Developing countries almost never have civil society organizations, making them vulnerable to tyrants who are always happy to fill the void with … tyranny. Rare indeed are the PTAs, the Elks, the Kiwanis, the Ladies’ Auxilliaries, the Neighborhood Watches, the Surfriders’ Foundations, the Explorers’ Club, the Roadrunners – and all the much-maligned but critically necessary spontaneously organized private groups that are the building blocks of democracy.

So it was a joy to read that in determinedly democratic El Salvador, our new CAFTA ally, Salvadoran locals got together to clean up the beaches. And had wild exuberant Latin American fun together, making it a party. Tell me that isn’t a society that doesn’t have a mission. Those people have a mission!

Having spent the week with the Salvadoreno and Guatemalteco immigrants to learn their feelings about CAFTA, I learned that everyone from the region feels a deep sense of mission to pull itself out of the pit of poverty and tyranny and take off together. I am not kidding, it is an awesome thing to see Central Americans continuously pull together. Not through the state but through each other. You not only see it, you feel it, you experience it, you hear the echoes upon echoes of these great people who are going to carve themselves up a very big slice of the pan-American Dream pie out there. They aren’t going to be third-world for long. Central Americans already pulled together to great effect for the passage of CAFTA. They also are pulling together to improve farm production with a farmer-to-farmer program with the gringos up north, who were incredibly impressed. Now they are pulling together to clean up the beaches. It is an absolute thing of beauty.