The media and Latin American politics

OK, here is one of the many empty-headed articles about, as the AP author puts it, the "leftist tide" in Latin America. This tide, which actually never rolled forth, is now at its "high water mark." It is nice to know that something that never happened is finished.

Conservative Felipe Calderon's apparent victory could signal that the leftist tide sweeping Latin America has reached its high-water mark, as voters frightened by the radicalism of Venezuela's Hugo Chavez seek refuge in more mainstream ideas across the region.

That trend has emerged with Mexico's presidential vote count Thursday, the setback dealt to Bolivian President Evo Morales in a referendum Sunday, Peruvian moderate Alan Garcia's victory over Chavez ally Ollanta Humala last month and the landslide re-election of Colombian conservative Alvaro Uribe in May.