VZCZCXYZ0007
OO RUEHWEB

DE RUEHSO #0035 0201352
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
O 201352Z JAN 09
FM AMCONSUL SAO PAULO
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 8882
INFO RHEHNSC/NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL WASHDC IMMEDIATE
RUEHBR/AMEMBASSY BRASILIA PRIORITY 0028
RUEHRI/AMCONSUL RIO DE JANEIRO PRIORITY 8990

UNCLAS SAO PAULO 000035 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE INR/R/MR; IIP/R/MR; WHA/PD 
 
DEPT PASS USTR 
 
USDOC 4322/MAC/OLAC/JAFEE 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: KMDR OPRC OIIP XM XR XF BR
SUBJECT: Media Reaction: Middle East and the Inauguration 
 
Title:  A Pause for Obama 
 
Main Editorial in center-right O Estado de S. Paulo (1-20) states: 
[Israel's] cease-fire was a result of an American demand, 
transmitted emphatically to all parties, for the assembly of a 
present peace around the first days of Obama in the White House.... 
Both parts voice their victory....Nevertheless, there are signs that 
the Hamas has preserved itself....'the world understands today that 
Hamas is the only address in Gaza', says an Israeli political 
scientist, '- a piece of data which is an intolerable reality to 
Israel". 
 
Media Reaction Topic: Presidential Inauguration/new administration 
Foreign Policy 
 
Title:  Obama's policy for energy 
 
Editorial in center-right O Estado de S. Paulo (1-20) by Jose 
Goldemberg: "U.S. extraordinary material progress is based on the 
consumption of those [coal, oil and natural gas] fuels, whose trade 
moves around at US$ 2 trillion per year....It is not surprising, 
then, that any attempt to reduce fossil fuel consumption finds so 
much resistance in the U.S....The new American government should 
substantially change [Bush's administration] policies, as indicated 
with the nomination of the new energy secretary, Dr. Steven Chu, a 
Nobel Prize winner in Physics (1997) and a professor at the 
University of California. [Among his opinions are:]....[1] using 
energy in a more efficient way....[2] increasing the production of 
renewable sources of energy that have already been developed.... and 
the possibilities of cooperation between U.S. and Brazil are good in 
that area....and [3] developing new technologies until they become 
competitive in the market." 
 
Media Reaction Topic:  Presidential Inauguration/New Administration 
Foreign Policy 
 
Title:  Obama's Promise 
 
Column in liberal Folha de S.Paulo (1-20) says: "Barack Obama's 
inauguration as the 44th U.S. president constitutes an historic 
event whose magnitude cannot be attenuated.  Not only a black 
politician reaches the post to govern the most powerful country in 
the world - an unedited fact to attest to the vitality of that 
democracy - as he [Obama] does it surrounded by a breeze of optimism 
that contrasts frontally with the panorama around him....The 
atmosphere of confidence and hope that surrounds Obama at his 
inauguration gives him an unusual grace period.  Nonetheless, the 
size and the multiplicity of the challenges that awaits him, 
however, accumulate the potential of eroding them rapidly. 
WHITE