BUENOS AIRES, Argentina, Jan 13 (Reuters) - A 30-minute taxi ride past the shuttered factories and graffiti-covered McDonald’s of Buenos Aires is a virtual tour showing why more Latin Americans hate the United States these days.
“Argentina did everything the United States told us to, and we went straight to hell,” said Sergio Cardenas, one of 60 workers who have since taken control of the factory and resumed production as a co-op. “The Americans ruined us.”
“Yankee gangsters! Give our money back!” blares graffiti scrawled on the walls of a branch of U.S.-owned Citibank.
Former Mexican dictator Porfirio Diaz could have been speaking for the whole region a century ago when he said: “Poor Mexico! So far from God, and so close to the United States.”
Distrust has deepened following the 1990s when many governments aligned with Washington only to see their economies collapse into crisis at the end of the decade.
“I don’t agree with anything they do,” said Elena Ruiz, 56, gesturing at the high-security, concrete walls of the embassy. “But I also think that what happens in Argentina is Argentina’s fault, not the Yankees.”
“The United States has never cared about Latin America and it’s worse when it has problems and phobias over terrorism,” said Peruvian bank employee Alfredo Romero, 29, as he shopped in downtown Lima.
Latinos Point finger at the US
Good old USA popular as ever with its drowned out calls for ever more free markets and privitisation, capitalism has even failed its closest allies and neighbours!