President Barack Obama heaped praise on Brazil's rise as a democratic, global power on Sunday as he courted Latin America on a trip overshadowed by a U.S. and European air assault on Muammar Gaddafi's forces in Libya.
On the second day of what aides call his signature first-term trip to the region, Obama viewed Rio de Janeiro's famed beaches and mountains from his helicopter and played soccer with slum kids in a display of cultural affinity.
In a speech at a historic theater broadcast live on television, he said Brazil had emerged from decades of underperformance to become a powerful economy and a flourishing democracy that had many shared values with the United States.
An old joke that Brazil would always be a "country of the future" because of its unfulfilled potential no longer held true, he said.
"For the people of Brazil, the future has arrived," he said to warm applause from hundreds of invited guests at Rio's Municipal Theater.
Obama, who is seeking improved relations with Brazil after a period marked by tensions and neglect, focused heavily on the two countries' shared culture and history, including their fights against colonial powers and their multicultural people.
"We became colonies claimed for distant crowns, but soon declared our independence. We welcomed waves of immigrants to our shores, and eventually cleansed the stain of slavery from our land," he said.
Obama's attention was divided by the biggest military intervention in the Arab world since the Iraq invasion.
The military campaign against Gaddafi's forces that was launched on Saturday intruded on Obama's schedule of diplomacy and business promotion in both Rio and the capital Brasilia, the first leg of his trip.
The White House has justified Obama's five-day Latin American tour in large part for its potential dividends of boosting U.S. exports to help create American jobs, also considered crucial to his 2012 re-election chances.
His talks on Saturday with Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff focused heavily on bolstering economic ties with Latin America's powerhouse, though little progress was made on key disputes such as trade barriers.
Conservative critics may seize the opportunity to chide Obama for being away from Washington -- and in a city renowned for its pristine beaches -- at a time when he is putting U.S. forces in harm's way. Republican foes have accused him of a failure of leadership in a string of international crises.
But in keeping with his "no-drama Obama" image, the White House wants to avoid any sense the U.S. president is being held hostage by events or unable to tend to other crucial business.
Obama was huddling with top aides in Brazil as the military operations in Libya unfolded.
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