Bulletin N° 268
Subject: ON THE POLITICS OF "PLUS ÇA
CHANGE, PLUS C'EST LA MÊME CHOSE ".
U..S. Election Day
7 November 2006
Grenoble, France
Dear Colleagues and Friends of CEIMSA,
Economic historian Douglas
Dowd
remarked during a talk given at Stendhal University in January 2002 [
see Chapter 22 of the publication of our international colloquium on "
REFLECTIONS
ON THE SOCIAL IMPACT OF AMERICAN MULTINATIONAL CORPORATIONS"] that the capitalist market place will continue to exist long
after its demise, that it will die not with a bang, but a whimper. He
put it even more graphically, predicting that capitalists will continue
to crawl across the barren landscape like a snail crossing an arid
stretch of land and from whose condition it is difficult to distinguish
between life and death until it has totally dissolved into the soil,
leaving only its empty bleached shell as a deposit on the surface of
the desert. There will be no final crisis, he continued; capitalists
will not even recognize the end when it comes. They will just continue
as they have until they can continue no longer....
The daily massacres in Gaza by invading Israeli troops is not being
televised. Some brave reporters have returned with a few photographs,
but it is only a small fraction of the fratricide we are permitted to
see in this region of the world where the two resilient semitic
families (both descendants of nomadic desert tribes, which existed long
ago) kill each other at a ratio of 100 to 1, with the encouragement of
foreigners living far away from the scene, many of whom are receiving
dividend checks regularly from their capital investments in U.S.
industries with military contracts. (The next quarterly dividend check
will be mailed at the end of December!)
The American nation is divided as well [see Bulletin
N°267 for our discussion of this divided nation], more than
50-50, against the U.S. support of war in Palestine and also against
its government's so-called "war on terrorism" policies at home and
abroad. In the next weeks and months ahead I believe we will be
witnessing damage control on a massive scale, as we've never
seen before --perhaps leading to the ousting of another President of
the United States. But most political discussions leading up to the
next presidential election, which is scheduled to occur in November
2008, will never take into account U.S. economic strategies. With the
eager assistance of an army of "perception managers", the major
discussions in the coming period will be limited to political issues,
like developing diplomatic tactics, more efficient to accomplish the
same economic objectives of MCP (maximum corporate profits). This
strategy of protecting maximum corporate profits, a job performed
effectively by the great American
military-industrial complex, will have to a tactic in the future,
perhaps, of including a greater number of non-American corporations,
and should this tactic be adopted we can anticipate an increase in
covert diplomacy to make it happen. A few strategically placed bribes,
some insider information on new investment opportunities, and of course
the usual rapport de force techniques, along with the threat of
being excluded, should be enough to secure more international
cooperation. This is the savoir faire that the neo-conservative
Cowboy didn't have. The alternative is a military coup d'état
and outright dictatorship in the USA, but this would be
counter-productive for private profits, at least one hopes it would be.
[See item H. below for this alternative point of view.]
American corporate interests will not make the same "mistake," twice,
if the military invasion of Iraq was indeed a mistake, from the point
of corporate profits. (But I'm ready to believe that Bush's tactics
were not a mistake at all, but rather they are seen as being no longer
appropriate. After all the windfalls over the past six years from
"cost-plus" contracts awarded to U.S. corporate interests, a few
influential people have decided, perhaps, that it's time to change
tactics and find a new way to make more money.)
Below are 8 essays from this U.S. election day. To some these
articles might seem to support the fact that U.S. economic structures
will not change over night, regardless of the election results. If it
is true, as some believe, that U.S. foreign policy and its domestic
policy are driven by short-term economic interests, couched in the
language of Grand Strategies
--like Hideki Tojo's promise of a Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity
Sphere out of fascist Japan, or Adolph Hitler's dream of a Third
Reich, or Benito Mussolini's vision of The New Man, or
Woodrow Wilson's War to make the World Safe for Democracy--
then the Grand Strategy of
today's Neo-Conservatives with the aim of creating the "New American
Century" might really be nothing more than hollow propaganda, which few
of them really believe. What matters are the dividends from
investments, and they are calculated every three months.
We are given the analogy that capitalist expansion is like riding a
bicycle : it is the movement of one foot down after the other keeps
that keeps the thing from collapsing, but this motion doesn't determine
the direction. The path is selected according to where the most
attractive (i.e. the largest and most secure) potential profits are
located. Thus, this machine is capable of sudden shifts in direction,
depending on the appearance of new opportunities for private investment
profits. Today few people would argue, for example, against the fact
that the U.S. militarily lost the war in Vietnam, while U.S.
corporations made off like bandits and in fact have won great
advantages from this "lost" war.
The ecocide in Iraq parallels that which the U.S. military
perpetrated in Vietnam. Do the permanent U.S. military bases around
Iraqi oil fields and near the pipelines in this region represent an
economic victory for U.S. corporations, regardless of the outcome of
the military outcome of this war? Indeed, does the devastation of
the environment in Iraq represent another U.S. economic opportunity for
American companies? You can be sure that future potential allies of a more liberal United States government
will be asking these questions, and first among them is Israel.
Items A., B., and C. begin with a necessarily anonymous photo
essay on the hidden horrors in Gaza, and go on to describe the
continued criminal violence by invading Israeli forces.
Item D. is an article by Martin Lukacs on a recent speech
that was delivered to students at McGill University by Seymour
Hersh discussing the unprecedented violence of the U.S. military
in the Middle East.
Item E., from Michael Albert, is an article on U.S. tactics
to defeat the democratic socialist movement in Hugo Chavez's Venezuela
before the December election.
Item F. is a copy of Amy Goodman's first syndicated weekly
newspaper column called "Breaking the Sound Barrier."
Item G. is the presentation of an argument by James Rothenberg,
suggesting the possibility of a U.S. "victory" in Iraq.
And, finally, item H., from John Gerassi, Professor of Political Science, CUNY, and
author of Jean-Paul Sartre: Hated Conscience of His Century, is
a worst scenario of today's election results.
And now, an important reminder that the best English-language news
coverage of world events (including the historic dismantling of
democracy in United States institutions today) can be found on the
Internet in the free daily broadcasts of DemocracyNow.com.
Sincerely,
Francis McCollum Feeley
Professor of American Studies
Director of Research
Université Stendhal Grenoble 3
http ://dimension.ucsd.edu/CEIMSA-IN-EXILE/
_______________
A.
from Information Clearing House:
7 November 2006
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/
The Hidden Horrors Of Israel's Attack On
Palestinian Civilians In Gaza : Images that the Israeli and
U.S. government's don't want you to see.
_____________
B.
from ICH :
6 November 2006
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/
Israeli snipers killed two Palestinians in
occupiedGaza on Saturday, one of them a 12-year-old girl, Palestinian
sources said.
__________
C.
from ICH :
6 November 2006
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/
Palestinian officials said the deaths bring the
toll since Wednesday to nearly 50.
_______________
D.
from Seymour Hersh :
31 October 2006
The McGill Daily
Pulitzer-winning investigative journalist Seymour
Hersh slams Bush at McGill address.
“There has never been an American
army as violent and murderous as the one in Iraq”
by Martin Lukacs
“The
bad news,” investigative reporter Seymour Hersh told a Montreal
audience last Wednesday, “is that there are 816 days left in the reign
of King George II of America.”
The good news? “When we wake up tomorrow morning, there will be one
less day.”
Hersh, a Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and regular contributor to
The New Yorker magazine, has been a thorn in the side of the U.S.
government for nearly 40 years. Since his 1969 exposé of the My
Lai massacre in Vietnam, which is widely believed to have helped turn
American public opinion against the Vietnam War, he has broken news
about the secret U.S. bombing of Cambodia, covert C.I.A. attempts to
overthrow Chilean president Salvador Allende, and, more recently, the
first details about American soldiers abusing prisoners at Abu Ghraib
prison in Iraq.
During his hour-and-a-half lecture – part of the launch of an
interdisciplinary media and communications studies program called
Media@McGill – Hersh described video footage depicting U.S. atrocities
in Iraq, which he had viewed, but not yet published a story about.
He described one video in which American soldiers massacre a group of
people playing soccer.
“Three U.S. armed vehicles, eight soldiers in each, are driving through
a village, passing candy out to kids,” he began. “Suddenly the first
vehicle explodes, and there are soldiers screaming. Sixteen soldiers
come out of the other vehicles, and they do what they’re told to do,
which is look for running people.”
“Never mind that the bomb was detonated by remote control,” Hersh
continued. “[The soldiers] open up fire; [the] cameras show it was a
soccer game.”
“About ten minutes later, [the soldiers] begin dragging bodies
together, and they drop weapons there. It was reported as 20 or 30
insurgents killed that day,” he said.
If Americans knew the full extent of U.S. criminal conduct, they would
receive returning Iraqi veterans as they did Vietnam veterans, Hersh
said.
“In Vietnam, our soldiers came back and they were reviled as baby
killers, in shame and humiliation,” he said. “It isn’t happening now,
but I will tell you – there has never been an [American] army as
violent and murderous as our army has been in Iraq.”
Hersh came out hard against President Bush for his involvement in the
Middle East.
“In Washington, you can’t expect any rationality. I don’t know if he’s
in Iraq because God told him to, because his father didn’t do it, or
because it’s the next step in his 12-step Alcoholics Anonymous
program,” he said.
Hersh hinted that the responsibility for the invasion of Iraq lies with
eight or nine members of the administration who have a
“neo-conservative agenda” and dictate the U.S.’s post-September 11
foreign policy.
“You have a collapsed Congress, you have a collapsed press. The
military is going to do what the President wants,” Hersh said. “How
fragile is democracy in America, if a president can come in with an
agenda controlled by a few cultists?”
Throughout his talk Hersh remained pessimistic, predicting that the
U.S. will initiate an attack against Iran, and that the situation in
Iraq will deteriorate further.
“There’s no reason to see a change in policy about Iraq. [Bush] thinks
that, in twenty years, he’s going to be recognized for the leader he
was – the analogy he uses is Churchill,” Hersh said. “If you read the
public statements of the leadership, they’re so confident and so calm….
It’s pretty scary.”
______________
E.
from Michael Albert :
2 November 2006
www.zmag.org/weluser.htm
Threats to Hugo Chavez As Venezuela's December
Presidential Election Approaches
by Stephen Lendman
On
December 3, 2006 voters in Venezuela will again get to choose who'll
lead them as President for the next six years. There's no doubt
who that will be as the people's choice is the same man they first
elected their leader in December, 1998 with 56% of the vote and
reelected him in July, 2000 after the adoption of the Bolivarian
Republic's new Constitution with a 60% total. They then saw him
survive three failed US-directed and funded attempts to unseat him
beginning with the aborted two-day coup in April, 2002, followed by the
2002-03 crippling oil strike, and then the failed August, 2004 recall
referendum. Chavistas must believe the man they revere has at
least more six lives and will use one of them in a few weeks to
continue in the job the Venezuelan people won't entrust to anyone else
as long as he wants the job.
They may also hope he has as much good fortune and as many lives as his
friend and ally Fidel Castro who in nearly 48 years as Cuba's leader
survived over 5,700 US-directed terror attacks against his country and
about 600 US attempts to kill him - an astonishing survival record
against a powerful and determined foe still trying to remove him to
reinstate oligarchic rule over the island state. The Bush
administration has the same fate in mind for Hugo Chavez Frias and
won't sit by quietly allowing Bolivarianism to flourish and spread
which it's doing as more people in the region and beyond are fed
up with the old order and want the same benefits Venezuelans
have. It's playing out now in Bolivia, on the streets of Mexico
and in the run-up to the December 3 Venezuelan presidential election
where the people show up in massive numbers most every time Chavez
makes a public campaign appearance.
Since beginning his presidency in February, 1999, Hugo Chavez and his
Movement for the Fifth Republic Party (MVR) have transformed Venezuela
from an oligarchy serving the rich and powerful to a model democratic
state serving all the people. From the start, Chavez kept his
campaign promise and began implementing his vision for political and
social change. He held a national referendum through which the
people decided to convene a National Constituent Assembly to draft a
new Constitution that was overwhelmingly approved in a nationwide vote
in December, 1999. It became effective a year later, changed the
country's name to the Republica Bolivariana de Venezuela, and mandated
Hugo Chavez's broad revolutionary vision for a system of participatory
democracy based on the principles of political, economic and social
justice. Ever since, the people of Venezuela haven't looked back
and won't now tolerate a return to the ugly past they'll never again
accept willingly.
The Chavez Campaign
Hugo Chavez began his reelection campaign by registering his
candidacy at the National Electoral Council (CNE) on August 12,
affirming his confidence in the country's electoral process and saying
that his campaign "must be above all a debate about ideas, an
opportunity to elevate the level of debate and the political
culture." Afterwards he addressed many thousands of his
red-shirted supporters in Caracas Square and told them the "Bolivarian
hurricane" was beginning with a goal of achieving 10 million votes that
would assure a convincing electoral victory in a nation of 27 million
people and just over 16 million registered voters according to the CNE
as of September 4. If he achieves it, he'll have gotten the
highest ever vote total in the country's history. He
sounded an optimistic note adding "The Bolivarian hurricane will become
a million hurricanes in all corners of the country, carrying forward
the Bolivarian project and defending the revolution."
Two polls out in September indicate he may be on track toward his goal
although their results show a wide variance. Datanalisis reported
Chavez had a voter preference of 58.2% (41% ahead of his closest rival)
while IVAD's percentage was 76.9%. And the most recent October
University of Miami School of Communication/Zogby International poll
shows Chavez with a 59% voter support compared to 24% for his only
serious rival, Manuel Rosales (discussed more fully below). The
Zogby poll also gave Chavez an overwhelmingly popular approval rating
among Venezuelan voters based on his job performance. If the
median between these poll results is closest to the right number on
December 3 and the voter turnout is high enough, that would translate
to a stunning victory for Hugo Chavez whether or not it's with the 10
million vote total he hopes to get.
Chavez's current overwhelming popularity is consistent with the results
of the Chilean firm Latinobarometro interviews conducted with 20,000
Latin Americans in 18 countries in 2005. It found a higher
percentage of Venezuelans calling their government "totally democratic"
than any other nationality surveyed as well as Venezuelans expressing
the highest degree of optimism about their country's future in the
region. These results contrast to the pre-Chavez era when the
country was ruled by oligarchs, ordinary people had no political rights
and the level of poverty was extreme enough to cause street riots the
government chose to violently suppress. Hugo Chavez changed all
that, and he's campaigning now on his Bolivarian record of
accomplishment that made him a national hero to most Venezuelans who
only want him as their President as long as he wants the job.
Chavez's plan to continue in office is part of his "Miranda Campaign"
to go beyond the traditional party structure by forming local
"platoons" of the "Miranda Campaign Command" across the country.
It began with the swearing in of 11,358 battalions and 44,698 squads
nationwide to mobilize all Venezuelans to vote on election day and to
supervise and handle security, logistics, vote tabulation and other
aspects of the voting process. Overall the aim is to bring
together 200,000 grassroots leaders of the Revolution who then will be
assigned the task of convincing 10 others to vote for Chavez that would
mean 2 million votes if successful. In addition, other
organizations representing social sectors, workers, peasants, women,
small business owners and indigenous groups will be mobilized to
support the campaign to build the "new socialism of the 21st
century." Chavez also wants to hold a nationwide recall
referendum half way through his next term in 2010, if he's reelected,
to let the Venezuelan people decide if the Constitution should be
amended to eliminate the current two-term presidential time in office
limit. He also announced his Simon Bolivar National Project which
includes the following:
- -- a new socialist ethic
especially against corruption
- -- a new socialist productive
model expanding the social economy
- -- a revolutionary
protagonist democracy under which the highest priority would be power
to the people including through communal councils
- -- the Bolivarian ideal of supreme
social happiness
- -- a new internal geopolitics
(focused on internal development)
- -- a new international geopolitics
based on a multipolar world focused against US hegemony, and
- -- assuring Venezuela is a global
energy power by developing its Orinoco Belt extra-heavy reserves and
raising its daily oil production to six million barrels daily
Hugo Chavez was greeted on September 1
by tens of thousands of supporters after returning from his
international diplomatic tour. He went seeking to establish and
solidify alliances and gain support for Venezuela's campaign for the
Latin American seat on the Security Council for which voting began on
October 16 in the General Assembly but that has been deadlocked since
because of US coercive tactics. Chavez told his supporters "This
is an election (for president) on whether we want to continue to be an
independent republic or return to being a North American colony."
He added: "For the first time in history, Venezuela is occupying
a privileged position in the world, a position of respect....because we
defend with a clear voice the interests of the countries of the Third
World and the sovereignty of the peoples." Chavez has a lot of support
to do it from most Venezuelans and the 25 political organizations that
nominated him including the MVR's coalition partner Patria Para Todas,
Podemos and several smaller parties. But Chavez also knows what
he's up against, and said he is "the candidate of the revolution....and
the national majority (and that other candidates are) tools of the US
government. In this electoral process there are two candidates
only, namely Hugo Chavez and George W. Bush."
On September 9, Chavez's electoral campaign battalions and
platoons were sworn in as part of his "Miranda campaign" to confront
"North American imperialism." It was done at a huge rally and
march of hundreds of thousands of supporters in Caracas. Chavez
used the occasion to propose the formation of a single united political
party of the Bolivarian Revolution to be formed in 2007 after the
upcoming election. In a speech he called for unity to further
"consolidate and strengthen" the spirit of Bolivarianism. He said
he wanted it to be the "great party of the Bolivarian Revolution (and
that) it should represent the republic and the revolution to the world
and establish the strongest connections with the greatest revolutionary
parties throughout the world."
The Opposition
A final unknown number of the currently 18 or so announced
candidates will be on the ballot on December 3 opposing Hugo Chavez,
but only one is of consequence because the US picked and backs him -
Zulia state governor (who by law should have relinquished his office to
run for president but for whom the CNE made an exception and allowed
him to remain in office) and regional Un Nuevo Tiempo party member
Manuel Rosales. The other more prominent ones, including Primero
Justicia candidate Julio Borges, dropped out to unite behind him as the
main standard-bearer of the opposition thus ruling out a primary the
US-funded right wing NGO Sumate planned to hold but then
cancelled.
It still remains to be seen what strategy the opposition will decide on
or even which, if any, of them will show up on election day.
Already Accion Democratica, Venezuela's largest opposition party in
size of membership, at first refused to back any candidate. The
AD's General Secretary, Henry Ramos Allup, said the only option is to
abstain from the election and that Rosales, Borges (before he dropped
out of the race) and other candidates are "like drunks fighting over an
empty bottle." Others in his party disagree though calling for an
exercise of "democratic resistance." Still it's clear to all in
the opposition, Chavez is so far ahead in the polls there's no chance
anyone can defeat him in a free, fair and open election so it's likely
Rosales was chosen to run with something else in mind, and his strategy
will show it as the campaign unfolds and especially as election day
approaches.
Clearly the US had the final say in picking him for whatever strategy
is planned that may have a lot to do with the fact that he's the
governor of the state of Zulia that has 40% of Venezuela's oil and
where in the past energy elites there supported the state's
independence to free it from the government in Caracas. Rosales
also favors this idea (likely with a little coaxing from his US allies)
and has called for a referendum to let the people of Zulia
decide. He's also very close to the Bush administration and was
the only governor to sign the infamous "(Pedro) Carmona Estanga Decree"
after the 2002 coup that dissolved the elected National Assembly and
Supreme Court and effectively ended the Bolivarian Revolution and all
the benefits it gave the Venezuelan people (for two days).
Rosales' electoral plan, with considerable US National Endowment for
Democracy (NED)-funded through Sumate support, should become clear
close to or right after the December 3 election if he's able to win a
majority of the votes in his own state. He may then try to go
ahead with an independence referendum, claim fraud in the rest of the
country, and make plans to declare himself president of the independent
state of Zulia if he, in fact, moves to break away and form it.
The Chavez government, of course, will never accept this, and the
Sumate/Rosales/Bush administration opposition may use this as as
justification to confront it violently when any attempt is made to stop
them. This could provide the US a pretext it may be seeking to
intervene militarily for whatever reasons it gives such as protecting
the lives of US citizens and defending democracy and human
rights. If it happens, it would be the same kind of stunt
Ronald Reagan used to invade Grenada in 1983 and GHW Bush used to do
the same thing against Panama in 1989. On both those occasions,
the US acted against leaders who never threatened the US or its
citizens. They were forcibly deposed solely because they were
unwilling to obey "the lord and master of the universe" from el
norte. The same scenario may be planned for Venezuela after the
upcoming election. It won't be long before we find out.
Another possible strategy planned may be similar to what happened in
the 2005 National Assembly elections. When it was clear then the
major opposition candidates couldn't win, they dropped out claiming
fraud that didn't exist. It was a cheap transparent stunt decided
on a few days before the vote as a way to avoid a humiliating defeat,
but it gave the corporate-run media a chance to trumpet their black
propaganda and characterize a free and fair election as tainted.
The tone out of Washington is always antagonistic and grabbed on to
this and at other times with oxymoronic language like Venezuela under
Chavez is an "authoritarian democracy, an elected authoritarianism, a
threat to democracy, (and) an elected dictatorship," all of it said
without a touch of irony. It also gave the opposition a chance to
chime in and say voter turnout was low (mostly because opposition
supporters had no one to vote for and stayed home) and the results thus
had no legitimacy. So it organized street demonstrations in
upscale neighborhoods and suburbs to create a false sense of turmoil
and disorder.
There was also evidence uncovered at the time that violence was planned
for around the time of the election to create unrest and further
delegitimate the results. This is how an oligarchy puppet regime
in the wings allied with the power structure in Washington
operates. They have no respect for the law or norms of conduct
and will use any means including murder to try to regain the power they
lost to Hugo Chavez democratically. There's no doubt schemes have
already been cooked up quietly that will be sprung between now and the
election period. Already on September 2, Caracas Diario Vea
reported it learned about a plot involving the right wing
opposition. It's called Plan Alcatraz and is aimed at making
unacceptable demands on the National Electoral Council (CNE) sure to be
rejected so as to allege fraud and then organize street actions in
protest including occupying CNE offices. Manuel Rosales is part
of the scheme to lead the protests but he'd have to withdraw from the
race to do it, which so far he's unwilling to do. He has been
willing to consult with representatives of the Bush administration and
met with them recently on a trip he made to south Florida where he
reportedly met with the president's brother, Governor Jeb Bush.
Colombian right wing paramilitaries are also known to be involved and
would be brought in to commit terrorist attacks along the border and in
other parts of the country. If that happens, it won't be the
first time as this tactic has been used before and foiled by Venezuelan
police when a plot was uncovered and arrests were made. This kind
of state-directed terrorism should come as no surprise to those
familiar with the government and ideological position of Colombian
President Alvaro Uribe that's hard right and in line with neocon Bush
administration policy. Uribe comes from a wealthy land-owning
family, has a history of links to the country's paramilitary death
squads and drug cartels, and engaged in state terrorism in the various
government positions he held for over 20 years that included
kidnappings and assassinations of trade unionists, peasants in
opposition groups, social and human rights activists, journalists and
others. He's also committed gross violations of Venezuelan
sovereignty and apparently still is doing it egged on by his US
ally. In spite of it, or maybe in praise for it, the Wall Street
Journal calls Uribe "(maybe) the most clear-thinking, courageous ally
in the war on terror that the US has in Latin America." The
Journal writer would have been right if she changed the preposition
"on" to "of," and the adjectives "courageous" to "outrageous," and
"clear-thinking" to "obedient."
In spite of his dubious background, Uribe was elected and then
reelected the country's president (in elections heavily tainted with
fraud) and was the only South American leader to support the Bush
administration's invasion of Iraq. He even invited the US to
"invade" Colombia to help it double the size of its military and supply
it with weapons and intelligence. He already benefits hugely from
the billions of dollars his government gets in "Plan Colombia" military
aid that's used to fight the FARC and ELN resistance and has little to
do with its supposed aim to eradicate coca cultivation except in areas
controlled by those two groups. He's now the Bush
administration's strongest and most subservient ally in the region, and
thus it backs the right Uribe claims he has to intervene militarily in
violation of another country's sovereignty - with bordering Venezuela
as the main target.
Reports are increasing that Uribe is directing his policy of
state terrorism against Venezuela by continuing to send Colombian
paramilitary hired assassins illegally across the border. They're
apparently responsible for a large number of deaths in the countryside,
and some have even infiltrated into metropolitan Caracas. High
profile figures are also becoming targets as was state prosecutor
Danilo Anderson who was killed in a December, 2004 car bombing likely
because he headed an investigation of the hundreds of individuals (all
from the opposition) suspected of being involved in the 2002 aborted
coup attempt. More recently National Assembly (AN) for the
Movement for the Fifth Republic, campesino leader, and Chavez supporter
Braulio Alvarez escaped a second assassination attempt when his car was
attacked and riddled with bullets. Alvarez is working with the
government to implement its land reform law that redistributes large,
underused land from the latifundistas (large land owners) to landless
campesinos that surely is angering the rich landowners who now with
Uribe's help are striking back.
One of Hugo Chavez's top priorities when first taking office in 1999
was land reform in a country run by oligarchs including rich land
owners. He's been determined to rectify the inequality of land
distribution the 1997 agricultural census revealed - that 5% of the
largest landowners control 75% of the land and 75% of the smallest ones
only 6% of it. His plan led to the current confrontation, but
Hugo Chavez is now responding more forcefully and on August 18
announced the creation of civilian/military security units in the large
farms that have been taken over in Barinas, Apure and Tachina
states. He's doing it to combat the wave of kidnappings and
assassinations especially in areas bordering Colombia that are linked
to paramilitary death squads infiltrating into the country. They
likely are dispatched by Alvaro Uribe and are employed by the
latifundistas. Tachina has been particularly hard hit by this
invasion as the number of killings there rose from 81 in 1999 to 93 in
2001, 212 in 2002 and exploded to 566 in 2005 for a total of 2037
deaths in the last seven years. In addition, the Caracas Daily
Ultimas Noticias reported in July that 70% of businesses in Tachina
bordering Colombia have to pay the paramilitaries a vacuna (vaccine) as
protection money to keep from being attacked.
All this is mounting evidence that Hugo Chavez has every reason to fear
the Colombian president and sees his close ties to the Bush
administration as part of a greater strategy to provoke a confrontation
giving the US a pretext to intervene to try to oust and assassinate
him. This also seems to be Uribe's aim as Colombia and Venezuela
share a common border, and he fears for his own survival in a country
plagued by poverty and violence. Uribe has an ugly record
supporting the concentration of wealth and power while cutting vitally
needed social services. He's also allowed his military and
paramilitary assassins to displace three million peasants, has one of
the worst records of state-directed terrorism in the world, and has a
long-term disregard for democracy and human rights. Just across
the border his people can see how the Bolivarian Revolution has
benefitted Venezuelans and many of them have emigrated there to take
advantage of it. It's hard to imagine those staying behind don't
want the same things and may one day act in their own self-interest to
demand them.
Hugo Chavez also needs to be wary of the major new base the US is
building in Mariscal Estigarribia, Paraguay, 200 kilometers from the
Bolivian border even though it's far south of Venezuela.
Reportedly the base will be able to handle large aircraft and house up
to 16,000 troops. Since July, 2005 small numbers of
fully-equipped US forces have been in Paraguay and have been conducting
secretive operations there. It's led some military analysts and
human rights groups to suspect an interventionist operation is planned,
likely directed at Bolivia and its president Evo Morales some of whose
policies mirror those of his friend and ally Hugo Chavez. But
with enough troops and long-range large aircraft in the region, the
base could also be used as a staging area for an operation anywhere
within its range that easily could include Venezuela. The human
rights group Servicio Paz y Justicia (SERPAJ) in Paraguay believes the
US wants the country to be what Panama once was, and to be able to
operate there to control the southern cone region of the continent.
It's also been reported that George Bush recently bought a 98,842
acre farm in Paraguay to go along with the 173,000 acres his father
already owns there. Both properties border Bolivia and Brazil and
comprise 2.7% of the whole country that comprises an area the size of
the state of California. It's not known what the Bush family has
in mind there or whether it may have any connection to a planned US
military intervention in the region. It is known Paraguay has no
laws criminalizing money-laundering, anti-terrorism or terrorist
financing even though if does have an extradition treaty with the
US. It's also important to be mindful of the fact that a dominant
US family of two US presidents now owns a sizable piece of real estate
in a country able to domicile a large number of US forces. It may
only be for whatever personal use they have in mind, but it may not be
and we can only speculate on what that may be.
We don't have to speculate that the US also has another major military
base in Manta, Ecuador that's much closer to Venezuela on Colombia's
southern border and is part of the US's increasing militarization of
the southern continent. The Pentagon says it's tasked to carry
out a variety of security-related missions, but that's just code
language for interventionist ones. Ecuadorian presidential
hopeful, Rafael Correa, who'll now face a runoff vote on November 26
after a tainted first round spoiled his victory, responded to a
question recently that he'd allow the base to remain in his country
provided the Bush administration gave Ecuador the same basing rights in
Miami. But even if this base is closed, the US is currently
building another new one in the Dutch colony of Curacao (a popular
vacation destination that will be tainted by it) that's located near
the Venezuelan coast and near the oil-rich state of Zulia.
It remains to be seen if he'll follow through if he wins the
presidency, but one positive development to watch is Paraguay's
decision not to renew a defense cooperation agreement with the US for
2007 because it's unwilling to grant US troops immunity from
prosecution by the International Criminal Court in the Hague
(ICC). The Court was established to assure perpetrators of war
crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide are brought to justice.
Foreign Minister Ruben Ramirez announced his country's decision on
October 2 saying his government concluded under international treaty
law, exceptions to immunity are only permissible for foreign diplomats
and administrative personnel. Paraguay is a member of the South
American Mercosur trade block that also includes Brazil, Argentina,
Uruguay and Venezuela. These countries have also refused to grant
US troops such immunity in another sign the US is losing influence in
the region as more leaders in it are standing firm against unreasonable
demands from Washington as well as its failed policies. Hopefully
the spirit and influence of Hugo Chavez is spreading.
US Intervention in Venezuela's Political Process - Again
It's no secret the Bush administration wants to oust Hugo Chavez,
has already tried and failed three times to do it, and is now planning
another attempt at whatever time and by whatever means it has in
mind. It may be staged in connection with the upcoming December
election and likely will be a reworked version of what was tried
earlier and failed but this time with some new twists and going further
than before.
Hugo Chavez knows it's coming, has taken steps to counter it when it
does, and has a hard-to-trump ace in his deck - the many millions of
Venezuelans who've already shown they'll come out in force to support
him, especially if the stakes are to keep him as their president.
Chavez witnessed some of that support when he spoke at an October mass
rally in Valencia in the state of Carabobo and sounded the alarm about
the Bush administration's plot to destabilize the election and
assassinate him. He indicated to the crowd that "friendly
nations" have warned him about this and said: "With God's favour this
will not happen, but if it (did) you know what you would have to do;
the Bolivarian Revolution at this stage does not depend on one man."
Chavez also said he's preparing for what he expects will happen and "we
are going to hit back so hard that they will not stop running until
they reach Miami. Chavez may not have long to wait to find out if his
plan can best the one Washington has cooked up.
In the lead-up to whatever is planned, the Bush administration is
relying on the usual kind of covert mischief from the CIA that
specializes in it. It's been at it all over the world for nearly
50 years and in Venezuela since Hugo Chavez was first elected.
Author and international human rights attorney Eva Golinger obtained
top-secret CIA documents through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)
requests showing the Agency had prior knowledge and was complicit in
the two-day 2002 aborted coup attempt to unseat President Chavez and
that the Bush administration provided over $30 million in funding aid
to opposition groups to help do it.
It began in 2001 involving the same quasi-governmental agencies that
are always part of these kinds of schemes - the National Endowment for
Democracy (NED), International Republican Institute (IRI), National
Democratic Institute (NDI), and US Agency for International Development
(USAID) which did its work through its Office of Transition Initiatives
(OTI). These agencies funded and worked with the opposition
staging mass violent street protests leading up to the day of the
coup. The documents also showed NED and USAID funded and were
otherwise involved in staging the 2002-03 crippling oil strike and the
failed August, 2004 recall referendum. The US State Department,
National Security Agency (NSA) and White House had full knowledge of
and had to have approved each coup attempt.
Most people have some idea how the CIA operates covertly but few know
much about the National Endowment for Democracy that was (in language
Orwell would have loved) established to "support democratic
institutions throughout the world through private, nongovernmental
efforts." If fact, its very much a part of government and its
purpose is to be the somewhat overt counterpart to the CIA, and in that
capacity its hands are almost as dirty as the spy agency short of
having actual blood on them. The one objective it pursues above
all others is the subversion of democracy including supporting the
removal of democratically elected leaders unwilling to allow their
countries to become submissive US client states.
It's already been learned from information made public, including
NED Quarterly Reports, that this agency actively supports anti-Chavez
organizations in Venezuela and that removal of Hugo Chavez is one of
its top priorities. It will also be reported soon in a new book
by Eva Golinger called Bush v. Chavez: Washington's War on Venezuela
that the Bush administration since 2005 has increased its (anti-Chavez)
"interference by providing funding, training, guidance, and other
contacts, and other strategically important ways to support the
opposition's presidential campaign here." Golinger also reports the US
anti-Chavez campaign includes the use of "psychological warfare within
Venezuela, but also in the international arena, and in the United
States." It's trying "to make people think that Venezuela is a
failed or failing state with a dictator, which is how the US government
refers to him."
NED is an old hand at this kind of dirty business since it was
established in November, 1982 by statute as a supposedly private
non-profit organization. It's hardly that as Congress approves
its funding as part of the Department of State budget going to its
sister USAID agency. NED also gets some private aid from several
well-known right wing organizations including supportive think tanks
that provide considerable funding for ultraconservative and
business-friendly enterprises.
USAID has considerably greater resources than NED to pursue its
activities which supposedly are to function as an independent federal
agency providing non-military foreign aid. In fact, however, it's
a thinly disguised instrument of US foreign policy able to do its dirty
work while avoiding congressional scrutiny. It, like NED, has in
the past been an instrument of US efforts to oust Hugo Chavez, and in
the run-up to the December election is likely to be working with the
opposition again as it was learned it did in the other three attempts
to oust the Venezuelan leader. We'll have to wait to learn more
about what schemes CIA, NED, USAID and other US-related agencies are
planning until they begin unfolding or are exposed in advance and
are headed off before any harm is done.
The Role of Sumate
Sumate is a nominal non-governmental organization (NGO) founded in
2002 by a group of Venezuelans led by Maria Corina Machado and
Alejandro Plaz and now headed by Ms. Machado. It's true purpose
and activities belie the claims it makes to be an organization of
independent citizens supporting the democratic process and promoting
the political rights of Venezuelans under the country's
Constitution. In fact, it's a US-supported and funded
anti-governmental organization dedicated to the overthrow of the Chavez
government and the return of the country to its ugly past ruled by the
former oligarchs and the interests of capital.
In the US this kind of activity or any foreign interference in
elections would never be tolerated. US election law specifically
prohibits foreign nationals or corporations from contributing to any
federal, state or local political campaign, and it would be unthinkable
to imagine there being any tolerance if it was learned a foreign
government attempted to influence the electoral process here.
None of this, however, applies to what the US does all over the world
rountinely. At least post WW II, this country has a tainted
history of meddling in the affairs of other countries almost like we
had a birthright to do it. Put another way, according to
"Washington-think," what's good for the US "goose" isn't allowed for
any other country's "gander."
It's thus no surprise Sumate went on the Bush administration
payroll when it first gained prominence in late 2003 becoming involved
in organizing and providing support for the 2004 failed recall
referendum signature collection process. Ever since it's been at
the center of anti-Chavez activities and is liberally funded to do it
by US agencies like NED and USAID. As mentioned above, it
cancelled a primary it planned to hold after the main opposition
candidates dropped out so Manuel Rosales could run unopposed against
Hugo Chavez in the December election. It's now moving ahead with
the help of millions of dollars of Washington-supplied opposition
candidate bankrolling. This was recently revealed in 132 USAID
contracts made public that claimed the funding to be politically
neutral but which Hugo Chavez believes is being used overtly and
covertly to undermine his government. USAID and NED now admit
they're spending (at least) $26 million on the December election, and
those organizations never support democratically elected leaders
running for office who don't obey US neoliberal diktats.
Chavez has lots of past experience to back up his claim of US
interference and an added new one now after the Bush administration
named career CIA agent Patrick Maher as the "mission manager" to
oversee US intelligence on Venezuela and Cuba. His previous job
was as deputy director of the CIA's Office of Policy Support and his
background includes having been an architect of the
counter-insurgency strategy in Colombia as well as managing the
agency's operations in the Caribbean region. William Izarra, a
former MVR Party leader and the national coordinator of the Centres for
Ideological Formation that organizes grassroots discussions about the
Bolivarian Revolution, believes this move elevates Venezuela and Cuba
into the "axis of evil" category along with Iran and North Korea, and
that heightens the risk of trouble ahead.
The Chavez government knows something is afoot and is taking preventive
action by having Venezuelan prosecutors bring conspiracy charges
against Sumate leaders. If convicted, Maria Corina Machado could
face up to 16 years in prison, and three other Sumate members also face
charges. The National Assembly also intends to require "non-profit"
groups like Sumate to reveal their funding sources. In addition,
it's recommending Sumate be investigated for currency and tax law
violations, and Chavez has threatened to expel US Ambassador William
Brownfield whom he accuses of causing trouble as he's done in the
past. All this is playing out in a highly-charged atmosphere of
mistrust that's well-founded according to Eva Golinger who wrote "The
Chavez Code: Cracking US Intervention in Venezuela." The book
cited clear evidence of the Bush administration's intent to overthrow
the Chavez government, and Golinger recently said Washington is "trying
to implement regime change. There's no doubt about it (even
though it) tries to mask it saying it's a noble mission."
The Prospect for Fall Fireworks in Venezuela
The Bush administration must believe while it's often wrong it's
never in doubt. It's already dealing with two out of control
conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan and has blood-stained hands from its
complicity with Israel on their co-sponsored conflicts against Lebanon
and the one still raging in Palestine. Undeterred, it seems
determined to become even more embroiled in the Middle East by planning
a possible attack against Iran according to some reliable reports (or
at least putting up a good bluff to do it), even though the US public
has grown disenchanted with George Bush's wars and it shows in his low
public approval rating. He's even now drawing flack within his
own party, and many Republican candidates for Congress on November 7
see him as radioactive and don't want him around. So why would
this administration be willing to risk making things even worse by
trying to forcibly remove a democratically elected leader revered by
his people who will never stand by and allow their Bolivarian
Revolution to be taken away from them.
Here's why. Soon after the Bush administration came to power,
Vice President (and de facto head of state) Dick Cheney said the US
must "make energy security a (top) priority of our trade and foreign
policy." The Iraq and Afghanistan wars followed what, in fact,
was "boss" Cheney's diktat with control of energy and its security one
of several key reasons why we're now embroiled in the greater Middle
East.
Now fast forward to June, 2006 and it gets more chilling.
The US Southern (military) Command in Latin America (that has no
business meddling in affairs of state) concluded that efforts by
Venezuela, Bolivia and Equador to extend state control over their oil
and gas reserves threatens US oil security. A study it conducted
states: "A re-emergence of state control of the energy sector (in those
countries) will likely increase inefficiencies and....will hamper
efforts to increase long-term supplies and production." Even
though the region produces only 8.4% of the world's oil output, it
accounts for 30% of US consumption, and most of that comes from
Venezuela and Mexico with each of these countries supplying about an
equal percentage of our needs.
A secure supply and firm control of oil from the region is
crucial to the US, but most of all from Venezuela because of its vast
reserves (including its immense untapped amount of Orinco Basin
super-heavy tar oil) that potentially are even greater than what's now
available from Saudi Arabia - although that's debatable and merely
suggesting it will open up a torrent of disagreement that may be
right. Still, Venezuela, by any measure, has the greatest
hydrocarbon reserves in the hemisphere, and that makes the country and
Hugo Chavez target number one in this part of the world for US energy
security importance and second only after the greater Middle East that
includes the Caspian Basin in Central Asia. Couple that with the
fact that the US sees Hugo Chavez as the greatest of all threats it
faces anywhere - a good example that may and is spreading throughout
the region threatening US dominance over it and you have a recipe for a
determined effort to oust him by any means including assassination and
armed intervention.
Chavez, of course, knows the risk and so do the Venezuelan people
who proved in 2002 they will rally en masse as they did then to restore
their president to office after the US-staged two-day April coup that
year briefly removed him. It's certain any attempt to oust him
again will be met with the same resistance, and it's hard to imagine
how intense it may be if the US succeeds in killing him. There's
no question Washington wants to avoid six more years of Chavez rule and
officials there have said it in so many words. They call Hugo
Chavez "a clear and present danger to peace and democracy in the
hemisphere (and) US strategy must be to help Venezuela accomplish
peaceful change (before 2007)." Heinz Dieterich, a Chavez
consultant, believes, as does Hugo Chavez, the Bush administration is
plotting to assassinate him to prevent his serving another term in
office.
So far there's been nothing more dramatic than the usual US
Chavez-bashing especially after his September 20 tour de force at the
UN General Assembly when the Venezuelan President had the courage to
say what most other world leaders think but only speak about
privately. The Bush administration responds claiming the Chavez
government is a dictatorship that supports terrorism. It also
unjustifiably accuses him suppressing the media and repressing his
opposition, and it's guaranteed a Chavez victory will be challenged
with outrageous accusations of electoral fraud arranged by a
state-controlled CNE.
The truth on all counts is the opposite of the rhetoric, yet the
vitriol continues unabated from Washington and is heard over the
corporate-controlled media in both countries. What should be
reported (but never is) is that the fairness of the Venezuelan
electoral system shames the corrupted one in the US that's now run by
corporate-owned and controlled electronic voting machines manipulated
to assure enough business-friendly candidates win even when they're not
the choice of the majority of US voters. Venezuela has real
democracy while what's called that in the US is just a shameless mirage
of one - an illusion the public hasn't caught onto yet. The
Venezuelan people know the difference between that and the real thing
and will fight to keep it. Sadly, most people in the US are kept
uninformed, don't know what they've lost, and can't even imagine the
kind of country they'd have if they had an enlightened leader like Hugo
Chavez instead of the appalling one they're stuck with for two more
years.
Things are certain to heat up in Venezuela between now and December 3
as the Bush administration tries to impose on the Venezuelan people
what's it's already done here at home, and it will be relentless and
ruthless about the way it does it. And if covert efforts are
afoot, as almost for sure they are, we'll likely see them unveiled
during the election period and they may be ugly. Hugo Chavez
expects them, is surely ready to confront them when they're sprung, and
it now remains to be seen how the latest chapter in the Bush
administration vs. Hugo Chavez will play out. Stay closely
tuned. It won't be long before the fireworks begin.
____________________
Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at
lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. Also visit his blog site at
sjlendman.blogspot.com.
_______________
F.
from Democracy Now :
6 November 2006
http://tour.democracynow.org/
Amy Goodman has a new nationally
syndicated weekly newspaper column called "Breaking the Sound Barrier."
_____________
G.
from ICH
7 November 2006
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/
It is not unreasonable to suggest we are
winning the war. Not won, but winning.
___________
H.
from John Gerassi :
4 November 2006
Francis,
Beware: If the Republicans think that a Democratic majority may stop
perpetual war the Bush administration now has the legal weapons to
stoop and/or cancel any election by declaring martial law. You don't
believe me? Read and weep:
Tito
On
October 17, while everyone was paying attention to the Military
Commissions Act of 2006, Bush also signed into law the JWDA 2007.
Public Law 109-364, or the “John Warner Defense Authorization Act of
2007” (H.R.5122), which Bush signed in a private Oval Office ceremony, allows
the President to declare a "public emergency" and station troops
anywhere in America and take control of state-based National Guard
units without the consent of the governor or local authorities, in
order to "suppress public disorder."
So in one day, we lost Habeas Corpus AND the Posse
Commitatus.
In a sense, the two laws complement one another. One allows for
torture and detention abroad, while the other seeks to enforce
acquiescence at home, preparing to order the military onto the streets
of America. There is a very specific term for putting an area under
military law enforcement control; the term is "martial law."
I would recommend reading the relevant portions of the Act in its
entirety (linked below); however, I want to call attention to
this gem:
(3) In any situation covered by paragraph (1)(B), the State
shall be considered to have denied the equal protection of the laws
secured by the Constitution.
(The John Warner
Defense Authorization Act of 2007, Sec 1042)
or
http://thomas.loc.gov/
(click on "THOMAS Home",
(then type into the Search
Window: John Warner National
Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2007)