Ghosts of bad policies.

This month, we return to Latin America, a region that has reverted to its traditional neglected status in the eyes of U.S. policymakers, after facing the full wrath of the United States in the 1980s.

David Helvarg recalls his conversation with Sister Ita Ford, one of the four U.S. churchwomen slain by Salvadoran soldiers in 1980. His was the last interview with Ford, and her words ring as true today as they did eighteen years ago.

"The United States has to realize it does not own Central America or any other part of the world, and that people have a right to shape their own destiny, to choose the type of government they want," she told Helvarg. "We don't lose Cuba, we don't lose Nicaragua, because they were never ours to lose. The sooner we accept this, the better."

Unfortunately, the U.S. government has still not accepted this. Nor has Robert Novak. On April 9, he wrote a piece entitled `Who Lost Colombia?' in The Washington Post Novak's title comes from Representative Benjamin Gilman, Republican of New York and chair of the House International Relations Committee, who held a hearing on U.S.-Colombia policy on March 31. According to Novak and Gilman, the Clinton Administration has not done enough to support Colombia's military.

But from where I sit, the Clinton Administration is doing far too much to bolster Colombia's military. The Administration supplies Colombia with $136 million a year in aid, making it the largest recipient in this hemisphere, even though its human-rights record is appalling.

The Administration justifies much of this aid--and Novak clamors for more of it--in the name of fighting the drug war. But Frank Smyth, a veteran foreign correspondent who has spent a lot of time in Colombia, notes that the military and paramilitary there are more involved in the drug trade than the guerrillas are.

Nevertheless, the U.S. military is worried that our ally in Bogota still needs more help. According to The Washington Post, General Charles Wilhelm, chief of the U.S. Southern Command, wrote a letter on April 6 to General Manuel Jose Bonnet, head of the Colombian military. "At this time, the Colombian armed forces are not up to the task of confronting and defeating the insurgents.... Colombia is the most threatened in the area under the Southern Command's responsibility, and it is in urgent need of our support." Bonnet responded by saying he'd love to have more U.S. military aid, including "atomic bombs."

Watch out for Colombia. It may be the next big battleground, despite Ita Ford's admonition eighteen years ago.

Ruth Conniff first met Newt's heir apparent, Bob Livingston, on TV. Ruth's a regular contributor to Fox TV News, and she appeared on a panel of journalists who were interviewing the man who would be Speaker. She was struck by his gentlemanly comportment--and alarmed at the dangerous politics that lurked beneath it. So she explores the record of this nicer Newt. As you'll see, Livingston's ascendancy is not something to cheer for.

By the way, if you want to see Ruth on TV, you should watch for her on Special Report With Brit Hume, which airs Monday through Friday at 6:30 P.m. Eastern time. She's on several times a week. It's nice to see one of our own mixing it up with Fred Barnes and Morton Kondracke.

Who's Mumbojumbo? That's what I wanted to know when the interview with Chumbawamba came in. I'd never heard of the band before, and the staff gave me a good ribbing about it. Turns out I had heard the band's music, though. My kids--Sam, who's eleven; Katherine, who's eight; and William, who's five--insist that I listen to the top forty station in town, and so I couldn't miss "Tubthumping" this spring. From the backseat of the car, they'd shout out the chorus, "I get knocked down, but I get up again." (You'll have to ask them for the rest of the words.)

When the staff told me Chumbawamba was one of the most political groups to make it big in a long time, I figured we should run the interview. And if you're as out of it as I am, well, at least you'll know the name of the group now.

April was kind to us. I went to New York to accept the James Aronson Award for Social Justice Journalism on behalf of the magazine, an award we shared with freelance writers Eyal Press, Jennifer Washburn, Ben Terrall, and Amy Goodman, who contributed to our special May 1997 issue, "Meet the Suharto Lobby."

A few days later, Managing Editor Anne-Marie Cusac accepted a Project Censored award for her piece in our September 1997 issue, "Shock Value: U.S. stun devices pose human-rights risk."

Congrats to the reporters.