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Today's
Stories
November
13 / 14, 2004
David
Domke
Bush, God and the Election: a Theology
of War?
November
12, 2004
Forrest
Hylton / Sinclair Thomson
Insurgent Bolivia: the Roots of Rebellion
November
11, 2004
Peggy
Thomson
Encounters with Arafat
Joe
Bageant
Hung Over in the End Times: Heaven's
Foot Soldiers Escape the Dog Patch
Ben
Tripp
The Squeaky Wheel Gets the Grief
Edwin
Krales
Cuba's Response to AIDS: a Model for
the Developing World
Jordan
Green
How They Tried to Suppress the Black
Vote in South Carolina
Gary
Leupp
Guzman's Fist
Mike
Whitney
Meet Your New AG: Alberto Torquemada
Sam
Bahour
Palestine is Bigger Than Arafat
Sylvia
Shihadeh and Robert Jensen
The Irony of Arafat
Russ
Wellen
Why Do They Laugh at Us?
Mark
Scaramella
Kerry's Enablers: the Clinton
Cult Factor
November
10, 2004
Joshua
Frank
The Bright Side of Bush's Reelection
Mickey
Z.
The Worst President Ever?: Bush +
Clinton = Bubya
Stan
Goff
Debating a Neo-Con
Mike
Whitney
Exit Ashcroft
Dave
Lindorff
Taking a Leak on the Bush Bulge
Ghada
Karmi
After Arafat
Fr.
Gerard Jean-Juste
Letter from a Haitian Jail
Rev.
Bob Jones, III
A Letter to President Bush: "God Has Granted America a Reprieve"
Bernestine
Singley
Tampa Vote: Dispatches from the Ground
Website
of the Day
Free Camilo Mejia
November
9, 2004
Meredeth
Kolodner
Rebuilding the Anti-War Movement
Saul
Landau
The Appeal of George W. Bush: a Mystery for the World to Solve
Brian
Cloughley
Diego Garcia and Freedom, Bush-Style
Charles
Glass
US is Failing the Test of History in
Iraq
Robert
Fisk
Arafat Died Years Ago
Paul
Craig Roberts
The American Century is Over
Adam
Federman
Witch Hunt at Columbia: Middle East Profs Smeared as Anti-Semites
M.
Junaid Alam
The Discredited Logic of ABB
Tony
Kevin
Fallujah and the Making of a War Crime
Pierre
Tristam
Zealots on the Mount: Get Voltaire on Speed Dial!
Patrick
Cockburn
Crushing Fallujah Will Not End the
Iraq War
Website
of the Day
Don't Blame the Voters!
November
8, 2004
Roger
Burbach
Out of the Ashes: Bush Win is a Defeat
for Democrats, Not the Left
Dave
Lindorff
Lessons from a Quagmire: Fallujah, the Hue of Iraq
Greg
Moses
After the Morning After: On the Homefront of the Civil War
Greg
Bates
Nader's Election Legacy: Something to Stand On
Michael
Donnelly
The Hit-and-Run Left: From ABB to CYA
Nick
Schwellenbach
Gutting FOIA: the Harm of Too Much Secrecy
Adam
Jones
Men vs. Civilians in Fallujah
Amelia
Peltz
Note from Palestine: This Is Not the Time for Despair
David
Swanson
The Media Black Out on Vote Fraud
Brian
Rainey
The Devil Made Them Do It? Elections, Religion and the American
People
Poets'
Basement
Albert, Landau, Hamod
Website
of the Day
A Report on the US Supply of Toxic Weapons to Iraq
November
6 / 7, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Don't
Say We Didn't Warn You
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Green Out
Carl
G. Estabrook
Who Killed Cock Robin?
Saul
Landau
Che: the Man and the Movie
Gary
Leupp
Let There Be Conflict!
Ben
Tripp
You Call This a Party?
Paul
Craig Roberts
The October Numbers: Continuing Stress on the Jobs Front
Jordan
Green
Heroin, Cocaine and Espanola, NM
Fred
Gardner
Haul of Justice
J.A.
Miller
Cults of the Jealous God: the Balfour Decision Reconsidered
Ramzy
Baroud
Life Without Arafat
Dave
Zirin
Out at the Ballgame: Pro Sports and the Gay Athelete
Ron
Jacobs
The Arrow on the Doorpost
Robert
Oscar Lopez
How White Liberals Became a New Racial Minority
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
The November Surprise
Dave
Lindorff
Silver Linings
Richard
Oxman
Invitation to the Bodily Snatched
John
Whitlow
Value Wars: the View from Lexington, Kentucky
Rahul
Mahajan
Fallujah and the Reality of War
Leila
Matsui
Political "Ju-On": Carrying a Grudge
November
5, 2004
David
Vest
The Not-Bush Brothers: a Fond Farewell
Elizabeth
Boylan
The Dems and Faith-Based Politics
Conn
Hallinan
War Crimes and Iraq
David
Zonsheine
Poetry and the Courage to Refuse
Cynthia
McKinney
It's a New Day!
Elaine
Cassel
Running from the Religious Right
Chris
Geovanis
First Protect Your Vote: Lessons for Democrats on Fixing Elections
from Chicago
Rob
Ritchie
Election 2004 by the Numbers
Jo
Guldi
The Beast of History is In
November
4, 2004
Sharon
Smith
The Self-Fulfilling Prophesy of Lesser-Evilism
CounterPunch
Wire
Bush Voters: 2000 v. 2004
Ben
Tripp
My Fellow Americans...Get Stuffed!
Michael
Donnelly
Why Not Blame Rosie?
Vijay
Prashad
An Election of Homophobia and Misogyny
Jules
Rabin
De Profundis: the Morning After
Robert
Jensen
Politics and Professions of Faith:
"Your Rich Men are Full of Violence"
Zoltan
Grossman
Blue State Secession: the Only Solution?
Jonah
Birch
1968 and Today
Dave
Lindorff
What Went Wrong?
Jack
McCarthy
I Knew It Was Over When Michael Moore Showed Up: He Was For Nader...Before
He Was Against Him
Donna
J. Volatile
Ahoy Kerrycrats! Welcome to Our Nightmare
Paul
Craig Roberts
The Bright Side of Black Tuesday
November
3, 2004
James
Hodge / Linda Cooper
The CIA and Abu Ghraib: 50 Years of
Training Torturers
Ann
Harrison
The Ghost Votes in the Machine: Voting Snafus Across the Nation
Greg
Moses
Blues for Fallujah
Anis
Memon
The Moral (Values) of This Election
Mickey
Z.
Post Mortem
Josh
Frank
The Dems Should be Ashamed
Chris
Floyd
No Ways Tired: Defeat, Dissent and the Bush Machine
spArk
Smoke Signals from Portland: Karmic Blowback and the Democrats
Friedrich
von Schiller
Folly, Thou Conquerest
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Democrats in End Time: Who to Blame
Now?
November
2, 2004
Gary
Leupp
Democratic Elections in Historical
Perspective: The Wrong Side Wins
Lance
Selfa
Selling the War on Terror
Laura
Carlsen
The US Elections and Latin America: Can the US Ever be a Good
Neighbor?
James
Davis
To Control the Event: Attention Bicyclists
Richard
Oxman
Getting Up with Osama
Dr.
Ira Kay
A Mental Map of the Bush Presidency
Jesse
Walker
Frankenstein v. Chucky: the Halloween Election
Thomas
C. Mountain
Election '24, Deja Vu?: LaFollette, Nader, & the "Most
Important Election of Our Lifetimes"
November
1, 2004
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
How Bush Was Offered Bin Laden and
Blew It
Dave
Lindorff
Bulgegate Confirmed; Press Yawns
Greg
Bates
Nader Voter Survey Results
Roger
Morris
Novel Politics: Only Fiction Can Do
This Election Justice
Diane
Christian
Death Tolls
Lenni
Brenner
Secularists Be Warned: Christlike Kerry Roams Spiritual Universe
Christopher
C. Conway
Can the Left Sink Any Lower?
Francis
Boyle
Legal Elites and the Iraq War: the Nazis Had Their Law Professors,
Too
Jason
Leopold
Rummy's Failed War Plan
Website
of the Day
Dylan Resurrects "Masters of War"
October
30 / 31, 2004
JoAnn
Wypijewski
The Long March and the Million Worker
March
Winslow
T. Wheeler
Spartacus Tells All
Bruce
Anderson
Notes from the Big Empty: When the Hippies Invaded NoCal
Vicente
Navarro
They Worked for Franco: How Sec. of State Cordell Hull and Nobel
Laureate Camilo Jose Cela Collaborated with the Fascist Regime
Robin
Blackburn
How Monica Lewinsky Saved Social Security
Greg
Bates
A Question of Character: What Makes Nader Tick?
Nancy
Welch
The American Health Care Crisis: an Interview with Dr. David
Himmelstein
William
Lind
Election Day: Which Menendez Brother Will You Vote For?
Brian
Cloughley
Uzbekistan and Bush Hypocrisies
Suzan
Mazur
Oops They Did It Again: the NYTs the Paper of Record and Rip-Offs
Greg
Moses
Standing at the Graves of Iraq
John
Chuckman
Osama's Endorsement
Richard
Oxman
Why Not Accept Osama's Offer?
Ken
Avidor
Landscape of Fear: When Ugly is Suspicious
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Bush, Ba'ath and Beyond
Hope
Bastian
Strangling Cuba's Economy
P.
Sainath
Tower of Gabble: Toward a Sustainable Rhetoric
Dave
Zirin
Bush League: Why MLB Owners Support the Prez
Jon
Swift
The Dry Drunk Thang: Put a Cork in It
Ron
Jacobs
The Joke's on Me: a Review of Bob Dylan's Chronicles Vol. 1
Alexander
Billet
Taking Theatre Back: Are the States Ready for "Stuff Happens"?
Poets'
Basement
Jones, Laymon, Norris, Ford and Albert
Website
of the Weekend
The Origins of Halloween
October
29, 2004
Harry
Browne
No Justice for Peace Activist in County
Clare
October
28, 2004
Forrest Hylton
"The Gas is Ours:" Bolivia's
Ghosts of October
Col. Dan Smith
Rebellion
in the Ranks
Alan Maass
Jon Stewart v. the Pundits
Ron Jacobs
Ecstasy
in Red Sox Nation
Alexander
Cockburn
Kerrycrats and the War
October
27, 2004
Jules
Rabin
Crammed with Distressful Politics
Dave
Lindorff
Bulgegate: the Lies Continue
Katherine
Van Tassel
On the Home Front: Both Parties
Ignore Working Parents
Jeffrey
St. Clair
The Bi-Partisan Politics of Oil
October 26,
2004
Brian Cloughley
Three
Weddings and Lots of Funerals: Atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan
William Blum
Fear
Factors
Lenni Brenner
The
1964 Berkeley Free Speech Movement: Lessons for 2004
Ben Tripp
The
Chicken Salad Election
Fidel Castro
After the Fall
Greg Bates
The Nation's Flawed Calculus
Walter Brasch
Gag the Public: the War on Dissent
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
An Open Letter to Pat Buchanan
Mickey Z.
Rumble in the Jungle at 30: Ali, Foreman and the Congo
Amir Taheri
The Boom in Conspiracy Theories
Alexander Billet
Say It Ain't So, Bruce!: the Boss Endorses Kerry
Doug Giebel
The Religion of G.W. Bush
Kathleen Christison
Why
I Liked Thomas Friedman's Latest Column Before I Didn't
October 25,
2004
Ralph Nader
Letter
from a Minnesota Highway
Werther
West
Texas Wahabbism
Dave Zirin
Boston's Killer Cops: Death of a Fan
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: Oregon Revokes Dr. Leveque's License
Omar Barghouti
Executing Another Child in Rafah
William J. Nottingham
Lori Berenson's Story
John Chuckman
A Foolish Consistency
Uri Avnery
On
the Road to Civil War
October 22
/ 24, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
You
Can't Blame Nader for This
Rev. William Alberts
On Bended Knee: Faith-Based Deceptions
Willliam A.
Cook
Killing for Christ
Saul Landau
George W. Bush: a Man of His Words?
Bill Quigley
I Held the Bullet in My Palm: Masked Haitian Police Shoot Children
While Arresting Priest
Christopher Brauchli
Seal It With a Frown: What Compassionate Conservativism Really
Means
William S.
Lind
Fallujah and the Moral Level of War
Sharon Smith
Guilt Trippers for Kerry
Greg Bates
Kerrynomics: "Hurt the Ones Who Vote for Us"
Justin E.H. Smith
Is Lesser Evilism a Compromise with Evil?
Rebecca Evans
Tarnished Legacy: Pinochet and the Chilean Military
Mike Whitney
Al Hurra TV: the Second Invasion
M. Junaid Alam
Purchasing Individuality in America
David Krieger
Nuclear Non-Proliferation: Examining the Policies of Bush and
Kerry
David J. Ledermann
The Emperor's New Crumbs
Lawrence Reichard
Same Old FBI Story
Website of
the Weekend
Lie Girls: the Real Coalition of the Willling
October 21,
2004
Ben Tripp
The
Undecided Voter Examined
Joshua Frank
Kerry
and the Environment:
It's Not Easy Pretending to be Green
Stan Cox
What
the Left Doesn't Get About Small Businesses
Bill Martinez
State
Depart and Cuban Visas: Only Anti-Castro Agitators Need Apply
Mark Engler
The War and Globalization
Lina Britto
and Lucia Suarez
Bolivia:
a Year After the October Insurrection
Website of the Day
Two Pampered Children of Wealth
October 20,
2004
Yitzhak Laor
"Did
You Two Squabble?": a Bullet Fired for Every Palestinian
Child
Jason Leopold
Sinclair
Broadcasting's Air War: a Long History of Journalistic Deception
Jesse Sharkey
A
Teacher's Account of How Military Recruiters Prey on High School
Students
Col. Dan Smith
Choking
Free Speech About the Draft
Dr. Teresa Whitehurst
Using My Religion
David Vest
If
Bush Wins, Blame Me
Jack Random
The Jackson 17: Reflections on a Mutiny
Ron Jacobs
Time
to Kick It Up a Notch
James Brittain
Plan Patriota and the FARC: a Change in the Countryside?
Christopher
Dols
Bombing Madison: Michael Moore's Fright Fest
Dave Lindorff
First They Came for the Nurses...
Website of
the Day
Banana Republican Catalogue
October 19,
2004
Jeffrey St.
Clair
Party
Favors: the Political Business of Terry McAuliffe
Jeff Taylor
Confessions
of a Swing State Voter
Matt Vidal
American
Myopia: "More Money in Your Pocket"
Victor Kattan
"It's Not Who You're Against; It's Who You're For":
Palestine Takes Center Stage At Euro Social Forum
William Loren
Katz
What Goes Around Comes Around
Sean Carter
O'Reilly Should Shut Up About Extortion Claiims
CounterPunch Wire
Who's Really in Bed with Republican Funders: Kerry or Nader?
October 18,
2004
Saul Landau
Facts
and Lies; Slogans and Truth
Dave Lindorff
Bulletin
on the Bush Bulge
Diane Christian
Sheep
and Goats: On the Language of Goodness
Greg Bates / Dave Lindorff
Betting on War: a Wager on the Fallout of a Kerry Presidency
Uri Avnery
Ariel
Sharon's Philosophy
Peter LaVenia
Leaving the Greens So Soon? a Response to Josh Frank
Mike Whitney
O'Reilly at the Whipping Post
Elaine Cassel
The Other War: Civil Liberties Three Years After 9/11
October 16
/ 17, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
The
Free Speech Movement and Howard Stern
Leslie Brill
Unmerciful Judge, Merry Executioners: the Death Penalty as the
True Measure of Bush's Character
Jules Rabin
Reckoning Deaths in an Agitated World
Dave Lindorff
About the Bush Bulge: Was There a Pucker in That Jacket or Was
the President Just Glad to be There?
Peter Linebaugh
Judging Judges: a Few Pages from The Mirror of Justices
Gary Leupp
Iran and Syria: How to Effect Regime Change and Expand the Empire
M. Shahid Alam
America, Imagine This!
Ron Jacobs
Trying to Cross Lake Champlain
Fred Gardner
The Flu Vaccine Question: How Bush Blew It
Jenna Orkin
The Toxic Legacy of 9/11
Dave Zirin
Name the DC Baseball Team: Contest Results
David Hamilton
Alone and Exposed: Bush as a Strong Leader?
Ralph Nader
Criticizing Israel is Not Anti-Semitism
Doug Giebel
Thinking the Unthinkable
Mark Engler
Crimes in Freedom's Name: Dick Cheney's El Salvador
Derek Tyner
Blacks Didn't Get the Vote by Voting: an Interview With Clarence
Thomas on the Million Worker March
Evan Jones
Gimme That Ole Time Religion: Cash and "The Mind of the
South"
Poets' Basement
LaMorticella, Klipschutz and Albert
Website of
the Weekend
No More Bush Girls
October 15,
2004
Paul Craig
Roberts
Where
Did These "Conservatives" Come From?: The Brownshirting
of America
Laura Carlsen
Wal-Mart
vs. the Pyramids of the Sun and Moon
Greg Bates
Empire of Insanity: Kerry's Iraq Troop Numbers
Michael Donnelly
News from a Swing State: Does Anyone Here Have a Spine?
Katherine Lahey
The Venezuelan "Threat": Why Do Kerry and Bush Fear
Hugo Chavez?
Robert Jensen
/ Pat Youngblood
Election Day Fears
Leah Caldwell
From
Supermax to Abu Ghraib: the Masterminds of Torture and Abuse
Website of
the Day
An Anti-Billionaire Policy? Why That Would Be Economic Racism
October 14,
2004
Darcy Richardson
The
Other Progressive Candidate: the Lonely Crusade of Walt Brown
Willliam A.
Cook
Turning
Myths into Truth
Laura Santina
Water, Women and War
Evelyn Pringle
Free Speech Banned by Big Pharma: What You Can't Say About Drug
Importation
Alan Farago
Lessons
from Nature
Rep. Maxine Waters
A Letter to Colin Powell on Haiti
Nicole Colson
Maimed
for Oil and Empire
October 13,
2004
Bishop Thomas
Gumbleton and Bill Quigley
Aftermath
of a Coup: The Other Disaster in Haiti
Sharon Smith
Barak
O-Bomb-a?: Democrats Target Iran
Christopher Brauchli
God and the Bush Administration
Mike Whitney
The Real Meaning of the Hamdi Case
Paul de Rooij
Amnesty
International: a False Beacon?
Website of
the Day
Operation
Truth
October 12,
2004
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
"Indian
Country"
Greg Bates
The Year of Voting Dangerously: a Survey Request of Nader Voters
in Swing States
Steven Conn
Progressives as Pawns: Kerry's War on Nader
Jason Leopold
Under Cheney, Halliburton Helped Saddam Siphon Billions from
UN Oil-for-Food Program
Security Scholars
for a Sensible Foreign Policy
Time for a Change of Course
Timothy J. Freeman
Dying for a Mistake
Pierre Tristam
Deconstructing Bush
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
The 2nd Debate: the Blurring of Act and Audience
Bill and Kathleen
Christison
Israel as Sideshow
Website of the Day
John Kerry's Personal Off-Shore Tax Shelters
October 11,
2004
Robert Fisk
Iraq:
Unforgivable Betrayals and Broken Promises
Kevin Pina
The
Untold Story of Aristide's Departure from Haiti
Patrick Gavin
Rethinking
Columbus Day
Chris Floyd
Tribes with Flags in the New Afghanistan
Daniel Wolff
Radioactive Money: Entergy, Political Cash and America's Most
Dangerous Nuclear Plant
Walter Brasch
The Only Ones Who Believe Saddam Had WMDs are Bush, Cheney...and
40% of All Americans
Mike Whitney
The Phony Afghan Elections: Ballot of the Disappearing Ink
Ari Shavit
"He Talks to Condi Rice Every Day": an Interview with
Sharon's Lawyer
Paul Craig
Roberts
The
Debates and the Big Lie
Website of the Day
Dylan's Greatest Recording?
October 9 /
10, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
"There
Are No Innocents"
Paul de Rooij
Northern Ireland is Still the Issue: a Conversation with Gerry
Adams
M. Shahid Alam
Making Sense of Our Times
Laura Carlsen
Protest and Populism in Latin America
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: ASA Goes to Court
Col. Dan Smith
Bush's Credibility Gap
Paul Craig
Roberts
Faith-Based Economics
Greg Bates
What If Nader Critics Get What They Demand?
Joshua Frank
Cobb, the Greens and the Collapse of the Left
Felice Pace
Wilderness, Politics and the Oligarchy: How the Pew Charitable
Trust is Smothering the Grassroots Environmental Movement
Walter A. Davis
Of Pynchon, Thanatos and Depleted Uranium
William A.
Cook
The Agony of Colin Powell
Phyllis Pollack
Twas No Crank Call Love Affair: London Calling, 25 Years Later
Poets' Basement
Klipschutz, Albert, Ford
Website of the Weekend
Abu Ghraib: the Taguba Annexes
October 8,
2004
Jennifer Loewenstein
The
Israeli Invasion of Gaza
Moshe Adler
Edwards' Gambit: He Hoped No One Would Notice the Similarities
David Swanson
Media Blackout: Press Continues to Ignore Labor's Opposition
to Iraq War
Dave Zirin
CounterPunch Contest: Let's Name the New DC Baseball Team!
Rep. Ron Paul
The Draft is a Form of Slavery
William S. Lind
Keeping Our SA Up
Samar Assad
Kerry v. Bush: No Difference When It Comes to Israel / Palestine
Jim Ingalls
and Sonali Kolhatkar
The Elections in Afghanistan
October 7,
2004
Dave Lindorff
All
Out of Volunteers: A Draft is in the Air
Masha Hamilton
Fear in Kandahar
Christopher
Brauchli
Master of Corruption: the Ripening Scandals of Tom Delay
Jason Leopold
Is There Still Time to Impeach Bush?
Bruce K. Gagnon
Bombing the Panhandle: Fighting the Pentagon in Rural Florida
Meredith Kolodner
Where
is the Urgency?: The Anti-War Movement's Election Year Challenge
October 6,
2004
Jeffrey St.
Clair
"Please,
Dude, Can I Take Them Out?": Targeting Civilians in Fallujah
Ron Jacobs
Going
Nuclear: the Ghost of Edward Teller Lives
Michael Colby
The National Flip-Flop: Suddenly Bush is Unfit to Lead?
Tarif Abboushi
More of the Same: Israel Wins the Debates
Matthew Behrens
Canadian Firms Profit from Iraqi Blood
Mike Whitney
Rethinking WMDs
John Pilger
Stealing Diego Garcia
Ben Tripp
Kerry's "Triumph"
Kevin McKiernan
Cheney's Poison Lab: Wrong Time, Wrong Target
Patrick Cockburn
Elections
Will Not End the Fighting in Iraq
Website of the Day
Is There an Islamic Problem?
October 5,
2004
Anthony Loewenstein
Rupert
Murdoch and the Marginals: "Personally Creating Outcomes"
Mark Clinton
and Tony Udell
The
Suicide of an Iraq War Veteran
Greg Bates
Trading
Idiots: an Open Letter to Eric Alterman
Dave Lindorff
What's
the Frequency, Karl?
Norm Dixon
Why Washington Won't Save Darfur Villagers
Larry Kearney
God Talk and Burning Children
Bill Linville
Dirty Politics in the Land of "Clean" Government
Gary Leupp
What
Edwards Should Ask Cheney
Website of
the Day
A Guide to Halliburton for Tonight's Debate
October 4,
2004
Diane Christian
The
Gates of Hell
Joshua Frank
An Interview with David Cobb
Doug Giebel
Incurious George: What If Bush Didn't Lie?
John Chuckman
Strange Victory: Sen. Obvious and the Pathetic Lump
Ramzy Baroud
Reverse the Picture: Anatomy of a Palestinian Outrage
Julia Stein
Remembering Mario Savio and the FSM
Sean Donahue
Outsourcing
Terror: Kerry and Special Forces
Website of
the Day
Mapping
Mt. St. Helens as She Rocks
October 2 /
3. 2004
Paul Wright
John
Kerry on Criminal Justice
Kathleen and Bill Christison
An Exchange with Israeli Historian Bennie Morris
Kathie Helmkamp
My Son Trent: a Marine Who Doesn't Want to Kill
Phillip Cryan
Indigenous Mobilization in Colombia
Lenni Brenner
The First Ex-Catholic Saint: Memories of Mario Savio
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: In Case You Missed "Montel"
Ron Jacobs
It Did Happen Here: When Neo-Nazis Terrorized Olympia
Ben Tripp
Sticker Shock
William S.
Lind
The Grand Illusion: Iraqi Security Forces
Dave Zirin
The Swindle of the Century: Baseball Comes to DC
Dave Lindorff
Lies from the Great Debate
Luscon Pierre-Charles
Haiti's Elections: a High-Tech Sham is Underway
Zoe Moskovitz
& Sasha Kramer
Separating Lies from Truth About Haiti
Nelson P. Valdes
Habana Night vs. Latin American Scholars in Vegas: 61 Banned
Cuban Academics
Alan Farago
The "Ownership Society" and the End of the Everglades
Nancy Haley
What is the Historical Jesus Trying to Tell Us?
Alex Billet
Long Live The Clash: London Still Calling After 25 Years
Steve Fesenmaier
Save and Burn: The War on Libraries
Poets' Basement
Smith, Holt, Albert
October 1,
2004
Steve Breyman
Kerry's
Missed Opportunities
Rose Gentle
My
Son Died for a Lie
Lee Sustar
Iran
in the Crosshairs
Ralph Nader
What
We Didn't Hear at the Debate: Where's the Exit Strategy?
Walter Andrews
We Are Less Secure Now Than Ever
Mike Whitney
Pandora's
Government
Mickey Z.
Debate
This
Saul Landau
The
Iraq Invasion: Lessons from the Pinochet Cases
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
|
Weekend Edition
November 13 / 14, 2004
The Politics
of Imperialism
Neoliberalism
and Class Politics in Latin America
By
JAMES PETRAS
The endless rhetorical vaporing about
"civilizational", "epochal", "global"
changes and "world-historical" century-long projections
are at best based on anecdotal selective data. The practitioners
of this style of rhetoric are what we might call 'ideological
charlatans'. Most of their sweeping rhetoric is largely inspirational
to give its readers and listeners a sense that they are
witness to or participants in a grand all-inclusive process,
which, if they follow the precepts of the ideological charlatans,
they are capable of understanding and engaging. The mighty images
rolling off the flapping tongues of the charlatans demolish
all contingencies, all time and place-bound conditionalities
because, we are assured by the charlatans, these contradictions,
exceptions, counter-trends are unimportant faced with the mystical
'Great Historical Perspective'.
Long-term, large-scale changes
across continents seldom take place without processes of cumulative,
heterodox changes at the level of class relations at the local,
regional, and national level. The spread of new ideas, organizations,
struggles and policies across national boundaries is similarly
not merely a process of a 'communication' or a 'technological
revolution' but the consequence of emerging political organizations
which already share basic outlooks and interests with the 'lead
actors'.
"Globalization"
or imperialist expansion, is not merely the "spread"
of an ideology and its imposition by force or persuasion. There
is a prior condition the existence of political and bureaucratic
elites and important sectors of the ruling class who have a common
political and economic interest and capacity to articulate the
ideology and implement pro-imperial policies.
The link between the 'global'
or imperial power and its control of national economies, natural
and financial resources, markets and treasuries is through the
ascendancy of national political-economic configurations of power.
The basic 'link' in the imperial chain what now is mistakenly
called "globalization" is based fundamentally
on the outcome of class struggle. Without a successful outcome
to the class struggle, there is no political elite or dominant
class capable of linking to the imperial drive. Without a national
'link' the imperial powers cannot expand, or "globalize"
the world. Unable to globalize or expand, the imperial powers
must intervene directly, that is, militarily to shift the balance
in the national class struggle, via invasions, coups and colonization.
Imperialist expansion, almost
everywhere, takes place in the first instance through force.
The imperial imperative is to conquer the national resistance,
in order to destroy the class adversaries of their imperial-linked
dominant class. Subsequently force is used to impose and defend
the dominant class ruling families, political clients, financial
groups, etc, who form the political elite. Force is used to
defend military and paramilitary formations, police and judicial
officials who will be defenders of the economic linkage groups
to the empire.
Imperial 'hegemony' is established
over the ruling class and its state apparatus not simply through
ideological persuasion as most so-called 'Neo-Gramscians' argue,
but through shared economic interests and common enemies. Without
the economic rewards and privileged access to the public treasury
and financial loans, it is questionable how effective imperial
ideology would be in influencing ruling class behavior. Given
the historical violence and exploitation induced by imperial
intervention and the concentration of wealth in the hands of
the imperial collaborators, imperial ideology does not exercise
hegemony over the masses of the people. In every instance the
introduction of imperial policies privatizations, structural
adjustment policies, "free markets" is rejected
by the great majorities of the populace. The exercise of imperial
power is not based on "hegemony" but rather on 'force'
and 'political-organizational' control and manipulation by the
local imperial-linked political-economic elites.
If the imperialist powers
in our time the US and the European Union are incapable
of establishing direct hegemony, strictly speaking, over the
masses in Latin America, they rely on the collaborator elites
with whom they share interests, property and riches. Given increased
polarization, and deepening political and economic crises the
collaborator ruling class's influence over the masses has become
very tenuous. In this context the crucial political-social class
which enters to exercise power is the petit bourgeois via its
electoral party apparatus, its role in the state bureaucracy
and in civic organizations, its close ties with the trade union
bureaucracy, NGO's and 'social movements'. Combining a 'populist
rhetoric' attacking "neo-liberalism" and "globalization"
with an unquestioning servility to electoral politics, and the
institutional and legal order, this class does exercise hegemony
over important sectors of the masses for longer or shorter time
spans.
The workers and peasants' struggles
for political power encounter their most serious obstacles to
advancing toward a social transformation in the organized electoral
parties of the petit bourgeoisie. Through "political alliances",
co-optation, clientele relations and diverse ideological diversions,
the petit bourgeois electoral class and their affiliated organizations
subordinate mass direct action to electoral politics, via demagogic
promises and deceptive "democratic" phrase mongering.
At the same time the petit bourgeois political class is drawn
to pacts with the dominant class in which it accepts its subordination
to ruling class interests both 'national' and 'imperial'.
Petit bourgeois politicians pact with the ruling classes in
order to secure 'political legitimacy', opportunities to hold
political positions, (without overt destabilization, threats
of coups, etc.), access to the public treasury (for personal,
family and network enrichment), and the possibility of ascent
into the upper-middle class or ruling class. In exchange the
ruling class secures protection of class and property relations,
prompt debt payments and a range of favorable economic policies.
The typical sequence of petit
bourgeois ascent begins with engagement in mass struggle ( as
labor lawyers, advisers etc..) and gaining political capital
through mass appeals and organization. This political 'capital'
is invested in running for electoral office (rationalized as
"combining many forms of struggle"). Once elected
to office the 'popular leader' of humble origins begins a series
of transactions with the ruling class, trading voting popularity
for political recognition and accommodation. This is rationalized
by the upwardly mobile petit bourgeois with the rhetoric of 'realism',
'pragmatism', 'possibilism' and the "need to broaden
the electoral base" to gain higher office (the presidency).
The "double discourse" becomes dominant in this phrase.
The upwardly mobile petit bourgeois make discreet visits to
the imperial embassies and capitals providing "guarantees"
to imperial interests, promises of prompt debt payments, promotion
of privatizations and free markets and appointments of neo-liberal
ministers. These commitments are given in exchange for imperial
certification.
The petit bourgeois, once elected
head of state, becomes embedded in the ruling class periphery.
The designated ruling class ministers design and promote imperial
interests while the newly elected President proclaims a policy
of fiscal discipline, export growth, wage constraint and 'reforms'
of welfare, labor and social legislation. The "people's
candidate" guarantees prompt and full payments to foreign
and local creditors, subsidies for agro-mineral and manufacturing
export elites and reduces wages, increases unemployment and eliminates
social welfare programs for the working class. The petit bourgeois
electoral organizations co-opts labor bureaucrats to oppose collective
action, and "discipline" labor. From the state apparatus
they create "anti-poverty organizations" to build a
clientele electoral base to replace the loss of disenchanted
class-conscious workers.
The "left-wing"
of the petit bourgeois electoral machine neutralizes the critical
mass social movements, arguing that the regime has "two
plans": The government will shift from 'Plan A' (neo-liberalism)
to 'Plan B' (social welfare) when it recognizes the "failure"
of its original policy. This is a sham and deliberate deception
designed by the "left" electoralists to justify their
continued positions in secondary offices while retaining party
affiliation in order to be re-elected. The "left"
electoralists are in constant dialogue with "critical"
leaders of the social movements, pressuring the latter to refrain
from building a powerful political alternative to the pro-imperialist
ruling class "People's President".
The petit bourgeois leadership,
politically integrated into ruling class politics and economics,
converts political positions into private economic wealth beginning
the transition from a petit bourgeois to bourgeois class position.
The final step in the ascendancy of the petit bourgeois politicians
is their acceptance into the social circle of the upper class,
the invitation to the big plantations, the parties with all the
celebrities and 'famous people', the dinners on Wall Street,
the big political and diplomatic receptions.. The petit bourgeois
has arrived, though occasionally they change clothes, put on
a baseball cap and visit a poor urban slum or a landless village
for photo opportunities. Being a leader in perpetuating poverty,
"Peoples President" expounds in international forums
and the UN on the need to struggle against "world poverty"
and calls on the wealthy nations to co-operate, which evokes
public applause and private cynical chuckles among knowledgeable
investors.
Imperialism rules through a
chain of political linkages that bring together ruling class
elites and authoritarian technocrats at the top who design the
strategies and policies to be implemented by the petit bourgeois
electoralists. The elite establish the national institutional
parameters within which the upwardly mobile electoral petit bourgeois
political class mobilizes and demobilizes the masses. The imperialist
class establishes hegemony over the ruling class; the ruling
class exercises hegemony over the petit bourgeois and the petit
bourgeois maintains influence over sectors of the leadership
of the mass social movements. The theoretical point is that
imperialism rules via indirect hegemony. Their interests are
articulated by subordinated petit bourgeois politicians via ideologies
'modified' to accommodate the demands of those below. For example,
the imperial ruling class speaks to the collaborator ruling class
of free markets, easy credit, loans, reciprocal benefits in free
trade and joint ventures. The ruling class speaks to the petit
bourgeois of 'democracy', 'elections', 'parties', 'power sharing',
economic opportunities, 'commissions' and upward mobility. The
petit bourgeois electoralist bellow to the masses against 'neo-liberalism',
'globalization', the need for 'alternatives' and the corruption
and venality of the 'old order'. The left electoralists mouth
the rhetoric of a 'new model', of 'pressuring the elites' and
of 'recapturing the party'. The social-movement leaders who
are linked to electoralists tell their mass bases that "circumstances
are not ripe for a break", "we need to return to the
bases" and "we have to focus on sectoral reforms".
The petit bourgeois convinces social movement leaders to refrain
from independent class struggle for political power.
Imperial Strategies
in Time of Crises
When imperialist power faces
mass conscious opposition, or where it has suffered a major electoral
defeat which has 'disarticulated' the normal political-economic
structures, imperialism cannot operate the through electoral
framework.
The imperialist strategists
rely on several non-electoral, violent and illegal approaches.
First and foremost is to divide the opposition or potential opposition
into warring factions the classic imperialist divide and
rule tactics. In Iraq, Washington and Israel are deeply involved
in the process of dividing Iraq into 3 mini-states: the north
to the Kurds, the center to the Sunnis and the south to the Shias.
Israel and the US have heavily armed the Kurds, established
a de-facto Kurd regime, forcible purged non-Kurds from the region
and organized the biggest and best armed militias in Iraq with
the promise of virtual independence. In the center they have
established the Allawi regime made up of ex-Saddamist secret
police bolstered by the US military. In the south, Washington
seeks amenable Shia clerics to fuse with former exiles to administer
oil depots and oil wells for US investors.
The principle weapon in fomenting
partition is political provocations organized by the secret services:
beheading Kurds and claiming it is by Iraqi Arabs; murdering
Sunni clerics and dumping the bodies in Shia neighborhoods; placing
bombs in Shia mosques. Unable to defeat a unified Iraqi national
liberation movement, the US and Israeli strategy is to create
weak mini-states warring among themselves and weakening
each other, lending themselves to becoming imperial collaborators.
In the case of Venezuela, the
US has failed four times to overthrow the Chavez government from
the "inside" via a military coup, a bosses' lockout,
a referendum and via the infiltration of scores of Colombian
paramilitary terrorists. The next move is to provoke a frontier
war with Colombia. The Pentagon encourages border crossing by
Colombian paramilitary forces ambushing Venezuelan soldiers.
They promote the Colombian government's claims on Venezuelan
offshore oil sites. As in the past, imperial policy involves
rearranging frontiers, re-defining clans, ethnic groups, and
tribal entities as "nations", while destroying existing
nations that oppose imperial domination.
Imperial violence, not
hegemony, plays the central role in the break-up of nation-states
and the creation of client mini-states of the empire. The result
of these mini-entities is the extension of military outposts
for the empire, new secure pipeline and transport routes to move
oil and gas and control over resource-rich enclaves.
The key link the forward
shields of this imperial expansion are the separatist warriors,
clerics, politicians and intellectuals, usually upwardly mobile
petit bourgeois, whose road to riches, recognition and local
influence is based on their utility to the imperial strategists.
An entire army of imperial pundits, neo-conservative ideologues
and liberal humanitarian imperialists provide the ideological
cover for imperial-sponsored separatist. They repeat the same
libertarian slogans, they ridicule when claimed by authentic
national liberation movements. Their purpose is to discredit
regimes opposing imperialism and defending the cohesion of their
nations. The imperial tactic is to pressure nation states to
enter 'negotiations' with the pro-imperialist separatists while
providing diplomatic and political backing to the civilian separatists
and military support to their armed counterparts.
Imperial strategies of divide,
fragment and conquer, receive strong moral and political support
from the libertarians and sectors of the progressive left. The
latter joins in the chorus supporting the separatists, calling
for negotiations, "self-determination" and the recognition
of the "legitimate" claims of the empire's progeny.
The theoretical point is that
empire-building tactics combine direct wars of colonial occupation
for oil and political control of strategic regions, with indirect
conquest via surrogate separatist and client leaders who disintegrate
and weaken the national cohesion of anti-imperialist nation-states.
The purpose of empire building
is not merely to secure monopoly control over world energy sources
but to build a worldwide network of military bases and political
clients to secure transport and communication routes. Empire
building involves the disintegration of real or potential anti-imperialist
nation-states and the integration of the 'separatist' entities
into the empire.
A theory of empire building
must take account not only of the role of the imperial state
and multinational corporations and banks the moving forces
at the center of the empire but the separatist terrorists,
gangsters, pious democrats and unholy clerics who operate at
the "bottom" of the empire. In the "middle"
there are the international functionaries, politicians, globalist
and anti-globalist ideologues who debate questions of wars and
self-determination in inconsequential forums. The 'social forums'
are "inconsequential" because the resolution of the
question of whether Washington or Europe will extend their empire
or not is resolved on the battlefields of Afghanistan, Iraq and
Colombia, in the shanty-towns of Venezuela and Palestine, in
the villages and towns of the Caucuses. In the Middle East the
Kurds, the Israelis, the Hashemite monarchs and the wealthy expatriates
line up behind the empire against the vast majority of impoverished,
downwardly mobile Arab workers, farmers, merchants and uprooted
youth with no future.
We are living in a time of
imperial wars, not civil wars. Entire societies are pillaged
and all the national resources are seized or "privatized".
In the midst of imperial-induced desperation and absolute misery,
the imperial leaders recruit soldiers and police from among the
impoverished masses. These 'national' recruits are merely imperial
mercenaries, foreign legionnaires in their own country. They
do not fight for a civil order; they defend an imperial order.
They are not linked to a 'dominant' class; they are directed
and financed by the imperial state defending an illegitimate
colonial puppet regime. The idea of a "civil war"
is an imperial ideological invention to divert attention toward
ethnic-religious divisions fomented by Washington.
The break-up of Iraq, Afghanistan,
Sudan, Chechenya, and the Caucuses are transitional tactics designed
to secure the strategic goal of re-integrating the new entities
into a US-dominated Greater Mid East- South/Central Asian Empire.
The US failed to 'fragment'
Iraq via war and separatism in the First Gulf War, though it
tried in the north and south. In the Second Gulf War it seeks
to form a "federated" colony based on a puppet regime
in Baghdad, a Kurd war-lord regime in the North and a Shia clerical
regime in the South. This strategy has only succeeded in the
North. The Kurds figure prominently in imperial expansionist
policy in the Middle East with Kurdish separatists active
in Syria, Iran, Turkey and Russia. Both Washington and Israel
promote the idea of Greater Kurdistan to use the Kurds as weapons
to destabilize their adversaries and potential critics in the
adjoining countries. The irredentist 'vision' of Greater Kurdistan
would become a vassal kingdom of the US imperium.
Imperialism
and Revolution in Latin America
The advance of imperialism
and the emergence of revolutionary movements are constant political
processes in Latin America. But they are not linear processes:
there are longer or shorter periods of retreat and consolidation
in an unstable relationship. Nor is the relationship between
imperial expansion and revolutionary politics always inversely
related: there are moments when in different times and places
both advance or both retreat and, at least temporarily,
a "third force" emerges. The uneven development of
imperialism and revolution means that broad generalizations covering
continent-wide activities over long or even short-term time spans
are imprudent.
The optimal economic conditions
for imperial expansion are 'open' economies that permit unrestricted
flows of US capital, commodities, profits and interest payments.
The best political conditions are regimes which facilitate the
privatization of public enterprises, denationalization of foreign
trade, denationalization of lucrative sectors of the economy
and public infrastructure. Foremost from the perspectives of
imperial investors are countries which have a reliable and cohesive
political apparatus (military-dictatorial or electoral-civilian)
which controls potential adversarial social classes. Imperialist
investors prefer 'honest' electoralists who work full-time for
their class interests over corrupt dictators who extort privileged
positions for themselves, families and friends. However faced
with a choice between an honest populist, socialist or nationalist
or a murderous free-market dictator, Washington always supports
and promotes the latter. Washington only accepts the fall of
dictators when a revolutionary crisis emerges which threatens
its strategic interests (the client state apparatus, US investments,
automatic international alignment with the US) at which
point it supports and promotes 'regime change', the election
of a conservative civilian regime.
Imperial Strategies
in Historical Perspective
Between 1946 to 1958 Washington
backed dictatorial and authoritarian liberal regimes throughout
the Caribbean and Latin America and worked to undermine
'national-populist' regimes in Guatemala, Bolivia, Brazil and
Argentina. Imperial strategists backed the Somoza dictatorship
in Nicaragua, Batista in Cuba, Trujillo in the Dominican Republic,
Perez Jimenez in Venezuela, Duvalier in Haiti, Odria in Peru,
Armas in Guatemala, Stroessner in Paraguay and the authoritarian
civilian Videla and Ibanez regimes in Chile.
This dictatorial-neo-liberal
period was a 'perfect fit' to US imperial needs in terms of trade,
investment and international diplomatic and political alignment
against the advance of socialism and nationalism in the rest
of the world. The post-World Wad II counter-revolutionary wave
faced counter-forces from the nationalists in Brazil under Vargas,
Argentina under Peron, Guatemala under Arbenz and in Bolivia
after the 1952 revolution from the armed revolutionary socialist
miners.
These nationalist challenges
were partially defeated by an alliance of US intelligence agencies,
working with the local military and ruling class: Arbenz was
overthrown in a CIA coup in 1954, Peron in a military coup in
1955, Vargas succumbed to pressure and committed suicide. In
Bolivia, Washington was able to co-opt the petit bourgeois nationalists
of the Revolutionary Nationalist Movement (MNR). While Washington
advanced in undermining its adversaries in the mid to late 1950's,
its clients in turn increasingly faced new revolutionary challenges
culminating in the revolutionary overthrow of Batista in Cuba,
and Perez Jimenez in Venezuela, and the exit of Odria in Peru
and Trujillo in the Dominican Republic.
The "simultaneous revolutionary
upsurge" from the late 1950's to the middle of the 1960's
reflected several important new characteristics in relation to
the nationalist opposition of the late 1940's and 1950's. The
revolutionary upsurge had a strong radical socialist component
which went beyond the earlier national populism of Peron, Vargas,
the MNR and Arbenz. Secondly it relied on extra-parliamentary
struggle guerrillas, insurrections and general strikes.
Third it called into question the earlier alliances with the
petit bourgeois electoralists like the MNR in Bolivia.
Fourthly, the new revolutionary movements were a challenge to
the rapacious authoritarian liberal export regimes of Central
America and the Caribbean and the stagnation of the import-substitution
'national populist regimes of South America. Fifth, while the
origins of this revolutionary wave were rooted in the specificities
of each nation, the regional similarities imposed by US counter-insurgency
tactics and the common revolutionary 'reference point' in the
Cuban Revolution created a point of convergence among the various
revolutionary movements. The Cuban Revolution's eminent success
in achieving equality, sovereignty, popular power and in defeating
US intervention tended to create a common pole of political struggle
throughout sectors of the revolutionary left. This new context
led Washington to fashion a new program (Alliance for Progress)
which was tactically oriented toward allying with the reformist
petit bourgeois parties to prevent new social revolutions and
defeating popular insurgents and mass movements. These temporary
alliances were designed to secure the strategic goal of establishing
pro-US regimes. Strategically Washington sought to 'roll-back'
the nationalist, socialist and populist gains of the 1950' and
early 1960's and re-establish and extend the Central American/Caribbean
liberal 'model' to all of South America.
Tactically, Washington adopted
a multi-track policy the promise of reforms via the Alliance
for Progress, the practice of direct armed intervention (Cuba,
Dominican Republic) and a high profile military strategy involving
counter-insurgency, military coups, overseas military missions
and military aid and indoctrination programs. A big role in
this effort at imperial containment of revolution was played
by the local petit bourgeois electoral leaders in Venezuela (Betancourt),
Colombia, Peru (Belaunde), Chile (Frei), Bolivia (Paz Estensoro),
Argentina (Frondizi), and Brazil (Quadros), who followed Washington's
lead in co-coordinating counter-insurgency, reversing nationalist
gains or promising "reforms" instead of revolution.
This period of multi-track tactics, however, was eventually
reduced to the primacy of the military option. The shift in
tactics reflected Washington's doubts about the effectiveness
of the civilian electoral regimes and the reforms in containing
the emerging revolutionary wave. Washington turned toward backing
a series of military coups Dominican Republic in 1962,
Brazil 1964, Argentina 1966, and Bolivia 1964 to eliminate the
emerging revolutionary forces and set the stage for a 'roll-back'
of nationalist populist reforms and to isolate revolutionary
internationalist Cuba.
In the conjuncture of the late
1960's the imperialist rollback strategy did not succeed in securing
Washington's control. In Brazil there was a popular upsurge
in 1968-69, in Argentina there were national insurrectional uprisings
in 1969 (including the famous Cordabazo), in the Dominican Republic
a massive popular-military insurrection which toppled the client
regime in 1965. In the late 1960'sand early 1970's in Bolivia,
Peru and Ecuador nationalist military officials allied themselves
with the populace to replace the pro-US electoral regimes. In
Chile the electoral left won the election of 1970. In Cuba,
the revolutionary regime consolidated power. All this demonstrated
that US military and electoral policy could be temporarily defeated;
that social programs beyond 'nationalist-populism' could be implemented;
that new forms of popular representation could be realized.
Washington's response to these
defeats was to rethink its options and to proceed to radicalize
its military, political and economic tactics in order to move
forward to its strategic goal of imposing a continent-wide neo-liberal
regimes under US imperial control. In Brazil Washington backed
the bloody repression of the Costa Silva dictatorship; in Argentina
Washington worked via Peronist death squads (The TripleAAA) and,
after the coup of 1976, the terrorist dictators (1976-82) which
murdered and disappeared 30,000 Argentines. In Chile, Washington
promoted a military coup backed by the economic elite and the
Christian Democrats, putting Pinochet in power for over 16 years.
Similar processes operated in Uruguay and Bolivia in the early
1970's. Washington supported long-term dictatorships in order
to totally re-structure the legal, economic, political system
to finally achieve its strategic goal the 'neo-liberal
state' integrated in the empire.
Dictatorships
of Long Duration and Bi-Party Clients: 1964-1980's
The beginning of US-backed
dictatorships of long duration in South America was accompanied
by the defeat and challenge of US client dictators in Central
America. In Nicaragua, the Somoza dictatorship whose family
tyrannized the country for nearly a half-century -- was overthrown
by a popular insurrection. In El Salvador and Guatemala mass-based
popular guerrillas challenged US-backed terrorist regimes and
their liberal economic policies. In contrast, in South America
"durable dictatorships" backed by the US took power.
There has been little analysis of the specificity of the dictatorships
of long duration (DLD), especially in terms of US strategic interests.
DLDs required the total dismantling of the representative institutions,
popular organizations of civil society, the physical assassination
of mass leaders and the displacement, exile and incarceration
of electoral politicians of the center-left and center. This
massive, systematic repression was carried out with US military
and civilian advisers, financial assistance and political backing.
The purpose of massive repression was to allow the new dictatorial
regimes time and a free hand in imposing large-scale, long-term
transformation of the state, economy and society. These changes
were in line with US strategic interest in establishing a new
liberal or 'neo-liberal' order under US domination. The process
began under the military regimes: trade barriers fell, privatizations
of public enterprises began, foreign investment was encouraged,
budgeting and fiscal policies favored local and US investors
and the financial sector was deregulated. The scope and depth
of the changes required to reverse almost 50 years of national
popular legislation and institutions went beyond the time frame
of military regimes. What Washington achieved during the military
dictatorships was the creation of the legal, ideological and
institutional foundations for the neo-liberal economy. The political-economic
parameters for US domination were set in place by the time the
military regimes began to deteriorate in the early 1980's
faced with a new upsurge of popular socio-political movements.
Washington and European imperialism, however, did not simply
rely on the single track of military rule but also cultivated
political exiles and displaced politicians from the traditional
populist, social democratic, and socialist parties, especially
those who claimed to be 'renovated', that is, to have rejected
their 'statest' past in favor of 'market solutions'. Washington
and Europe subsidized the future electoral parties, provided
lucrative professional positions and fellowships to 'exile' electoral
leaders, and prepared them ideologically for a return to electoral
politics when mass popular direct action put the military regime
in a crisis mode.
The key theoretical point is
that the return of the electoralist "center-left" and
"center-right" took place within the neo-liberal parameters
established by the imperialist-military state. The purpose of
the ex-populist, ex-socialist and ex-nationalist electoral elites
was to demobilize the anti-dictatorial movement and channel it
into electoral channels while deepening and extending the liberal
policies of the dictator. If the military laid the foundations
of the neo-liberal regime, the civilian electoralist constructed
the structure through massive privatizations of all strategic
sectors, total de-regulation, perpetual debt payments, and redistribution
of wealth upward and outward.
The petit bourgeois electoralists
succeeded in realizing the strategic interests of the US Empire
a continent-wide liberal economy.
Between the 1980's and 2004
the liberal onslaught continued despite the revolutionary upsurge
during the 1990's and early in the new millennium. The breakdown
of the neo-liberal model in Argentina (2001) and Bolivia (2003)
and the severe crisis in Brazil (1997/8) were temporary detours
en route to complete US colonization.
Rise and Fall
of the 1990's Popular Upsurge
During the 1990's the US-sponsored
neo-liberal regimes and economies in Latin America experienced
a series of breakdowns, severe crises and chronic stagnation.
The economic failures of neo-liberal regimes generated a mass
base for a new wave of radical social movements, who replaced
the previous generation of electoral center-left and ex-radical
parties of the 1980's as the principal opposition to US imperialism.
CONAIE in Ecuador, MST in Brazil, the Cocaleros in Bolivia,
the unemployed piqueteros in Argentina, and the Zapatistas in
Mexico each joined with urban-based movements to challenge the
neo-liberal policies and in some cases to topple regimes. These
movements and their politics of extra-parliamentary direct action
detonated support within the cities among a minority of militant
trade unionists.
In addition to the new mass
direct action movements, the Colombian guerrilla (FARC and ELN)
increased their territorial control and influence, surrounding
the capital of Bogotá. In Venezuela, a new kind of nationalist
politics which combined mass mobilization and class polarization
with electoral politics headed by Chavez won the Presidency in
1998 on the basis of opposition to US imperialist policies.
The high points of these movements occurred at different moments
of the 1990's peaking about 2001.
In response, Washington accelerated
its militarization program on the one hand, and, on the other
hand, adjusted its political strategy to promoting and co-opting
a new generation of center-left politicians to serve its neo-liberal
agenda.
Militarization includes a broad
repertoire of tactics even in the same country. In Venezuela,
Washington pursued a range of policies from promoting a military
coup, a civilian-military coup, an employers' lockout, a fraudulent
referendum and the contracting of Colombian paramilitary forces
for cross-border terrorist activity. Washington's offensive
tactics were in each instance defeated by an alliance between
the urban poor and constitutional military forces. The conflicts
radicalized the mass base of the Chavez movement, increased the
level of grass roots organization, leading to expanded social
programs but did not radicalize the regime's policies toward
bankers, industrialists or the owners of the mass media.
The US vastly increased its
military aid to the Colombian regime and paramilitary forces
under Plan Colombia and expanded its military bases throughout
the Andean region. As a result of a scorched earth policy, the
guerrilla encirclement of the major cities was weakened and the
US-backed Uribe regime survives. However Plan Colombia has failed
to inflict any strategic defeats on the guerrillas, and the level
of urban and rural social discontent and social organization
has increased.
Paradoxically, while the heightened
militarization tactics of the US have failed to achieve strategic
targets, its political tactics have been successful: Washington's
support of center-left electoral politicians has produced a number
of strategic victories in Brazil, Argentina, Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador
and most likely in Uruguay in the near future.
In each of these countries
powerful social political movements have been fragmented, isolated,
divided and weakened through the rise to power of ex-leftist
parties formerly considered allies of the movements. The most
striking case is the Lula regime in Brazil, the largest and most
important economy in Latin America. Da Silva has provided the
US with a "dream regime" setting aside a budget
surplus of over 4.25% to pay foreign creditors, slashing pensions,
reversing labor legislation, negotiating in favor of AlCA, heading
up the military occupation of Haiti to prop up the US imposed
puppet regime. Lula has virtually frozen the minimum wage below
the level of inflation and expanded privatization to include
basic infrastructure. Similar policies have been implemented
by the pseudo-populists Gutierrez in Ecuador, Toledo in Peru,
and Mesa in Bolivia. In Argentina the moderate conservative
Kirchner regime has neutralized and divided the piquetero movement,
retained the radical privatization and free trade policies implemented
by his predecessors, while providing subsistence doles for the
vast army of unemployed and providing small increases for impoverished
pensioners.
The Dynamics
of Petit-Bourgeois Electoralists and the Leaders of Social Movements
The relationship between petit
bourgeois electoralists and social movements is a changing one
highly dependent on the political conjuncture. In the
run-up to taking electoral office, particularly in moments of
deep social and political conflict, the electoralists seek out
the 'radical' social movement leaders for political support to
sustain the electoral system against the threat of a popular
uprising. The electoralists utilize popular demagogy to deceive
the popular movement and even promise a calendar to implement
progressive and even nationalist social-economic reforms. To
the leaders of the social movements they offer a "social
pact" and the promise of future electoral opportunities.
The purpose is clear: to encourage the social movement leaders
to serve as "firemen" to demobilize the masses,
to divide the movement and to oppose any large-scale protests.
This tactical "left-turn" during the time of crisis
allows the petit bourgeois electoralists to consolidate their
control over the state and their relationship with the US embassy
prior to proceeding to implement the neo-liberal program. Once
de-mobilization has taken place and the movement has been divided,
the petit bourgeois electoralists have a free hand to first repress
those popular leaders not co-opted and then to move against the
social base of their collaborator movement leaders. Subsequently
the electoralists launch their neo-liberal offensive, discarding
their "social partners" like used condoms.
This is perfectly exemplified
in Bolivia under President Carlos Mesa in his relation to Evo
Morales. First President Mesa secured Morales support to consolidate
his regime with the promise of future presidential elections
and a truce on coca eradication. Morales loyally fulfilled his
tasks for Mesa: his cocalero movement, trade unions and political
party opposed a general strike, supported Mesa's referendum in
favor of the private petroleum companies, and aligned with the
President in Congress, even as Mesa explicitly put his regime
under the supervision and direction of the US Ambassador, John
Greenlee. With the full backing of the US Ambassador, Mesa launched
a violent military campaign against the coca farmers and their
union under Morales 'leadership', killing and injuring dozens
and destroying thousands of cultivated acres. Morales facilitated
this repression by decentralizing opposition to each local union,
and refusing to organize a regional blockade of highways. To
cover his failed policies he verbally threatened to withdraw
congressional support, still holding onto the last threads of
hope for the presidential elections three years in the
future.
Mesa, backed by the military,
the embassy and the economic elite was no longer in need of Morales,
discarded Evo, who has been discredited nationally and even among
some sectors of the coca unionists..
Imperialists oil multi-nationals
and US imperial power were faced with an insurrectionary challenge
in October 2003. They were able to reconsolidate control because
of the political link with the petit-bourgeois electoralists
and their political ability to recruit, utilize and discard social
movement leaders according to the changing political conjuncture.
Empire Building:
The Iron Linkages
Imperialist power is exercised
through a chain of economic and political linkages, which are
sustained by tactical adaptations to specific political conjunctures
in order to sustain strategic interests. The key theoretical
point is that this new wave of electoral neo-liberal politicians,
formerly aligned with the major extra-parliamentary movements,
has been able to temporarily channel political support behind
regimes, which embrace the imperial agenda. The result is a
deep disenchantment of the mass base of these movements (as in
Ecuador), the political co-optation of some movement leaders
(Bolivia), the division of the movements (Argentina) and a serious
temporary decline in movement capabilities. No major national
confrontation has taken place since the ascendancy of these new
neo-liberal regimes took power though, over time, sectoral strikes
and major demonstrations have re-started everywhere, and a new
wave of uprisings especially in Bolivia is likely. While the
US works with Latin American generals, the commanders of paramilitary
groups, and agro-business and banking elites, its most significant
political victories have accrued thanks to its linkages with
the petit bourgeois electoral parties and politicians. They
have been far more effective in demoralizing the masses than
all the mass media propaganda outlets; they have been more effective
in dividing and weakening the movements than all the "counter-insurgency"
programs; they have been more effective in co-opting leaders
and beheading movements than all the para-military death squads.
One should neither underestimate
nor overestimate the significance of this imperialist-electoral
petit bourgeois link. The 'link' is not a simple imposition
on the ex-center-left, but a result of the internal dynamics
of a rightward shift of these parties and leaders as they strive
for greater social mobility, family wealth, political influence
and social status. The "pressures of imperialism"
reinforce reactionary tendencies inherent among upwardly mobile
petit bourgeois electoralists.
The link however is not sustainable
over the medium run as the neo-liberal policies erode initial
popular support; disillusionment with some movement leaders leads
to the emergence of new leaders and new movements; and some movement
leaders, who are compromised with the failed electoral policies,
return to the bases and revive the politics of direct action.
A new cycle of mass mobilization extends throughout Latin America
was visible by mid-2004 in several countries (Bolivia, Argentina
and Brazil). However, these emerging struggles are mostly focused
on short-term demands, through they could escalate in the near
future.
Globalization
or Imperial Re-Division of the World
The large-scale, long-term
movement of capital into every region of the world has led many
writers to speak of "globalization" a phenomenon
which is said to describe a new historical phase in capitalists
or imperialist development. A few writers even speak of an 'interdependent',
post-imperial world. The magnitude and deepening of social economic
inequalities of nations, classes, races and gender however and
the enormous concentration of military power (and its use in
wars of conquest) has led to an increasing number of writers
to turn to the theory of imperialism. This is a theoretical
and empirical advance in clarifying the nature of inter-state
and class relations. While the recognition that imperialism
is the driving force of the current epoch and conversely,
anti-imperialist movements are the major challenge there
is little clarity on the significance and principle impact of
imperialism.
The single most significant
fact about imperialism (in all of its manifestations, whether
old US imperialism, revived European and Japanese imperialism
or newly emerging Chinese imperialism is the re-division of the
world. We are in the midst of a major struggle among the major
and minor, old and new imperialisms, to seize control of regions,
regimes, energy and strategic resources, through wars (unilateral
and multilateral), "regional or bilateral free trade agreements",
military alliances and economic associations.
The several imperial powers
are engaged everywhere in incorporating former communist and
nationalist countries within their empires. Eastern Europe is
incorporated into the European Union economic empire while the
US incorporates the same countries under its tutelage via NATO
and wartime "coalitions" as mercenaries in their empire.
In Latin America, the US works to incorporate liberalized economies
and regimes into its empire via trade and investment agreements,
while European investments and buyouts of privatized enterprises
enters to carve up sectors of the economies. Europe seeks to
seize sectors of the Mercosur market via a new trade/investment
pact, while the US advances its colonial scheme via ALCA.
In the Caucasus, Europe and
the US compete to carve out enclaves of control: the US via client
regimes and military bases and the Europeans via corporate buyouts
of energy resources and bribes to corrupt rulers.
In the Middle East, Europe
aims for investment/trade enclaves with comprador and rentier
regimes, while the US moves toward direct military-colonial conquest
to establish colonial regimes. The difference between US and
European tactics in the Middle East is greatly influenced by
Israeli influence over US Mid East policy, especially through
its Zionist agents in the Pentagon.
In Africa, the Great Powers
compete to carve up the oil and mineral rich states, fomenting
regional wars in Sudan, Nigeria, Equatorial Guinea and elsewhere.
Religious, tribal and ethnic identities are instrumentalized
by each imperial center to undermine central governments and
create mini-states, run by clients for major corporate interests.
We are in a period similar
to the Great Re-division of Africa in the 1870's and 80's
when the major European powers carved out their colonial territories.
Today, on a much grander scale, we are witnessing a similar
process accelerated by the forced disintegration of the Soviet
Union, Yugoslavia and the Pan Arab movement. Russia is being
divided through imperial-sponsored "separatist movements".
The aggressive military moves by the US in the Middle East are
abetted by the Zionist sub-imperialist vision of a co-prosperity
sphere. The aim is to monopolize strategic oil countries. This
has led to the opposition of excluded European imperial powers.
Carving up nations and regions, and the need to consolidate
the newly incorporated clients into their respective empires
requires an expanded military presence, and a more or less rapid
deployment military force. Subsequently it is essential to fix
an 'election' of a puppet regime to satisfy the 'citizens' of
the imperial country and to quiet the noisy but inconsequential
dissident social democrats and liberals. Insofar as the US and
Europe are electoral systems, the citizens who vote for the imperialist
regime are also responsible for imperialist genocide.
The 'carving up of the world'
is the dominant characteristic of empire expansion in the contemporary
period. It is carried out by agreements among the imperial powers
(multi-lateral consultations, Security Council agreements, and
'coalitions'), and with the active and passive acquiescence of
a majority of its voters. Imperial agreements, however, do not
preclude competition over regional spheres of influence, colonial
reconstruction contracts, oil exploitation permits and takeovers
of privatized state resources.
Carving up the world by unilateral
force maximizes the potential advantages to the imperial power
(it monopolizes the client relationships and resources) but it
increases the risks of political isolation, prolonged and costly
colonial wars. This may weaken imperial capacity to act in other
regions of the world. This is best illustrated today by the
US colonial power grab in Iraq.
Each imperial country attempts
to weaken its rivals by characterizing their activities as "imperialist",
"illegitimate" and against "international law"
especially in times of unilateral colonial occupation. Thus
the high moral position adopted by Europe in relation to the
US colonial war in Iraq. However in the case of Haiti, Afghanistan,
and Sudan where both major imperial centers decided collectively
to share influence, they issue joint solemn declarations of high
moral principles in favor of colonial wars.
Carving up
the World: Latin America
The imperial struggle to "carve
up Latin America" has several particularities. One is the
long-term imperial presence of the US in the region and the consequent
long-standing and deep ties to the ruling class and military.
The re-entry of Europe over the past two decades, particularly
but not exclusively Spain, has led to competitive but not highly
conflictual rivalries over control of strategic sectors of the
privatized economy. The prolonged and inconclusive negotiations
between the European Union and MERCOSUR are less the result of
US obstruction and more the result of European refusal to sacrifice
minority agricultural sectors to gain access to Latin American
industrial, service, financial and commercial sectors. Similar
problems have emerged in negotiations between the US and Latin
America over ALCA.
The carving up of Latin America
takes place among some countries which have a substantial industrial
base or a large peasant and Indian subsistence agricultural sector
all of which are obstacles to colonial exploitation based
on maquiladora export platforms, financial pillage via debt payments
and large-scale agro-exports based on agro-business corporations
linked to giant imperial trading corporations.
The consequences of successfully
'carving up' Latin America will be to convert the region into
an agro-business, agro-mineral, cheap labor manufacturing export
platform capable of sustaining perpetual debt payments. This
is a huge task that requires sustained efforts by the political
class of electoralist politicians capable of deflecting and fragmenting
inevitable popular resistance to this "roll-back" of
100 years of history. From the imperial perspective there are
numerous positive signs the New Right politicians headed
by Lula have taken important steps toward integrating Brazil
into ALCA, while moving toward an agreement via MERCOSUR with
the European Union. In a sense Brazil will be the first joint
colony of the two major imperial powers. Similar processes are
at work in the Andean countries of Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia and
Colombia. Venezuela's opposition to the 'carving up' process
has resulted in joint US and European support for a violent colonial
restoration.
So far the carving up of Latin
America proceeds through the "legal channels" of elected
petit bourgeois politicians, not through wars or ethnic separatist
movements. The principle obstacles to the re-division of Latin
America are the class-based national resistance movements and
the insurrectionary potentialities of class-based popular movements,
as well as revolutionary socialist regimes like Cuba and nationalist
governments like Venezuela.
Latin America's carving up
does not occur in the midst of severe inter-imperial conflict
but via joint and competitive activities of US and European
corporations and governments. The major strength and weakness
of the imperial "carving up" process is found in the
political link facilitating the process. The petit bourgeois
electoralists promote colonial re-division but become severely
compromised and rapidly deteriorate faced with mass opposition
and uprisings. Unlike other regions, colonial carving up has
led to heightened class warfare which links vital class issues
of social-economic transformation with anti-imperialist struggles.
In that sense Latin America provides a powerful reference point
for the toilers of the world suffering from the imperial re-division
of their countries.
James Petras, a former Professor of Sociology at
Binghamton University, New York, owns a 50 year membership in
the class struggle, is an adviser to the landless and jobless
in brazil and argentina and is co-author of Globalization
Unmasked (Zed). He can be reached at: jpetras@binghamton.edu
Weekend
Edition Features for October 30 / 31, 2004
November
6 / 7, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Don't
Say We Didn't Warn You
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Green Out
Carl
G. Estabrook
Who Killed Cock Robin?
Saul
Landau
Che: the Man and the Movie
Gary
Leupp
Let There Be Conflict!
Ben
Tripp
You Call This a Party?
Paul
Craig Roberts
The October Numbers: Continuing Stress on the Jobs Front
Jordan
Green
Heroin, Cocaine and Espanola, NM
Fred
Gardner
Haul of Justice
J.A.
Miller
Cults of the Jealous God: the Balfour Decision Reconsidered
Ramzy
Baroud
Life Without Arafat
Dave
Zirin
Out at the Ballgame: Pro Sports and the Gay Athelete
Ron
Jacobs
The Arrow on the Doorpost
Robert
Oscar Lopez
How White Liberals Became a New Racial Minority
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
The November Surprise
Dave
Lindorff
Silver Linings
Richard
Oxman
Invitation to the Bodily Snatched
John
Whitlow
Value Wars: the View from Lexington, Kentucky
Rahul
Mahajan
Fallujah and the Reality of War
Leila
Matsui
Political "Ju-On": Carrying a Grudge
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