More Houses, More Plagues

I don't much care for Hugo Chávez and I don't much care for the opposition to Chávez. Chávez hardly has democratic credentials. Consider the following:

He is trying to undermine the judiciary's independence on Venezuela.

His thuggish attitude towards state employees as evidenced by this picture as well as the firing of public employees for signing the recall petition.

The use of force and violence against opponents.

His butting his nose into the Chile-Bolivia dispute.

The opposition for their part has engaged in some contemptible and possibly criminal acts as well:

The attempted coup in April 2002.

The brutally divisive strikes of 2002 and 2003.

The opposition also has not been able to unite itself as a political force and the result will probably be a victory for Chávez in next Sunday's referendum. If that happens, the opposition should be prepared to learn to live with Chávez as well as learn that the best waty to prevent subsequent demagogues is to have a more transparent and just society. Chávez should be prepared to finally realize that he governs the entire nation and not just his followers. I remain less than optimistic about either scenario occurring.

What would also help would be if Chávez agreed to change some of these rules placed on the elction observers:

• Nobody but the government's Electoral Council will be allowed to do a quick count of the vote.

By comparison, all potentially contested recent elections in Latin America have allowed independent quick counts, including the 1994 and 2000 elections in Mexico, the 2000 election under authoritarian President Alberto Fujimori in Peru and the 1988 plebiscite in Chile.

• The Electoral Council has asked international monitoring teams to limit their observers to 40 people nationwide. The OAS and the Carter Center each deployed more than 60 election monitors in recent Venezuelan elections and want to keep at least that figure.

Electoral historians say the last Latin American leader besides Castro to cap the number of electoral observers was Panama's Noriega, who placed a limit of 20 observers per international group.

• While the Electoral Council says international observers will have freedom of movement, its regulations will restrict their movement: Observers are being asked to participate in a ''program'' of guided tours on election day.

In other words, unless they resist the government's guidelines, they will be chaperoned by pro-Chávez electoral officials and shown whatever Chávez wants them to see.

• The Electoral Council has prohibited the OAS, the Carter Center and other international election-monitoring teams from expressing their opinions during the electoral ''process,'' which presumably includes election day.

Experts say a key role of international observers is to keep the public informed before, during and after the election, so as to give a credible outside opinion when there are irreconcilable differences among opposing parties.

I don't think any of this from either side is good for Venezuela.

Comments

[James R MacLean]

Sorry, I can't believe you're making this sort of imbalanced rant. First, you hold Chavez personally responsible for each and every action by individual national guardsmen. Yes, Randy, you did. Do you think our own government could endure that sort of scrutiny? Yes, Venezuela has greater difficulties in controlling its law enforcement apparatus than, say, the USA; no doubt the episode you linked to was a result of class resentment, which President Chavez did not create. You will protest, but this is the error you are making: Chavez came to power with the stated agenda of alleviating the plight of the 80% of the population that lives in poverty. This class has simmering resentments that erupt in ugly behavior so you blame Chavez for that! By this logic, no leader supporting ethnic minorities or the very poor would ever pass muster, and I don't believe that's what you mean.

You rebuke him for butting into the affairs of other nations. I've read your site, and it's excellent; you must have momentarily taken leave of your sense of irony when you said that.

You ignore the fact that the majority of political deaths during his tenure were inflicted by his opponents. Snipers by rightest army units, organized crime favorable to the opposition, and a coup agains the legitimately elected government--and you say that he's not democratic. Are you really capable of making anything like a fair judgement of this person? You chide the elites of Venezuela (in another post) for allowing huge poverty, when the country--and its urban elite--enjoy such wealth. You wrote one time that if this were not changed, more Chavezes would appear. Well, I am gloomy enough to think that the poor of Venezuela can perhaps be ground under the heel of falangism after all. But good grief, is it not possible that anyone seeking to "prevent another Chavez" would ultimately be compelled to either imitate his methods? or, otherwise, impose such iron fascist tyranny that the poor can never harbor a glimmer of hope again EVER?

You know, before reading this post I thought perhaps the Chavez haters had a point--maybe. Now I don't. You were the most eloguent critic I read of him. And reading this post, it's utterlyu convinced me that his administration is the classic textbook victim of predatory neoliberalism. Every meritritious argument against Allende, every rebuke of Arbenz...,

Tell me, is there a single advocate for the destitiute that you don't revile? I mean, besides spiritual leaders with zero net influence?

(Apologize in advance for the heated character of this post, but I am beside myself with depression and anger.)

[Randy Paul]

James,

Time for a deep breath.

Tell me, is there a single advocate for the destitiute that you don't revile? I mean, besides spiritual leaders with zero net influence?

Lula. Oscar Arias Sanchez. Nestor Kirchner. Overreacting a bit, don’t you think?

Sorry, I can't believe you're making this sort of imbalanced rant. First, you hold Chavez personally responsible for each and every action by individual national guardsmen. Yes, Randy, you did. Do you think our own government could endure that sort of scrutiny?

No, I hold him responsible for the fact that no one has been brought to answer for these acts and for his role (as well as the opposition’s) in creating the divisive environment in Venezuela. Unless you believe that I somehow support what has happened and what continues to happen to detainees in Iraq and Gitmo, then yes, I hold and continue to hold my government up to that kind of scrutiny.

This class has simmering resentments that erupt in ugly behavior so you blame Chavez for that!

No, what I blame Chávez for is using that resentment to feed his political power base with demagogic rants. Lula has managed to reach out to people from across the political spectrum without creating huge divisions in society, and if you think that there aren’t huge class differences in Brazil filled with simmering resentments, don’t kid yourself.

You ignore the fact that the majority of political deaths during his tenure were inflicted by his opponents. Snipers by rightest army units, organized crime favorable to the opposition, and a coup agains the legitimately elected government--and you say that he's not democratic. Are you really capable of making anything like a fair judgement of this person?

No I don’t ignore that “fact,” I just haven’t found a source that I can trust with enough independence to come to that conclusion. In fact, both Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch don’t come to that conclusion.

As for the coup attempt, I have consistently condemned the opposition for seeking to change Venezuela’s government this way as I have condemned Chavez for using the same methods twelve years ago. Perhaps you might want to do the same.

You rebuke him for butting into the affairs of other nations. I've read your site, and it's excellent; you must have momentarily taken leave of your sense of irony when you said that.

No, I’m just being consistent. Chávez was the only leader in the Americas who butted into this issue. If it’s wrong for other governments unasked to butt into Venezuela’s affairs, then it is also wrong for Chávez unasked to butt into a dispute between Bolivia and Chile.

The fact that Chávez is dedicated to helping the poor doesn’t make him above criticism. I have consistently criticized both sides in this dispute, which was indeed the thrust of my post. The opposition needs to find a way to live and work with Chávez should the referendum fail and Chávez needs to realize that he has to seek his goals while leading all of the people of Venezuela. Why you find that mystifying and sought to comment the way you did is a mystery to me.

[James R MacLean]

Lula. Oscar Arias Sanchez. Nestor Kirchner. Overreacting a bit, don’t you think?

Perhap, but it's very difficult to compare the predicaments of these leaders. Oscar Arias Sanchez was not the leader of an oil-rich nation; Costa Rica already had a political tradition relatively more congenial to the sort of reforms he was undertaking. In other words, he did not upset any apple carts. Lula of Brazil also has an entirely different challenge. And incidentally, in Brazil you will also find massive police abuses that Lula has had limited power to resist. Yes, he's done what was possible; but the sort of police abuses you're talking about are actually eclipsed by those in, say, Mexico or Brazil--and with limited accountability.

When Pres Chavez was elected, yes, of course I was vexed because I deplored what he did. But I also understood that at long last, the poor had a right to fight back--something that always horrifies liberals. You say you blame him for the demogogic way in which he appeals to class resentment; it doesn't make me delirious with joy either, but what else works? Yes, of course Brazil has class resentments and inequalities, but that doesn't mean it's exactly the same situation as V; part of the difference, for example, is that, in Brazil, the divide is less "binary", there's more gradations and nuance--i.e., there are different rival classes, a very complex ethnic dynamic, and so on.

Nestor Kirchner does deserve a lot of respect as well--absolutely. But he's doing something very different. In his case, he's appealing to a far broader base of nationalism, because of the peculiar challenges he's tackling. For example, a huge cross section of the middle class also is going to approve of him. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but--Argentina has different problems.

Incidently, this is a departure from the main point. I don't propose to compare point-by-point the excellence or lack thereof in the Kirchner, Lula, Arias, or Chavez presidencies, because that's beyond the scope of these remarks. What bothers me so deeply is that Chavez is being "taken down" by a gigantic, foreign-coordinated effort. Blaming this on Chavez's blunders is both misleading--I think a lot of these blunders are inevitable, personally--when you have a monstrous, ham-fisted violation of V's sovereignty and dignity, then it is wildly inappropriate to focus [almost] entirely on the alleged abuses of the victim--which, by the standards of the region, are quite petty. And finally, what about the plight of the people he's trying to help? Fine, if you think Chaez is a total screw-up, I can't stop you, but you must know that the reason for this massive anti-Chavez effort by the Bush Administration and multilateral financial institutions (MFIs) is driven by a determination to control V's oil, and defeat any sort of pro-poor agenda.

V's situation, again, is different from that of A or B, or CR's. There' class struggle is dual; in B or A, it is graduated. That doesn't take away from Lula's or Kirchner's achievements--but in the event of their election, they didn't have an agenda which clashed so openly with the group controlling most of their respective country's wealth. Chavez did, and he couldn't avoid doing so.

[Randy Paul]

James,

I have attempted to write fairly and honestly about both sides here. I favor neither side and believe that both sides have subjected Venezuela to a great deal of divisiveness. My argument has always been a plague on both of their houses, hence the title of the post. I do not know if means matter as much to you as the ends, but I believe that they are both imoirtant.

I have always made the argument that the Chávez's of the world don't occur in a vacuum. If the opposition really find his rule repellent, then they need to consider some serious structural changes in their society. Yes I know it's easily said, but not done.

In any event, threatening people with losing their jobs at a state-run company is more than demagogic: that borders on the totalitarian.

[James R MacLean]

In any event, threatening people with losing their jobs at a state-run company is more than demagogic: that borders on the totalitarian.

We are in perfect agreement that it is dreadful behavior. It may possibly reflect decisions made by Chavez's office. On the other hand, such political intimidation of employees is very routine in Latin American countries, or so I am advised. Usually the private sector does this, and no eyebrows are raised. If you insist, I could hunt down some examples.

Does this make it OK? No, of course not; but V is in a class struggle, and a desperate one at that. In view of the bitterness of the struggle, and the foul tactics used by (and infinite foreign resources available to) the "opposition", this remains a relatively petty abuse.

I [...] haven’t found a source that I can trust with enough independence to come to that conclusion,[viz., that the majority of political deaths during his tenure were inflicted by his opponents]

I've read the links, and this is fair enough--my impression was formed during the sniper attacks of 2002, when circumstantial evidence left me convinced that nearly all the shootings were perpetrated by anti-Chavez forces. I do think that has poisoned the atmosphere and I also think it would require an astonishing level of administrative competence for Chavez to prevent GN units from roughing up very surly opposition demonstrators. But I have to say this--compare to the country reports for M, B, and A. I know you criticize these abuses also, when occasion calls for it, but if this is a global epidemic even in countries under less foreign assault and subversion than V, then perhaps "a plague on everybody's house" just misses the point. Countries in a state of massive foreign intrusion are invariably going to react, just as Arbenz did in Guatemala.

The perpetrator in this situation is not Chavez. It's the Bush White House and the permament interventionists at the NED.

I have always made the argument that the Chávez's of the world don't occur in a vacuum. If the opposition really find his rule repellent, then they need to consider some serious structural changes in their society. Yes I know it's easily said, but not done.

I think what you've done is convince me that anyone who does make those structural changes will wind up being tarred with the same brush.

[James R MacLean]

PS: I am not a leftist in any sense of the term. Undeniably C's methods are not the best, but as this crisis progresses I am being forced to believe that that other methods are closed to him. If he were to use far greater zeal to crack down on excessively zealous GN members, it's plausible that more of his allies would defect--after all, the strike tactics employed by the opposition did create conditions of desperation on the part of the destitute, and in the conditons of "prisoners' dilemma", they have indeed defected.

As bitterly opposed as I am to the radical left, when that is the only alternative available to the desperate, I cannot in good conscience rebuke them. I think, Randy, that that's a re-phrasing of what you said.

[Randy Paul]

Undeniably C's methods are not the best, but as this crisis progresses I am being forced to believe that that other methods are closed to him.

Christ, he never tried them! He's been spewing demagoguery from day one. As a matter of fact, let me remind you that his first attempt to effect change in Venezuela was an attempted coup.

It's all about power, James.

[blah]

If that happens, the opposition should be prepared to learn to live with Chávez as well as learn that the best waty to prevent subsequent demagogues is to have a more transparent and just society.

You are asking the coup plotters to learn how to love democracy? Do you think those people are Boy Scouts? They are not interested in preventing demagogues; they are interested in seizing power. If they were capable of learning to value transparency and justice, Venezuela would not be in the predicament it is in today. However bad Chavez may be, the so-called opposition is incapable of doing better. The only hope is for some new force to emerge. Sorry, but I find that you are very naive about the opposition.