[T]he decisive issue will be if presidents Calderón and Obama manage to create an agenda that sets the framework for a new pan-Americanism based on conditions of equity and justice. There's no better option for combating the grave problems that punish all the of the countries on the continent and that range from multinational crime to the lacerating economic and social shortfalls. If this is delivered, we could be attending the birth of a new type of multilateralism for the American continent.This is a little too unspecific and optimistic. Valdés doesn't mention exactly what the framework for a new pan-Americanism would consist of (aside from Obama being more friendly with leftist leaders in El Salvador, Brazil, Chile, et cetera), and it's easy to imagine a scenario wherein some grand mechanism for pan-Americanism is announced with great fanfare but eventually turns out to be ineffective. I'm not saying that Obama is incapable of fostering a new era of Western Hemisphere relations, but we can't conclude that he is or is not succeeding based only the visit to Mexico.
I also think that expecting every visit from Obama to usher in a new era is setting the bar impossibly high. He's not going to be able to wipe away all the realities and traditions dictating relations in the Americas in one fell swoop, and thinking that he might is a recipe for disappointment.
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