Hey there, Jody Avergan here. Welcome to Some Sunday Context, where we bring you new

conversations and episodes from the archives to provide a little context for what is going on in the

world or in the world of our show. Now, this past week, we ran an episode about the Bay of Pigs

Fiasco, April 1961. Lots of meddling and hairbrained plans

in Cuba on the part of the new JFK administration. Well, today, an episode from the archives

about something that was happening at basically the exact same time, just a few weeks earlier.

And it presented a very different kind of approach to Latin America on the part of

the JFK administration. At the same time that the CIA was cooking up these plans for an invasion

in Cuba, the Kennedy administration was trying to convene a very high-minded, unified, coalition-based

approach to Latin America by supporting democracies in the region through aid, diplomacy,

and economic development. So here is the episode we did about what was effectively a

Marshall Plan for Latin America. And I do think it pairs nicely with the Bay of Pigs episode

because it shows that the U.S. relationship to many parts of the world has always been

full of contradictions.

It is simultaneously high-minded and idealistic and also really corrosive and meddling.

I suppose one other way to put it is that sometimes the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing or even actively chooses not to care what the other hand is doing.

And the gap between our rhetoric and our actions. Well,

that is certainly one of the big themes, not of just this era, but across 250 years of American

history. So I think it's worth listening to this episode. And we will bring it to you right

after the break. Before we get to that, a quick reminder to join our newsletter community for

lots more, including early

access to our 50 weeks that shaped America episodes, like the one about the Golden Gate Bridge

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