An excellent synopsis of Cuba's defiance of US imperialism..

[Postman]

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/stephen_kinzer/2008/02/made_in_america.html

[mirrera]

1. Great Author—Kinzer— he wrote Overthrow...

a book about the 14 countries the USA has overthrown in the last century. Excellent read. If we would leave the Southern cone alone their inclination towards left leaning Democracy is clear. We force them into varying degrees of dictatorship, through our interference. The more free, the more space for the CIA jackals.

Two books:
Economic Hitman
Overthrow

An alternate history— or how the rest of the world sees it.

[malaise]

2. A profound comment

It was not possible, he told Castro, to impose a reformist political programme in any Latin American country within the framework of democracy, because the US would crush it. The only way to do so, the two men agreed, was to establish a dictatorship in which no opposition groups were allowed to function.

I would add or Caribbean after Latin America. I lived through the chaos in Jamaica.

That said I have come to the conclusion that the principle institution that facilitates destabilization is the Chamber of Commerce. Remember most of the old established newspapers in our part of the world are owned by the old merchant class and their bosses.