Colombia's Green Revolution

"In a society where human life has lost value there cannot be any other priority than re-establishing respect for life as the main duty of citizens."

- Colombian presidential candidate Antanas Mockus

These are dark days in the world of politics. A replay of the Thatcher/Reagan tidal wave that drowned progress 30 years ago seems inevitable as the rightwing spin on the causes of the latest financial crisis seems to be gaining the upper hand. Once again, the UK is leading the way, ConDem'd by a lethal combination of a spiraling debt and a new government intent on reasserting the supremacy of the elite. In America, the Tea Party has become more than a cover for the sexually repressed teabagging of last spring and is now powerful enough to dictate who will run in many of November's mid-term elections. Meanwhile, continental Europe has decided the best way to save their currency is to print a trillion euros to hand over to the banks. Oh, and not fix anything besides cutting the benefits of those who will have to pay the money back. Fortunately, there seems to be one place where they've realized that when something no longer works, it's time to try something different. The May 30th Colombian presidential election may see the election of the world's first Green president.

It seemed a few months ago that Álvaro Uribe would be able to pull off the African dictator-for-life trick of changing the constitution to remain president, after all, he did it in 2006 to the delight of multinational corporations, the rich and paramilitary death squads. Miraculously, the supreme court ruled against his bid, yet it seemed even that wouldn't stop his policies from being continued as the initial favourite to win was Uribe's replacement candidate for the Party of National Unity, known as the Party of the U, former defense minister Juan Manuel Santos. After all, Uribe won reelection in a landslide and with the continued support of the wingnuts pumping up the Hugo Chavez rhetoric only a superhero would be able to derail the status quo from further entrenching the might is right lunacy that ensures the perpetuation of hate and death.

There seemed to be no less likely candidate for national superhero in 1993 than Antanas Mockus. After studying mathematics in France he returned home to study philosophy. This son of Lithuanian immigrants has shown his flair for the unexpected and unpredictable, he and his wife took their wedding vows while astride an elephant inside a cage full of Bengali tigers. Yet he also served as vice-president and then president of the National University of Colombia and contributed to the formulation of the Colombian Constitution of 1991. But it was his eccentricity that launched his political career and marked the turning point for Bogota, at the time on of the most dangerous cities in the world. It was the early 90's, the university campus was in chaos thanks to anarchists and FARC rebels. Invited to speak before students, Mockus, a pacifist, had vowed not to be humiliated but was pushed to the limits of his patience as students booed and heckled. Suddenly, in the moment that changed everything, he undid his belt, turned, and mooned the audience. For whatever reason, his university, his city and perhaps in the future, his country, would never be the same again, as he was forced to resign and found himself swept into the mayor's office on a wave of public support. A born teacher, he changed everything by teaching the people how to live in society, from respect to conservation.

The best way to keep the military and her American arms suppliers happy though is to maintain the status quo. That means the Pablo Escobar image of Colombia as a dangerous place that produces cocaine and rebels and therefore needs to be ruled with an iron fist. Now in its tenth year, Plan Colombia, originally scheduled for two years, has seen the US pouring money into the country, sending more there than the rest of Latin America put together. Álvaro Uribe has presided over Colombia's continued capture by American foreign policy which has meant a staggering spike in inequality. Drug lords and arms dealers are part and parcel with subsistence farmers who don't even know who Mockus is as the live without TV's. Last summer the Colombians agreed to give the US what the MSM labeled narcotic and inusurgent aid but is simply cover for a dirty drug war that spawns FARCs and wacky neighbors like Hugo. Of course Chavez railed against the plan, but there were also reasonably sane leaders who opposed giving the Americans an increased free hand in the airspace of the region at the meeting of the Union of South American nations such as Argentina's Kirchener and Ecuador's Rafael Correa. Oh, and Brazil's Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the guy who just struck a deal to partially solve the Iranian impasse, so good in fact the US had to move quick to emaciate it. Sovereignty was maintained per the letter of the accord, but the US was in fact given expanded access to airbases, an exception to the trend of losing friends and bases, Ecuador's Manta airbase joined the Central Asian losses. A 10-year lease gave the US access to seven Colombian bases - three air force, two naval and two army – stretching from the Pacific to the Caribbean. The 800 American soldier cap was maintained as well, but with private armies outnumbering government troops in most warzones these days, the 600 contractor clause seems to have little relevance.

Hey it's just a drug war, after all about 90 percent of the cocaine produced in Colombia is smuggled into the United States, despite more than $6 billion of American security aid to Colombia over the last decade to combat insurgents and trafficking. Oops more MSM lingo. The now 46-year old conflict needs to be brought to a close, it makes the Afghanistan war look short. It's not about Chavez though the wingnuts like president Uribe (oh yes, I'm afraid Álvaro is one, fits my classic definition of one who perpetuates ideas that don't work) would have us think by saying things like, "On various occasions Mr. Chávez has said that at any moment he’d turn on his Sukhois and in a few minutes they are in Colombia". In fact Venezuela remains Colombia's second biggest trading partner. Though yes, the Russians are keeping Venezuela's armed forces looking good.

Bolivia's president, Evo Morales, called for a continent-wide referendum on the plan, saying "If the Colombian president wants his bases to be used, I say I want a referendum in South America so the people of Bolivia, Colombia, Peru, Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina all 12 countries can decide." You see this came hard on the heels of the Colombian armed forces almost provoking a regional war by crossing into Ecuador and killing the Farc second in command. "Alias Raul Reyes has been killed in combat," a beaming then defense minister now presidential hopeful, Juan Manuel Santos, announced at a press conference in March 2008. Raul Reyes, whose real name was Luis Edgar Devia Silva, was the first member of the secretariat of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, (Farc) to be killed in combat with Colombian government troops in the four-decade-old history of the rebel army. As spokesman and leader of the political wing of the guerrillas Reyes was believed to be first in line to take over from legendary Farc leader Manuel Marulanda. Sixteen other rebels and one solder died in the raid, Santos said.

Based on what the two-time mayor of Bogota Antanas Mockus did over his terms, he would do things differently than the former defense minister's promised continuation of Uribe's policies. Reyes was the Farc's top negotiator during failed peace talks with the government of Andres Pastrana from 1998 to 2002, during which he led a Farc commission on a tour of several European nations. The death of Reyes came two days after the Farc unilaterally released four civilian hostages who had been held for more than six years in jungle camps. Mediators working for the liberation of those and dozens of other hostages had met with Reyes to negotiate their release. Mockus condemned such an aggression into a neighbour's soil and said he wouldn't do it.

His wacky style led to landslide victories and um, creative solutions to problems. The list of achievement by Mockus during his time as mayor read like the magical realism quality of a novel by compatriot Gabriel Garcia Marquez:

• he helped solve a water shortage by appearing on TV showering, showing Bogotanos how he turns off the water while soaping up - within two months a 14% reduction in water usage had been achieved
• he asked the city's richest residents to pay an optional 10% tax and more than 60,000 volunteered to pay helping the city triple it's 2002 tax revenue from 1990
• taming traffic turmoil by deploying teams of street mimes to show both drivers and pedestrians how to behave, so successfully he was able to dispense with the corrupt municipal traffic police and employ more mimes instead
• in an effort to reverse aggression and violence in the city, he carried out a massive educational initiative. City government worked with prostitutes, the homeless and prison inmates. Policemen were obliged to attend training in conflict resolution. Children were encouraged to report domestic violence
• as women were afraid to go out at night and realizing that seeing them in the streets creates a safer atmosphere, he asked men to stay home and reflect on women's role in society. An estimated 700,000 women strolled the newly created pedestrian central boulevard the first night to enjoy open-air concerts and ladies only promotions
• intent on getting the homicide rate under control and reducing late night fights, Mockus pushed for the so-called "Carrot Law" which obliged bars to close at 1am. (A "carrot" is slang for a healthy person who doesn't smoke or drink.) The homicide rate saw a reduction from 80 per 100,000 in 1993 to 22 in 2003
• to convince taxi drivers to hand over their guns he allowed them to up their fares while creating a report an honest taxi driver campaign which resulted in 150 of them being dubbed "Knights of the Zebra" to advise the mayors office on taxi 'etiquette'
• raising awareness by painting stars on the pavement where pedestrians are killed and seeing a reduction in traffic fatalities from 1300 to 600 a year
• -more initiatives here

Today, Bogotá is a radically different place with 400,000 bicycle users. Car use is down, 1.6 million people travel on the Trasmilenio daily and Bogotá is automobile-free on major streets on Sundays. Traffic fatalities and homicide have been drastically reduced. A whopping 98.5% of kids attend school.

Wait, it gets even cheesier. Mockus encourages his staff to hug each other while the regime that Santos represents establishes the Justice and Peace Law (yeah, I know, how could something with a name like that not be nefarious?). It demobilized many paramilitary members and guerrillas but also granted them de-facto amnesties while allowing the groups to continue their war of terror against the left. No, not only the military left, more importantly, the labour left. Colombia under Uribe has stretched it's commanding lead in the trade unionists murdered charts, the highest clip in the world, every year, teachers to miners. In fact the first close collaborator of the 12 Apostles, a paramilitary group so-named because one of its members is a priest, has just spoken out in Argentina about Uribe's brother Santiago's direct payment to death squad members. At the very least President Álvaro knowingly granted them amnesty back in 2005.

The bizarre quality of the election story was enhanced by the presidential debate question posed by a doll asking, "Little ball, little ball for two hundred. Mr. Candidate how can you help me. I want to study but I have to work." Oh yeah, Mockus was abused as a child and has recently announced that he is in the first stages of Parkinson's Disease. If anything, Antanas seems to have picked up support since he announced that he had the disease on a talk show. The last poll results were announced on Friday, they won't be conducted for the last week as a twist in election law bans them along with campaigning. So, theoretically, Sunday's rallies were the last chance for the candidates to make their pitch. A Mockus victory would give hope that the next stage of Colombia's history will be written in pencil, not with blood. In 25 years, 5 million have been displaced by war ensuring 60 percent of rural Colombians remain poor, according to Ricardo Bonilla, an expert on poverty at Bogota's National University. A country where at least 2742 trade unionists have been murdered since 1986. A place where each of the six banana companies operating pays between 3 and 4 cents for every banana produced directly to support death squads. This helps to ensure that 79% of the Afro-Colombian population has been internally displaced through massacres, killings, threats and intimidation so the companies can move in and use the land. A country that doesn't respect international borders, launching cross-border attacks into foreign territories to achieve military objectives.

Mockus, the philosopher-mathematician of course has a vice-presidential candidate who is a fellow mathematician and ex-mayor of Medellin, Sergio Farjado. He took what was described by Time as the worst city in Colombia and succeeded in reducing crime, cleaning the streets and turning the city into a modern metropolis with a state-of the art metro. The last polls showed Santos in a statistically insignificant lead, around 34-32%, but with neither reaching the 50% threshold, a second round will be needed, one that is polling 45-40% in favour of Mockus as he'll pick up more of the non-incumbent vote. You would vote for change too with a 43% poverty rate as the never-ending war is nothing but an American exported cause of extreme inequality, the only major country in Latin America in which the gap between rich and poor has increased in recent years, according to a report by the U.N. Economic Commission on Latin America. The percentage of Colombians who are indigent also rose from 20.2 percent in 2007 to nearly 23 percent in 2008, nearly double the region's average. Where the power of the state is used to conduct illegal wiretaps on political opponents and journalists. Even more seriously, about 90 members of Congress, most belonging to Uribe's party, are being investigated or are already in jail in conjunction with the "parapolitics" scandal linking government figures to paramilitaries and drug traffickers. Even more seriously, under Santos' watch, the army has developed a body bag culture where success is measured in killed enemy combatants with the inevitable result of a "false positive" scandal. Civilians are rounded up, dressed in rebel uniforms, and turn up dead in the countryside. The attorney general is investigating cases involving over 2,000 victims.

To Uribe supporters in Washington, and to investors the world over, the Colombian government touts its success in delivering blows to a guerrilla movement that once seemed invincible, an effort carried out with $7.3 billion in U.S. aid since 2000. The economy has since flourished, more than doubling output since 2002 when Uribe took office. Foreign investment in Colombia is the fourth-highest in Latin America which ensures the rich receive grants while the poor burden tax and death squad law. That philosophy was crystallized through the Insured Agro Income program, which provided most of a $250 million annual fund to sugar, palm oil and other large agricultural sectors. Even government officials acknowledge that poverty remains widespread in the countryside. Indigent sharecroppers are relegated to the poorest soil, working land without title, while a swath the size of Virginia is in the hands of drug traffickers and corrupt politicians, said Alejandro Reyes, an expert on land and author of a recent book, "Warriors and Peasants: The Plundering of Land in Colombia." Reyes said the Uribe administration places a priority on funneling aid to the biggest farms because the government believes they are best suited to revive the rural economy. "The government thinks that the peasantry are not good producers, that they don't know how to save, how to assimilate technologies," Reyes said.

What Mockus may deliver is a change that sees the legitimacy of law reinstated. Enough of the shrug of the shoulders when human rights are taken away along with the "es que's". Success in pushing rebels into the jungles has come at too great a price in human rights and the message of an outsider who promises to deliver order within the rule of law may carry the day. Give people dignity and they will return it as Antanas has proven works in Bogota. Who's to say if his social experiment on a city will translate to a national stage, especially with so many rebels and vigilantes controlling so much of the countryside, but Colombia deserves to find out from a man whose overwhelming goal is to teach about the sacredness of life.

For the doubters, there's five more parts to convince you:

A Pact With Which Devil?

"Good fortune will elevate even petty minds, and give them the appearance of a certain greatness and stateliness, as from their high place they look down upon the world; but the truly noble and resolved spirit raises itself, and becomes more conspicuous in times of disaster and ill fortune."
- Plutarch

Well, it took just over 206 years, but Haiti has finally climbed to the top of the world's most cursed nation charts. Ever since rising up and defeating the forces of Napoleon to become the first nation to grow out of a slave revolt, gaining independence on January 1st 1804, it has become a place where the apocalypse wears the trappings of the norm. It's one of those places that seems to be dealt one disaster after the other. The big question is how can the death-toll resulting from a 7.0 earthquake that stuck near Port-au-Prince, the same magnitude that hit Northern California in 1989 killing 63 people, be well on it's way to surpassing 100,000?  Is it as Pat Robertson said because the Haitian people "got together and swore a pact to the devil"? Why is it that Rush Limbaugh is forced to vacation on the eastern half of Hispaniola to find luxury resorts and not worry about getting AIDS from young boys? The truth of why we owe the poorest nation in the western hemisphere all the help we can is written in the pages of history and unfortunately is indeed a witches' brew of politics, economics and natural disaster.

While Rush claims the latest disaster in Haiti is simply a made to order excuse for Obama to improve his image with the "light-skinned and dark-skinned black community", comments such as his are intended to obfuscate the problem of racism that has been the cause of much of Haiti's ills. There is good reason why much of the world owes Haiti more than just their taxes . It's hard to imagine, but at the end of the 18th century Haiti, or Saint-Domingue as it was known then, was considered by many to be the most valuable colonial possession in the Americas, referred to as the Pearl of the Antilles. Unfortunately for the French, their revolution in 1789 also resonated throughout the Caribbean. The Jacobins' cry of "liberty, equality and fraternity" was taken up by rebels on the island and the "Black Jacobins" were born as the slaves rose up in 1791.

"My decision to destroy the authority of the blacks in Saint Domingue (Haiti) is not so much based on considerations of commerce and money, as on the need to block for ever the march of the blacks in the world."
- Napoleon Bonaparte

The Haitian Revolution didn't follow a standard script. Out of the uprising came a self-educated slave named Toussaint L'Ouverture who emerged as the revolution's leader through skill on both the battlefield and in the complexities of politics. Realizing the greed of the competing imperial powers and that the ongoing European war would drain their strength, L'Ouverture consistently outflanked his adversaries. In a complex web of emancipation, guerrilla warfare, alliances and broken promises involving the three major colonial powers, France, Spain and England, the end result was Tousaint dead in a French jail in the Jura, having been tricked by Napoleon and 100,000 of the 500,000 blacks and 24,000 of the 40,000 whites inhabitants dead. The new leader of the rebels, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, proclaimed the nation's independence January 1, 1804 after defeating Napoleon's brother in law General Charles Leclerc and 43,000 French troops at the Battle of Vertieres on November 18, 1803 and reverted the name to its former native monkier - Haiti; it became the first independent nation in Latin America, the first post-colonial independent black-led nation in the world, and the only nation whose independence was gained as part of a successful slave rebellion.

"Dear me, think of it? Niggers speaking French"
- US Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan

And what was America's role in all this? Well, nothing short of the Louisiana Purchase. America's 3rd president was in office, Thomas Jefferson, a man afraid of his own shadow due to its dark appearance (though he had no problem with the darker female outline). Regarding the prospect of a free black nation he said: "If something is not done, and soon done we shall be the murderers of our own children." Alarmed that a slave uprising may spread north he threw his support behind the upstart French leader, Napoleon Bonaparte, in his quest to reassert French rule of his prized Caribbean possession. So when Napoleon asked Jefferson if the United States would help a French army traveling by sea to St. Domingue, Jefferson replied that "nothing will be easier than to furnish your army and fleet with everything and reduce Toussaint [L’Ouverture] to starvation." Of course his word proved to be as worthless as his morals when he learned that Napoleon planned on moving his forces to the North American mainland, basing a new French empire in New Orleans and settling the vast territory west of the Mississippi River. The rest is, as they say, history, without resupply and dealing with a determined enemy as well as an hitherto unknown threat, a pesky female mosquito carrying yellow fever (taking Leclerc's life along with 20,000 of his men), Napoleon's forces were routed and he was eventually forced to sell the Louisiana territories for a song in order to raise a new army to deal with the British.

So, it seems America, France, Spain and Britain owe the impoverished nation a little help, but why does Venezuela seem so prepared to lend a hand? It must be an evil plot to establish a foothold for Chavez' anti-American screed outside of Cuba in the area, right? Nope, it's called historical debt, debt for their freedom from slavery in which Haiti played a crucial role. After initial success in New Grenada (Colombia today) and Venezuela, Simon Bolivar was eventually pushed out by royalist forces in his quest to liberate South America from the Spanish oppressors. After first being denied help in Jamaica, El Liberator found support from Haiti and its president Alexandre Petion who granted him asylum and helped in outfitting him for his triumphant return to Caracas on his way to becoming the liberator of Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Panama and founder of Bolivia. In return for six schooners and a sloop - 250 men, mostly officers, and arms for 6,000 troops, Petion's only request of Bolivar was the freedom of all slaves in the countries that Bolivar was going to set free.

Sadly, independence hasn't been a smooth ride for Haiti. One wonders how different things may have turned out if Tousaint L'Ouverture had been allowed to lead the nation into its new era, perhaps they may have even achieved some sort of stability. Instead, Haiti has lurched from one leader to the next, suffering 32 coups, along with one disaster followed by another - in the span of 30 days in the fall of 2008, Haiti was hit by four hurricanes and tropical storms. The newborn nation quickly learned that being the first free black state wasn't exactly a passport to diplomatic acceptance. Isolated internationally during its national infancy, Haiti wasn't recognized by the Vatican until 1860 or the US until 1861; even Simon Bolivar turned his back on them, refusing to invite Haiti to the Congress of Panama, saying "The government regards with repugnance the idea of treating Haiti with the same etiquette generally maintained between civilized nations". In order to gain conditional French recognition and to gain relief from the embargo enforced along with Britain, Spain and the US, Haiti was forced to pay reparations of 150 million francs in gold (about $20 billion today) and a 50% reduction in import duties in 1825 to compensate for French slave losses. By the turn of the 20th century, 80% of the national budget was going to pay off the loan and its interest - the country was locked into the role of perpetual debtor nation.

"I wrote Haiti's Constitution myself, and if I do say it, it was a pretty good little Constitution."
- Franklin D. Roosevelt

Meddling in internal Haitian affairs has continued unabated to the present day. Beginning in 1860, the waters around Haiti were the home for over 50 years of gunboat diplomacy as Germany, France, England and the U.S. competed for influence. Between 1849 and 1913, US Navy ships entered Haitian waters 24 times to "protect American lives and property". This led to the first US invasion and ensuing occupation of the island in the early days of WWI in 1915 on the pretext of subduing bandits threatening American property and fears that Germany might occupy the island. The result turned out to be 19 years of often brutal occupation. While there, the assistant secretary of the Navy in the Wilson administration, a certain Franklin D. Roosevelt, took the opportunity to write a constitution for the people of Haiti. It only got worse post WWII as the US threw its support behind Haiti’s (and one of the world's) most notorious president, Francois Duvalier, known as Papa Doc, in the 1950's through to his son, Jean-Claude, or Baby Doc, in the 70's. The evil perpetrated by their regime with their Tonton Macoutes is almost beyond compare. "During his first four – and bloodiest — years in power, Papa Doc received $40 million from Washington, much of it in the form of outright gifts. The U.S. even went so far as to send Marines to protect this regime from any popular movement that might threaten its rule." Oh, and then we come to Aristide.

Who knows if the US directly orchestrated the coups (yes, plural) to remove the twice-elected president of Haiti, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, winner of the first free and fair election, what is important is to view the events in context. The nation had survived 30 years of brutality under the Duvalier family, a time that witnessed around 30,000 political opponents eliminated. Enter Aristides, a slum priest in a land of right-wing death squads, trumpeting a message of liberation theology, a message the Reagan brain trust declared less Christian than Communist. "US policy," they said, "must begin to counter (not react against) . . . the 'liberation theology' clergy."

The moment Aristides won over 2/3 of the vote on December 16th,1990 in a field of 12 represented the second great shift away from imperial power in Haiti and therefore the wheels of regime change turned their focus once again to the western third of Hispaniola. The administration of Bush I turned to funding the opposition and the military. Declassified records now make it clear that the CIA and other US groups helped to create and fund a paramilitary group called FRAPH, which rose to prominence after the first military coup that ousted Aristide in September 1991, six months into his five year term. A more brutal version of the Macoutes rose, known as the zinglando, terrorizing in an era when thousands of civilians were killed and hundreds of thousands fled overseas or across the border into the Dominican Republic.

For the next three years Haiti was run by military-civilian juntas as ruthless as the Duvaliers. With the nation immersed in anarchy and violence, and a flood of refugees trying to float stateside, the Clinton administration had Aristides reinstalled with the help of 20,000 marines in 1994. Moving quickly this time, Aristides abolished the army who had overthrown him. Yet, before much else could be accomplished, fate once again stepped in. Events outside of Haiti's power once again moved against the country as Republicans gained control of Congress that same year, sealing her doom as the senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman was now Jesse Helms and House Speaker Newt Gingrich ensuring that the flow of US help would slow to a drip. Even though previously promised aid dried up, the country managed to limp to a successful transition of power when Aristide's 5-year term expired as Rene Preval was elected in December 1995. Future catastrophe was foreshadowed as Aristides was accused of rigging parliamentary elections, something frowned upon by the US if your name isn't Karzai, and encouraging armed groups of his supporters in the absence of an army.

In 2000 he became president once again in elections boycotted by the opposition. Amid all the accusations of abuse the country was once again hit by a triple whammy from the outside world: the UN cut back its mission, the EU suspended its aid program and of course Dubya came to power in the US. The new administration blocked all forms of assistance, including World Bank loans, a policy of economic strangulation that reflected the longstanding anti-Aristide views of the Republican Congress. The result was disastrous. From 2000-04, Haitians sank deeper into poverty, and their government became dysfunctional setting the scene for yet another coup. The example of the four promised loans from the Inter-American Development Bank (the IDB) for health, education, drinking water and road improvement paints a picture of the politicization of aid. The US asked to block the loans until the electoral disputes had been resolved. Yet even after all eight of the senators in question were out of office, the freeze on aid remained in place throughout Aristide's tenure. The State Department later claimed that the freeze was decided on by a consensus of the members of the Organisation of American States in something called the Declaration of Quebec City. Yet somehow the declaration is dated April 22nd 2001, and the letter from the US representative asking that the loans not be disbursed was dated April 8th. To quote the conclusion of one of the few journalists to find this scandal worthy of inquiry, ‘it would seem that the effort became concerted after it was made.’

The officially disbanded army along with murderous paramilitary groups seized control of much of the country forcing Aristides to request international aid. France agreed to help on the condition he step aside while the US declined to help in the absence of a "political solution". By failing to send troops earlier, the United States effectively gave a green light to the second coup d'etat against Aristides, despite having intervened a decade earlier to reverse the first one. Finally, on the night of February 29th, 2004, a team of US Navy Seals kidnapped him and his wife and they woke up 20 hours later in Africa, where they remain in exile, trapped without passports, to this day.

Of course this latest natural disaster would have occurred no matter what happened in the past. Yet, it is the economic policies of the rich towards the impoverished half island which have exacerbated the situation in Haiti - as always, it comes down to the dollar. Remember as you watch the relief efforts controlled at gunpoint by a foreign aggressor army that Haiti had been reduced to dependence on aid organizations for almost every function usually paid for and controlled by the government. 10,000 private organizations perform supposedly humanitarian missions in Haiti, however many projects seem to serve the people administering the projects as much of the money flows back stateside and American pockets. A nation is made to be dependent in may ways.

Rice, that most basic of foodstuffs provides the clearest example. Haitian import of US grown rice increased from 0 to 200,000 tons between 1980 and 2000 making the nation of 7 million the 4th largest importer of US rice. Coincidentally, per capita income has dropped from around $600 in 1980 to $369 today over the same time. Why? Under IMF tutelage, the nation learned it is better to have farmers move into the slums of Port-au-Prince to fight with laid-off government employees for 30 cent-an-hour jobs in sweatshops owned by U.S. clothing manufacturers. Additionally, through a series of structural adjustment programs, beginning in the 1980s, the IMF encouraged Haiti to adopt some of the lowest tariffs in the Caribbean. The predictable outcome was an explosion of urban slums such as Cité Soleil, Bel Air and Martissant, scenes of food riots in April 2008 (resulting in another ousted prime minister), where building conditions helped amplify the death toll of the past week to tsunami-like numbers. In November 2008, after a school collapsed in the wealthy district of Pétionville, the Mayor of Port-au-Prince estimated that 60 per cent of the city's buildings were shoddily built and unsafe. If the presidential palace couldn't hold up, it was clear what would happen to shacks built on the hillsides. Free market theories of comparative advantage were applied to justify the structural changes in the economy causing massive human suffering while American rice growers receive subsidies through a wide variety of mechanisms. Well, at least American Rice Inc. got rich.

In overthrowing me, you have done no more than cut down the trunk of the tree of the black liberty in St-Domingue - it will spring back from the roots, for they are numerous and deep.
- Toussaint L’Ouverture

For the same reason American soldiers disappeared from Haiti after 9/11, the world's attention has been drawn to the prosecution of the 'global war on terror'. Therefore no one even notice the story in 2006 when it was claimed that the US had caused the 2004 coup. (Read the 11-pages that we all missed in the NY Times!). While trying to impose democracy as far away as Afghanistan and Iraq, Dubya did another finish-what-daddy-started, this time in Haiti, mostly with the help of groups like the International Republican Institute playing the Haitian role of Blackwater. While the head of Blackwater just had his men rape and kill, the Institute's leader in Haiti, Stanley Lucas, an avowed Aristide opponent from the Haitian elite, was a little more subtle, counseling the opposition not to work with Aristides, fermenting the inevitable coup. Active in 60 countries they saw their federal financing nearly triple in three years, from $26 million in 2003 to $75 million in 2005. Meanwhile, there is never any slack in the financial noose tightened tag team style as the $125 million that Haiti gets each year from the States (as of 2000) is contingent on a passing grade from the IMF. Again, context: Haiti's government, which serves 8 million people, has an annual budget of about $300 million, comparable with a US city of just over 100,000.

Yet, at a time when the focus after a natural disaster should be on relieving suffering and curing the political and economic ills that have plagued Haiti since its inception, it'll be voodoo and the devil that has gotten Haiti in the minds of many. Of course if by voodoo you mean racism and the devil the western powers you couldn't be more on target. It's not just wacky billionaire American televangelists blaming these demons, it's also Spanish clergymen (sorry, Spanish only), Archbishops of York, and NY Times journalists. Limbaugh will spew hate to turn the tables of blame on those that look to help a persecuted people and all the while Naomi Klein's prophesized Shock Doctrine will be used as a tool to further entrench failed neoliberal economic therapy. The Heritage Foundation wasted no time in issuing a statement calling for economic 'reform' in Haiti to be tied to the aid now flowing into the country (the original has since been taken down and replaced with this lighter version). Well, I've seen a memo for the financial elite who are to blame for making this disaster a thousand times worse than it needed to be: Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Chase combined have set aside $47 billion for bonuses; Haiti's annual gross domestic product in nominal terms - $7 billion.

Well, that's it, a bonus for those of you who made it this far, Stewart ripping on some real devils. Don't forget to check the Amazon stripe on the side, I've updated it with some works by Haitians and a Chomsky about Haiti. Plus a little music to carry you to the next post.

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How to lose friends and influence

"Reputation, reputation, reputation! O I have lost my reputation! I have lost the immortal part of myself, and what remains is bestial."

- Shakespeare, Othello, Act 2 Sc. III

The Harvard University professor Joseph S. Nye Jr. first coined the term "soft power" back in 1990 to describe the ability of a political body, such as a state, to indirectly influence the behavior or interests of other political bodies through cultural or ideological means. It's now identified as the third form of power that nations can wield, with the other two being "hard power", military might, along with economic strength. Power is the ability to influence the behavior of others to get the outcomes one wants; you can coerce others by threatening them with a stick, you can induce them with payments, or you can simply attract or co-opt them. The year 1990 could be seen as a high water mark for the USA for all three forms of power: the symbolic defeat of communism with the fall of the Berlin Wall the previous year, the US and its allies were about to unleash the 'Desert Storm' invasion of Iraq and the poor deprived citizens of Moscow were finally able to order their first Big Mac. American hegemony was sealed, the new world order of American led globalization would usher in a new era of peace and prosperity. However, Russian bombers may soon be stationed in Cuba as naval battle groups are sent to Venezuela to perform joint exercises, while Chinese investors are exchanging ideas with Brazilian ethanol producers and Iran can sit tight in the knowledge that the security council will block any meaningful resolution against it at the UN. So, what's happened here?

While the US military hasn't been overwhelming in its performance in Iraq or Afghanistan, you can't deny that it is still the unquestionable hard power force in the world. The trouble is that the group of people who have come into power over the last 20 years or so have seen American military preeminence as a passport to do what they want. This view, that Charles Krauthammer has called “the new unilateralism" holds that the United States is so powerful that we can do as we wish and others have no choice but to follow. They have used that view as a way of applying American military power to all sorts of problems. As for soft power, well the current administration has finally come around in the past couple of years to admit that it is relevant. As recently as 2004, then US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld professed to not even understand the term soft power, claiming popularity was too ephemeral to be measured. When the actions of the current administration are combined with the popularly held view that they didn't even enter power democratically, the effects are easy to see in a growing tide of anti-Americanism. Oh oh, I'm feeling quite ranty, this could be a long post, bear with me.

That we have come to a point where outright purchases of private sector companies is not only proposed but accepted by many who claim to be defenders of free markets bodes ill for the future of American society - Ron Paul
The most important source of US power for the past century has been its financial weight. Now that the market roller coaster of the past week has resulted in what is essentially the nationalization of the financial industry, that era has officially ended. Time magazine went so far as the refer the the US as the United States of France. Although history may look back at these events as the turning point, the loss in economic power has been a long time coming. On October 26, 2000 you could buy a Euro with 82.52 US cents. While it has bounced off its low, the markets told the US about its confidence in the economy Monday as the Euro rose to US$1.4824 in afternoon trading, up from the $1.4470 on Friday. Meanwhile oil was up over $25 at one point, but settled for a $16.37 gain to end at US$120.92 and gold shot up $44.30 to settle at US$909 an ounce. In that fateful year of 1990, the US also moved from a negative to a positive current account balance as it managed to record its last positive figure in 1991, just shy of $3 billion. This essentially means that the US has been buying more goods (and services) from abroad than it is selling, with the flow of foreign funds into the US financing the difference. In other words, foreigners are purchasing such things as US Treasuries, shares in companies, and even firms or property. The deficit is precisely the amount foreigners must acquire in US denominated assets to keep the dollar from falling. Up to now, foreigners have been willing to finance the shortfall because of their belief in the American way. The past week not only has investment banking died, the American way could die with the proposed banking bailout package, result, goodbye dollar as the world's currency.

The typical knee-jerk reaction to the above problem has been to point the finger at China. Their currency is undervalued, or they aren't importing enough American products. However it's China that is winning the power war where it really matter as coincidentally they have the world's largest current account surplus, $370 billion. Hard power, they've definitely got that. Soft power we can start with the Olympics, where, although the shine was tainted a bit by the Tibet protests, still was an overwhelming success in the world's opinion. Beijing aggressively courts the governments of countries with diplomacy, trade deals, debt forgiveness, and aid packages. China's no questions asked policy is diametrically opposed to that of the US and the EU and has resulted in a spreading Chinese influence globally. Right now, your kids wear Chinese clothes and play with Chinese toys. It is not at all inconceivable that their kids will listen to Chinese pop and prefer Chinese movies. The inhabitants of southeast Asia are already doing so. At least there's always the lingua franca of English to fall back on, right? Wrong, the Chinese are working hard to change that in their favour too. In 2005, China's education ministry announced a new initiative to boost Chinese-language teaching in American universities and language institutes around the world. Beijing University, China's most prestigious, announced a visiting-scholars fund to encourage foreign PhDs to study in China. More than 110,000 overseas students from 178 countries studied in China in 2004. This figure marked a ten-year high, and an increase of over 40 percent from 2003. "There's a belief that to get ahead, it would behoove you to go to China, in the same way that ten years ago people said the same about the United States.

While the US has focused on using its military to secure influence, particularly in respect to oil, China has signed oil and gas exploration contracts around the world; with Brazil, Ecuador, Bolivia, Colombia, Venezuela and Cuba in the Americas; in the Central Asian states such as Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, and China's oil exploration interests extend to Burma, Vietnam, and Malaysia in southeast Asia; imports of crude oil also constitutes the bulk of China's imports from African states. The Chinese approach to foreign relations is officially termed "noninterference in domestic affairs." Unlike the hypocritical policies of the US, China doesn't mix business with politics and argue that such attempts by foreign nations to discuss democracy and human rights violate the rights of a sovereign country. While the US disregards international law in places like Iraq or Guantanamo while trying to twist other nations into following their vision of the world, China has its Tibet but doesn't force its ideals on others. As a result, examples of the growth in Chinese influence are not hard to find, even outside their traditional sphere of influence:

South America:
In Argentina, following their disastrous effects “neo-liberal” economic policies backed by Washington and the International Monetary Fund, “You cannot understand the miraculous Argentine recovery after the financial crisis of December 2001 without considering the boom in soy exports to China”. In Bolivia, China will invest $1.5 billion in the onshore oil and gas sector as well as showing interest in developing its largest tin mine, Huanuni. In Chile, China will set up a joint venture with the state copper company, Codelco. Meanwhile, a Chinese-led consortium bought oil and pipeline assets for $1.4 billion in Ecuador. The story is even bigger in Brazil and Venezuela. Farmers have been rushing to plant soy on the fringes of the Amazon rainforest in an attempt to satisfy China's voracious appetite. As for the ethanol politics in Brazil, maybe you can learn more here. It has also imported millions of tons of oil and iron ore from Brazil and has signed a deal to help construct a major natural gas pipeline. Finally in Chile, 2006 saw the Bachelet government sign a free trade deal with China in an effort to boost sales of copper, fruit, and fish oil. The Chilean president boasted of figures showing a $1.4 billion increase in trade between the two nations last year. “When Chile considers how to continue its development, Chile thinks big,” Bachelet remarked. “And to think big means to think China.”

Africa:
In Africa, where the game was once ideological, it has become purely financial. Che Guevara no longer stalks the Angolan countryside. Where once the government of China would build a 1,100-mile-long railway across Tanzania to support a communist brother, today it's all about profit. The continent sits on 90% of the world’s cobalt, 90% of its platinum, 50% of its gold, 98% of its chromium, 64% of its manganese and one-third of its uranium. It is rich in diamonds, has more oil reserves than North America, and has been estimated to hold 40% of the world’s potential hydroelectric power. Africa is now supplying a third of the oil fuelling China’s economic boom. Angola has overtaken Saudi Arabia as China’s largest supplier of oil. Trade hit $55 billion last year, up 40% from the year before. It is expected to top $100 billion in 2010. China has overtaken Britain as Africa’s third-largest business partner and is fast catching up with France. In Angola, which exported roughly 465,000 barrels of oil per day to China in the first six months of 2007, Beijing secured a major stake in future oil production in 2004 with a $2 billion package of loans and aid that includes funds for Chinese companies to build railroads, schools, roads, hospitals, bridges, and offices; lay a fiber-optic network; and train Angolan telecommunications workers. Sudan, with its vast oil reserves, is the number one recipient of Chinese investment, and sells some two-thirds of its oil to Beijing, while receiving arms in return. Whether rebuilding the infrastructure in Addis Ababa, or building a railway line linking Khartoum to the Red Sea, the common theme across the continent seems to be that China offers "no-strings" aid, a marked contrast to Western donors who impose conditions on aid and tie trade sweeteners to human rights issues. Robert Mugabe said, “We have turned east, where the sun rises, and given our backs to the West, where the sun sets." OK, it's Mugabe, but even a respected leader like President Festus Mogae of Botswana, who may run the best-managed country in Africa said, "China treats us as equals, while the West treats us as former subjects,” he has said. “That is the reality. I prefer the attitude of China to that of the West.”

Of course China also continues to sell arms to Sudan, among other African countries. In the period from 2003 to 2006, China's arms sales to Africa made up 15.4 percent ($500 million) of all conventional arms transfers to the continent. Notable weapons sales include those to Sudan, Equatorial Guinea, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Burundi, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe. Beijing has also sent Chinese military trainers to help their African counterparts. Arms sales and military relationships help China gain important African allies in the United Nations, including Sudan, Zimbabwe, and Nigeria, for its political goals, including preventing Taiwanese independence and diverting attention from its own human rights record. The Congressional Research Service reports that China views these sales as a means of "enhancing its status as an international political power, and increasing its ability to obtain access to significant natural resources, especially oil" (PDF). Africa registered 5.8 percent economic growth in 2007, its highest level ever, in part because of Chinese investment. Experts say the roads, bridges, and dams built by Chinese firms are low cost, good quality, and completed in a fraction of the time such projects usually take in Africa. China also contributes peacekeepers to UN missions across Africa, including Liberia and Darfur. It has cancelled $10 billion in bilateral debt from African countries, sends doctors to treat Africans across the continent, and hosts thousands of African workers and students in Chinese universities and training centers.

Iran:
Again, here the Chinese are winning the game based on what were once American rules. While the US threatens with the stick and carrot, China has won the game of influence. Where the US supported the Shah and paid the price, China doesn't meddle, it does business. Back in 2004 Sinopec group signed a $70 billion deal for Iranian oil and gas over the next 20 years. Annual bilateral trade has reached $20 billion. In September Chinese President Hu Jintao met with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a man the US refuses to talk to. Result, the blocking of American resolutions to punish the Iranian government for going forward with their nuclear program. "We mutually complement each other. They have industry and we have energy resources" said Ali Akbar Salehi, Iran's former representative to the International Atomic Energy Agency. China has no wish to see democracy flourish in the Middle East and has no problems dealing with the world's only theocracy.

Venezuela:
A category onto itself thanks to Hugo Chavez, his trip to China this week is what got me thinking about this post. While the US loathe him, they need him, well, his oil at least, as Venezuela is the 4th largest exporter of oil and 3rd largest exporter of gas products to their market, gobbling up about half of Venezuela's total exports...for now. After first stopping in America's other favourite nation, Cuba, Chavez arrived in Beijing while most world leaders were converging on New York, about which Chavez commented, "It's much more important to be in Beijing than in New York." It's too bad really, as you may recall his 2006 tirade against the US at the UN meeting in which he referred to Dubya as the devil. He hit the ground running in Beijing, announcing plans to build refineries and a fleet of oil tankers as part of a plan to double oil exports to China by 2010. On November 1st China will launch Venezuela's first satellite and according to Chavez will also be selling them a couple dozen fighter planes. Of course this follows Chavez' last trip to China a couple years ago when trade agreements were signed which Chavez referred to as the "Great Wall" against American hegemonism. In return China promised to back Venezuela's bid to join the UN security council (which eventually went to Panama), build houses for 20,000 people as a contribution towards Mr Chávez's policy of reducing homelessness, help build a fibre optic network, modernise a gold mine and develop railways and farm irrigation systems. After Beijing, Chavez plans on visiting Moscow, Belarus, Portugal and France.

So, what's my point? Take my adopted home country of Poland as an example. To a Pole, the US has always been the promised land, where an entrepreneur (a French word by the by) could start with nothing and wind up rich through hard work and business savvy. This vision has given the US a huge supply of soft power, influence. The bailout package now before Congress represents a serious threat to this ideal. The Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac bailouts already brought a nationalized housing market, AIG insurance, the last thing the beacon of free markets needs now is a socialized banking system. Capitalism will always have winners and losers. Just as war results in casualties (another problem the west can't seem to face), business involves bankruptcies. Instead of subsidizing corporations, the US needs to refocus its efforts on regaining its former position in the eyes of the world; China and to a lesser extent Russia are making huge inroads around the world. Even the head of the Pentagon, the hard power centre of the US, Secretary of Defence Robert Gates has argued for more funding for soft power activities. A trillion dollars can buy a lot of friends, why use it to reward failure and increase the power of the central banking system? Thomas Jefferson wrote: "The Central Bank is an institution of the most deadly hostility existing against the principles and form of our Constitution...if the American people allow private banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered."

Old Revolutionaries Die Hard (Sometimes)

Prachanda's the guy on the right

With all the news seemingly centred on Georgia and China this past week, an interesting story has slid by almost unnoticed by the world. Oh yeah, and it has a hammer and sickle involved. In tiny mountainous Nepal, former Maoist guerrilla leader Prachanda was sworn in as that countries Prime Minister just two years after laying down his arms. In true revolutionary form, Pushpa Kamal Dahal still uses his "nom de guerre", Prachanda, meaning the fierce one, easily won 464 votes out of 577 ballots cast in a special Constituent Assembly vote. This after leading a decade long insurgency against the Hindu monarchy that saw the deaths of at least 13,000 people.

The question remains if he can complete the transformation from rebel ideologue to successful political leader, however, there are many precedents that say it's possible. From George Washington to Daniel Ortega and all points in between, many revolutionary leaders have become successful politicians. Lest we forget, Ortega was the leader of the Sandinista National Liberation Front, the group that helped overthrow dictator Anastasio Somoza Debayle in 1979. His first term in office as president of Nicaragua was from '85 to '90. He initiated land reforms in an attempt at wealth redistribution and had to deal with the American backed Contra rebels. This brings to mind another thorn in the US' side, good ol' Fidel. It was Castro's birthday just the other day (August 13th), and although no longer technically in power, it was a long, interesting ride. From the Bay of Pigs, through the Cuban Missile Crisis, he proved that he could keep his country going , for better or worse, despite the efforts of the world's superpower just 90 miles away.

Other successful examples abound, Lech Walesa in Poland went from union leader on the docks of Gdansk to the first directly elected president of his country after the fall of Communism. Speaking of which, of course there were Lenin and the rest in the USSR and Mao Zedong in China. Regardless of which side of the political fence one sits, most everybody would agree that the best example of freedom fighter turned political leader is Nelson Mandela, like Walesa, a Nobel Peace prize winner. Not only did he lead his people to victory in one of the most important struggles of the 20th century, he knew when to step aside and let others lead, something many of this ilk have never figured out. Robert Mugabe would be the most glaring example of this type and some would argue that Hugo Chavez should take some lessons on when to move aside from his hero Simon Bolivar.

I know I've left many important figures out, the list could go on forever, Kenyatta, Begin, Shamir, Qadhafi, Carransa, Arafat..., but back in Nepal the changes have already begun and huge challenges remain. In April the Maoist party won elections but failed to secure a majority and therefore had to negotiate with other parties to secure the backing of the 464 out of the 577 ballots cast in the special Constituent Assembly. The same Assembly voted to abolish the 239-year-old monarchy in May, declaring the nation the world's newest republic. However, the Nepali Congress, which ruled Nepal for much of the past 18 years and the second largest party in the assembly, have refused to join the Maoists in government. The former guerrilla Maoists are also on the US list of terrorist organizations which isn't surprising as Prachanda was inspired by Peru's Shining Path along with chairman Mao. The promised land reform in a nation where 80% of the population depend on farming for a living will be difficult in one of the world's poorest countries already dealing with soaring food and fuel prices. The trickiest problem will be the integration of the 20,000 rebel fighters with the national army. In addition, they have two years to draft a new constitution. An uphill battle to be sure, but I think the true test of a revolutionary turned political leader is the ability to form compromises with former enemies, something he's already done forming alliances with other parties. He has also insisted that Maoists are not "dogmatic communists" and that globalisation and free markets are facts of life, hello China. Finally, and prematurely in this case, a true revolutionary must know when to step aside, something many never learn as they cling to their ideological beliefs and battlefield mentality, hello Mugabe, Musharaf...

...We leave victorious...because we Sandinistas have spilled blood and sweat not to cling to government posts, but to bring Latin America a little dignity, a little social justice. - Daniel Ortega

(Note: Yes, I realize Ortega went back into politics, and yes he's been accused of some nasty stuff)

How Al-Qaida Saved South America?

"We found those realms in such good order that there was not a thief or a vicious man, nor an adulteress, nor were they an immoral people, being content and honest in their labour...

We have destroyed by our evil behaviour such a government as was enjoyed by these natives... Owing to the bad example we have set them in all things, that these natives from doing no evil have turned into people who can do no good...

There is no more I can do to alleviate these injustices than by my words ... in which I beg God to pardon me..."

Masio Serra de Leguizamon

Last of the Conquistadors

Cuzco, 18 September 1589

Living a world away, one can't be blamed for sometimes losing track of what's going on in that other America, somewhere below the Panama Canal, the twelve independent nations that make up what I know as South America. The Spanish weren't the first to try to impose their way of life on others, and the US won't be the last, but both have definitely had a profound impact on the politics of these countries.

With the election of Fernando Lugo, leader of the Patriotic Alliance for Change, as president of Paraguay, the political transformation of South America can now be called nothing short of revolutionary. Every country short of Colombia now has a president that can be called left-leaning at the very least. This is a situation that could never have happened in the 20th century as the US control ranged from subtle influence to outright coup d'etats to place those they wished to have in power in the presidential offices across most of the continent.

Even before the conquistadors arrived in the 16th century, South America had a long history of contact between their civilizations, sometimes peaceful and of course often violent. However, the arrival of the Spanish brought this destruction to a whole new level. Their destructive path first through the West Indies, then into Central America and finally South America is well documented, but it's still hard to grasp the scale of death caused by their search for new wealth. Germ warfare (smallpox), cultural genocide (the Catholic church) and of course good old-fashioned war, decimated a once thriving culture and finally completely wiped out the indigenous cultures in less than 200 years. Eventually European colonial infighting, Simon Bolivar and finally the US brought about the end of Spanish rule in the Americas, leaving just one power to chart the destiny of an entire hemisphere opening the door to Manifest Destiny.

The Monroe Doctrine of 1823 was brought into existence to protect the new nations of the Americas from the evil European powers, but in typical world power ageing process, benevolent protection turned to aggression through the right of intervention to help "stabilize" a country through amendments to the doctrine such as the Roosevelt Corollary of 1904. 1898 saw a double victory for the US; they put an end to Spanish influence defeating them in the Spanish-American war and then as a bonus Britain gave up their rights to build a canal across the Central American isthmus and thus handed control of the entire hemisphere to the US. This also marked the beginning of American imperialism in South America as Colombia, which was then in control of Panama, refused to sell the rights to the canal for a mere ten million dollars (reportedly they wanted twenty-five million). America's answer, as became their modus operandi when governments refused to give them what they want, support for a Panamanian revolt, which emerged victorious and then gave America the right to build the canal as a gesture of gratitude.

The long history of direct and indirect involvement ranges the entire spectrum from friendly advice to CIA operations, troop deployment and nuclear threat (in Uruguay!) and is far too long a list to get into here. However, the new millennium and the post 9/11 world has brought with it a new threat. With the US bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan in a search for the world's most elusive man, resources may be stretched too tight, or perhaps they are just too distracted to notice what is occurring to the political landscape of South America(a little out of date). OK, not all of the new leaders are as anti-American as Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, but it's not hard to see a theme developing on the continent. From Lula's unionist roots in Brazil to Tabare Vasquez' first measure as president of Uruguay, the restoration of diplomatic ties with Cuba, a huge shift has occurred. I for one am excited to see what this vast continent does with it's new found freedom. Will Chavez really become the next Simon Bolivar? Will China or India replace the US as the main influence in the region. One way or another it seems as though were witnessing another stone in the wall of American hegemony being removed.