Word: portillo
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...uncommonly revealing photographic session. Posing in the Rose Garden outside the Oval Office of the White House last week, President Carter and his guest, Mexican President José López Portillo, 59, flashed toothy smiles and made an awkward attempt to stand together arm in arm. But the transparent effort to present a buddy-buddy image tailed to camouflage the uneasy relations between the circumspect Carter and the blunt, ebullient Mexican. Their lack of rapport mirrors the testy state of affairs between the U.S. and its angry, increasingly influential neighbor to the south...
...reason is oil. Since 1972, when geologists drilling into the cactus-studded wasteland of Tabasco state tapped into the gigantic Reforma oil and gas field, Mexico has turned up one immense deposit of petroleum after another. In his state of the union address in early September, López Portillo boasted that Mexico now had proven combined reserves of 45 billion bbl. of oil and gas. Officials of Pemex, the national oil com pany, predict that as many as 200 billion bbl. of crude may eventually be uncovered...
...creates a natural market for Mexican exports. By helping to meet the U.S. demand for oil, Mexico could acquire the capital it needs to modernize its economy, thereby offering its impoverished masses the chance for a better life. But, riding a wave of nationalistic feeling at home, López Portillo has made it clear to Washington that Mexico's response to America's energy needs will be dictated by a) his own country's special interests and b) the resolution of other nagging issues that cloud U.S.-Mexican relations...
...Portillo pointedly reminded Carter of the new facts of hemisphere life when the President visited Mexico City in February, tongue-lashing his guest for treating Mexico with "a mixture of interests, disdain and fear." Caught off guard by that undiplomatic verbal assault, Carter responded with one of the more unfortunate utterings of his presidency, a rambling ac count of how, on a previous visit, he had been afflicted by "Montezuma's revenge...
Carter alluded to that embarrassing moment during a black-tie dinner for López Portillo Friday night. Lifting a glass of water?White House servants had not yet filled the wine glasses?Carter promised: "I am determined to make the result of our toast better than in Mexico." He conceded that the U.S. and Mexico "have not always had happy and peaceful relations," but claimed that "the troubled and uncertain times between our two countries are gone forever." López Portillo was slightly less euphoric in his response. He noted that "frank and open communication" was necessary to enhance...