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Denouncing Hugo Chavez. And other sports of the rich, infamous and just plain stupid

by Open-Publishing - Monday 16 October 2006
1 comment

Governments South/Latin America Daniel Patrick Welch

by Daniel Patrick Welch

Nancy Pelosi apparently has so much time on her hands, and so few
other issues to address, that she saw fit to unload on Hugo Chavez
following his appearance before the U.N. in New York. Most readers
are familiar by now with Chavez’ provocative swipes at "Devil" Bush
and his comment that the titular head of U.S. empire had left the
place reeking of sulfur from his earlier appearance.

Is this run-of-the-mill Pablum of the Poor what angered Democratic
Party leaders so? It could hardly have been the more substantive
complaints in Chavez’ brief address: the observation that the
permanent veto of a few mega-powers is an undemocratic throwback that
taints the entire mission of the U.N. (Gasp! What insolence!). Or
that the refusal to issue visas to several members of Chavez’ staff
reeks of political payback thoroughly inappropriate for the
geographic host of an international organization (ingrate!).

No, denunciations are issued primarily because they are cheap and
easy political currency, a convenient distraction from events, issues
or problems the denouncer might otherwise be compelled to address.
Outrage is seductive; with the world burning around them, the leaders
of the system and the war machine fed by both parties have nothing
else to say and nothing to offer, either to their own people or the
citizens of the world.

Denunciations, repudiations and other useless gestures have long been
a substitute for real action and a smokescreen to reassign proper
targets of outrage. When Nelson Mandela visited the US as the
apartheid regime was crumbling beneath his lifelong struggle, it was
demanded of him that he "repudiate" Mohamar Khadafi and Fidel Castro.
Pictures were circulated of the supposedly embarrassing hugs that
would make such "repudiation" necessary.

Mandela refused, of course, clearly seeing the absurdity of bowing to
pressure from the erstwhile funders of his oppressors to denounce
those who had supported his struggle for decades. Black protesters of
the Vietnam War, urged to patriotic duty to kill communists and
children halfway around the globe, demurred with a similarly poignant
retort: "No Viet Cong ever called me ’Nigger.’"

But there is a disturbing lesson in the pattern of those our
politicians love to hate, and especially in our
toothless "opposition’s" complicity with the real forces colluding to
turn back human progress on an unprecedented scale. There is
something unconvincing about the party of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
being outraged by war crimes, either by the current administration or
around the world. And ringing even hollower is the self-righteous
drivel from the lips of the heirs to one of the most nearly total
successful genocides in human history. Three centuries of slavery,
apartheid and racist terrorism came to an end (sort of) under their
watch. Democrats love to absorb these "struggles" and "victories"
into their legacy, conveniently forgetting not only that racism was
the founding tenet of huge sections of their own party, but that
their desire to claim credit is ill-deserved. Until the very sunset
of official American apartheid, even those most sympathetic in power
resisted, demurred, watered down, mitigated and counseled caution and
yet more patience among the oppressed. Some heroes.

And now, despite all historical evidence that reliance on change from
the leadership down is an exercise in futility, rank-and-file
democrats are nearly giddy at the prospect of gains to be made in the
coming biennial farce next month. Let’s keep our eye on the ball:
Democratic leaders have more to say about Hugo Chavez than the
problems he is attempting to address.

Even in opposition they have almost nothing to say about the hugest
issues of the day: the near total inability of our society to address
virtually any of our actual problems caused by the bloated and
counterproductive war machine. So stuffed with our money that the
machine hemorrhages billions with barely anyone noticing, war waste
dwarfs all other items and all other budgets on the planet.
Government on all levels is completely paralyzed by this fear-induced
blackmail, even as it has more money than any other on earth. A
crisis, of course, met largely with silence from Bush’s "friends
across the aisle.” Likewise with support for the ongoing slaughter
and colonization of Palestine, a festering injustice so obvious that
even the sleepy US public is starting to wake up to the atrocities.

A million cluster bombs lay scattered over southern Lebanon, a
million little ambassadors for the truth behind the US agenda in the
region. There is no timid or incremental solution to problems that
scream for radical change. Yet the Democrats with few exceptions,
right beside their Republican collaborators are so engorged on
corporate money, so beholden to interests diametrically opposed to
our own, so convinced of the rightness of their collusion with these
forces, so full of...well, shit, to be perfectly honest...that they
expect us to believe that something basic will change when they take
power. And if they have nothing to say now, will they miraculously
have more to say once the Made in USA SKU labels on all those cluster
bombs trace directly back to their own purse strings? Don’t hold your
breath.

Forum posts

  • Well put. Our so-called opposition party is truly pathetic. Chavez knows how to make his voice heard, even if it costs him a little. He will not be ignored. Of course, the American press can only focus on the sensational, but the fact that Chomsky’s book went to the top shows some people were listening or at least curious. Viva la revolucion!