Whenever speaking to my friends from Chile, Argentina, and Colombia, it is almost impossible not to talk about politics. What I found to be most interesting is that they all lean to a conservative belief system rather than liberal, something most gringos would find to be a taboo for latinos. But for me, I am not shocked at all, when you look into the political turmoil in South America, a liberal leader or ideology is almost always involved, yet Americans refuse to believe that these beliefs can affect the United States. With Democratic Presidential Candidate Hillary Clinton leading polls, many ill-informed Americans should take a look at Latin American politics and should fear that history may repeat itself.
The failure of many past liberal leaders in South America shows that within the last ten years, countries such as Peru, Chile, Brazil, and Argentina grew tired of liberal presidents. The approval rating of Michelle Bachaclet, the liberal leader of Chile, dropped to 30% since May, corrupt Argentine Leader Cristina Fernández de Kirchner was replaced by conservative president Mauricio Macri, and most importantly, Brazilians are tired of the lies and crime of Dilma Rousseff. There is an abundance of examples to show how liberalism failed latinos, but the three most prominent are in Peru, Argentina, and of course, Brazil.
Peru's leader during the 2000's, Alberto Fujimori, is an example of media corruption in which Americans have become accustomed too, especially with the recent DNC leaks. During Fujimori's second presidential campaign, the President was arrested for paying over $40 million to media sources to only go against his opponent and not him. With this, he was fined $1 million and an 8-year prison sentence. During this time, he spread these tabloids specifically to poorer neighborhoods and minorities.
Alberto Fujimori during court case
A similar case to Clinton is her recent cover up to the DNC leaks. Found inside the leaks, are hundreds of emails showing the Clinton campaign illegally joined with the DNC to help Senator Bernie Sanders lose, questioning his belief in God and his overall time as the Senator from Vermont. This, and they purposely went after minorities, stating latinos are the "most brand loyal consumers" in the United States and named their plan to get the latino vote the "Taco Bowl Engagement". In the leaks as well, is a homophobic list of gay men where DNC chairs ask "Who's the best gay" to give a speech during the DNC.
Peruvian Protestors stating "No More Fujimori" as Alberto's daughter, Keiko Fujimori runs for office
Years before in 1950's Argentina, Juan and Eva Perón, exemplified the corruption of politician charities. During their time in office, Eva Perón created La Fundación de Eva Perón. The foundation helped hundreds of homeless Argentines find education, employment, and necessary health care, or so was thought.
During this time, Eva Perón funneled millions of dollars into her banking account in Switzerland. Many orphanages her foundation built were deemed fake, and after opening them, many orphans were kicked out into the streets. The Peron's corrupt organization show an identical history to Bill and Hillary's Charity, the Clinton Foundation. During the Haitian Earthquake of 2011, the Clinton Foundation asked for millions of dollars to send to Haiti for recovery. Also within these donations, were significant donations from foreign governments such as Russia and Saudi Arabia. Since the tragic earthquake, no aid was sent from the Clinton Foundation, only a factory built by foreign donations that was hundreds of miles away from the epicenter. To this day, hundreds of Haitian-Americans are livid with the Clinton's, with a recent protest at the Clinton Foundation Center in Manhattan.
The last significant historical warning is the recent debacle in the Brazilian Government. In April, President Dilma Rousseff was sentenced to impeachment. If Clinton is elected President, both Rousseff and Clinton before coming the leaders of their countries were in significant questioning. For Rousseff, it began with her as the head of the government-owned oil company, Petrobras. During her time as chairwoman, the Brazilian government found a multi-million dollar and multi-year corruption scandal within the corporation. This made many Brazilians distrust her before voting her into office, similar to how many Americans feel distrust to Clinton, but are still voting her in. As this scandal occurred, Hillary Clinton called President Rousseff "a global standard" for transparency. With Clinton, before her race as president, her trust has been questioned due to her involvement in the killing of the dictator of Libya Momard Gadafi, which lead to the uprising of ISIS, which Obama states to be his biggest mistake in office. After, her trust began to decline as well with her involvement in Benghazi, telling the American people that the attack occurred in the American Embassy due to an offensive YouTube video, which was later proven false. Most recently, trust for Clinton dropped with her infamous email scandal, using her own private server for secret government information, which is considered a felony. The FBI stated that at least 100 emails were found with sensitive government information, which may have been found and hacked by the Chinese and Russian Government.
As we come closer to November, it is important that we take note of our neighbor's mistakes in South America as we decide who our new POTUS will be. Even if Americans do know the history of corrupt liberal leaders, many will still vote for Clinton, thinking that America is so star-spangled awesome that we will still prosper, which proves how much in denial we are in for this election. The only main difference between Hillary Clinton and these leaders is that none of them got away with their crimes, Fujimori was sentenced to 8 years in prison, after Eva Perón's death, Juan Perón was exiled to Spain, and Rousseff is now impeached. Hillary Clinton is still out and free, and the only way at this point for her to pay for her crimes is by not voting her in as the President of the United States.
Dilma Rousseff and Hillary Clinton
