Because the U.S.-educated Alberto Vollmer has founded two highly successful programs to provide the poor with land and job opportunities, he has found a way to earn the respect of the self-styled revolutionary government. The programs have so effectively defused social tensions -- in a country famous for them -- that even officials in other countries emerging from conflict have sought him out for advice.

Brazil's president signed two new decrees Tuesday aimed at cracking down on illegal deforestation in the Amazon. The first gives inspectors the power to seize property and goods from people caught with illegally logged wood, and shortens the period during which landowners can appeal fines for environmental violations from eight years to one. The other provides for more agents to police the vast Amazon basin, which covers an area larger than Western Europe.

Yes We Can (NY Times)
By BOB HERBERT
The thing about visionaries like Al Gore is that they don’t imagine what’s easy. They imagine the benefits to be reaped once all the obstacles are overcome.