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Topic: Elections could tilt Latin America further left
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robbie_dee
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 195
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posted 10 December 2005 10:58 AM
New York Times( login: babblers8 , password: audrarules ) quote: Since a bombastic army colonel, Hugo Chávez, won office in Venezuela in 1998, three-quarters of South America has shifted to the left, though most countries are led by pragmatic presidents like Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in Brazil and Néstor Kirchner in Argentina.That decisive shift has a good chance of spreading to Bolivia, Ecuador and, for the first time in recent years, north of the Panama Canal. In Nicaragua, the Sandinistas, led by Daniel Ortega, are positioning themselves to win back the presidency they lost in 1990. Farther north, in Mexico, polls show that Andrés Manuel López Obrador, a hard-charging leftist populist, may replace the business-friendly president, Vicente Fox, who is barred from another term. Traditional, market-friendly politicians can still win in all these countries. But polls show a general leftward drift that could bring policies sharply deviating from longstanding American economic remedies like unfettered trade and privatization, better known as the Washington Consensus. "The left is contesting in a very practical way for political power," said Jim Shultz, executive director of Democracy Center, a policy analysis group in Bolivia. "There's a common thread that runs through Lula and Kirchner and Chávez and Evo, and the left in Chile to a certain degree, and that thread is a popular challenge to the market fundamentalism of the Washington Consensus."
From: Iron City | Registered: Apr 2001
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robbie_dee
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 195
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posted 11 December 2005 02:19 PM
quote: Originally posted by jrootham: Because we are not being killed or starved at the rate common in South America.
Yeah, I know and I am grateful for that actually. But is that it, really? Canadians don't see the most brutal side of the Empire so they are more inclined to tolerate it? It's not like neoliberalism hasn't hurt Canada at all. (edited to make clear who I was responding to). [ 11 December 2005: Message edited by: robbie_dee ]
From: Iron City | Registered: Apr 2001
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M. Spector
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 8273
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posted 11 December 2005 03:21 PM
Venezuela's Chávez has been actively reaching out to other Latin American countries and forging alliances, promoting his "Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas," known as ALBA.This is fertile territory for Chávez; 43% of the population of Latin America - are poor, with 96 million (nearly one in five) living on less than a dollar a day. George W. Bush is the most unpopular president in Latin America in history, especially in Argentina, which is still ravaged by an economic meltdown widely attributed to the International Monetary Fund. The USian push for a FTAA agreement (Free Trade Area of the Americas) is meeting a great deal of skepticism, and creating a polarization between Washington and Caracas. More countries are gravitating towards Caracas: quote: Regional integration has built stronger relationships of trust among Latin American and Caribbean nations, looking to solve development problems by investing in their workforces and pooling collective resources.... It is grounded in the principles of complementarity (rather than competition), solidarity (instead of domination), cooperation (not exploitation), and respect for sovereignty (instead of corporate rule).As a concept, ALBA is based on the notion that Latin American countries can be stronger when they are united with each other rather than competing for the honor of top US lapdog. And in practice, ALBA is based on grassroots citizen participation, as the citizenry are both the implementers and the beneficiaries of the agreements under the banner of ALBA. Petrosur is probably the most well-known of these agreements, an expansion of an historic program between Venezuela and Mexico with the poorest of Latin American nations to provide low-cost oil to poor Caribbean and Central American nations, and allow them to pay back with favorable financing or with goods and services. This program has especially borne fruit between Cuba and Venezuela, where the latter has benefited from about 20,000 Cuban doctors and nurses providing free, preventative health care to 17 million Venezuelans, as well as assisting in the literacy program that has just taught over 1.5 million Venezuelan elders how to read and write. Source
From: One millihelen: The amount of beauty required to launch one ship. | Registered: Feb 2005
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jrootham
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 838
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posted 11 December 2005 03:38 PM
quote: Canadians don't see the most brutal side of the Empire so they are more inclined to tolerate it?
To be a little clearer. Most Canadians are relatively well off. In 2000 the median family income was $55,000. It requires 2 or more incomes to do that in many (most?) cases, but it is still fairly well off. Given that, people are likely to support the current system since any change might put them at risk of losing. The median was essentially flat between 1990 and 2000, meaning that inequality is rising. If the median actually falls I would expect a lot of flailing around for solutions. As long as a bad solution doesn't take things apart completely I expect a good solution will eventually be found. Then again, if we look at individuals things are not so good. $23,600 and falling. I gotta figure there are a lot of 3,4, and 5 income familys out there. Family source Individual source [ 11 December 2005: Message edited by: jrootham ]
From: Toronto | Registered: Jun 2001
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Geneva
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 3808
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posted 19 December 2005 06:24 AM
in Argentina, the "pragmatic"" Kirchner is indeed safe electorally for a while, given the country's strong economic recovery from the catastrophe of 2001: http://tinyurl.com/b685vThe real economy Now in its third year of recovery from the 2001 devaluation, Argentina again shows a high, 8% annual rate of economic expansion, ... This pronounced recovery is in answer to sustained employment and private salary expansion since mid-2003, public employment increases, and an improved medium-range outlook since the second trimester’s virtual ending of the default. Stronger than 2003’s nearly one million net-term new jobs, employment level recovery has recorded almost a million new jobs, along with another 700,000 newly-employed in 2004, and somewhat less than 300,000 in 2005. Employment expansion was accompanied by formal sector salary increases of 21.9% by the end of 2005 .... [ 19 December 2005: Message edited by: Geneva ]
From: um, well | Registered: Feb 2003
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M. Spector
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 8273
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posted 02 January 2006 04:07 AM
2006: The Year of Living Democratically quote: Latin America is radicalizing, and it's largely a product of the economic havoc wreaked upon the region's majority poor by the US model, the so-called "Washington consensus," and all the Washington consensuses before it. In the coming year, there will be ten Presidential elections in Latin America. The concentration of elections in a single year and the very real possibility of movements and parties antagonistic to the US project winning makes the 2006 Presidential election cycle unprecedented. Haiti, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Mexico, Nicaragua and Venezuela all feature strong left-leaning candidates that could potentially pursue autonomous policies once in office. If even half of these candidates are victorious, Latin America's political map would be completely redrawn, and no amount of obfuscation could hide such a resounding rejection of US-promoted economic policies. To avoid this, the US is depending on "democracy promotion" to subvert this explosion of genuine democratic suffrage and self-determination. Governmental and quasi-governmental institutions such as the Agency for International Development (USAID) and the NED are already funneling grant money and technical expertise to friendly civil society groups, NGOs and political parties in an attempt to steer elections away from the left.
From: One millihelen: The amount of beauty required to launch one ship. | Registered: Feb 2005
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