But Hugo Chavez better pay attention to Venezuelans’ safety. The level of violence in Caracas is six times higher than in Bogotá of neighboring Colombia.

Colombian cities such as Bogota, Cali and Medellin were synonymous with violence ten years ago, but the government in all administrative levels has succeeded in reducing their homicide rates. In Caracas, in contrast, the problem has become worse over the last ten years. Now the homicide rate in Bogota is less than 20 per hundred thousand inhabitants; in Caracas it is at 124 per hundred thousand inhabitants. In Rio this rate is 40 and the authorities are trying to understand what made Bogota such a successful model of crime prevention.

The old Latin American left rejects President Alvaro Uribe for being Bush’s collaborator and admires Hugo Chavez for nationalizing international companies and calling Bush a devil. The new left is afraid of Chavez’s clear purpose to build a new fascist dictatorship in Latin American.

Bush condemns Chavez's government. During Bush's government, Latin America has been getting White House's attention only on subjects that U.S. diplomacy’s paranoia sees as a threat to the United States such as the crazy Chavez or the senile Castro.

South America feels it is not troublesome enough to catch the attention of the United States. If Bush’s government actually wanted to create strong ties with the nations of this continent, he could have many opportunities. One of them is cooperation on biofuels field and environmental protection.

Supposedly, ethanol is the most significant reason for his official visit to Brazil. If so, the very first decision should be to ask Congress to cancel the strong barriers against imports of Brazilian ethanol. Brazil has the most productive and cheapest ethanol in the world and the most advanced technology to produce it. We have been developing it since the 1970’s in the first oil shock. American ethanol is an important resource for the American economy but it depends on protectionism and subsidies. It would be great for the competitiveness of U.S. producers to face imported ethanol in a free trade situation. This would benefit consumers and taxpayers, as well.

The most significant concern for the success of this cooperation on bioenergy ought to be avoiding that the expansion of Brazilian ethanol production endangered the integrity of the Amazon Forest. As a matter of fact, cooperation to protect the Amazonia would be the smartest decision for both countries. Climatologists are convinced that the Amazon Forest’s destruction would have a major impact in the Northern Hemisphere’s climate.

But if George Bush lands in Brazil now talking about Amazonia, he would sound suspicious. Fears of U.S. interests in internationalizing the Amazon have their roots in past American mistakes. It would be a hard place to create a credible basis for an independent bilateral relationship. In part, these fears also come from our paranoia, always looking suspiciously at foreigner’s attraction to the Amazon. It is about time we overcame the poor basis of our standing relationship and look with maturity to our future -- that is our common destiny facing the regional and global challenges that lie ahead.