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Today's
Stories
March 29, 2004
Kathy Kelly
Crossing Lines
March 27 / 28, 2004
Jennifer Loewenstein
A
Journey to Rafah
Jeffrey St. Clair
Empire of the Locusts
Gary Leupp
The Yassin Assassination: Prelude to an Attack on Syria
William A. Cook
The Yassin Assassination: a Monstrous Insanity Blessed by the
US
Faheem Hussain
Some Thoughts on Waziristan: Once and Always a Colonial Army
Elaine Cassel
Is Playing Paintball Terrorism?
Larry Birns / Jessica
Leight
Disturbing Signals: Kerry and Latin America
John Ross
Bush Tells the World: "Drop Dead"
John Eskow
A Memo to Karl Rove from the Hollywood Caucus
Alan Maass
Who Are the Real Terrorists?
Dave Lindorff
Spineless of US Journalists
Joe Bageant
Howling in the Belly of the Confederacy
Dave Zirin
Reasonable Doubt: Why Barry Bonds is Not on Steroids
Craig Waggoner
Who Would Mel's Jesus Nuke?
The Kerry Quandry
Joel Wendland
Marxists
for Kerry
Josh Frank
Scary,
Scary John Kerry
Matt Vidal
Spoilers, Electability and the Poverty of American Democracy
Poets' Basement
LaMorticella, Hamod, Guthrie, Davies and Albert
Website of the Weekend
Say a Little Prayer
March 26, 2004
Christopher Brauchli
There's
a Chill Over the Country
Robert Fisk
The Man Who Knew Too Much: the Ordeal
of Mordechai Vanunu
Joe DeRaymond
Democracy in El Salvador? Think Again
Mike Whitney
Lessons on Apartheid from Ariel Sharon
Mickey Z.
Somalia and Iraq: Looking Back and Ahead
Chris Floyd
The Pentagon Archipelago
CounterPunch Photo Wire
Cheney's Close Shave?
John Breneman
Bush's Comic Bomb
Website of the Day
Dick
is a Killer
March 25, 2004
Lee Sustar
Who
is to Blame for Lost Jobs?
Standard Schaefer
An
Interview with Michael Hudson on Offshore Banking Centers
Roger Burbach
Lula vs. the IMF: Brazil Begins
to Throw Off the Austerity Planners
Jimmer Endres
Elections Without Politics: The Military Budget Is Not an "Issue"
Larry Tuttle
Acting in Your Name: Identity Theft and Public Interest Groups
Toni Solo
Misreporting Venezuela
Dan Bacher
A Memorial Wall for Iraq War's Dead and Wounded
Saul Landau
Is
Venezuela Next?
Website of the Day
The Spiral Railway
March 24, 2004
Gary Leupp
General
Musharraf's IOU
Richard Oxman
Shakespeare
for Kerry
William Lind
The Beginning
of Phase Three: 4G Warfare Hits Iraq
Rep. Ron Paul
Iraq One Year Later
Michael Dempsey
Killing Rachel Corrie Again
Alan Farago
The Bad Math of Mercury: Bush's War on the Unborn
Benjamin Dangl
and April Howard
Media
in Cuba
John L. Hess
No Lie Left Behind: Judy Miller Does Dick Clarke
Greg Weiher
Two Cheers for Dems: "We're Not as Bad as George"
Eva Golinger
An Open Letter to John Kerry on Venezuela
Grayson Childs
Where's Cynthia McKinney?
Steve Niva
Israel's Assassinations will Only
Fuel More Suicide Bombings
Website of the Day
The Bushiad and the Idiossey
March 23, 2004
Phillip Cryan
The
Drug War's Next Casualty: Colombia's National Parks
Ron Jacobs
They Shoot Men in Wheelchairs, Too?
Dave Lindorff
A Spanish Parallel: Scare Tactics and Elections
Mike Whitney
Richard Clarke and Teflon George
Brian McKinlay
Bush's Lil' Buddy in Trouble: John Howard Starts to Wobble
JG
Driving Mr. Koon: "Jim Crow Lives Next Door"
Phyllis Pollack
Gettin' Jigga with Metallica: the Battle Over the Double Black
CD
Ahmed Bouzid
Sharon's One-Way Track
Sean Carter
The G-Word Goes to Court: One Nation Under [Your Logo Here]
M. Shahid Alam
World's Greatest Country: Do the Facts Lie
March 22, 2004
Mazin Qumsiyeh
On Extrajudicial
Executions
Uri Avnery
The
Assassination of Sheikh Yassin is Worse Than a Crime
Gilad Atzmon
Sharon's Rampage
Mike Whitney
Guilty Until Proven Innocent: the Story of Captain James Yee
Jason Leopold
Firm With Ties to Cheney Faces Criminal Indictment in Cal Energy
Scam
Greg Moses
Stop
Walling and Stalling: a Report from Houston's Peace March
Phil Gasper
San Francisco: 25,000 March for an End to the Occupation
Lenni Brenner
Report
from NYC: Old and Young Parade for Peace
Julian Borger
The Clarke Revelations
Steve Perry
Karl Rove's Moment
Website of the Day
Enviros Against War
March 20 / 21, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Gay
Marriage: Sidestep on Freedom's Path
Jeffrey St. Clair
Intolerable Opinions in an Age of Shock and Awe: What Would Lilburne
Do?
Ted Honderich
Tony Blair's Moral Responsibility for Atrocities
Saul Landau / Farrah Hassen
The Plot Against Syria: an Irresponsibility Act
Gary Leupp
On Viewing "The Passion of the Christ"
William A. Cook
Fence, Barrier, Wall
Phil Gasper
Bush v. Bush-lite: Chomsky's Lesser Evilism
Ron Jacobs
Fox News and the Masters of War
John Stanton
Which Way John Kerry? The Senator's Inner Nixon
Justin Felux
Kerry and Black America: Just Another Stupid White Man
Mike Whitney
Greenspan's Treason: Swindling Posterity
Augustin Velloso
Avoiding Osama's Abyss
Lawrence Magnuson
Eyes Wide Open: Is Spain Caving in to Terrorism?
Kathy Kelly
Getting Together to Defeat Terrorism
Tracy McLellan
Scalia & Cheney: Happiness is a Warm Gun
Kurt Nimmo
Emma Goldman for President!
Luis J. Rodriguez
The Redemptive Power of Art: It's Not a Frill
Mickey Z
The Michael Moore Diet
Jackie Corr
When Harry Truman Stopped in Butte
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
The Great Trial of 1922: Gandhi's Vision of Responsibility
Poets' Basement
Stew Albert & JD Curtis
Website of the Weekend
Virtual World Election
March 19, 2004
Jeffrey St. Clair
Zapatero
to Kerry: Back Off, Senator, Our Troops are Coming Home
Ann Harrison
So
Protesters, How Well Do You Know Your Rights?
William MacDougall
Fortress Britain's War on "Economic Migrants"
Greg Moses
Sold American: Cowboy Nation Gets Ready to Vote
Cynthia McKinney
Haiti and the Impotence of Black America: Roll Back This Coup,
Mr. Bush
Norman Solomon
Spinning the Past; Threatening the Future
John L. Hess
"Missing" Evidence and the NYTs
Vicente Navarro
The
End of Aznar, Bush's Best Friend
Website of the War
Naming the Dead
March 18, 2004
Gila Svirsky
Rachel
Corrie, One Year Later: She Never Lost Faith in Decency
Christopher Brauchli
Drilling a Hole in the Sanctions: How Halliburton Made $73 Million
from Saddam
William Kulin
Report from Iraq: Just Another Baghdad Car Bombing
Mike Whitney
Resistance: a Moral Imperative
Rep. Ron Paul
Broadcast Indecency Act: an Indecent Attack on the First Amendment
Josh Frank
The Nader Question
Jack Random
They Lied & They Lost: Madrid and the Lessons of Democracy
Greg Bates
What Makes a Nader Voter Tick? A Survey
Sam Hamod / Alfredo Reyes
Contempt of the World: Hastert, Bush and Cheney on Spain
Gary Leupp
The
Madrid Bombings: the Chickens Come Home to Roost
Website of the Day
Privatizing Armageddon: Buy Your Own Doomsday Key
March 17, 2004
Marjorie Cohn
Spain, the EU and the US: War on
Terror or Civil Liberties?
David MacMichael
Untruth
and Consequences
Michael Donnelly
Wear the Green, But Skip the Green Beer
Tom Stephens
"Steady Leadership": Let the Buyer Beware
Wayne Madsen
Sen. Kerry, Let Me Help You Out
Karyn Strickler
Who Owns the Sierra Club? Anonymous Donors and Rigged Elections
Peter Linebaugh
Bush:
Blanc Blanc
March 16, 2004
Lenni Brenner
James
Madison: the Anti-Clerical Father of the Bill of Rights
Scott Boehm
Madrid
Diary: How to Change World Order in Four Days
Alexander Lynch
From Franco to Aznar: the History
Behind the Spanish Elections
Sam Hamod and Alfredo
Reyes
The Truth About the Spanish Elections: Aznar Was Going Down Anyway
Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg
You Wouldn't Do a Dog This Way:
Executing David Clayton Hill
Mike Whitney
The Case for a Nuclear Iran
Robert Fisk
The Bloody Price of the "War
on Terror"
Bill Christison
The
Aftershocks from Madrid
CounterPunch Photo Wire
The Passion of St. Teresa
Website of the Day
Join the War on Art!
March 15, 2004
Harry Browne
Terror Nothing New to Europe
Mike Whitney
Justice
Not Murder: the Tragic Symmetry of Terrorism
Lidice Valenzuela
Haiti: a Coup without Consultation
Greg Moses
Lessons
from the Texas Primaries: Looking for a Coalition with Legs
Mickey Z.
Depraved Indifference: C-Sections, Patriarchy & Women's Health
Asaf Shtull-Trauring
AWOL
in New York: From Refusenik to Organizer
CounterPunch Wire
Gen. Gramajo Executed by Bees!
March 12 / 14, 2004
Gabriel Kolko
The
Coming Elections and the Future of American Global Power
Saul Landau
Oh, Jesus...It's the Movie!
William Blum
Neo-Con(tradictions)
William S. Lind
Why They Throw Rocks
Rahul Mahajan
The Meaning of Madrid: War on "Terrorism" Makes Us
All Less Safe
Neve Gordon
Demographic Wars
Kurt Nimmo
Kerry and the Progressive Interventionists
Mickey Z.
The "New" UN Blames the Poor
Mike Whitney
War Games: the American Media Leads the Charge
Helen Scott and Ashley
Smith
Aristide's Fall: What Led to the Coup?
Justin E.H. Smith
Loïc Wacquant: Against a Sociodicy
of the American Prison
Brandy Baker
Him Again? Al Gore Needs to Move On
Robin Philpot
Nobody Can Call It a "Plane Crash" Now: the Report
on the Assassination of Rwandan President Habyarimana
Mokhiber / Weissman
The Meat Monopoly Takes a Rare Pounding
Dave Zirin
She Turned Her Back on the War: an Interview with Toni Smith
Daniel Wolff
The Lord's Pier
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.
|
March
29, 2004
AFL-CIO in Venezuela
Deja
Vu All Over Again
By KIM SCIPES
Massive mobilizations, strikes, street conflict,
hysterical mass media, social and economic disruption: Chile
in 1972-73 Venezuela in 2002-04.
The AFL-CIO is once again on the scene,
this time in Venezuela, just as it was in Chile in 1973. Once
again, its operations in that country are being funded by the
U.S. government. This time, the money is being laundered through
the quasi-governmental National Endowment for Democracy, hidden
from AFL-CIO members and the American public.
Once again, it is being used to support
the efforts of reactionary labor and business leaders, helping
to destabilize a democratically-elected government that has made
major efforts to alleviate poverty, carried out significant land
reform in both urban and rural areas, and striven to change political
institutions that have long worked to marginalize those at the
lowest rungs in society. And also like Allende's Chile, Venezuela's
government under president Hugo Chavez has opposed a number of
actions by the U.S. Government, this time by the Bush Administration.
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is a
former mid-level Army officer, proud of his indigenous roots
and with an avid interest in addressing the exclusion of those
on the lowest rungs of society. When he helped lead a coup against
the government in February 1992, the effort was unsuccessful.
Defeated and captured, Chavez was imprisoned but later pardoned.
Following his release from prison, he
helped create a movement with an electoral component, and was
elected President in December 1998, with 56 percent of the vote.
His closest competitor received 39 percent. According to Professor
Steve Ellner, one of the most knowledgeable observers of the
situation of Venezuelan workers, an important part of Chavez'
popularity with the poor stems from his belief that "the
plight of the poor took priority over the protection of private
property."
Chavez and his efforts are contradictory:
although he advocates including the poor in the political process,
he has done so in a top-down manner. His movement is ideologically
unfocused and internally contradictory. It has not focused on
building organizations to empower the poor. It has appealed to
the poor to mobilize to support his government's efforts.
In many ways and over a number of years,
the poor have responded, most notably by overturning the April
2002 coup attempt, led by reactionary labor leaders, top business
leaders, and the business federation that had deposed Chavez
and tried to exile him by force. (This is similar to what recently
happened to President Aristide in Haiti.) A split within the
military-Chavez commands tremendous respect in the ranks with
the military-foiled his kidnapping and kept high-level officers
from suppressing the mass mobilization. Chavez was returned unharmed
to the Presidential Palace when millions of people surged against
the putschists.
But social conflict has continued ever
since. Most notable was the 63-day strike led by senior management
in Venezuela's oil industry between late 2002 and early 2003.
This strike, with accompanying sabotage, caused a shattering
27 percent drop in the Gross Domestic Product in the first trimester
of 2003, resulting in great social and economic turmoil, and
depriving the government of massive amounts of money that it
had been using to fund social programs.
The war against the government has continued
ever since, with the AFL-CIO's American Center for International
Labor Solidarity (ACILS) deeply involved.
ACILS-also known as the Solidarity Center-has
overseen all of the AFL-CIO's foreign labor operations since
1997, centralizing a previously decentralized set of regional
bodies that had long worked in Africa, Asia, Europe and Latin
America. These organizations, which played a key role in the
Cold War, had a terrible affect in the developing regions of
the world.
There is a consensus that ACILS' work
under President John Sweeney has been considerably better than
foreign operations carried out under previous AFL-CIO presidents
George Meany and Lane Kirkland. But the continuing lack of transparency,
accountability and even simple reporting to AFL-CIO members about
ACILS has generated concerns among activists about what the organization
actually does in the many countries in which it operates. Solidarity
Center Director Harry Kamberis' background is not a typical labor
background and looks suspiciously like CIA, which also adds to
activists' unease. (See my report in Labor Notes, February 2004.).
Most of ACILS' funding comes from the
National Endowment for Democracy (NED), not the AFL-CIO. The
NED was created by the Reagan Administration in 1983. One of
the authors of the enabling legislation has said that NED was
to do at least some of the work previously done by the CIA, albeit
publicly: its talk appears progressive, but its actions are reactionary.
One of the NED's initial directors was that well-known democrat,
Henry Kissinger, Richard Nixon's point man in the campaign against
Chile's elected president, Salvador Allende.
NED is funded by the U.S. Government,
through the State Department, but operates "independently"
from any on-going governmental control. This enables the U.S.
Government to deny any responsibility for NED's activities, and
NED can claim it is an independent non-governmental organization
(NGO), not a governmental one, and thus not subject to governmental
scrutiny or oversight.
NED has been long active across Latin
America. It has been active in Venezuela, the fifth largest oil
producer in the world, since 1992. According to accounts gathered
from NED itself, NED provided $4,039,331 to Venezuelan and American
organizations working in Venezuela between 1992 and 2001: 60.4
percent of that, or $2,439,489 was granted between 1997-2001.
Of that $2.4-plus million since 1997, $587,926 (or almost one-quarter)
went to ACILS for its work with the Confederation of Venezuelan
Workers (CTV in Spanish). In 2002, the last year for which details
are available, NED pumped in another $1,099,352, of which ACILS
got $116,001 for its work with CTV. Altogether, ACILS received
$703,927 between 1997-2002 for its work in Venezuela alone. [During
2000-2001, ACILS received $8,889,009 from NED for its worldwide
operations.]
The AFL-CIO gives a different accounting.
Stanley Gacek, the Assistant Director of the AFL-CIO's International
Affairs Department, writing in the Spring 2004 issue of New Labor
Forum, claims "... our total solidarity program with the
CTV amounted to less than $20,000 in support of the Confederation's
highly successful internal democratization process...."
Yet what has been that work in Venezuela
for which ACILS claims it was paid only $20,000 but which NED
reports as costing over $700,000? The AFL-CIO claims its efforts
have concentrated on enhancing internal democracy of the CTV,
a notoriously non-democratic labor center. The CTV has had a
relationship with the AFL-CIO (meaning the government-funded
American Institute for Free Labor Development or AIFLD) for more
than 30-years, and has been a pillar of pro-American, anti-communist
unionism in the region. Some have tied it with the CIA. For 30
years, CTV was controlled by Democratic Action (AD), one of the
nation's two longtime ruling parties. Despite highly publicized
attempts at internal reform mounted in 2001, AD's control over
CTV only intensified.
The CTV was largely discredited in Venezuela
during the 1990s because of its unwillingness to develop viable
alternatives to the government's neoliberal policies (i.e., before
Chavez). In his chapter on "Organized Labor and the Challenge
of Chavismo" in a 2002 book he co-edited, Steve Ellner details
six reasons for the CTV's loss of prestige: it failed to consult
members; it abandoned any mobilization strategy; it allowed the
government to gut historical worker benefits; it followed party
(AD) dictates rather than developing independent positions; it
failed to develop a consistent analysis of neoliberalism and
globalization; and it maintained "resistance to internal
reforms designed to strengthen and democratize the movement."
The CTV underwent internal reform in
2001 but, according to Steve Ellner, those CTV Executive Board
elections were marked by widespread violence and fraud. The pro-Chavez
people won some representation, but the fraud kept them from
gaining the ability to influence policy. At the same time, both
the elected President and Secretary General were members of AD,
something that had never happened in the previous 30 years: previously,
AD had occupied the presidency but not the Secretary General
position. As Ellner notes in a personal communication, "AD
made well sure that it would maintain absolute control of the
CTV."
It is questionable whether this internal
reform resulted from AFL-CIO advice, or from the Chavez administration's
challenge to its established procedures. In any event, without
such changes, the CTV's marginalization from Venezuelan society
would undoubtedly increased. Despite the internal reform-including
a direct vote for the CTV's executive board by a number of sectors
of Venezuelan society -CTV leadership has remained adamantly
opposed to President Chavez.
According to a report to be published
in New Labor Forum by Robert Collier of The Newspaper Guild/Communications
Workers of America (CWA) in May 2004, the CTV has worked with
FEDECAMARAS, the nation's business association, to carry out
general strikes/lockouts of in December 2001, March-April 2002,
and December 2002-February 2003. Collier reports that according
to many published reports and interviews that he has conducted
in the country, that "... the CTV was directly involved
in the [April 2002] coup's planning and organization."
Professor Hector Lucena, another labor
observer, reports that these April actions were led by the CTV
and joined by FEDECARAMAS. Christopher Marquis of The New York
Times reported on April 25, 2002, "...the Confederation
of Venezuelan Workers led the work stoppages that galvanized
the opposition to Mr. Chavez. The union's leader, Carlos Ortega,
worked closely with Pedro Carmona Estanga, the businessman who
briefly took over from Mr. Chavez, in challenging the government."
Further, Collier reports, "For months before, CTV Secretary-General
Carlos Ortega created a tight political alliance with FEDECAMARAS
leader Pedro Carmona, and they repeatedly called for the overthrow
of Chavez." In short, Collier concludes that "... in
Venezuela, the AFL-CIO has ... supported a reactionary union
establishment as it tried repeatedly to overthrow President Hugo
Chavez-and in the process, wrecked the country's economy."
These accounts differ from the April
27, 2002 statement by the AFL-CIO titled, "The AFL-CIO and
Worker Rights in Venezuela." In this statement, we find
"... there is no evidence that the CTV or its leaders went
beyond the democratic expressions of dissent."
When the coup took place, Carmona was
installed as President on April 12. The July-August 2002 issue
of NACLA Reports describes how Carmona disbanded the National
Assembly, repealed a series of popular reforms passed by Chavez,
reinstated fired management at the national oil company (PDVSA),
and fired all the judges of the Supreme Court.
Ignoring the labor wing of the opposition,
Carmona appointed a cabinet of business leaders, military men
and conservative politicians. According to Collier, it was only
after this betrayal by Carmona did the CTV condemn the coup.
David Corn, writing in The Nation of August 5, 2002 confirms
this: "The CTV did denounce Carmona-but not until Carmona,
on the afternoon of April 12, announced his decree to shutter
the National Assembly and the Supreme Court."
Gacek offered another account in his
New Labor Forum article (to which Collier is responding), writing
that, "The CTV publicly condemned the April 2002 coup, never
recognized the short-lived regime of Carmona and, unlike the
Catholic Church, refused to endorse Carmona's decree dissolving
the National Assembly." However, authors Ellner and Rosen
report, based on Hearings of the Special Political Commission
of the National Assembly that were broadcast on TV on May 10,
2002, that "[CTV leader] Ortega had publicly called for
the immediate dissolution of the Assembly on April 12, prior
to the announcement of Carmona's decree" (emphasis added).
In a personal communication on March
6, 2004, Ellner elaborated on events: "The CTV promoted
a march which was designed to topple the Chavez regime and everybody
knew at the time that the idea was to create chaos so that the
military would intervene." Going further, he explained that
"Opposition leaders openly called on the military to overthrow
Chavez, and the strike leaders-not only Ortega but the supposed
'moderates' like Manuel Cova, Alfredo Ramos, Pablo Castro, Rodrigo
Penson, Froilan Barrios-none of them stated at least publicly
that they were opposed to a military coup."
ACILS' work in the country has not been
limited to rationalizing and minimizing the role played by CTV
leadership in the April 2002 coup. A series of quarterly reports
on work in Venezuela from the Solidarity Center to NED have come
to light through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests.
They have been posted on a web site http://www.venezuelafoia.info
by the Venezuela Solidarity Committee/National Venezuela Solidarity
Network.
Excerpts from the January-March 2002
quarterly report by the Solidarity Center to NED are illuminating.
"The CTV and Fedecamaras, with the support of the Catholic
Church, held a national conference on March 5 to discuss their
concerns, perspectives and priorities regarding national development
and to identify common objectives as well as areas of cooperation.
The conference was the culminating event
of some two months of meetings and planning between these two
organizations. The joint action [producing a "National Accord"
to avoid a supposedly "deeper political and economic crisis"]
established the CTV and the Fedecamaras as the flagship organizations
leading the growing opposition to the Chavez government"
(emphases added).
The report continues: "The Solidarity
Center helped support the event in the planning stages, organizing
the initial meetings with the Governor of Miranda State and the
business organization, FEDECAMARAS, to discuss and establish
an agenda for such cooperation in mid-January." The report
continued to detail more of their efforts, concluding with the
comment that, "The March 5 national conference itself was
financed by counterpart funds."
Less than 30 days after the March 5 conference,
the CTV and FEDECAMARAS launched a national general strike to
protest the firing of oil company management, and the coup attempt-in
which CTV and business leaders played central roles-took place.
It is possible to argue that these and
other meetings in which Solidarity Center representatives participated
had nothing to do with the events surrounding the coup attempt.
However, suspicion was aroused by the International Affairs Department's
continued unwillingness to provide reports of the Solidarity
Center's work, let alone detailed reports of these specific meetings-as
noted above, Solidarity Center reports to NED have been posted
on the web.
Concluding that ACILS played no role
in the turmoil that rocked the country would require us to ignore
the central role being played by CTV and FEDECAMARAS leaders
in that turmoil-leaders with whom Solidarity Center representatives
were in regular contact. It would also require us to ignore the
$587,926 that was provided by NED to ACILS between 1997-2001--$154,377
in 2001 alone-to pay for work with the CTV.
[NED quadrupled its budget in Venezuela
to $877,000 in the period shortly before the coup, according
to Marquis of The New York Times. In addition to the $157,377
to ACILS, NED provided $339,998 to the international wing of
the Republican Party; $210,000 to the international wing of the
Democratic Party; and presumably another $171,125 to the Center
for International Private Enterprise, the international wing
of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. It is bad enough that ACILS
gets money from NED, but it is much worse that they work to carry
out the NED program.]
Then there was the December 2002-February
2003 strike/lockout that so devastated the economy. ACILS was
granted $116,001 on September 13, 2002 to continue its work with
the CTV for another six months-in March 2003, the grant period
was extended another year. Further, according to Ellner (personal
communication), "...no one in the CTV leadership-absolutely
no one-publicly spoke out against the way the [December-February]
strike was being handled." The "leftists" that
Gacek referred to-Barrios, Ramos, Cova, Castro, etc.-"...
actively participated [in] and supported the strike."
Along with this, Ellner writes, "...
the opposition has, in my mind, not modified its tactics in significant
ways since 2002, and the CTV continues to be a key actor currently
in Venezuela" (emphasis added). Gregory Wilpert, writing
on Z Net, identifies the CTV as well as FEDECAMARAS, almost all
opposition parties and nearly all of the private media, as comprising
"the hard-core opposition." Juan Forero, writing from
Caracas for The New York Times on March 11, 2004, in an article
about how NED efforts are trying to destabilize Venezuela, reports
that leaders of the CTV, along with leaders of the AD and two
other parties, "... have been at the forefront of the anti-Chavez
movement" (page A-3).
Thus, despite any claims to the contrary,
ACILS has been and continues to be intimately involved in the
on-going efforts by CTV leadership to overthrow the government.
And thus, as ACILS itself admits, gains made "are threatened
by the attempts of some members of the CTV leadership to embark
on a political agenda, and engage in political alliances, that
have at best questionable support from the membership."
Further, "The political opposition is viewed with suspicion
by the urban poor and has offered no substantive alternative
to the government's program (ACILS Grant No. 2002-433.0, p. 6)
(emphases added).
Interestingly, during the 1990s, "The
CTV failed to reach beyond the organized working class by defending
the interests of this lower stratum of the population" (Ellner:
"Organized Labor and Chavismo"). Yet in this 2002 grant
request for $116,001 to NED, ACILS claims, "The CTV has
the technical and political capacity to propose programs that
will support organization and representation of workers in the
informal sector..." a sector CTV has not cared about for
a very long time. I think it is safe to conclude that ACILS is
developing CTV's political program-not its members-in a direction
that CTV heretofore has refused to go. ACILS is not a passive
follower but appears to be intimately involved in creating CTV's
direction and, accordingly, shares direct responsibility for
its results.
The parallels with 1972-73 Chile are
overwhelming. Just like in Chile in 1972-73, the AFL-CIO, through
ACILS, is clearly engaged in an effort to destabilize a democratically
elected government that disagrees with a number of positions
of the US Government.
This destabilization effort is not singular,
but is one component of a multiple-track endeavor that includes
supporting a peasant organization that opposes land reform; an
educational organization that has suggested no education reforms;
an organization seeking to incite a military rebellion; a civic
association that has worked to mobilize middle class neighborhoods
to "defend themselves" from the poor; a civil justice
group that opposes grassroots community organizations because
they supports the Chavez government; a "leadership group"
that supports the metropolitan Caracas police, whose behavior
has become markedly more repressive over the past year; and a
number of other anti-Chavez organizations, each which have received
recent funding from NED.
While there have been significant changes
in foreign operations policy that has developed under the Sweeney
Administration, the information from Venezuela indicates that
these changes are quite limited, and certainly do not apply to
unstable situations where the existing social order is being
challenged from progressive forces. Despite the improvements
that have been made, ACILS has reverted to the worst practices
of what were thought to be by-gone years-and the people who run
it don't want AFL-CIO members or the public to know.
But there are three questions that beg
for answers from ACILS, Harry Kamberis, and the AFL-CIO leadership
in general. First, how do these efforts to overthrow a democratically-elected
president-a president who is actively trying to meet the needs
and aspirations of the poorest 80 percent of the population-help
meet the needs of these working people? Second, how does working
to destabilize the elected government of Venezuela help workers
and their families in the United States? And third, if your projects
such as in Venezuela are so good for American working people,
why are you trying so desperately to keep U.S. trade unionists
from accurately knowing what you are doing in these countries?
Why, indeed?
For the most developed account of the
AFL-CIO's role in destabilizing Chile in 1972-73, see my article
in the Summer 2000 issue of Labor Studies Journal titled, "It's
Time to Come Clean: Open the AFL-CIO Archives on International
Labor Operations." This has been posted on-line in English
by LabourNet Germany at http://www.labournet.de/
For a discussion of resolutions for the
AFL-CIO to "clear the air" that developed, at least
partially stimulated by the above article, and how AFL-CIO International
Affairs leaders have basically ignored them, see my "AFL-CIO
Refuses to 'Clear the Air' on Foreign Policy, Operations"
in the February 2004 issue of Labor Notes at http://www.labornotes.org/
Additional Resources:
For an important compilation of documents
regarding the National Endowment for Democracy and its efforts
to destabilize Venezuela--all obtained through Freedom of Information
Act (FOIA) requests by journalist Jeremy Bigwood and posted on
a web site by the Venezuelan Solidarity Committee/National Venezuela
Solidarity Network, go to http://www.venezuelafoia.info.
Included in here are an important set
of reports from ACILS to NED about its work with CTV--and these
obviously were never expected to see the light of day. For these,
go to the http://www.venezuelafoia.info
site, and on the left hand of the page, in a box under National
Endowment for Democracy (NED), click on "ACILS-CTV."
These are extremely important documents. (The documents on this
web page are those referred to by Juan Forero in his article
that appeared yesterday, "Chavez Condemns US, Citing Efforts
to End His Rule" in The New York Times, March 11, 2004:
A-3.)
Another excellent web site, including
analysis of developments in Venezuela is http://www.venezuelaanalysis.com.
Gregory Wilpert's reports have been quite helpful in understanding
the situation.
Still another excellent site is that
called "Venezuela Watch" on ZNet: http://www.zmag.org/
This has a number of articles--most are quite good to excellent--concerning
developments over the past two years on Venezuela.
Another recent labor-related piece is
"The Question Remains: What is the AFL-CIO Doing in Venezuela?,"
by Alberto Ruiz on ZNet.
For an article by Stanley Gacek, Assistant
Director of the AFL-CIO's International Affairs Department, detailing
how he, and presumably the IAD, sees the situation in Brazil
and Venezuela, see his "Lula and Chavez: Differing Responses
to the Washington Consensus," which was published in the
Spring 2004 issue of New Labor Forum, and can be found on-line
at http://forbin.qc.edu/
Stan Gacek complains that some critics
are even wondering why ACILS is even operating in Venezuela...duh!
He is referring, at very least to an article I published on ZNet
on May 2, 2002: Kim Scipes, "AFL-CIO and Venezuela: Return
of Labor Imperialism, or a Mistaken Reaction" http://www.zmag.org/(yes,
they misspelled my last name).
You also might want to reference my Feb
2004 article in Labor Notes about how the AFL-CIO has refused
to address issues raised by the California State AFL-CIO concerning
their international labor operations: Kim Scipes, "AFL-CIO
Refuses to 'Clear the Air' on Foreign Policy, Operations"
at http://www.labornotes.org/.
There are a set of references after the article (not including
the ones presented here), with links directly to each of them,
and these references are annotated.
An excellent chapter in a recent book--not
on-line--that gives an in-depth look at the Venezuelan labor
movment is Steve Ellner, "Organized Labor and the Challenge
of Chavismo" in a book that Ellner co-edited with Daniel
Helliger, VENEZUELAN POLITICS IN THE CHAVEZ ERA: CLASS POLARIZATION
AND CONFLICT, Boulder, CO: Lynne Reinner Publishers, 2002.
Some older articles that provide useful
information:
David Corn, "Our Gang in Venezuela"
(about the National Endowment for Democracy--not the most sophisticated
analysis, but provides some good information): http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20020805&s=corn.
Greg Wilpert, "Why Venezuela's Middle
Class (for the most part) Opposes Chavez," dated October
27, 2002 on ZNet: http://www.zmag.org/content/.
Mike Lebowitz, "Venezuela's National
Union of Workers," dated April 2, 2002 on ZNet: http://www.zmag.org/content
There have been three recent articles
on line about recent efforts to destabilize Venezuela. All three
give particular attention to the reactionary role being played
by the private news media (mass media) in that country:
Bill Berkowitz, "Venezuela at the
Crossroads," dated March 5, 2004. It was on Alternet last
week and was quite informative: http://www.workingforchange.com/.
Dario Azzelini, "The Destabilization
Script as Applied to Venezuela," dated March 5, 2004, on
ZNet (not yet posted on Z's Venezuela Watch): http://www.zmag.org/content.
Gregory Wilpert, "How To Turn a
Government into a Pariah: Venezuela's Matrix," dated March
8, 2004 on ZNet (not yet posted on Z's Venezuela Watch): http://www.zmag.org/content/
For an important evaluation of the mass
media's role in the April 2002 coup, by the International Federation
of Journalists, see "Missing Link in Venezuela's Political
Crisis: How Media and Government Failed a Test of Journalism
and Democracy," Report of the IFJ Mission to Caracas, June
10-12, 2002: http://www.ifj.org/pdfs/venezuelajuly02.pdf.
Kim Scipes,
PhD, is a former member of the Graphic Communications International
Union as well as the American Federation of Teachers and the
National Education Association.
This essay originally appeared in Labor Notes.
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