See the vote counters at
http://incakolanews.blogspot.com/2008/08/evo-67-approval-and-counting.html(I got there from www.BovRev.net--those alert South America watchers!)
Evo is pushing toward 70 fracking percent, as the outlying district votes trickle in, and now has majorities in 6 out of 9 (and nearly 7 out of 9) provinces.
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What an asshole this Dieterich is!
"...the liberal thought that
hegemonizes the praxis of the Bolivian government which continues to cling to illusions of a bourgeois regime...." --Dieterich
Hegemonizes the praxis? I mean, come on.
We should have known. Anybody who gets quoted by Simon Romero (the NYT's 'Judith Miller' for South American oil) is not to be trusted. (See BoRev.)
There are many fallacies in Dieterich's argument. I will just mention two, and be done with hegemonizing his praxis.
He says that, because one of the white separatist governors is ignoring Evo's HUMONGOUS victory, and is proceeding as if it hadn't occurred, that victory somehow legitimizes the white separatist movement.
Huh?
The governor is a lawless, racist, greedy, Bush-funded SOB--and would have been, no matter the outcome of this referendum. This referendum did not "legitimize" him. He was elected in a previous vote. What the referendum did was to legitimize and solidify and massively increase
Evo's mandate of reform, and marginalize the separatist governors, who now have
a mere 33% (!) of support in the country as a whole, and
lost support in some of their own provinces.
This tremendous
endorsement of Evo's mandate, by the vast majority of Bolivians, must be seen in a regional context, for that is where the unity of Bolivia and the progress of social justice in Bolivia, will be won or lost.
Evo's huge mandate strengthens the hands of his allies--Chavez in Venezuela, Correa in Ecuador, Fernando Lugo in Paraguay, the Kirchners in Argentina, Lula da Silva in Brazil, Tabare Vasquez in Uruguay, and others--whose strong economic and political support is essential to holding Bolivia together and defeating this Bushite separatist scheme. The social justice revolution in South America is a
regional event. It cannot be viewed in isolation, within the borders of one country. For instance, the election of a leftist in Paraguay was as important to Bolivia's unity and the success of Evo's government as any event you could name in Bolivia, because it cut off a staging area and a route of intervention by the U.S. military. (Lugo wants the U.S. military out of his country, and will not cooperate with the U.S. in any interference with his neighbor, Bolivia--whereas the previous rightwing government very likely would have.)
Evo's big mandate gives these other leaders a much stronger hand to play in supporting him--whether at the OAS, at the Rio Group, in peace negotiations with the separatists, in regional trade groups, within their own countries (economic policy toward Bolivia), and vis a vis the malefactors in the Washington DC and Bogota. For instance, Brazil and Argentina both stated, prior to this referendum, that they would not recognize or trade with the separatist provinces (whose main product is gas--the resource that the separatists are trying to hijack). Brazil and Argentina are Bolivia's chief gas customers. This was obviously the policy of their presidents--Lula da Silva and Cristina Fernandez. But both of these presidents have trouble with rightwing elements in their legislators. Evo's 67% win (and counting) gives them a strong argument for maintaining and enforcing that policy, which might well have been weakened by a lesser win, or by no-referendum at all (continued corporate/fascist media over-playing the strength of the separatists, with no concrete evidence--such as this 67% Evo win--to contradict it).
And that Brazilian/Argentina policy, in turn, strengthens Evo's hand. Who are the separatists going to sell their gas
to? This economic/political reality--that Bolivia's neighbors and chief trade partners all now have leftist governments, helping Morales--further marginalizes the separatists, and means their ultimate defeat. The referendum aids this cooperative process. Lula da Silva and Cristina Fernandez can now point to this mandate, in furtherance of isolating the separatists.
Dieterich spoke too soon (apparently driven by a Maoist agenda--he quotes Mao, for godssakes!): "The government's position has not moved forward because it was already known beforehand that Evo counted on around 60% of the public's sympathies."
Make that 67%! (--and counting). Evo has not only not lost support--he has gained significant support and solidified what is an astonishing mandate, in any circumstance, but is particularly amazing in Bolivia, with its once-fractured political scene, and all the USAID money being poured in to stoke a civil war.
Clearly, the vast majority of Bolivians
don't want armed conflict--Maoist or fascist. Dieterich of the fancy words is, in my opinion, speaking for a tiny, outmoded, leftist faction that feels injured because it is so out of touch with reality. Nobody is listening to them. Bolivians want peace and progress. They are proceeding democratically and don't want, and don't need, armed conflict to achieve their goals.
He makes one good point. Nobody--but nobody--should be naive about the violent intentions of this white racist elite and their Bush backers. With that, I agree. But the answer to that security issue is
regional. Regional unity is essential in facing it. Bolivia cannot solve this problem alone, nor by internal use of force--which is exactly what the Bushites want: civil war. Lula da Silva recently proposed a South American defense pact, not including the U.S. That is the answer, ultimately, if it is needed--a South American peacekeeping force that could step in, if these separatists provinces become too unruly and start a shooting war against the government. But this will more than likely be prevented by unified, regional, economic, political and diplomatic action.
Point #2, as to Dieterich: This Bush-backed, fascist separatist movement (and there is evidence of it in Venezuela and Ecuador, as well) is a desperate corporate strategy resulting from their inability to win, or steal, elections in South America.
Voting is precisely what is needed to counteract it. More and better democracy--not another Colombia, where the armed leftist reaction to fascist atrocities and fascist rule has become an excuse for $6 BILLION worth of U.S. militarization and U.S./Bush dictation. This Bolivian referendum was exactly the right answer. And it will continue to be the answer--as to social justice--so long as elections in South America continue to be honest, aboveboard and transparent, which they are almost everywhere except in Colombia (and there may have been some fiddling in Peru, to get the corrupt 'free tradists' into power). The "bourgeois," as this writer contemptuously calls it,
and the grass roots social activists and movements, have worked long and hard, for decades, on transparent elections. It has paid off with an astonishing, peaceful, democratic, leftist revolution that has swept South America and is moving into Central America (El Salvador will be next). VOTING has been the key. Not armed revolution. Armed revolution FAILED everywhere but in Cuba.
Finally, Dieterich calls the Kirchner loss of a close vote in the legislature, on taxing soy exports, "the end of the Kirchner project in Argentina." It is not. That was just one political battle. The same with the Chavistas' 69-amendment Constitutional referendnum last December (which they also lost by a hair). To sweepingly say that the left is doomed because of two closely lost votes is ridiculous and grandiose. It is almost Limbaugh-ish in its quickness to jump on a political failure as the omen of a defeat of an idea or movement. Yes, the fascist bastards in Washington DC and their fascist bastard clients in South America can slow down
some reform, can throw monkey-wrenches into it, and can spend billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars in these and other fascist activities (including paramilitary death squads, bullies and thugs). But they cannot win. South America is moving toward self-determination
inexorably. This leftist trend cannot be stopped. A few lost votes within a democratic context (which includes freedom for fascists and Bushites) means nothing in the bigger picture, as long as the democracy holds. And the left keeps coming back with big victories in the most meaningful elections--a leftist elected in Paraguay, of all places, and this huge Evo win.
Political mistakes were made by the left in Venezuela and Argentina, in both of those situations. (For instance, in Venezuela, piling 69 amendments into one proposal--which confused some voters--and saddling economic reforms with an equal rights for gays and women amendment in a country with particularly rightwing Catholic clergy.) Neither one was catastrophic, as Dieterich would like us to believe. The socialist program in Venezuela is on track, as is the reconstruction of Argentina's economy on social justice lines, after its decimation by Clinton/Bush "neoliberalism." And overall the trend is overwhelmingly leftist, as well as moving swiftly toward economic/political unity and strength in a South American Common Market. The rule in Latin America has been "divide and conquer" by the U.S. and its corporate dragons. A South American Common Market is badly needed in order to bring cooperative strength to bear in fighting for social justice. For now, this is the best course. It may not always be. Unified markets can be oppressive, undemocratic and dictatorial, and can swamp national interests and local peoples' power. But for now, this kind of collective power is essential in dealing with the U.S. (the power behind this separatist trouble). And this is the power that will be most critical in preserving Evo Morales and the peoples' revolution in Bolivia, believe me--collective leftist power in the
region.
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