Bachelet, Chile
Kirchner, Argentina
Lula da Silva, Brazil
Rafael Correa, Ecuador
Hugo Chavez, Venezuela
Evo Morales, Bolivia
Fernando Lugo, Paraguay
Now these people oppose the US corporate interests to differing degrees. Still, can I say something about these guys for a moment?
When Evo Morales came into power in Bolivia, he cut his salary in half and ordered that no cabinet member could be paid more than he. He then took the savings from this act and invested in hiring more public school teachers. WHO DOES THAT? Name one leader. Name one. His minister of justice was a maid. His vice president was a guerilla leader in Bolivia’s anticorporatocracy revolutionary movement and had been in prison for 4 years after which he came out, got a degree as a mathematician, and became a sociology professor being praised as a political analyst. The leader of the senate was a rural school teacher.
Four months later, Morales ordered the Brazilian military to occupy all oil and gas fields around the country and place them in state control. He said the looting of these countries had ended and demanded a reversal in the traditional oil profit percentages of 80% to foreign companies and 20% to the country to one that was more favorable to Bolivia.
When Bachelet became president of Chile, she named women to HALF of her cabinet staff. WOW!
Chavez staged a failed coup in 1992 in which he claimed all responsibility. He led a coup because the country’s collaboration with the western corporatocracy had led to a per capita income plummet in Venezuela. They no longer had the largest middle class in Latin America, no where close. In 1998 he was elected president with 56% of the vote and he honored people like Guatemala’s Arbenz, Chile’s Allende Panama’s Torrijos, Ecuador’s Roldos--all assassinated or overthrown by the CIA. When he came into power, he kept his commitments. He invested oil profits into projects to fight illiteracy, malnutrition, disease, and other ills instead of back into the oil industry. He helped Kirchner buy down the Argentine IMF debt of more than $10 billion and he sold discounted oil to those who couldn’t afford even in the US! He set aside a portion of oil revenues for Cuba so it could send medical doctors to impoverished areas around the continent. He fought for inclusion of Afro-Venezuelan curricula and helped create laws to consolidate rights of indigenous people.
EHMs could not convince him (Chavez read “Confessions of an Economic Hit Man” and admits to being approached by them), so jackals were sent in. They staged a coup in 2002, but the coup actually failed (read the details; it’s quite interesting). People loyal to Chavez called for a massive countercoup and he was restored to power.
Rafael Correa, president of Ecuador, said he took a check to the IMF and paid off the debt of his country (Rafael used to be the economic/finance minister). When he handed them the check, the IMF people said “No, no no. It’s fine. Keep the money, you can pay later.” Can you imagine that? I’m shocked. He said no. He handed them the money again and said he didn’t want to deal with them anymore.
Kirchner, former president of Argentina and husband of current president, said that he sat down with Bush in one meeting. After suggesting a Marshall plan for Latin America, Bush got angry and stood up saying no, that a Marshall Plan was an idea of the Democrats. Bush told him that the best way to revitalize the economy was war, that “all the economic growth that the US had had had been based on the different wars it had waged,” according to Kirchner. He couldn’t believe it, and neither could I.
Bachelet, Chile
Kirchner, Argentina
Lula da Silva, Brazil
Rafael Correa, Ecuador
Hugo Chavez, Venezuela
Evo Morales, Bolivia
Fernando Lugo, Paraguay
There are others, but I don’t want to put people who I think might actually be quite horrible people. These, though, I see as wanting the good for their people.
So it’s a strange place here in Washington. I don’t look at the media in the same way. I don’t think as highly of some US news sources. I try to diversity when I prioritize news-learning. It’s important to see how people see things from different perspectives.
So there is a rising tide. I’ll talk a bit about EHM work in the Middle East and some of the most recent “roots” of the tensions there both religious and ethnic and a little bit about Africa.
No comments:
Post a Comment