U.S. President George W. Bush urged Latin American countries on Monday to build on democratic gains of recent decades. "The dramatic gains for democracy we have witnessed in our hemisphere must not be taken for granted," Bush told a gathering of the Organization of American States, the Western Hemisphere's top diplomatic body, Reuters reported. In a 15-minute speech, Bush lauded political change that has made democracy "now the rule rather than the exception" in the Western hemisphere but he said countries faced a choice between two visions. "One offers a vision of hope. It is founded on representative government, integration into the world markets, and a faith in the transformative power of freedom in individual lives," he said. "The other seeks to roll back the democratic progress of the past two decades by playing to fear, pitting neighbor against neighbor and blaming others for their own failures to provide for their people," he added.
