Why should anyone respect this paper's spin?

[Judi Lynn]

Couldn't believe the blatant, crude, and of course COARSE attempt to smear this guy, hoping to color perception in the readers' eyes before they even know who the heck he is!

URUGUAY PRESIDENTIAL CONTENDER MUJICA MEETS WITH BACHELET
Thursday, 20 August 2009
The political ticket most likely to win Uruguay’s upcoming presidential election - Sen. Jose Mujica and economist Danilo Astori - returned to Montevideo on Wednesday after a day long visit in Chile to meet with President Michelle Bachelet and local investors interested in Uruguay.

The visit was part of a regional campaign to boost the image of the candidates from Uruguay’s center-left Broad Front coalition. Last week Mujica and his ticket partner Astori met with Brazil’s Lula da Silva.

“In spite of the distance, the cordillera and Argentina, we have many things in common with Chile and we had to come to talk with President Bachelet,” said Mujica following his hour long meeting with Bachelet at the La Moneda presidential palace on Tuesday afternoon.

“We wanted to exchange ideas, talk about our impressions and have an idea how Chile will move into the future because we are a small country and we must be able to take advantage of all alternatives, small, large, that we can come up with,” he said.

Bachelet leads Chile’s governing center-left Concertación coalition, which has been in power since Chile’s return to democracy in 1990.

~snip~
Mujica’s folksy, down to earth style of communicating has been very effective with a significant percentage of Uruguay’s electorate. Still, others believe he is too coarse to become Uruguay’s next president, including President Vazquez, who hand-picked economist Astori as candidate to woo middle of the road voters.

But Mujica won the nomination at the coalition’s convention, and then named Astori as the vice-presidential candidate.

The Mujica-Astori campaign has yet to announce if similar visits to other socialist leaders of the continent- including Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, Bolivia’s Evo Morales; Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega or Ecuador’s Rafael Correa - have been scheduled.

SOURCE: MERCOPRESS
By Santiago Times Staff

http://www.santiagotimes.cl/santiagotimes/index.php/2009081916937/news/political-news/uruguay-presidential-contender-mujica-meets-with-bachelet.html

You'd get the feeling, if you believe everything you read, that this guy, instead of shaking hands with you, would demand that you pull his finger!

I'd just as soon learn what his ideas are, Santiago Times Staff, since THAT'S what matters.