The Puerto Rican Debt Narrative
On the Media | May 6, 2016
A misleading national ad campaign portrays the Puerto Rico debt crisis as a case of makers versus takers. It's the latest chapter in a long narrative about the territory's ability to govern itself.
But the message that Puerto Rico should pull itself up by its own bootstraps ignores the fact that Congress has had control of those bootstraps for 118 years. Harry Franqui-Rivera of The Center for Puerto Rican Studies at Hunter College, the City University of New York talks to Bob about the history of the U.S. relationship with Puerto Rico -- from the Spanish-American War in 1898, to Cold War propaganda in the Caribbean, to the narrative of the current crisis.
Song: Lamento borincano - by Orquestra Serenata Tropical
