AUSTIN, Texas — To George W. Bush, Greeks may be Grecians, and the leaders of India, Pakistan and Chechnya may go unnamed. But when it comes to Mexico, even obscure officials are familiar territory.
"Tomas is terrific, worked with him a lot," Bush volunteers of Tomas Yarrington, governor of Tamaulipas, a Mexican state that shares a lengthy border with Texas. "You know Patricio?" he asks an observer, referring to Patricio Martinez Garcia, the governor of Chihuahua, another Mexican border state.
For a man with a reputation as a foreign policy neophyte, Bush's fluency in things Mexican may come as a jolt. But as governor of a state that exported $41 billion worth of goods to Mexico last year across 1,200 miles of shared border, Bush may be the most Mexico-savvy politician ever to run for president.
Critics contend that Bush's record with Mexico, characterized by frequent visits and easy friendships with the country's power brokers, is heavier on style than substance. And it is true that he has done little to tackle the toughest long-term issues on the border: drug trafficking, illegal immigration and pollution.
But a close examination of Bush's years as Texas governor shows he has forged a substantial record on cross-border issues. His fixation on what he calls "missed opportunities" in the region suggests that U.S. policy in Latin America, particularly trade policy, is likely to undergo a considerable transformation if he becomes president.
Bush said in a recent interview that if he is elected, one of his first foreign policy initiatives would be to revive efforts to create the hemisphere-wide trade bloc first proposed by his father, former President Bush. The idea has languished during the Clinton administration.
The proposed Free Trade Area of the Americas would have 800 million consumers and a combined gross domestic product of $10 trillion. It would be the largest single market in the world, opening up the vast Latin American continent to the entry of competitively priced U.S. goods.
Bush and other proponents argue that the pact would spur economic growth in the United States and modernization and democratization throughout the Americas. It would make it no more difficult, in terms of duties and quotas, to sell an Ohio-built washing machine in Brazil than it is to sell the same product in Indiana.
