U.S. prodding Argentina on political tilt to the left

[Judi Lynn]

Posted on Mon, Dec. 12, 2005

INTER-AMERICAN RELATIONS
U.S. prodding Argentina on political tilt to the left

Argentine President Néstor Kirchner is worrying the Bush administration with his turn to the left and courtship of Venezuelan leader Hugo Chávez.

BY PABLO BACHELET
[e-mail]

WASHINGTON - Argentina is dispatching a senior diplomat to Washington to answer the Bush administration's increasing concern over President Néstor Kirchner's apparent tilt leftward in recent weeks, U.S. officials say.

Kirchner has been easing moderates out of his cabinet and courting Venezuela's leftist President Hugo Chávez. And at the 34-country Summit of the Americas in Argentina last month, he strongly opposed President Bush's efforts to promote free trade.
So far, the Bush administration has opted to deal with the issue in private rather than in public, say analysts and U.S. officials in Washington.
(snip)

Only a week after the Summit of the Americas, Kirchner flew to Caracas, where he signed energy deals and obtained Chávez's pledge to buy more Argentine bonds, which would reduce Argentina's dependence on the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The Argentine leader also has become a leading proponent of Venezuela's full membership in the Mercosur trade bloc, which includes Paraguay, Uruguay and Brazil. And Chávez has said he wants to buy Argentine nuclear technology. U.S. officials have expressed confidence that Argentina will reject the proposal.
(snip/...)

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/13386292.htm
(Free registration required)

[ananda]

1. Why bother?

Who cares what BushInc thinks?

[TygrBright]

2. Well.... anyone who doesn't want to suffer a mysterious "accident"...

...for starters.

Not that the U.S. government would have anything to do with dirty tactics like that. They merely need to look put-upon and pious, wink suggestively at the directors of some mega-multi-national corporation, and shake their heads sadly afterward.

Say it with me, everyone....

"plausible deniability!"

I knew you could.

cynically,
Bright

[VaYallaDawg]

3. ..."The citizens were begging for a regime change" ...

[Judi Lynn]

13. Pausible deniability. That's a hot one.

Sometimes it takes 30 years or more until the plausibility wears off!






Prescott Bush and Nixon

[confludemocrat]

4. so Kirchner's "easing out" CIA-planted US toadies? and Bush is "concerned"

he's easing out "moderates". are they like our moderates and therefore gutless, spineless lackeys to narrow US business interests. Why is the US concerened about internal cabinet matters unless they are losing their agents inside-game in that government?

[IndianaGreen]

5. Thank G-d for Iraq!

As long as our military is bogged down in Iraq, Bush lacks the troops to do evil elsewhere. In a strange and perverted way, the carnage in Iraq is saving the lives of people in Latin America.

[Judi Lynn]

6. It's a sad truth. I fully believe it.

It must really gall _Bush to be overextended in Iraq, as it will lose him standing with his fellow right-wing monsters, Nixon and Reagan, who got to partake of copious blood-letting on the sly in Latin America, through the success of their schemes and plots, and lots of U.S. taxpayers' money.

[ozone_man]

7. In a strange way indeed.

At least some good has come out of it. South America is on course for a brighter future without U.S. meddling.

[MalachiConstant]

8. uhoh!

somebody ready the death squads! call the school of the americas! we can't have political dissidence abroad!








postscript:

i apologize in advance if this is against some rule i'm unaware of, but i'm going to plug my thread. i have started a thread suggesting a new DU group for career advice, and job seekers. if you're interested please check out this thread and reply:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=105x4430590

[bemildred]

9. Kirchner says yeah yeah yeah and continues to do as he likes ... nt

[ninkasi]

10. The nerve of the man!

From the article
"But at the Summit of the Americas in Argentina, U.S. officials say, Kirchner seemed more concerned with scoring points with his domestic audience, which generally dislikes Bush, than keeping good relations with Washington."

So he's more concerned about what his own people think than keeping good relations with Washington? Well, if he's their leader, that makes sense to me. It's weird that the U.S. would consider that a bad thing. You know, being so strongly in favor of democracy, and all...

More leaders need to stand up to the Bush bully and make decisions based on their own people's wishes and best interests. Since Bush doesn't care what we the people think, and he bases his decisions on what's best of him and his cronies, I can understand why he can't grasp this concept.

[IndianaGreen]

11. US is making the same noises about Bolivia

America really hates true democracy, particularly when the popular will runs counter to Wall Street!

Rumsfeld was in neighboring Paraguay recently. The pretext was to visit US troops stationed in Paraguay to combat terrorism, since Osama was reported to be driving a cab in Caracas.

Rumsfeld said that MAS was not a legitimate political party, and he threatened serious consequences if Evo Morales were to be elected.

Four years ago, then National Security Advisor Condi Rice threatened Bolivia with military action if MAS won that election.

The consensus among us REDS is that the US will try to instigate a Congo/Katanga Province-style secession in Bolivia, getting the resource-rich region that is across the border from Paraguay to split away from the rest of Bolivia.

Under this scenario, Evo Morales would find himself cast as the Patrice Lumumba of Bolivia.

Bolivian Could Be a 'Nightmare' for U.S.
By FIONA SMITH, Associated Press Writer
Mon Dec 12, 3:03 PM ET

CARACOLLO, Bolivia - As a little boy in Bolivia's bleak highlands, Evo Morales used to run behind buses to pick up the orange skins and banana peels passengers threw out the windows. Sometimes, he says, it was all he had to eat. Now, holding the lead ahead of Sunday's presidential election, he's threatening to be "a nightmare for the government of the United States."

It's not hard to see why. The 46-year-old candidate is a staunch leftist who counts Cuba's Fidel Castro and Venezuela's Hugo Chavez among his close friends. Moreover, he's a coca farmer, promising to reverse the U.S.-backed campaign to stamp out production of the leaf that is used to make cocaine.

With his Aymara Indian blood and a hatred for the free-market doctrines known to Latin Americans as neo-liberalism, Morales in power would not only shake up Bolivia's political elite, but strengthen the leftward tide rippling across South America.

"Something historic is happening in Bolivia," Morales told The Associated Press in an interview. "The most scorned, hated, humiliated sector now has the capacity to organize."

At a recent campaign stop in the western highland town of Caracollo, Morales and members of his Movement Toward Socialism party were mobbed by crowds who kissed them, showered them with confetti and draped necklaces of flowers and fruit around their necks.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051212/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/bolivia_america_s_foe

[bemildred]

12. This was interesting in that regard (Bolivia-Paraguay):

Venezuelan “accessibly” priced oil for Paraguay

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez last Saturday added Paraguay to its “accessible” energy supply scheme which will entitle the landlocked South American Mercosur member to defer 25% payment of the oil bill.

The bilateral agreement similar to that signed with other Caribbean and Central American countries and Uruguay in Mercosur contemplates “modest payments terms” deferring the 25% payment for up to 15 years with an annual interest rate of 2%.

President Chavez stopped over in Asunción, Paraguay, Mercosur’s poorest member, Saturday for a few hours following his participation in the Mercosur Montevideo summit where Venezuela began proceedings to become a full member of the South American trade block, a process which can take from one to three years during which the country will have a voice “but not a vote”.

The agreement establishes that Paraguay can either pay the oil invoices in full or 75% within 90 days, said Paraguay’s government owned oil company, Petroleos Paraguayos (Petropar) chief Armando Rodriguez adding that the first Venezuelan shipment is scheduled to arrive next February/March.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=116x12344

[Judi Lynn]

14. Bolivia has been raped and exploited wildly, and it's fighting back.

It's deeply impressive that Bolivians fought for getting their water back from the claws of Bechtel. (I'm certain the elder _Bush is connected to Bechtel.)

BOLIVIA: A nation holds its breath


Federico Fuentes

~snip~

The battle for Bolivia’s gas
Regarded as the poorest nation in South America, Bolivia sits on top of approximately 1.5 trillion cubic metres of gas, worth more than US$1.5 billion at current market prices. Currently, however, transnationals such as British Gas, Repsol and British Petroleum are pocketing the big profits. Their deals with Bolivia’s neoliberal government ensure a profit return of $10 for every dollar invested, while Bolivians pay 12-times the price that the gas is initially sold to the transnationals.
(snip)

Bolivia was one of the first Latin American countries to have neoliberal policies imposed upon it. The 1985 privatisation of Bolivia’s mines changed the political landscape of the country. Forty thousand miners — Bolivia’s most militant organised trade unionists and the bedrock of many left movements — lost their jobs.

Since 2000, however, a new militant movement for progressive change has been exploding from the indigenous peoples of the country. The Aymara and Quechua indigenous peoples make up 67% of the Bolivian population and the vast bulk of the poor, including of the sacked miners. As they were forced out of the mines, many turned to growing coca, forming the backbone of the cocalero movement.

Washington has been trying to use the “war on drugs” to justify pushing Bolivia to eliminate coca growing. However, in Bolivia, coca is widely chewed as a stimulant, and viewed as a central part of the country’s culture.

The cocaleros, with militant union experience and a strong sense of national indigenous culture, have thus become the frontline of resistance to US militarised intervention in the country. The coca leaf has come to represent the basic right of the Bolivian people to live a peaceful, dignified life without foreign intervention. Morales is a leader of this struggle,, with which MAS is closely identified.

In 2000, Bechtel, which had just bought the newly privatised water supply contract, raised the price of newly privatised water by 400%, and started charging for collected rainwater. The resulting rebellion forced the re-nationalisation of the water supply.
(snip/...)

http://www.greenleft.org.au/back/2005/620/620p19.htm



Evo Morales