Sunday, November 30, 2008

An Excellent Write-Up

Newton Garver, in The Buffalo News, has a wonderful summary of recent Bolivian political events. Garver's unafraid to call a spade a spade; namely, U.S. ambassador Philip Goldberg's behind-the-scene machinations to weaken Evo Morales' government and strengthen the rebel medialuna. Also great is his analysis of the Bush administration's insistence on democracy--but only the corporatist/capitalist version. To wit:

From the perspective of the right-wing opposition in Bolivia, as for Bush and Rice, the principal threat to human rights and dignity is not poverty or conditions of slavery, but the “tyranny of centralism” and restrictions on business opportunity. In order to promote right-wing democracy in Bolivia, the Bush administration needed to support and strengthen forces in Bolivia opposed to Morales. This was readily feasible, because of a persistent and deepening struggle in Bolivia between two forces, both of which continue to grow stronger.

One is the indigenous people, dozens of distinct ethnic groups, of which the largest by far are the Quechua and the Aymara; together indigenous people comprise nearly two-thirds of the nation’s population. The revolution of 1952, under Victor Paz Estenssoro, enfranchised these Indians and provided them for the first time with opportunities for education as well as political expression. They think of democracy in Lincoln’s terms — as government of the people, by the people and for the people. The government of Morales is a direct beneficiary of this initiative

Kudos to you, Mr. Garver. I'll be nominating you for an end-of-year "Achiever" award!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes, this is exactly what is taking place. I am excited to see what Obama does in terms of Bolivia, the indigenous people, and Morales. I hope he supports Morales and not the right-wingers.

mgrace said...

Well, I think that all U.S. citizens who are concerned about about this need to hold Obama's feet to the fire. With his recent selection of Clinton as SoS, my hopes aren't set too high. The neo-liberal model will hold for a while. But with our economic decline, maybe that'll give the "socialist" nations down south a chance to breathe and develop their own model.
I don't know, but there's a chance.
Thanks for reading.