terrible sitcom idea. In reality, the situation is just plain terrible.

The situation in Venezuela entered a new stage yesterday as opposition leader Juan Guaidó claimed the nation’s Presidency.

Last week, the Mexican Supreme Court pushed that country further down the road toward legalization of marijuana for all purposes.

The fact that American officials talked with Venezuelans plotting a coup against the government of their country is a dangerous turn of events.

Thankfully, they chose not to help.

Venezuela has arrested two military officers in connection with the alleged assassination attempt on President Nicolás Maduro earlier this month.

Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro survived an apparent, albeit amateurish, assassination attempt yesterday in what could be a sign of underlying instability in Venezuela.

Donald Trump had to be talked down from considering military intervention in Venezuela.

Andrés Manuel López Obrador, a populist from the left, rode a wave of populism and public disdain for the outgoing President to a landslide win in Mexico

Colombia is currently choosing its next president.

In an election that pretty much everyone agrees was illegitimate, Nicolás Maduro has won a second term as Venezuela’s President.

Cuba has a new President and he isn’t named Castro, but that doesn’t mean we’re going to see significant change in the near future.

The answer is, of course, no. Really, this is a post about the wall as policy.