Eighteen Latin American Countries Prefer Obama

One of a flood of new international polls on which U.S. candidate people prefer, is one by Latinobarometro. According to the Chilean organization’s Web site, this annual survey involves some 19,000 interviews in 18 Latin American countries, representing more than 400 million inhabitants. Covering the results of the survey, this article from Uruguay’s Observa newspaper says in part: “Asked about which candidate would be more advantageous for Latin America, 29 percent prefer Democrat Barack Obama and only 8 percent Republican John McCain. Another 29 percent think it doesn’t matter, 31 percent don’t know and 2 percent didn’t respond. … As for the attention that the new U.S. president will pay to Latin America, the answers vary a lot, with 39 percent of Dominicans who think he will pay more attention, an opinion shared by 31 percent in Brazil and 29 percent in Costa Rica and Uruguay. “At the other extreme are Honduras, Bolivia and El Salvador, with only 14 percent who share that view, while in Guatemala and Panama, those who think he will pay more attention are at 15 percent, in Peru at 16 percent, in Chile and Ecuador at 19 percent, at 21 percent in Nicaragua, 24 percent in Argentina and Paraguay, 25 percent in Colombia and 27 percent in Venezuela and Mexico.