Washington Still Has Problems With Democracy in Latin America

By Mark Weisbrot - CEPR:

Imagine if Barack Obama, upon taking office in January 2009, had decided to deliver on his campaign promise to “end business as usual in Washington so we can bring about real change.”

Imagine if he had rejected the architects of the pro-Wall Street policies that led to the economic collapse - such as Larry Summers, Tim Geithner, and the stable of former Goldman Sachs employees running the Treasury Department - and instead appointed Nobel Prize-winning economists Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz to key positions, including the Federal Reserve chairmanship.

Instead of Hillary Clinton, who lost the Democratic presidential primary because of her unrelenting support for the Iraq war, imagine if he had chosen Sen. Russ Feingold (D., Wis.) for secretary of state, or someone else interested in fulfilling the popular desire to get out of Afghanistan.

Imagine a real health-care reform bill instead of the health-insurance reform we got - one that didn't give the powerful pharmaceutical and insurance lobbies a veto.

It goes without saying that Obama would be vilified by the major media outlets. The seething hostility of Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh would be matched by more mainstream news organizations, which would accuse the president of polarizing the nation and engaging in dangerous demagoguery.

With most of the establishment media and institutions against him, Obama would face a constant battle for political survival - although he might well triumph through direct, populist appeals to the majority of voters. This is what a number of left-of-center Latin American leaders have done:

In Ecuador, President Rafael Correa was reelected by a large margin in 2009, despite strong opposition from the country’s media.

In Bolivia, Evo Morales has brought stability and record growth to a country with a tradition of governments that didn’t last more than a year. And he has done so in spite of the most hostile media in the hemisphere, as well as unrelenting, sometimes violent opposition from Bolivia’s traditional elite.

And Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has survived a military coup attempt and other efforts to topple his government, winning three presidential elections, each one by a larger margin.

All these presidents took on entrenched oligarchies and fought hard to deliver on their promises.

Morales, the first indigenous president in a country with an indigenous majority, re-nationalized fossil-fuel industries, created jobs through public investment, and won approval of a more democratic constitution. Correa doubled spending on health care and canceled $3.2 billion in foreign debt that he declared illegitimate. Under Chavez, who took control of his country’s oil industry, poverty was cut in half, and extreme poverty dropped by more than 70 percent.

These presidents faced another obstacle to delivering on their promises that Obama would not: the opposition of the most powerful country in the world. The same was true of former Argentine President Nestor Kirchner, who had to battle the Washington-dominated International Monetary Fund to implement his economic policies, which made Argentina the fastest-growing economy in the hemisphere for six years.

Chavez, of course, has been the most demonized in the U.S. media. That is not because of what he has said or done, but because he is sitting on 100 billion barrels of oil. Washington has a particular problem with oil-producing states that don't follow orders - whether they are dictatorships (Iraq), theocracies (Iran), or democracies (Venezuela).

All of these leaders had hoped Obama would pursue a different, more enlightened Latin American policy, but that hasn’t happened. It seems that Washington, which was comfortable with the dictators and oligarchs who ran the show in the region for decades, still has problems with democracy in its former “back yard.”

Mark Weisbrot is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, in Washington, D.C. He received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Michigan. He has written numerous research papers on economic policy, especially on Latin America and international economic policy. He is co-author, with Dean Baker, of Social Security: The Phony Crisis (University of Chicago Press, 2000) and president of Just Foreign Policy. He is also co-writer of Oliver Stone’s current documentary, “South of the Border,” now playing in theaters. He can be reached at weisbrot@cepr.net.

Source: Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR)

July 19th 2010

venezuelanalysis

Bahamas Blog International

A Tale Of Two Extraditions

By Saul Landau - Z Space

The US government demanded that Jamaican Prime Minister Bruce Golding extradite a drug dealer. When Venezuela made similar demands on Washington, for arguably the Hemisphere’s most notorious terrorist, the Justice Department brushed off the request.

Compare the recent arrest in Jamaica of “Dudus” (Christopher Coke) to stand trial in New York for drug and arms trafficking to Washington’s response to Venezuela’s extradition petition for Luis Posada Carriles, aka the Osama bin Laden of the Western Hemisphere for plotting the October 6, 1976 bombing of a Cuban commercial airliner over Barbados. All 73 crew and passengers died.

Evidence abounds pointing to his culpability including declassified cables from the CIA. An October 12, 1976 CIA cable from Caracas states that “Posada was overheard to say that `Now we are going to hit a Cuban airplane’.”

22 years later, Posada told NY Times reporters Ann Bardach and Larry Rohter (July13, 1998) he had orchestrated a series of hotel bombings in Cuba to dissuade tourism. An Italian tourist died in one of the blasts.

Posada’s captured underlings – arrested by police after the bombs exploded -- named him as the criminal author. A recent New Jersey Federal Grand Jury gathered evidence showing Posada used money and personnel from Miami to carry out the hotel bombings.

However, instead of charging him with terrorism and conspiracy to commit murder Justice invented a legal inanity and charged Posada with immigration fraud: lying to US officials when he entered the United States in 2004. Since then, the Justice Department has created reasons to delay the case – perhaps as Jose Pertierra suggests, so he will die before going to trial. http://machetera.wordpress.com/2010/06/22/waiting-for-posada-carriles-to...

Compare this dallying with a bona fide terrorist to the “extradite Dudus or else” position taken with Jamaica’s government. Jamaican security forces killed some 70 residents trying to capture Dudus in his Kingston neighborhood. But Washington refuses to extradite the mass murderer Posada.

As Washington intimidated Jamaica’s government over Dudus the drug and gun peddler they ignored the fact that millions of US citizens consume drugs imported from Jamaica; and US banks that launder money from the trade.

But a more sinister fact underlines the Dudus and Posada cases. Both of criminals owe their careers to Washington’s 50 year war against Cuba.

In 1976, Prime Minister Michael Manley told me during the filming of his campaign film, of an unusual invitation. In January 1976, Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, vacationing at the Rockefeller estate in Jamaica, invited Manley to visit to convince him to withdraw his support of Cuban troops in Angola. (Castro had sent troops there in October 1975 at the Angolan government’s request to stop CIA and South African invasions of that newly independent African country.) Kissinger’s grimaced as Manley reiterated his backing for Castro’s Africa policies.

“He then assured me,” Manley chuckled, “I should not worry about CIA activities in Jamaica.” But, he said, some interesting “coincidences” occurred shortly after the visit.

Norman Descoteaux arrived to head the CIA station in Kingston, an expert on destabilization campaigns in South America. As journalists arrived in Kingston to cover World Bank and IMF meetings, violence exploded in Kingston’s western slums. Tourists exposed to the media accounts would have had good reason to change plans for a Jamaican vacation. Soon afterward, security forces arrested armed youth who admitted they were getting trained to attack the government, Other gunmen killed two policemen.

Manley applied “heavy manners.” He revived a special court permitting the arrest without bail of persons with unlicensed firearms and formed unarmed, community self-defense groups. The CIA learned from its “mistakes,” however.

In Manley’s 1980 campaign for re-election, the violence far exceeded the 1976 carnage. I heard the nightly roar of gunfire in Kingston streets and filmed people weeping for  their dead kin outside a recently torched housing project in a pro-Manley district. Thousands died in that pre-election period. The gangs bought by Manley’s opponent, Edward Seaga, and the CIA successfully destabilized the government.

Manley lost; Seaga became Prime Minister and the first foreign visitor to the Reagan White House.

Dudus’ father, Lester, emerged from the violence campaigns as head of the Shower Posse (they sprayed their victims with automatic weapons) in West Kingston. Having secured a political alliance with the winner in 1980, and possessing arms from the CIA, he began dealing drugs and weapons.

So powerful had the posse become – now under Dudis the son -- that Labor Party chief and now Prime Minister Bruce Golding tried to defuse the US extradition request for nine months. The State Department assured him that continued resistance would endanger US-Jamaican relations (aid money) and his political career.

But Washington sneers at Venezuelan pressure just as George H. W. Bush in 1990 derided his own Justice Department’s strong advice against pardoning Orlando Bosch, Posada’s co-conspirator in the airline bombing. Judges play along with the charade. One magistrate, without fact or testimony, ruled against Posada's extradition to Venezuela because Posada’s lawyer claimed Venezuela would torture him “while in custody."

The Caribbean states (Caricom) called the 1976 Cubana airline bombing “terrorism in Caribbean airspace.” Ricky Siingh writing in the Jamaica Observer said “no double standards on implementation of bilateral extradition treaties should be permitted on the part of Jamaica and the USA in the case of Christopher Coke; or that involving Venezuela and America for the extradition of Posada.” June 20?? Accusing the United States of double standards is like charging a prostitute with having sex. Indeed, US behavior in the Posada case gives hypocrisy a bad name.

Hubris with Jamaica over a druggie! The stalling game played with Venezuela over a terrorist! Wouldn’t it be nice to live in a nation of law?

Landau directed Michael Manley’s campaign films in 1976 and 1980. Counterpunch published his A BUSH AND BOTOX WORLD.

Source: Z Communications

July 19th 2010

venezuelanalysis

Bahamas Blog International

The roots of The Bahamas' crime epidemic

The roots of our crime epidemic
By PACO NUNEZ
Tribune News Editor:



BAHAMIANS are afraid. A recently circulated questionnaire revealed a public "deeply troubled" by the explosion of crime and violence in society.

Crime has been unacceptably high for decades, but over the past few years it has reached unprecedented levels. Many now say they feel like prisoners in their own homes, afraid of being attacked each time they step outside.

As people become increasingly concerned about their safety, calls have mounted for more serious measures to be taken.

Pro-hanging marches have become a common occurrence, and the vast majority of those polled said they believe some form of intervention by foreign law enforcement agencies is now necessary. There have even been murmurs of support for vigilante justice in the face of what is seen as an ineffective judicial system.

Our political class and some senior police officers would have us believe it's not as bad as all that. Admitting that crime is at an all-time high, they say the public perception of danger is nevertheless exaggerated; fear of crime is worse than crime itself. Even if this were true, it is difficult to understand why heightened alarm is in itself a bad thing (except, of course for the reputations of those charged with keeping the public safe). It stands to reason that the more fearful I am - or at least, the more alert and aware - the more likely I am to remain alive and unharmed.

In any case, the newly-released Report on Crime: Root Causes of Crime - an intensive study three years in the making - would seem to contradict this politically convenient narrative. It suggests crime and violence are not only perpetuated at the fringes of society as we have been repeatedly told, but fester at the very core of who we are as a people.

Led by eminent psychologist Dr David Allen, the research team repeated the approach used by the medical journal Lancet in its 1986 report on the cocaine epidemic in the Bahamas. In addition to conducting a series of confidential interviews, the research team organised focus groups consisting of:

* Families of murder victims,

* Those involved in programmes for students guilty of violent or disorderly behaviour,

* Chronic drug addicts,

* Troubled teenagers and parents,

* Public and private psychotherapy groups,

* Church groups,

* Individuals from violent neighbourhoods

The results indicated five primary causes of crime and violence in the Bahamas:

Chronic Violent

Drug Syndrome

The report noted that the Bahamas was the first country outside South America to experience a national crack cocaine addiction problem.

It said: "The chronic violent drug syndrome (CVDS) is the continuing devastating blow delivered to our country by the 1980s cocaine epidemic", noting that similar syndromes exist in Mexico, Colombia, Jamaica, and some US cities including Miami and Washington DC.

CVDS encourages serious crime in a number of ways, primarily through the violence and executions attendant upon the creation and maintenance of drug trafficking empires, "creating fear and panic among the public and empowering the drug barons in turf wars," the study said.

The syndrome also leads to increasing numbers of drug addicts, two thirds of whom are involved in multiple crimes, according to the research. "In and out of prison, these persons are cognitively impaired and find it hard to hold down a job," the study said.

It added that although the rate of new crack addictions does not seem to be increasing at the moment, there is a widespread and growing marijuana epidemic among children age 10 through adolescence. "This destroys educational potential since the brain is not fully developed until the mid-20s."

The study notes that the proliferation of firearms, both legal and illegal, is also a symptom of CVDS. "Guns and drugs go together. Young men tell me that getting a gun is easier than going to the mall," Dr Allen said.

This leads to murder becoming common and life being considered cheap. The drug business is by nature a "kill or be killed" existence and cultivating a dangerous reputation is both a survival tactic in a highly armed society and the primary means of getting ahead in the world.

One reaction to this is the formulation of gangs, which men and women - whether involved in the drug business or not - join for "affirmation, safety, protection, connection and empowerment".

Of course, in such an atmosphere the general work ethic and thereby the concept of personal property eventually cease to have any meaning. "With a gun, what is yours is mine. With a gun even if you lose the dice game, you still win," Dr Allen said.

As a consequence, regular citizens begin to live in fear and therefore decide to seek gun licenses.

The crack cocaine epidemic has also laid siege to the nuclear family in the Bahamas as it engulfs parents, leaving children to fend largely for themselves - particularly in terms of the formation of the ethical dimension of their character. Children remain "un-bonded and lack habilitation and social skills. There is no motivation for education in the home," the study said.

All this leads to sprees of violent crime which are not confined to any sector of society, as "the gun is the law in the drug world".

Anger

Unsurprising considering the consequences of CVDS, the researchers interviewed numerous Bahamians whose immediate response to becoming angry was to talk about killing, poisoning or suicide. This applied to one third of those interviewed, some of whom came from "respectable families".

"We have an anger problem in our midst," the report concluded, adding the frightening assertion that this often renders individuals literally unable to stop themselves from committing violent acts.

Dr Allen explained that poor childhood conditioning can lead to a society in which when individuals feel wounded, "instead of doing our grief work, we give over to destructive anger and shame, leading to resentment, bitterness, hardness of heart and finally grievance. At the grievance point we enter the 'blind spot'.

"My work shows we become possessed by evil or negative energy. Young men who have committed murder or extreme violence describe being taken over by a negative force. . . One man told me, 'All of a sudden I could not stop stabbing him. Looking back, I felt something was controlling me'."

While any explanation of individual behaviour which eliminates personal responsibility from the equation should be approached with extreme caution, the research team behind the study make a strong case for the argument that many young offenders have at least a diminished responsibility, as their behaviour is to some extend governed by factors beyond their control.

The study explained that anger causes diffuse physiological arousal (DPA) - the heart rate increases, blood pressure rises and the pulse quickens. "Because of the intimate connection of the heart to the brain, when the pulse rises 10 per cent above normal, the IQ drops 20 to 30 points," it said.

In addition, a person who lacks appropriate strategies for dealing with anger often suffers from alexithymia, or an inability to express feelings or strong emotions.

"If a person cannot express 'I am angry' or 'I am hurt' they will act it out. For example, a young man who beat a woman said he wanted her to feel what he was feeling. When asked what he was feeling, he said, 'I don't know'," the study noted.

Economic downturn

Men, the study contends, derive a great deal of their self-esteem from their employment.

"Men without work become angry at their wife or girlfriend and the children suffer. Some persons respond by a wish to die (suicide). Although there is no direct causal connection between poverty and crime, there is a clear connection between the loss of money or status and increased rage or suicidal ideation," it said, noting the case of a local woman who said that after recently losing his job, her boyfriend kept a hangman's noose in the bedroom, telling her he could no longer afford to give her what she wanted, "so when the time was right, he would hang himself".

The study added: "Young girls make themselves available to older men in a form of prostitution which is becoming increasingly common. This is seen as an acceptable way to pay for education or family bills, eg, cable, electricity and water".

Affects of child abuse

In an Insight article published last year, Dr Allen said his work over the years has revealed that child abuse is alarmingly widespread in this country.

The study notes that nearly all troubled children are victims of some type of abuse, especially physical and sexual abuse.

Trauma

The study noted that on average, each victim of violence has a "sociophile" of 100 people, including family members, friends, neighbours, et cetera, who are in turn traumatised by the victim's trauma. If one pauses to consider the thousands of violent crimes perpetuated in this country on an annual basis, the number of affected persons is revealed to be truly staggering.

The symptoms of trauma include several which can lead to yet more violent crime, such as:

* Anger and a need for revenge. Dr Allen tells of a woman who rushed into a local shelter wielding a machete and saying someone had just killed her brother. "Because her brother was the supporter of the family and acted like the father she felt obligated to kill his murderer," he explained. Had it not been for the intervention of a member of the research team, the woman might have become a murderer herself.

* Fear of being alone. This often drives young people into the waiting arms of gangs. One young boy interviewed as part of the study said a friend of his was killed because he was alone. "He should have been with his boys," the young man said.

* Magical thinking. Dr Allen said a young boy told him: "If you get stabbed, just hold your chest and you will not die. My friend did it and he lived."

* Short life expectancy. A group of 12 to 15 year-olds told the research team they did not expect to live to be 25 or 30, because they know someone who was killed.

* Glorification of violence. A 15-year-old who stabbed another boy said violence is cool. "If you kill you get stripes and you will only spend six months in jail," he said.

* Suicidal tendencies. When a young person committed suicide, friends said the person was better off, and they wish they could do the same.

* Poor cognitive skills, disinterest in school, inability to concentrates and poor impulse controls. This leads to fights and stabbings, the study found.

Response

According to Dr Allen and his team, what the Bahamas must do is replace this culture of violence and destruction with one of "life and hope". In light of the formidable obstacles to such a transition outlined in the study, this is by no means an easy task.

Dr Allen suggests that we need to develop leaders in all segments of this community; individuals who "absorb chaos, exude calm and instill hope".

He added: "Studies show that child abuse can be greatly reduced by neighbourhood walkarounds. If every church adopted the community around their church, and did weekly walkabouts they would observe child abuse, neglect and other crimes in the making. This is a powerful crime prevention process. Using this methodology, since there is a church on every corner, we could revolutionise the Bahamas in three years."

Dr Allen also recommended that we teach people the skills necessary to deal with anger and trauma peacefully and constructively, beginning with simple steps like dealing with provocation by slow breathing and visualisation techniques.

The question is, how can a society driven by traumatic circumstances to cynicism and hard-heartedness ever open up to such methods?

This is a problem we will probably continue to struggle with, if not forever, at least for the foreseeable future. One thing, however, is certain - we will never solve it by pretending that crime and violence are the purview of a small, fringe element of society.

Violent crime may not exist in all places at all times, but the seeds of aggression and criminality have been sown into the very fabric of the Bahamian character over the past few decades and no one is immune to the consequences. The sooner we admit this and get on with finding the best way to tackle it, the better.

What do you think?

pnunez@tribunemedia.net

July 19, 2010

tribune242

Bahamas Blog International

22 Statistics That Prove That The Middle Class Is Being Systematically Wiped Out Of Existence In America

By Michael T. Snyder:

The 22 statistics that you are about to read prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the middle class is being systematically wiped out of existence in America. The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer at a staggering rate. Once upon a time, the United States had the largest and most prosperous middle class in the history of the world, but now that is changing at a blinding pace. So why are we witnessing such fundamental changes? Well, the globalism and “free trade” that our politicians and business leaders insisted would be so good for us have had some rather nasty side effects. It turns out that they didn’t tell us that the “global economy” would mean that middle class American workers would eventually have to directly compete for jobs with people on the other side of the world where there is no minimum wage and very few regulations. The big global corporations have greatly benefited by exploiting third world labor pools over the last several decades, but middle class American workers have increasingly found things to be very tough. The reality is that no matter how smart, how strong, how educated or how hard working American workers are, they just cannot compete with people who are desperate to put in 10 to 12 hour days at less than a dollar an hour on the other side of the world. After all, what corporation in their right mind is going to pay an American worker ten times more (plus benefits) to do the same job? The world is fundamentally changing. Wealth and power are rapidly becoming concentrated at the top and the big global corporations are making massive amounts of money. Meanwhile, the American middle class is being systematically wiped out of existence as U.S. workers are slowly being merged into the new “global” labor pool.

What do most Americans have to offer in the marketplace other than their labor? Not much. The truth is that most Americans are absolutely dependent on someone else giving them a job. But today, U.S. workers are “less attractive” than ever. Compared to the rest of the world, American workers are extremely expensive, and the government keeps passing more rules and regulations seemingly on a monthly basis that makes it even more difficult to conduct business in the United States.

So corporations are moving operations out of the U.S. at breathtaking speed. Since the U.S. government does not penalize them for doing so, there really is no incentive for them to stay.

What has developed is a situation where the people at the top are doing quite well, while most Americans are finding it increasingly difficult to make it. There are now about 6 unemployed Americans for every new job opening in the United States, and the number of “chronically unemployed” is absolutely soaring. There simply are not nearly enough jobs for everyone.

Many of those who are able to get jobs are finding that they are making less money than they used to. In fact, an increasingly large percentage of Americans are working at low wage retail and service jobs.

But you can’t raise a family on what you make flipping burgers at McDonald’s or on what you bring in from greeting customers down at the local Wal-Mart.

The truth is that the middle class in America is dying – and once it is gone it will be incredibly difficult to rebuild.

The following are 22 statistics that prove that the rich are getting much richer and the poor are getting much poorer in America….

#1) According to a poll taken in 2009, 61 percent of Americans ”always or usually” live paycheck to paycheck, which was up from 49 percent in 2008 and 43 percent in 2007.

#2) The number of Americans with incomes below the official poverty line rose by about 15% between 2000 and 2006, and by 2008 over 30 million U.S. workers were earning less than $10 per hour.

#3) According to Harvard Magazine, 66% of the income growth between 2001 and 2007 went to the top 1% of all Americans.

#4) According to that same poll, 36 percent of Americans say that they don’t contribute anything to retirement savings.

#5) A staggering 43 percent of Americans have less than $10,000 saved up for retirement.

#6) According to one new survey, 24% of American workers say that they have postponed their planned retirement age in the past year.

#7) Over 1.4 million Americans filed for personal bankruptcy in 2009, which represented a 32 percent increase over 2008.

#8) Only the top 5 percent of U.S. households have earned enough additional income to match the rise in housing costs since 1975.

#9) For the first time in U.S. history, banks own a greater share of residential housing net worth in the United States than all individual Americans put together.

#10) In 1950, the ratio of the average executive’s paycheck to the average worker’s paycheck was about 30 to 1. Since the year 2000, that ratio has exploded to between 300 to 500 to one.

#11) One study found that as of 2007, the bottom 80 percent of American households held about 7% of the liquid financial assets.

#12) The bottom 40 percent of income earners in the United States now collectively own less than 1 percent of the nation’s wealth.

#13) Average Wall Street bonuses for 2009 were up 17 percent when compared with 2008.

#14) In the United States, the average federal worker now earns about twice as much as the average worker in the private sector.

#15) An analysis of income tax data by the Congressional Budget Office found that the top 1% of U.S. households own nearly twice as much of America’s corporate wealth as they did just 15 years ago.

#16) In America today, the average time needed to find a job has risen to a record 35.2 weeks.

#17) More than 40% of Americans who actually are employed are now working in service jobs, which are often very low paying.

#18) For the first time in U.S. history, more than 40 million Americans are on food stamps, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture projects that number will go up to 43 million Americans in 2011.

#19) This is what American workers now must compete against: in China a garment worker makes approximately 86 cents an hour and in Cambodia a garment worker makes approximately 22 cents an hour.

#20) Despite the financial crisis, the number of millionaires in the United States rose a whopping 16 percent to 7.8 million in 2009.

#21) According to one new study, approximately 21 percent of all children in the United States are living below the poverty line in 2010 - the highest rate in 20 years.

#22) According to Professor Emmanuel Saez of the University of California at Berkeley, the gap between what the top 10 percent of Americans earn per year and what the rest of us earn has been widening sharply for the last 30 years. His measurements show that the top 10% percent of Americans now take in approximately 50% of the income.

Visit Michael’s Economic Collapse Blog

July 17, 2010

inteldaily

Bahamas Blog International

Haiti six months after - a national and international shame

By Jean H Charles:


On July 12, 2010, the international press has returned en masse to Haiti for an evaluation of the progress in the rebuilding effort after the earthquake of 1/12. It has been reporting on whether the outflow of global donations has contributed to bring solace to the people of Haiti. The verdict is unanimous: the effort in rebuilding has hit a discomforting snag.

To start with, only Norway, Australia and Brazil have delivered on their promised pledges, or 10% of the $5.3 billion raised at the United Nations last March. Only 250 million tons of rubble out of 3 billion metric tons has been removed. The majority of the 1.5 million displaced people are still living in tenuous conditions in tents and shacks. The international Jesuit Society summed up the general sentiment; Haiti six months after the hurricane is a national and international shame!

Wyclef Jean, the ubiquitous Haitian-American artist, gave us the picture of the situation on the ground. “I arrived here 24 hours after the quake and I will say that minus the bodies on the floor, and minus the smell, it looks exactly the same today as it did then. Nothing has changed and people are getting frustrated. The youth is frustrated.”

The Haitian government continues to exhibit the same indifference towards, and the same lack of leadership and coordination in leading the way for an effective recovery. In canvassing the pile of literature on the process of reconstruction, I have been able to find only three points of light.

- The 7 Day Adventist Relief fund has built, with recycled material, some 500 solid homes to house displaced families from the earthquake.

- Venezuela, in the city of Leogane, operates an effective tent city with the support system that makes the lives of the people much better than before the earthquake.

- There is no major outbreak of disease because of the abundance of vitamin D from the tropical sun and the medical care of organizations such as Doctors without Borders and the chain of international medical volunteers who commute to Haiti week after week.

The rest is promises and promises, without a delivery mechanism system. The Haitian people, passionate fans of soccer, have observed a hiatus of three weeks during the World cup season. The World Cup is over; Haiti this summer will be a hot one! The people are already on the streets demanding the resignation of the inept and corrupt government.

The amount of discontent is broiling. The Haitian government is requesting a 20% tax to admit donated material into the country. The warehouses near the airport are filled with food and medicine; yet, because of indifference, dysfunction, nepotism and corruption, the food and the medicine are not delivered to those in need. Worse, some of the medicine is now expired and some of the food is now rotten.

Having invested so much emotion and empathy in Haiti after the earthquake, the rest of the world is crying for some explanation. Leadership matters. The current issue of Foreign Policy has provided an excellent analysis on why Haiti will continue to sink itself and the rest of the world with it. Haiti is pregnant with the lethal cocktail that feeds the appetite of the type of leadership that we find in countries like Somalia, Guinea, and Niger in Africa. Weak and bad leaders make their countries weaker, threatening world security.

Rene Preval the president of Haiti is benefiting of an aura of goodwill fed by a sector of the international community. Yet he fits into what Paul Collier, the eminent economist, called the bad guy, whose survival is incubated against the interest of its people by a combination of support from the international powers, big business and international institutions, labeled the enablers by Paul Wolfowitz.

The neocolonial ruse of using corrupt leaders to maintain the grip on the country’s resources and its people is alive and kicking in Africa and in Haiti. France has recently helped Bongo junior to succeed Bongo senior. The United Nations is making the bidding for some named foreign countries in planning to help Preval to succeed himself through a clown puppet with a botched and flawed election.

The takeover of the Bastille on July 14, 1789, in France did have unintended consequences some fifteen years later in Haiti. It produced the country’s independence in 1804. Be ready for a rough ride this summer! Haiti, the rebel daughter of Africa has a way of setting an international trend. The undemocratic practices of some Western powers, supported by corrupt national leaders, might be in the beginning of their end. It seems Haiti is ready to ring the bell for the death of the failed States as it did some two hundred years ago by dismantling the world order of slavery.

Haiti needs the support of all people of goodwill in the world as it crosses the river from that painful transition of a failed state status to an enlightened nation, ready to provide service and leadership to the world. Stay tuned for updates on the mahogany revolution in progress, in Haiti!

July 17, 2010

caribbeannetnews

Bahamas Blog International

Bolivarian Venezuela at a Crossroads, Part 2: Debate and Contradiction in the PSUV

By Eric Toussaint

Part 2: Debate and Contradiction in the PSUV [1]

During the 2007 constitutional referendum, one might have thought that the party created by Hugo Chávez in 2006 was stillborn since fewer people voted ‘Yes’ than the number of people officially enrolled in the party.[2] But this impression was partially belied in the following months. Grassroot meetings multiplied, which resulted in the nomination of candidates for the municipal elections and for governors of the 23 states that make up Venezuela. However, the process is contradictory. While participation from the party’s rank and file was active and effective and while grassroots members did appoint candidates for the elections, the fact stills remains that when it came to the party’s executive board, ordinary members could not vote for all the leaders and Chávez himself put his government’s ministers in the party’s key posts (for example, the eight vice-presidents of the PSUV). This creates a regrettable confusion between the state, the government, and the party.

In this respect some voices have been raised within the PSUV to challenge the fact that the party’s management and coordination are left to the ministers who are already overloaded with their governmental mission. Moreover their position as ministers gives these leaders the power to disproportionately influence the decisions taken by the party. It is also easier for them to influence some party members when the latter are called to the polls. A critical view, shared by a substantial number of activists, was expressed by Martha Harnecker as follows: “One of the things that surprise us and, I imagine, must shock people abroad, particularly in Europe, is that the state is the instrument with which the party is built. It is in clear contradiction with our vision of the party.”[3]

Gonzalo Gómez, a PSUV activist and co-founder of Aporrea, also shows concern regarding the relationship to be built between the party and popular power (which he also calls “the constituent player”): “The party can seek to propose and give direction, accompanying social movements in the building up of popular power, but it cannot subjugate popular power; in other words subjugate this constituent player by the constituted power.”[4]

Communal councils: when “constituent power” challenges constituted power

The law entitled Ley de los Consejos Municipales (LCC)[5] was voted without any genuine debate on 7 April 2006. Its article 3 states: “The organization, functioning, and action of communal councils must meet the principles of co-responsibility, cooperation, solidarity, transparency […], honesty, effectiveness, efficiency, social responsibility, social control, equity, justice, and gender and social equality.”

A citizens’ assembly (asamblea de ciudadanos y ciudadanas), “the grand decision-making body of communal councils” according to Article 6, must consist of at least 20% of inhabitants from the age of 15 and over. The communal council defines its jurisdiction, and its members are not paid, according to Article 12. Its various areas of intervention are defined as follows: “Health, education, land management in towns or rural areas, housing, social protection and social equality, popular economy, culture, security, communication and information, leisure and sports, food, technical guidance on water, technical guidance on energy and gas, services, and any other matter the community may decide useful to proceed with,” according to Article 9.

President Hugo Chávez set up communal councils back in 2006, as a way of introducing participation in the drafting and implementing of local policies. The government sets great hope in these councils, which it sees as “territorial grassroots units of popular participation and self-government.” As the president said, this “revolutionary explosion of popular power” must be the realistic and sustainable basis for a new type of state, for “a socialism of the 21st century.”

Talking about the 15,000 councils already extant in June 2007, Juan Leonel M. of FONDEMI, the Microfinance Development Fund, does not hide the fact that relationships with municipalities are sensitive: “Actually the mayors, or at least many of them, are opposed to this new mode of election and way of organizing communities. They see the communal councils as organizations in competition with their own administrations. But the idea today is that the established power must move hand in hand with the constituent power of communal councils. The state is initiating a revolution within the state system. The people’s constituent power must be the motor of change. Communal councils are the cornerstone of municipal self-government where the people have direct access to power.”[6]

The 2006 law on communal councils is currently being changed. It is likely to be replaced shortly by a new law that is being drafted.[7] To know more about this experiment, read Martha Harnecker’s books on the subject. She lives in Venezuela and has devoted much time in the last few years to the experiment with communal councils.[8]

The PSUV Congress was held in several sessions from November 2009 to April 2010. The 772 delegates who took part in the Congress were elected in a secret ballot by rank-and-file party members (according to official figures, half of the 7,253,691 party members turned out for these internal elections). There were very few workers and company trade unionists among these delegates. On the other hand, many delegates were employees who are answerable to the party or to local authorities and are therefore easily influenced. Even though Hugo Chávez, as president of the party, called on delegates to act in Congress as spokepersons for the popular base and social movements, with Congress composed as it was, it is hard to see how this could really lead to positive results.

In June 2009, the PSUV was the center of attention and debates, when thirty of the most eminent intellectuals invited by the Miranda International Center (CIM) discussed the progress of, and remaining obstacles to, the revolutionary process currently taking place.[9]

The CIM published a summary of these days for reflection entitled “Intellectuals, democracy and socialism: dead ends and paths to follow.”[10]

Here are some extracts from the summary which give an idea of what is at stake in the party itself and beyond, if a genuine revolutionary project is to be implemented.

“What is the future of a party whose base rarely gets the opportunity to have their say? (…) Is this non-separation between state and party merely repeating a mistake of the 20th century socialist model? Was the PSUV created as a top-down structure out of a political necessity felt by the government, rather than a necessity felt by the base? Another important aspect that came up several times was the need for collective leadership of the party, which is effectively based on grassroots social movements (and which does not merely use them as the government’s communication channel during election periods), thereby putting an end to harmful, partisan vote-catching. This would create the base of a true revolutionary party which recognizes the right to express criticism and which fosters greater democracy within the party.”

Another issue debated was the nature of the new revolutionary state. If the state was the instrument used by neo-liberalism to implement its own agenda, should it also be used to free us from neo-liberalism? Can this state put us on the path to socialism or, on the contrary, is it an obstacle to socialism? Other issues debated were the role of the media, both pro- and anti-Chávez; the characteristics of the revolution – it was said that it contained “many types of revolutions within it: student, farmer, worker, socialist, feminist, military and popular,” thus the need for a constant dialogue between these groups; the definition of 21st century socialism; popular participation, especially through communal councils (see section above), which were described as “a prime example of participation” but “not [playing] a sufficiently participatory role” in practice because “they run the risk of being co-opted by the party.”

The final issue considered during the meeting concerned the place and role of criticism in a revolutionary process, and the main question discussed was the following: “Is it possible for a revolution to succeed if it does not make criticism one of its main driving forces?” It was acknowledged that “criticism has lost some of its rightful place. In media that are sympathetic to the process, it is not difficult to find reactions reminiscent of 20th century socialism where those who openly criticize are accused of being “counter-revolutionaries” or “CIA agents”. This considerably weakens the process as it prevents the government from implementing changes when things are not working.” At the same time, the intellectuals said they “were pleased that the executive had given them a space for criticism - something which had not happened in ten years. They also stressed the fact that this event proved that fear of criticism was unfounded. The claim made by the anti-Chávez opposition that there is a lack of freedom of expression in Venezuela is equally false.”

The controversy raised by this meeting showed how relevant these questions are. These days were broadcast live in full on a public channel (TVES) and then re-broadcast over a period of some 10 days. Important sectors of the government strongly criticized the CIM initiative as well as the content of these meetings. Among the critics were the Minister for Oil Rafael Ramirez and Minister of Foreign Affairs Nicolas Maduro, both of them important political figures in the PSUV. One of the pro-Chávez daily newspapers, VEA, published several articles condemning the CIM initiative and stating, “they convene meetings amongst intellectuals whose positions are confused, whilst allowing them to let off steam at Chávez’s leadership which they describe as a “hyper-leadership” or “progressive autocracy”. Without a doubt, these are pro-Chavista supporters without Chávez, ashamed to show their true colors and get on the other side of the fence.”[11]

After ten days of controversy, both in the pro-Chávez and the opposition press, Hugo Chávez, in his televised programme Aló Presidente of June 14, seemed to agree with those who criticized the International Miranda Centre (CIM). That merely served to increase public interest in the event: different trade union worker leaders as well as the Communist Party of Venezuela and “Homeland for All” (two parties which support the government while refusing to join the PSUV) have defended the CIM and stated that the critical contribution of revolutionary intellectuals was a positive event. It was feared that at some point the CIM would be brought to heel or even shut down but nothing of the sort has happened. This shows once again the complexity of the changes taking place in Venezuela, whose government cannot be considered as totalitarian.

Notes

[1] The first part of this series ‘Bolivarian Venezuela at the crossroads’ was posted on the CADTM website on 14 April 2010 under the title ‘Venezuela. Nationalization, workers’ control: achievements and limitations’ http://www.cadtm.org/Venezuela-Nati...

[2] Officially, six million Venezuelans joined the PSUV at the time of the referendum on 2 December 2007. And yet the ‘Yes’ won only a little more than four million votes, some of which certainly did not come from PSUV activists since the PCV (Partido Comunista de Venezuela, Communist Party of Venezuela) and the PPT (Patria Para Todos, Homeland For All), among others, called for a ‘Yes’ vote. In fact, during the phase when the party was launched, ministries were given membership targets, which resulted in a flawed process and an artificial inflation of membership figures.

[3] Speech of Martha Harnecker on the occasion of the meeting “Intellectuals, democracy and socialism: dead ends and paths to follow” organized by the CIM http://www.rebelion.org/noticia.php...

[4] Speech of Gonzalo Gómez on the occasion of the meeting “Intellectuals, democracy and socialism: dead ends and paths to follow” organized by the CIM http://www.aporrea.org/actualidad/n...

[5] http://www.tecnoiuris.com/venezuela...

[6] Quoted in « Les conseils communaux au Venezuela : un outil d’émancipation politique ? », by Anne-Florence Louzé, in Olivier Compagnon, Julien Rebotier and Sandrine Revet (eds), Le Venezuela au-delà du mythe. Chávez, la démocratie, le changement social, Editions de l’Atelier/Editions Ouvrières, Paris, 2009, 238 p

[7] See the project of the new law: http://www.alcaldiagirardot.gob.ve/...

[8] See Martha Harnecker “De los consejos comunales a las comunas” http://www.rebelion.org/docs/83276.pdf. This 61 page study includes a bibliography of Martha Harnecker’s 21 books on the subject of popular participation. Read also, by the same author, “Las Comunas, sus problemas y cómo enfrentarlos” http://www.rebelion.org/docs/90924.pdf

[9] The Miranda International Center (CIM) is an official institution created by the Venezuelan presidency and financed by the Ministry of Higher Education.

[10] The complete summary (in French and Spanish) is online on the CADTM website at http://www.cadtm.org/Venezuela-prem... and http://www.cadtm.org/Primera-sintes...

[11] Published 6 June 2009 under the collective signature Grano de maíz.

Translated by Francesca Denley, Judith Harris, Stéphanie Jacquemont and Christine Pagnoulle.

Eric Toussaint, Doctor in Political Science (University of Liege and University of Paris VIII), is president of CADTM Belgium (Committee for the Abolition of Third World Debt, www.cadtm.org). He is the author of A diagnosis of emerging global crisis and alternatives, VAK, Mumbai, India, 2009, 139p; Bank of the South. An Alternative to the IMF-World Bank, VAK, Mumbai, India, 2007; The World Bank, A Critical Primer, Pluto Press, Between The Lines, David Philip, London-Toronto-Cape Town 2008; Your Money or Your Life, The Tyranny of Global Finance, Haymarket, Chicago, 2005.

July 14th 2010

Bolivarian Venezuela at the Crossroads, Part 1: Nationalization and Workers’ Control

Bolivarian Venezuela at the crossroads, Part 3: The Venezuelan economy: in transition towards socialism

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Bahamas Blog International

The Bahamas is "on track" to reduce HIV/AIDS among young people by 25 per cent this year

Bahamas 'on track' for 25% HIV/AIDS drop in young people
By ALISON LOWE
Tribune Staff Reporter
alowe@tribunemedia.net:


THE Bahamas is "on track" to reduce HIV/AIDS among young people by 25 per cent this year, according to the United Nations HIV/AIDS programme.

As a country that bears a "high burden" of HIV/AIDS prevalence compared with other countries globally - with around three per cent of the population known to be infected with the virus - it was also noted in this year's UNAIDS report as one which is making significant strides towards curtailing its prevalence within its borders.

"A ground-breaking study for UNAIDS led by the International Group on Analysis of trends in HIV prevalence and behaviours among young people shows that these countries with high burden of HIV have either achieved or are on track to achieve the international goal of reducing HIV prevalence among young people by 25 per cent in 2010, as agreed at the International Conference on Population and Development in 1994," said the UNAID's "Outlook 2010" report released yesterday.

Sixteen out of 25 countries most affected by HIV/AIDS have seen HIV rates among young people fall - a "breakthrough essential for breaking the trajectory of the AIDS epidemic," according to UNAIDS.

Those countries that have achieved the 25 per cent reduction goal already are: Botswana, Cote D'Ivoire, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia and Zimbabwe.

Eighty per cent of young people living with HIV/AIDS live in sub Sahara Africa.

The Bahamas was identified as one of those countries "likely to achieve" the 25 per cent goal, along with Burundi, Lesotho, Rwanda, Swaziland and Haiti.

This news comes after Dr Perry Gomez, Director of the National HIV/AIDS Programme in The Bahamas revealed in a press conference in October 2009 that if infection trends seen in the early part of that year continued to year end there would be an overall rise in the number of new HIV infections in 2009 over the previous year.

At around the same time, Health Minister Dr Hubert Minnis released the findings of a study involving public and private school students, between the ages of 15 and 17 in New Providence and the Family Islands, which he said showed that while some youngsters are knowledgeable about the deadly virus, many are not taking the necessary precautions to prevent it.

Following the study's findings, Dr Minnis suggested health policy-makers, planners and professionals must redouble their efforts to ensure that young people take HIV/AIDS as seriously as they should.

The Tribune could not reach Dr Gomez and Camille Barnett, President of the AIDS Foundation, for comment on the UNAIDS Outlook report yesterday.

UNAIDS' latest report on the state of the fight against the potentially deadly HIV/AIDS virus shows that countries that saw the greatest shift in the number of young people contracting the disease included Kenya, whose infection rates were down 60 per cent between 2000 and 2005; Ethiopia, where there was a 47 per cent change in HIV prevalence among pregnant young women in urban areas and 29 per cent in rural areas; Malawi and Cote d'Ivoire HIV where prevalence among pregnant urban young women declined by 56 per cent and Burundi and the Bahamas' near neighbour, Haiti, where prevalent dropped by around half.

The report said that in 13 countries, the declines in prevalence were associated with notable reported changes in behaviour among young people, such as waiting longer before they become sexually active and using condoms.

At present there are around 5 million young people living with HIV worldwide, making up about 40 per cent of new infections.

According to UNAIDS' estimates there were 33.4 million people living with HIV worldwide at the end of 2008. In the same year there were nearly 2.7 million new HIV infections and 2 million AIDS-related deaths.

The Bahamas recently signed on to become a beneficiary of the US President's Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), which will allow the country to benefit from up to $2.5 million in grants from the US Government over the next three years towards fighting HIV/AIDS.

July 14, 2010

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