Word: rico
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ARECENT TIME article on Puerto Rico carried the obligatory and classic photograph of a Latin American city. In the foreground stand shacks, slum alleys, and ragged brown children; in the background rise white concrete and glass office buildings. One can find such an image of inequality in Caracas, Lima, Mexico City, or San Juan. It appears to make a profound statement about contrasts in underdeveloped countries, until one recalls the famous photo poster of the Sixties showing dilapidated shacks, broken streets, and ragged black children. In that case, however, the city was Northeast Washington D.C., and the structure...
...contrast of wealth and poverty so apparent in most Latin American countries is less stark in Puerto Rico. Between the shacks and the skyscrapers lies a buffer zone of crackerbox concrete housing developments with a Volkswagen in every garage. Twenty years of industrial development as a self-governing commonwealth under American rule have created a large middle class whose veneer of prosperity conceals the extensive poverty that afflicts large sectors of the island's population...
...compact, which is now be ing discussed in Congress. The island would be explicitly recognized as a sovereign entity voluntarily choosing union with the U.S. Puerto Ricans would remain U.S. citizens but, unless they live on the mainland, still could not vote for fed eral offices. Most important, Puerto Rico would gain full autonomy in specific areas, perhaps including the setting of minimum wages, environmental controls and tariffs, and regulating immigration. It would be able to import some goods without paying duties...
Independence has been an emotional cause for more than a century. In Puerto Rico's universities, among older intellectuals and even within a faction of the ruling party, various shades of independentista sentiment persist. Alfonso Valdes Jr., a prosperous businessman and former Chamber of Commerce president, sighs and says: "Independence is very close to my heart. It is a romantic idea and deep down, emotionally, most Puerto Ricans feel sympathy for it. But it is impractical for as long as we can see. It just would not work." Adds Alex Maldonado, editor of the pro-Commonwealth El Mundo...
...this atmosphere, it is hard to take seriously Mari Bras' prediction that the issue of Puerto Rico's relations with...