Fausta's Blog

American and Latin American Politics, Society, and Culture

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Bolivian Myths at TNR

The New Republic (who disgraced itself with the Scott Thomas Beauchamp story) has an excellent article by Alvaro Vargas Llosa, Bolivian Myths: What Do the Bolivian People Really Want:

After talking to Bolivians from all walks of life in areas ranging from the rural outskirts of Santa Cruz, in the east, to Cochabamba, in the highlands, and from the jungles of Chapare to Tiwanaku, the site of an ancient citadel peopled by indigenous Bolivians, I am persuaded that Morales’ government is ruling based on myths. Those myths need to be exposed before other Andean countries where ethnic and social divisions are also abrasive follow suit.

  • The greatest myth is that Bolivia’s population is alien to Western culture imposed by 300 years of colonial rule and two centuries of republican life.
  • The second myth pursued by Morales is that Bolivians want communal property.
  • Another myth is that the regions calling for local autonomy want to break away from Bolivia.
  • One last myth is that the nationalization of natural gas in the southeastern lowlands will liberate the indigenous population.

As they say, read the whole thing.

Update

What would Bill Cosby say?
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"Beware Iran in Latin America"

says Andres Oppenheimer (emphasis added):

Iran has already become the second largest investor in Venezuela, after the United States, and recently inaugurated a weekly Iran Air flight between Tehran and Caracas. Flights are packed with government officials and government-friendly business people, according to Venezuelan press reports.

In addition to opening an embassy in Bolivia, Iran is expanding its diplomatic missions across the region. After attending the inauguration of Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega and receiving two state medals from him in January, Ahmadinejad has stationed about 20 Iranian officials at his embassy there, which has by now become one of the largest in that country, Western diplomats say.

Earlier this year, the Iranian foreign ministry held its First International Seminar on Latin America in Tehran.

IRAN’S GOALS

What is Ahmadinejad looking for in Latin America?

First, he is seeking Latin American support to counter U.S. and European pressures to stop Iran from developing nuclear capabilities. Venezuela and Cuba were, alongside Syria, the only three countries that supported Iran’s nuclear program in a February 2006 vote at the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency.

Second, Ahmadinejad wants to strike back at the United States in its own hemisphere. Iran may want to be able to finance anti-American groups and possibly destabilize U.S.-friendly governments in order to negotiate with Washington from a position of greater strength. Following the U.S. invasion of Iraq, Iran seems to be saying: “You got into my neighborhood; now I’m getting into yours.”

Third, Ahmadinejad’s popularity at home is falling, and he may want to show his people that he is being welcomed as a hero abroad.

Oppenheimer believes, as I do, that

the growing presence of obscure Iranian ”diplomatic personnel” in Venezuela, Nicaragua and other countries in the region raises questions over whether Iranian agents will soon start slipping into other countries to support terrorist or totalitarian groups.

Importing the Middle Eastern conflict or bringing the Iran-U.S. conflict into Latin American territory is clearly in the interest of Iran.


Over in Bolivia, “indigenous nationalism” is bringing together the drug trade and anti-Western ideology. This certainlly will not be the path towards a third way (“Tercera Opción” link in Spanish)

Una “Tercera Opción” que establezca un nuevo concepto de sociedad, que reasuma el aspecto social abandonado por la ortodoxia del ‘libre mercado’ y deseche, a su vez, la excluyente tesis gubernamental del Estado ‘socialista indigenista’.
(my translation) A “Third Way” that would bring about a new societal compact which would resume the social aspect that was abandoned by the orthodox ‘free market’, and which will at the same time discard the exclusionary governmental thesis of the ‘indigenous socialist’ state.

For starters, Bolivia has never in its history even come close to being a free market.

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Investor’s Business Daily praises the new Costa Rica-US free trade agreement, which was reached after many stumbling blocks

Recognizing reality, ignoring side issues, resisting foreign meddling and embracing the future, a free and democratic Costa Rica said yes.

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Ecuador’s president Rafael Correa is doing his utmost to bring the country to ruin. Last week he said he’ll dissolve Congress; this week he increased taxes on oil companies from 50% to 99%. You can read lots more on Ecuador at ECrisis.

The Financial Times looks at Chavismo’s limits in Ecuador:

Mr Chávez has become a popular figure at home by channelling oil revenues towards social spending. But even in Venezuela his government’s top-down economic policies have failed to create jobs and diversify the economy. Elsewhere in Latin America there is growing recognition among voters that the “petro-populism” and anti-American bombast of the Venezuelan caudillo do not offer a way forward.

Centrist governments in Brazil, Mexico and Chile are strong and more than holding their own. Alan Garcia, the recovering populist who last year saw off an electoral challenge by a Peruvian ally of Mr Chávez, is gaining popularity.

Voters in Costa Rica narrowly backed their country’s membership of the US-Central America trade pact, overcoming a powerful left-wing opposition campaign. In any event, few countries have the resources to emulate Mr Chávez. Ecuador is typical in this respect. Its oil industry is smaller and exports are more broadly based than those of Venezuela, with farmers dependent on the US market.

Ecuador’s recent experience of greater government involvement in the economy has not been encouraging. In the first half of this year, for example, oil production fell and productivity continued to decline.

By imposing a 99 per cent windfall tax on international companies – which include state-owned Andes Petroleum of China and Petrobras of Brazil – Mr Correa risks cutting off investment flows to his country.

Mary Anastasia O’Grady isn’t as optimistic on Latin America, where she sees many governments engaging in “creative destruction”.

Indeed, she has plenty of evidence to go by:

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I started today’s roundup with Iran and I complete it with Iran:

Nicaragua Bonds Tumble as Ortega Aligns With Iran, Venezuela:

Investor confidence ebbed as Ortega signed energy accords with Venezuela and sought investment from Iran.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who calls President George W. Bush “the devil,” says the U.S. plotted to overthrow him in 2002 and has threatened to cut off oil shipments. The Bush administration has denied the claim. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has rejected U.S. calls to halt the nation’s nuclear program.

In his UN speech last week, Ortega defended efforts by Iran and North Korea to develop nuclear power. “The enemy continues to be the same,” he said. “And it’s called global capitalist imperialism.”

Nicaragua is currently the second-poorest country in the Americas.

Update Via Siggy,
Ahmadinejad’s World

Special thanks to Eneas Biglione of the Hispanic American Center for Economic Research.

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From Illich Ramirez to Osama Bin Laden

I just received an interesting article, and decided to translate it. Mind you, I can not vouch for its accuracy, but it brings up a serious issue,
De Ilich Ramírez a Osama Bin Laden
(my translation, emphasis added)

From Illich Ramirez to Osama Bin Laden
by Jose Brechner

Pakistanis? Afghans? No, indigenous Venezuelans

Before Osama Bin Laden, the world’s best-known terrorist was Venezuelan Illich Ramirez Sanchez, alias “Carlos the Jackal”, who was captured in 1994 and is serving a life sentence at the Clair-vaux prison in Northeastern France, from where he sporadically corresponds with Hugo Chavez, who calls him a “distinguished compatriot” and referred to him as a “friend” during an OPEC conference in Caracas.

Carlos worked for Muammar Gadafi of Libya, Saddam Hussein of Iraq, Hafiz-al-Assad of Syria, George Habash of the FPLP (Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine) , the Italian Red Brigades, the Colombian M-19 Movement, the German Baader-Meinhof, and any other socialists and communists that would pay him. The name Illich is no coincidence, since his father was a millionaire leader of the Venezuelan Communist Party that named his three sons after his heroes, Vladimir, Illich, and Lenin. Carlos joined the party as a child, received a Communist education in Cuba, and traveled to Jordan where he became a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine Islamic group. After that, he traveled freely throughout the Middle East with official passports granted by the governments of the region.

In prison, Carlos embraced Islam as a religion, as many other Communists do, not because they believe in Allah, but because they feel kinship with Muslims in their hatred of the USA. Aristotle said, “Evil unites men.” In a recent interview, The Jackal laughed remorselessly when asked about his murders, and criticized Al Qaeda by saying, “They are not professional. They are not organized. They don’t even know how to make explosives or detonators well.” When asked how many did he kill, he replied, “I can’t count, less than 100 anyway.” French police has documented 83 murders. And what did he achieve from that? “Our example has been followed not only by Communists, but also by Jihadists.”

In a nearer and more dangerous scenario, which also has Venezuela as a starting point, Hezbollah in Latin America, also called Hezbollah Venezuela, converts to Islam any indigenous Chavista it can, because they are the ones that least understand what is going on. Evangelical missionaries have disappeared from the jungle because according to Chavez they are genocidal spies. Evo Morales in Bolivia repeats Chavez’s same words.

Chavez has invited Iranian Shiite “missionaries” to convert the Guajiros and other indigenous peoples in Amazonia. The entire Wayuu tribe is now Muslim, women wear veils while men go to Kalashnikov shooting practice. Some have themselves photographed wearing suicide vests loaded with bombs, and the Venezuelan government distributes the photos, publicizing its friendship with Ahmadinejad and Middle East terrorist groups.

Hezbollah Venezuela refers to Jose Miguel Rojas Espinosa – the mastermind of the terrorist attack against the American Embassy in Caracas – as “the first mujeheddin, an example of strength and dignity in Allah’s cause, the first prisoner of war of the Revolutionary Islamic Movement in Venezuela.” The group is linked to Argentinian socialist-terrorist Norberto Rafael Ceresole, who is allegedly linked to the AMIA (Argentine Israelite Mutual Association) attack in 1994, and who is the acting ideologue for Chavez and Morales’s regimes of Socialism for the 21st Century.

In Bolivia – South America’s most indigenous country – conversion to Islam didn’t start visibly, but it is an important part of the Islamist-Leftist scheme towards a conquest of America, imposing totalitarianism under Morales’s whip, with Chavez and Ahmadinejad at the helm. Converting Quechuas and Aimaras will not be as quick or as easy as converting the Venezuelan tribes because the indigenous Bolivian population is in the millions, but the goal of the Muslims is precisely to convert millions.

As I said, I can not vouch for its accuracy, but this is worth keeping an eye on.

More:
The Shi’ite Indians of Venezuela, via A colombo-americana’s perspective.

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Latin America this week: Cuba, Mexico, Guatemala, Bolivia, Colombia, and Brazil

Cuba:
Even The Economist has theories on the “announcement”:

So just before October 10th, the date of Cuba’s declaration of independence from Spain in 1868, expect another wave of rumours in Miami that Mr Castro has passed away.

I won’t believe any rumors until the Cuban government produces
a. a corpse,
and b. DNA for corroboration.
As far as I’m concerned, it ain’t over until Horatio sings.

Babalu blog has links to John Stossel’s 20/20 entire program on healthcare.

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Mexico:

On September 10th six explosions ripped through gas pipelines in the state of Veracruz, disrupting oil and natural-gas supplies, shutting down factories and forcing thousands from their homes. It was the third such attack in the past three months, and the most severe. Left-wing rebels claimed responsibility. Pemex, the state oil company, says it hopes to restore a full service within the next few days.

Who was behind the explosions?

Group that attacked pipeline in Mexico is financed by Chavez

The subversive group Revolutionary Popular Army (EPR, left), that attributed yesterday the attacks against six gasoductos of state Mexican Petroleums (PEMEX), is financed by the government of Hugo Chavez, according to a report of press based on the Mexican intelligence service.

Yesterday Mary Anastasia O’Grady wrote about Calderon’s misguided economic reforms,

Having one win under his belt, Mr. Calderon moved this summer to introduce a fiscal reform designed to close revenue shortfalls. A better course of action, with oil topping $80 a barrel, would have been opening the oil market to private investment. But this would have challenged the theology that says that the inefficient state-owned oil monopoly Pemex is sacred. Mr. Calderon apparently has decided, for now, against questioning that taboo.

Instead, he chose to go after the productive private sector of the economy, where at least some large companies are known to take advantage of a complex, exemption-ridden regime to dodge tax payments. The choice has not been fruitful.

As I reported in my July 2 column, Hacienda Minister (Treasury Secretary) Agustin Carstens, formerly of the International Monetary Fund, chose not to seek growth through lower corporate tax rates and simplification. Instead, he crafted a plan to create a corporate alternative minimum tax. The proposal raised the cost of labor on some part of the work force and complicated the code.

This has the rancid odor of a tax hike, not that of a flat tax, and as such it will not lead to growth and prosperity.

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Colombia:
Also at The Economist, an article on Uribe’s move to involve Chavez in the FARC negotiations,

The bigger risk is that by bringing in Mr Chávez, Mr Uribe has granted the FARC an avenue to international legitimacy. If that were the prelude to serious peace talks, so much the better. But Mr Chavez, an elected president but one who has ridden roughshod over his country’s institutions, is hardly best placed to persuade the FARC to accept the rules of democracy.

Uribe has accepted a European proposal on a safe haven, and Sarko is also pressing for a hostage accord, since French-Colombian hostage Ingrid Betancourt, has become a cause celebre in France, even when in Colombia she’s another high-profile hostage among many.

Quite frankly, adding Chavez to this equation strikes me a insane.

Venezuela News and Views has an excellent post on this “very confusing situation where everyone involved is at least playing a double game.”

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Argentina:
Guess who‘s meddling in the elections?

There is a divide among governments in Latin America and the left is making a comeback, with a backlash against free-market reforms and US policies. The “responsible” camp is led by two socialists who have become very pragmatic. In Brazil, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has followed moderate macroeconomic policies, with some innovative initiatives on hunger, land reform and energy. In Chile, President Michelle Bachelet has successfully led a coalition with the Christian Democrats and achieved strong growth and reductions in poverty. Felipe Calderon, Mexico’s conservative president, is following a similar course.

The “irresponsible” camp is led by Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan president, seeking to spread his “21st-century socialism” across Latin America with populist, nationalistic policies fuelled by the country’s rising oil revenues. He has nationalised private assets, forced the departure of US companies, cracked down on the media and other opposition outlets and funded his own corps of leftist candidates throughout Latin America. He has proposed a “Bank of the South” to replace the US-backed International Monetary Fund and recommended a change in the constitution that would allow him to serve for life. On Mr Chavez’s side are Bolivia, Ecuador and, of course, Cuba.

Argentina has been teetering on the brink of the Chavez camp and the signals from Ms Fernandez are not promising. Since Argentina’s economic collapse in 2001, its government has repudiated billions of dollars in debts to foreign lenders, accepted billions more of Venezuela’s petrodollars and flirted with Mr Chavez’s anti-American policies. Mr Kirchner accepted an offer from Mr Chavez for nearly $4bn to pay off International Monetary Fund debt. In exchange, he lent his support to Venezuela’s bid to join Mercosur, the regional trade bloc, and to Mr Chavez’s proposed Bank of the South. Brazil has thrown cold water on the bank proposal and Mr Chavez has been forced to put off his bond sales, reputedly for lack of buyers.

Ms Fernandez has an opportunity to shift course and join the responsible camp. The country is back on its feet with about $44bn in foreign reserves from the boom in commodity prices. In 2006 it recorded a fiscal surplus equal to 3.5 per cent of gross domestic product. It is time the country moved away from Venezuela and joined Brazil, Chile and Mexico. There are several steps Ms Fernandez should take. First, Argentina should take no more Venezuelan funds. Second, it should drop its support for a Bank of the South. Third, it should clean up its investment climate so it can re-enter international capital markets.

Let’s hope they do.

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Guatemala:
The NYT has recently started to run insightful articles on Latin America. Last week Marc Lacey explored the reasons behind Rigoberta Menchu’s defeat in Guatemala. The article is under Times Select, but you can read it at the HACER website,

She was not from around here. That was obvious to anyone who scrutinized the details of the embroidery on the traditional Mayan clothes she wore to campaign. She is a Quiche Mayan, from the midwestern highlands. Her indigenous language is different, unintelligible to a local Tz’utujil speaker. Nineteen other Mayan groups live in Guatemala, each linguistically distinct. Because of the rivalries and conflicts among Mayans, Ms. Menchú had to win over Mayan voters just like any other outsider.

Read the rest.

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Bolivia;
Simon Romero, also at the NYT, says that Evo Morales is bringing stability to Bolivia.

Unfortunately Evo’s vision for Bolivia involves totalitarianism, reliance on oil and gas (and coca) instead of economic development and wealth creation, and closer ties with Iran,

On the political front, critics say Mr. Morales is tilting toward authoritarianism, with rough verbal treatment of opponents and a proposal by supporters to be re-elected indefinitely. And some policies seem erratic and inspired by President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, like his moves this month to establish diplomatic ties with Iran while announcing visa requirements for American visitors.

“Chávez sees the creation of a great Latin American fatherland, a vision that I share,” said Mr. Morales, defending his aid from Venezuela, while criticizing foreign assistance that requires conditions like coca eradication. He remains the leader of the Federacion del Tropico, saying he would return to growing coca when his presidency ends.

Meanwhile, last month the parliamentarians came to blows over corruption. It won’t be the last time.

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Brazil:
Aside from becoming a propaganda vehilce, I see no benefit to the government opening a government-run TV station in a country with 600 TV channels.

Special thanks to Eneas of Hispanic American Center for Economic Research for the links.
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Bullsh*t headline of the day: "Venezuela’s aid to Latin America exceeds that of U.S."

The AP’s Natalie Obiko Pearson and Ian James got the bullsh*t by the horns, and they’re tooting Hugo’s “charismatic-leader-helping-the-poor-offering-free-health-care-education-adult-literacy-and-job-training-initiatives-that-help-millions-of-[insert country name here]” fantasy (emphasis added):

Bolstered by windfall oil profits, Chavez’s government is now offering more direct state funding to Latin America and the Caribbean than the United States. A tally by The Associated Press shows Venezuela has pledged more than $8.8 billion in aid, financing and energy funding so far this year.

Promises, promises.

After whetting our appetites, however, AP has a brief reality check:

While the most recent figures available from Washington show $3 billion in U.S. grants and loans reached the region in 2005, it isn’t known how much of the Venezuelan money has actually been delivered. And Chavez’s spending abroad doesn’t come close to the overall volume of U.S. private investment and trade in Latin America.

Or the billion$$$ in remesas (private money transfers) the legal and illegal immigrants to the USA are sending their relatives in Latin America daily.

Gustavo Coronel explains how Hugo Chavez’s Big Splurge: Buying Few Real Friends. Of course, Ian hasn’t read that one.

Ian’s the guy that did the puff piece on Hugo and Sean’s Excellent Adventure earlier this month.

Meanwhile, Ian’s way behind the times: The NYT is starting to wake up They’ve noticed a change

Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez has taken over from Fidel Castro the mantle of Latin America’s leading opponent of the United States, which remains the largest customer for Venezuela’s oil.

And they’re not happy:

Mr. Chavez’s claim that he is increasing “participatory democracy” by giving voice to Venezuela’s disenfranchised poor rests on gestures like the proposal to create grass-roots governing councils with executive authority over a range of issues. In fact, they would further erode democratic checks and balances by stripping power from state and local governments, where opposition parties retain some vestigial power, and giving it to entities dependent on the central government.

Indeed, Mr. Chavez’s plan to allow himself to run for re-election as many times as he wants – to achieve his stated goal of governing until the 200th anniversary of Venezuelan independence in 2021 – could lock Venezuela in the grip of an all-powerful strongman for years to come. It’s participatory democracy in which only Mr. Chávez and his friends get to participate.

But the AP’s notoriously gullible: Notice how they say, Castro Signs Essay Amid Health Rumors, as if they had witnesses to that action.

Over in Bolivia the coca leaves, the production over which Evo’s union leader, re making predictions: the coca leaves predict Castro will recover.

I kid you not.

I fully expect Ian and Natalie to have faith in Evo and his coca leaves.

The Bolivians, however are not as enthralled over the Bolivian politcal situation. Indeed, they’re in the midst of a political crisis.

(Re the use of bullsh*t on the headline: Long-time readers of this blog know that I strive to keep a certain level of discourse. However, words have meaning, and the meaning really applies in this situation.)

———————————————————–

In a somewhat related item, when I posted about Hugo and Sean’s Excellent Adventure, I applauded Maria Conchita Alonso.

Maria Conchita became a naturalized American citizen last week, and has declared herself an enemy of populist governments (link in Spanish).

Unfortunately she forgot her panties (link in Spanish). Let’s hope she finds her way.

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Remember those Cuban doctors Fidel sent to Venezuela?

Via Mike’s America,
Growing numbers of Cuban doctors sent overseas to work are defecting to the USA

A large number of the defectors have fled from Venezuela, which has received some 14 000 Cuban medical professionals, more than the rest of the world combined. Currently, dozens have sought refuge in neighbouring Colombia, often living in precarious conditions, while they await permission to enter the USA.

Andres paid a price to get to Colombia. He and his wife had been assigned to the city of Punto Fijo on the northwestern coast of Venezuela, not far from the border. Their escape went smoothly until they reached the frontier, where Venezuelan guards refused to permit them to cross because the visas on their passports were valid only for travel within Venezuela. Only after Andres bribed the agents with nearly all their possessions did the guards let them leave Venezuela. “We gave them all the money we had, cellular phones, watches, and they let us cross”, he said. “We were in Colombia and we had reached freedom. We felt free.”

Andres and his wife were fortunate because not all defecting Cubans get across the border but are, instead, arrested and shipped back home. Once across the border, however, Andres and his wife found themselves stranded in north east Colombia’s harsh Guajira desert without contacts or money to continue travel. Eventually, however, they were given a lift by truckers, who carried them to the capital, Bogota.

In Bogota, Andres has lived with two other defectors in an unused storage room provided by a church group. They have also received assistance from the UN High Commission for Refugees. But, as they wait for their US visas, many of the Cubans are fearful because of their uncertain legal status in Colombia, whose government has given few of them refugee status.

The working conditions are those of slave labor:

Several Cuban defectors interviewed in Bogota said that they fled not only because of oppression in their own nation, but also because of unreasonably poor and demanding work conditions in Venezuela. Andres said that he could not stand the conditions in Venezuela, where he lived in a crowded house with a leaky straw roof which he shared with fifteen other Cuban doctors waiting to be put to work.
…
The doctors also said that in Venezuela, Cuban minders monitored their movements, prohibiting non-work contact with Venezuelans. When not at work, the Cubans were required to be at home after 6 pm. One couple said that after they pointed out some problems with the programme, officials threatened to send them back to Cuba in retaliation.

The Cubans said that the programme they worked in, called “Inside the Barrio”, was also plagued with mismanagement and inefficiency. Although many clinics were severely understaffed, newly-arrived medics sometimes sat for months waiting for assignment to a post, they said, and often conditions in the clinics were rudimentary lacking even basic medicines.

And they’re fleeing from Bolivia, too.

Read the article. Earlier this year the WaPo had

You should also bear in mind that Cuba’s suffering shortages of healthcare workers because one-fifth of Cuba’s health care labor supply – some 14,000 doctors and 6,000 health workers – has been contracted out to work in Venezuela. In return for these medical services, Cuba receives 90,000 barrels of discounted oil per day.

Chew on that the next time you read/hear about the charismatic-leader-helping-the-poor-offering-free-health-care-education-adult-literacy-and-job-training-initiatives-that-help-millions-of-Venezuelans/Cubans/Bolivians, and every time you hear about the excellent Cuban healthcare and other myths.

Too bad the folks who have been playing SICKO at the downtown movie theater for the past 5 weeks, and the folks who watch the movie don’t care much about reality.

Update
Slide show: Cuban Healthcare in Decline (h/t The Real Cuba).

Update, Friday 27 July
More on the Sicko Propanganda.

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Don’t snow for me, Argentina, and today’s Latin American items

UPDATED

Reading the news, you would think Al was in the Southern Hemisphere:

Buenos Aires sees rare snowfall

Argentina’s capital, Buenos Aires, has seen snow for the first time in 89 years, as a cold snap continues to grip several South American nations.
Temperatures plunged to -22C (-8F) in parts of Argentina’s province of Rio Negro, while snow fell on Buenos Aires for several hours on Monday.
…
In Bolivia, heavy snowfall blocked the nation’s main motorway and forced the closure of several airports.
…
In Chile, temperatures dropped to -18C (0F) in parts of Araucania region in the south.

Last month The Economist was reporting about Peru’s poor infrastructure. Infrastructure problems are more evident now that the Peruvians are chilly, too,

Cold snap prompts Peru emergencyThe Peruvian government has declared a state of emergency in several Andean regions hit by unusually cold weather.

Of course, it’s all due to climate change

Scientists say the unseasonable droughts, heavy rains and frosts are due to climate change.

I’ve known all along that the weather is constantly changing, and I’m not a even a scientist (but I’m married to one).

Now, whether climate change = global warming, that’s another crock altogether.

Not worried about the carbon footprint, Evo wants to drill in a Bolivian national park, the Madidi:
This photo is captioned,
Activists want sustainable development in the constitution.

Of course they do.

In financial news, Argentina’s inflation rate is about 7 percentage points higher than what is being officially reported, even when The Economist reports that

Helped by high prices for its farm exports, Argentina has recovered vigorously from its economic collapse of 2001-02. Unemployment has fallen from a peak of 21% to 10% (excluding those on workfare programmes); today, 27% of Argentines live in poverty, compared with more than half in 2002.

The BBC says that Cuba’s municipal elections will be held on 21 October, and that

This marks the start of an electoral process which could clarify early next year whether his brother Fidel Castro will resume power as head of state.

Let me explain a thing or two:

  • Since Castro took power in 1959, Cuba has not held free elections
  • They’re not about to start

    Cuban tourism is flagging since Cuba is not as cheap as people are led to believe.

    Of course a round-up of Latin American news must include Venezuela:
    Jane’s Intelligence reports,

    Oiling the axis – Iran and Venezuela develop closer ties
    This Iran-Venezuela alliance within OPEC has caused friction with Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest oil exporter and a nominal ally of the US, which favours more modest crude prices by seeking higher output. Nonetheless, the Venezuelan and Iranian goal of higher prices has come about owing to a number of factors, including a lack of refinery capacity, geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, an increase in demand and climatic conditions, helping to drive up the price of crude oil from around USD28 per barrel in 2000 to an average of USD65 during 2006.

    Caracas and Tehran have found common cause in favouring higher oil prices for political ends: as a lever to pull the balance of power away from oil-consuming countries, especially the US, which is still the world’s biggest consumer.

    According to Alberto Garrido, a Venezuelan political analyst who has charted the historical rise of Ch�vez: “Chavez sees himself and Ahmadinejad as brothers defining a strategic anti-US alliance that is part of an ambitious and well-structured global project.”

    Chavez’s Plans Worry Catholic Leaders, and they should be worried.

    However, there might be good news for Mercosur:

    Mercosur: A falling-out with Hugo Chávez could be good news for a paralysed trade group

    Mr Chavez’s absence from Asuncion may, however, mark a turning point. He took umbrage at a resolution passed by Brazil’s Senate criticising his recent silencing of the main opposition television channel. Brazil’s Congress (like Paraguay’s) has yet to ratify Venezuela’s entry to Mercosur, and after insults from Mr Chávez is unlikely to do so soon. That leaves Venezuela in the oxymoronic situation of being a “full member in process of accession”. Mr Chávez said this week that he would withdraw Venezuela’s application unless it was approved in three months. He seems interested in Mercosur chiefly as a political platform. Free trade would expose the big inefficiencies engendered by his statist economic policy.

    I continue to be optimistic about Lula:

    Since Lula’s re-election last October Brazil’s foreign policy has seemed more pragmatic and less driven by leftist ideology. Lula has not concealed his irritation with Mr Chávez’s antics. There is no sign yet that Brazil’s president wants a clear breach with his oil-rich friend and rival. But if Mr Chávez’s brinkmanship backfires, that might just be the best thing that has happened to Mercosur for years.

    A while ago when I read that the Immigration Bill exempted illegals from paying back taxes, I said I should have declared myself an illegal alien. Here’s yet another reason: Mexican Migrants Take Free Flight Home

    Hernandez was one of 74 migrants who flew to the Mexican capital Monday under a U.S. summer program, now in its fourth year, that gives participants free transportation all the way to their hometowns instead of simply deporting them back across the border.

    A little bit of r&r, and it starts all over again:

    Hernandez said he volunteered to get a free trip to rest and visit his family in the Pacific coast state of Guerrero. In a couple of weeks, he said, he’ll try his luck again in the desert.

    At the blogs
    Gateway Pundit: FARC Leader Palmero Found Guilty in US Courts

    Venezuela News and Views: RCTV comes back, sort of, while Globovision fights back to stay

    Now, what does that mean exactly? Not much. Cable, even if Supercable were to be included, does not reach 25% of Venezuelan homes. Even adding Internet (by the way, those who can watch RCTV through Internet and YouTube certainly can afford cable), even adding those who steal the signal of some cable company, no more than 30% of Venezuelan homes have access to some form of cable TV, and mostly in upper income areas: poorer areas simply cannot afford a cable bill unless a few pool together and steal the signal with the complicity of the payer. One of the reasons by the way why you see many Direct TV satellite dishes in the barrios is that Direct TV signal cannot be stolen that easily. Besides, installing expensive and vulnerable ground line in popular district is a deterrent for other systems than Direct TV. The paradox is that the poor are forced to buy the more expensive satellite system if they want to escape Chavez blabber.

    The result is that RCTV will go from a 100% national coverage to a 30% coverage AT BEST. With the consequent decrease in advertising revenue. The implications for RCTV is that it will be difficult to keep its large staff and producing capabilities and news coverage, at least as long as it does not manage to sell enough production overseas. Right now, outside the US and Colombia I do not see that many buyers for anything Venezuelan except soap operas.

    Now go read that whole post, and also Housing in Venezuela: propaganda and reality.

    The Devil’s Excrement: Not much new, but for some submarines and more conflicts

    Publius Pundit: Ecuador: If you have to deny you’re an idiot…

    Memo to Rafael Correa: If, as head of state, you have to deny being stupid to the author of a book whose title is ‘The Idiot Returns‘ where he’s made you Exhibit A, it’s a pretty forgone conclusion that you are even stupider than you were written about! If you had a lick of sense, and you don’t, you might like to keep it all as quiet as possible.

    I don’t have a link to The Idiot Returns, but here’s the first one in the series,

    Sorry, Colombia! is up and running. Please go visit. Also don’t miss my two latest podcasts, on human rights in Cuba, and on Colombia, Congress and the FTA with Robert Mayer of Publius Pundit and Sorry, Colombia!.

    Meanwhile, way up North, Canada asserts its claim to territorial waters in the Arctic,and they’re staking out their borders.

    Update
    A Jacksonian’s must-read.

    Here’s a video of the UN Human Rights Council move last month to remove Cuba and Belarus from its blacklist (h/t UN Referendum):

    Update 2
    The Democrats’ Colombia Agenda by Mary Anastasia O’Grady

    In the five years between the 2002 kidnapping of 12 state legislators by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the rebels’ recent announcement that 11 of those hostages have been killed, much has changed for the better in Colombia. The lawmakers were taken at a time when the state was very weak. Their murders, on the other hand, appear to be a desperate act by a frustrated band of thugs who have failed to achieve their desired results with terror.

    Colombia today is significantly more secure and economically healthier than it was in 2002. Yet as events in recent weeks reminded us, two dark clouds remain parked over the country.

    The first is the ruthlessness of organized crime networks like the FARC, which have blossomed during the U.S. war against cocaine. Thanks to the policy of prohibition coupled with strong demand, the FARC remains a well-funded menace even though it has no popular support.

    The second source of trouble — most recently evidenced by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s announcement that her party will block the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement — is the unrelenting opposition of Congressional Democrats to anything that could be considered helpful to defeating terror and putting Colombia on surer economic footing.

    The U.S. war on drugs, which is backed by both Republicans and Democrats and blames Colombia for the fact that Americans use cocaine, is immoral on its own. But as the guerrillas have gotten into the narcotics trafficking business, Democrats have added insult to injury by arrogantly micromanaging the war from Washington with advice from left-wing NGOs. Passed in 1997, the Leahy Law (named for Sen. Patrick Leahy, D., Vt.) mandates that any officer charged with “credible allegations” of human-rights violations be relieved of his command lest the country lose its U.S. aid to the military. It didn’t take the rebels long to see opportunity in the law. They promptly began ginning up accusations against the country’s finest generals. It didn’t matter that the evidence almost always turned out to be suborned perjury. Careers were destroyed and the armed forces leadership gutted.

    President Álvaro Uribe, who took office in August 2002, recognized what was happening and set out to rebuild the military, strengthen the presence of the state and end any speculation that the government might seek a path of appeasement in the face of violence. He has made great progress. The guerrillas are now back on their heels and kidnapping and murder rates are down substantially. Bear Stearns analyst Tim Kearney, who just returned from a trip to Colombia reports that the economy is “firing on all cylinders” due to “a combination of a better security environment, as well as the government’s market-oriented reforms.” He adds that, “with investment driving a powerful rebound, we now think that real GDP growth will reach 6.4% in 2007.”

    If Colombia’s hard left was upset before with Mr. Uribe, this has really stirred up the nest. Their only hope is help from Washington so they are returning to what worked before, this time recyling tired old charges that the president has links to paramilitary groups and insisting that the government has been protecting assassins who target union leaders.

    Democrats seem only too happy to help. They can’t invoke the Leahy Law against civilians but blocking the FTA in the name of “human rights” is just as good. It satisfies the “sandalistas,” who still dream of a Cuban revolution for all of Latin America, and it makes the most important Democratic Party constituent, the AFL-CIO, happy by knocking off any threat of new international competition.

    This may be good for shoring up the Democrat’s base but it is harmful to U.S. geopolitical interests in the Western Hemisphere and to an important U.S. ally and it will dash the hopes for a better life of millions of impoverished Colombians. Either the Democrats have very poor foreign policy judgment or they have sympathy for the devil.

    Read every word, and watch the video included in that post.

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    One-Way U.S. Trade For Ecuador?, asks IBD

    Ecuador’s president, Rafael Correa, who wants to dissolve his country’s Congress by an assembly with powers to rewrite the volatile nation’s constitution, a la Hugo, is knocking at our door asking for free trade:

    Presidents Rafael Correa of Ecuador and Evo Morales of Bolivia, are both running notoriously anti-American regimes. They have blasted the U.S. as a capitalist oppressor, and said their whole national mission is to slip its imperialist shackles. Needless to say, they’ve been no friend to the U.S. in the United Nations. Worse yet, they’ve forged alliances with some of America’s worst enemies, like Iran and Cuba. They’ve also grown increasingly slack and obstructive in even fighting the drug war that plagues the entire Andean region. Morales has increased coca production by 8%, keeping the street price of cocaine steady even as Colombia’s production falls 9%. Ecuador has emerged as a major drug transshipment point and money laundering center – something that is evident by its well-developed illegal immigrant smuggling routes to the U.S., which are the region’s best. Ecuador has announced “irrevocably” that it will shut down a tiny U.S. military base at Manta port that tracks drug planes, in order to kick out the U.S. imperialists.

    But in exchange for fighting the war on drugs, they’ve both been recipients of large amounts of U.S. aid in 2006 – $120 million in Bolivia’s case and $500 million in Ecuador’s. Along with this aid, which is both humanitarian and technical, they both have preferential “ATPDEA” trading privileges to sell their goods duty-free in the U.S. without having to reciprocate the favor to American firms.

    With a setup like that, they can, in practical terms, reject and obstruct the idea of real free trade, which would ask them to open their markets to U.S. competition, as long as they retain their current trade privileges. Thus, America’s generosity to them has provided a platform for them to condemn real free trade with impunity. But under the radar, they feverishly want a continuation of these one-way US trading privileges, which is why they’re suddenly telling America they never really meant it about the ‘imperialismo’ charges and all that as the expiration beckons.

    Investor’s Business Daily has more:
    Foreign Relations: Should the U.S. offer preferential trade privileges to hostile anti-American regimes that view them as cheap handouts? Offering nothing in return, Ecuador thinks so. We are less sure

    The U.S. doesn’t ask much from Ecuador. Sandwiched between Colombia and Peru, Ecuador has only provided a tiny “forward operating base” at the port of Manta, with 300 U.S. troops conducting aerial surveillance to keep Colombia’s FARC Marxist narcoterrorists from bringing war to Ecuador as they have to their own country.

    Instead of helping on that front, Ecuador now vows to shut down the Manta base and let the skies there go unpatrolled.

    The Manta shutdown ends any rationale for APTDEA. So does Correa’s refusal to recognize the FARC as a terrorist organization or to chase its operatives from Ecuadorean soil.

    Worse, Ecuador has harassed Colombia with lawsuits as it tries to eradicate coca fields, making Colombia’s war that much harder.

    Read both.

    In other, “Gimme, gimme!” news, Castro Says U.S. Must Change Its Cuba Policy `Unilaterally’.
    But, is he still wearing his jogging suit?

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