Venezuela notes

Waking Up

2011-05-08T19:53:00.000-07:00

After three years of hibernation, Venezuela notes is waking up!

First, I'd like to announce the publication of my new book, Revolutionary Doctors: How Venezuela and Cuba Are Changing the World's Conception of Health Care, which will be available from Monthly Review Press at the end of this month (May 2011). To accompany the book, a new blog, Revolutionary Doctors (revolutionarydoctors.com) will be appearing online; I hope it will be useful for expanding the discussion of the accomplishments of Cuba and Venezuela in the field of medicine and other areas. Their persistent efforts to pursue progressive change in peaceful ways are under constant attack from the North, where the pattern of military/capitalist conquest is still enthusiastically promoted by the so-called centers of Western Civilization.

Those who have never read Venezuela notes before can gain some insights into what has been taking place in the Bolivarian Revolution by reviewing the articles written in 2007-2008. I've found a few small mistakes to correct as I re-read them, but in general I feel that their depiction of Venezuelan reality is far more reliable than what has been called "news" in the North American and European press over the past decade.

The scarcity of accurate information and the production of disinformation concerning Venezuela in the transnational media is more than matched by its antagonistic coverage of Cuba, which has endured constant media attacks as well as economic and political terrorism for more than half a century. Perhaps more damaging than the constant negative bias is the utter absence of positive news stories about both countries, especially in regard to their impressive achievements in developing the human potential of their own populations and their extraordinary humanitarian missions to help the people of other nations. One purpose of my book and the blogs is to redress this imbalance, but even more important is to let readers know that some very important experiments, not only in the practice of medicine but in the practice of creating a better world, are taking place. The progress that Cuba and Venezuela are making holds great promise for most countries in the world, even for the United States. Although it is a very rich country, the United States is also very underdeveloped in some respects; for example, it still allows for extreme overconsumption of health care by some people while millions of others live year in and year out without adequate medicial attention.

I'm sure that many young Americans are hoping to pursue careers in medicine in order to help remedy this imbalance, but chances are they don't know they have the opportunity to gain the appropriate education in Cuba - for free! They can attend the Latin American School of Medicine (Escuela Latinoamericana de Medicina, or ELAM) which has already graduated more than 10,000 students from all over the Americas who are trained in comprehensive family medicine so that they can attend to poor and underserved communities in their own countries. As I was doing research for Revolutionary Doctors in Havana in March of 2009, I had the pleasure of meeting four young revolutionary doctors-in-training at ELAM who are among the more than one hundred students who come from the United States:

on the right:

Pasha, Malik,

and Ian

on the left:

Frances

The training at ELAM, a rigorous six-year program, is based on the same principles and curriculum that are used in Venezuela to train doctors in Comprehensive Community Medicine, known there as Medicina Integral Comunitaria, or MIC.

Some of my young neighbors in Monte Carmelo are nearly finished with the MIC program and will soon be full-fledged MDs serving the residents of communities in the state of Lara and other areas that have been served by Cuban doctors working for Barrio Adentro over the past seven or eight years.

The articles below, written in 2007 and 2008, recount some of the experiences of the MIC students and the Barrio Adentro physicians who train them. Much of the material in these blog entries has been incorporated into Revolutionary Doctors.

Four articles on health care and medical training in Venezuela

2011-04-29T06:53:00.000-07:00

The articles below were written in 2007 and 2008, but were reposted in November 2008 so they can be read together as a group and in the order in which I wrote them.

Fidel´s WMDs versus Bush´s WMDs - World Medical Doctors are more powerful than Weapons of Mass Destruction

2008-11-14T07:22:00.000-08:00

(originally written in June of 2007)
This is a confrontation that has been brewing for 45 years: the United States versus
Cuba. George W. Bush and Dick Cheney have been acting more and more belligerent, as if they believed that their WMDs, the most deadly collection of "weapons of mass destruction" in the world, are superior to Cuba's own brand of WMDs.

What the North Americans ignore, at their peril, is that Cuba's WMDs are "World Medical Doctors," an incomparable force for peaceful cooperation that is winning the admiration of people the world over (except in the United States, where almost everyone, including the media, is unaware of their existence.) How can the U.S. assortment of nuclear and biological warheads compete with tens of thousands of highly trained, humanitarian physicians?

One example of a superior weapon
One of the Cuban WMDs is a young ophthamologist working at a Barrio Adentro 2 diagnostic clinic in the town of Sanare in the mountains of Venezuela. Dr. Eulogio (his first name – all the patients seem to call the Cuban doctors by their first names) is one of over 30,000 medical professionals who are currently serving people outside of Cuba, and 20,000 of them in Venezuela alone. In January of 2007, he and his older colleague, Dr. Frank, spent about six hours talking about medical care and medical education.

The Cuban doctors are treating thousands of people each month at the various Barrio Adentro sites around Sanare. There are several small neighborhood medical offices that treat outpatients, and one new diagnostic clinic that has an intensive care unit and medical specialists, plus MRI and X-ray equipment.

But they also have another job – training the doctors who will one day replace them. At present 42 local residents of the municipality are going to medical school through an intensive training program known as “integral community medicine.”

Dr. Frank has four second-year students who follow him around on his medical rounds and appointments during the week, observing diagnosis and care while discussing physiology and pathology that are pertinent to their current studies. Their afternoons are spent in intensive classes which include CDs designed by the best professors at medical schools in Cuba. The CDs are available for the students to watch as many times as they like, allowing them to review the information and concepts in the lectures with local instructors such as Dr. Frank.

In January of 2007, Dr. Frank spent hours talking to three students from the Dickinson College in Pennsylvania about the concepts and practice of medical care and education in Cuba and Venezuela.

After studying six days a week for six years, these students will become family physicians who will treat everyone in this agricultural area. If, at some point, they want to become specialists, they would have to do another three years of study and residency.

Some of the local students recently completed high school and others, like Juan, are more than twice their age. A forty-seven year-old man in his second year of training, Juan says that he dreamed of going to medical school over twenty years ago but that was financially impossible for him and his family, so he worked for years as a nursing assistant in a local physician’s office. While he gets a small scholarship while completing his studies, Jose says he is only able to pursue his medical career because of strong financial and moral support from his wife and their extended families.

This physicians’ training program is being implemented nationwide on a huge scale, so that by 2012 there will be 23,000 new doctors in Venezuela, all educated to provide medical care in their home towns and barrios. Some of these physicians will undoubtedly become WMDs, or World Medical Doctors, and will be available to join their Cuban counterparts in deployment to Latin America and other parts of the globe.

Dr. Frank and Dr. Eulogio say that the Venezuelan students are the beneficiaries of a “revolution within the revolution” in Cuba, where the system of education is being radically changed. In Cuba, too, doctors are now being trained differently, and are starting go on rounds to see patients in their first year like in Venezuela, rather than in the fourth year as in the past. Other kinds of educational progress are also evident; for instance, increasing quality of primary and secondary schools, where class sizes are being reduced to 15-20 students per teacher.

The doctors think the scholastic achievements of their Venezuelan students are impressive, but they emphasized something else: “What is even more satisfying for us to see is the creation of moral and ethical values that allow them to really influence their own communities.”

I told the two doctors that I had talked to several people in the waiting room downstairs who were very happy with their care at Barrio Adentro II. They felt comfortable because the Cubans treated them as equals and enjoyed answering questions and chatting with them. During the lengthy time I spent talking with Dr. Frank and Dr. Eulogio, many people banged on the door and stuck their heads in just to say “Hi!”

“I think we and our students are creating a new model of what a medical professional is supposed to be,” explained Dr. Eulogio. “The old Venezuelan stereotype of a doctor, at least in the cities, was somebody driving around in a fancy car with black windows and air-conditioning. So nobody knows who they are -- people only get to see them in their offices if they can pay.”

One of the people responsible for this extraordinary investment in human capital is Dester Rodriguez, a military general and a director of PDVSA, the Venezuelan national oil company. He is responsible for overseeing the billions of dollars of oil profits that are channeled directly from PDVSA into the “misiones,” the social missions that are designed to lift the majority of Venezuelans out of poverty. He likes the idea that he is financing ultra-sophisticated human weaponry, but he doesn't refer to them as WMDs. He puts them in a category "more powerful than atomic weapons" and calls them "missiles of love." [see article on “Sowing the Oil”]

Fighting capital with human capital – the battle of WMDs is a “Battle of Ideas”

After the Soviet Union collapsed in 1989, the United States and George Bush the Elder announced that there was a “New World Order.” They expected to impose a global capitalist regime that would allow no room for any small, revolutionary nations like Cuba. The U.S. economic blockade had damaged Cuba in previous decades, but in the 1990s it became much more devastating because the Cubans no longer engaged in significant trade with the Eastern Europe and Russia. The Cuban economy sank into a true depression and the production of goods and services fell by at least 30%. The nation struggled to feed its people, and only by imposing strict food rationing did it prevent the health of its children from deteriorating. The capitalist world waited for Cuba to collapse.

When Cuba invigorated its tourist industry in a effort to attract dollars and euros into their economy, it did not allow capitalist values to overwhelm revolutionary values. But it wasn’t easy, particularly since some people working in the tourist industry were earning a lot more than professionals in various kinds of public and social service jobs.

Cubans decided to emphasize the kinds of social solidarity and humanistic concern for other people that distinguishes their society, and to contrast them with the materialistic and self-centered behavior that characterize advanced capitalist societies. When Fidel Castro addressed the nation on May Day in 2000, he told the Cuban people that Cuba would survive by engaging in a Battle of Ideas: "Our consciousness and the ideas sown by the Revolution throughout more than four decades have been our weapons. Revolution means …being treated and treating others like human beings ….it is challenging powerful dominant forces from within and without the social and national milieu …. it is a profound conviction that there is no power in the world that can crush the power of truth and ideas.¨

Interviewed four years later, Abel Prieto, the Cuban Minister of Culture, expanded on this theme and explained why the Battle of Ideas was connected to Cuba’s programs of international medical assistance. “… in contrast to the stupidity, barbarity and the law of the strongest that today intends to impose itself worldwide, we try to defend the idea that another world is possible. Against the neo-liberal model, this fierce version of capitalism that reserves for a small minority the luxury of consumerism and excludes ¾ of the population of the world, we propose the defense of the values of social justice and authentic democracy. We believe that what should be globalized are not bombs or hatred but peace, solidarity, health, education for all, culture, etc. That is why, when our physicians go to help in other countries, although their mission is to work for medical attention, they are also bearers of our values and our ideas of solidarity. This is the essence of the Battle of Ideas.”

As the United States has kept expending its energy and hundreds of billions of dollars on neo-colonial wars, it did little to engage the Cubans on the philosophical battlefield. Some State Department figures weakly declared in 2005 that the U.S. wanted to engage in its own “battle of ideas,” without pointing out that the Cubans had defined the terrain of the battlefield five years earlier.

There were some efforts at genuine humanitarian assistance by the U.S., such as military helicopters delivering medical aid to Pakistan in the wake of a terrible earthquake in late 2005. In 2007 the State Department played up the visit of a U.S. hospital ship to Panama where it dispensed free medical care. But these efforts paled beside he much more extensive aid that Cuba dispensed to Pakistan (1,500 doctors and nurses living in wintry conditions they had never experienced before) and to Latin America and the rest of the world.

Cuba has more than 45,000 students studying medicine, almost 20,000 of them coming from poor parts of Latin America and Africa (as well as a handful of students who come from poverty-stricken areas of the United States.) The U.S.A., almost thirty times bigger in population than Cuba, and hundreds of times greater in material wealth, has roughly 64,000 students in medical school.

For a refreshing look at the practice of Cuban medicine and medical education as they affect many parts of the world, see the feature-length film, Salud, directed by Connie Field. She is a veteran documentary film-maker who was previously nominated for an Academy Award for Rosie the Riveter, the story of working women in the U.S. during World War II.

WMDs -- World Medical Doctors – now being produced in Venezuela (WMDs Part 2)

2008-11-13T06:20:00.000-08:00

(originally written in October of 2007)

Jonas, left, with his brother and his father
Jonas lives on a tiny dairy farm on the hill above Monte Carmelo. His father is intensely proud that his son is studying to be a medical doctor. “He’s only in his second year,” he said, “and already he sees patients.”

“Remember, Papá,” cautioned Jonas, “we do see the patients and talk to them, but we don’t treat them yet. We’re just there to observe and assist our teachers and ask questions.”

“I know that,” his father responded. “What I mean is that it’s important that all of you are learning to talk to the patients, treating them like friends and fellow human beings.”

Jonas is not the first person in his extended family to attend medical school, according to his father. He tells the story of his niece, who many years ago dreamed of being a doctor. Her mother, who was very poor, worked constantly to save every penny and told her daughter to study hard. The extended family pitched in to help the mother.

“She really did go to medical school,” explained Jonas’ father, “at one of the big city universities. Then she her got her training in a specialty, and now sees lives and sees her patients in a rich neighborhood of Caracas. Of course, now, as far as she’s concerned, I don’t exist. In fact, my niece doesn’t want to associate with anyone in the family and doesn’t talk to any of us.”

This is why the government has introduced a totally new system of teaching doctors. The old system, centered around elite universities where only a tiny minority of poor and working class students are enrolled, has continued to turn out professionals who want to work in the urban centers and enjoy a fairly rich, upper-middle class lifestyle. These kinds of universities, home to many of the students who are currently protesting against the constitutional reforms, are not unique to Venezuela, for their counterparts exist all over the world.

The Venezuelan government has avoided the temptation to abruptly seize control of these older universities and force them to operate in a manner that serves the poor majority. Instead, it has simply bypassed them and constructed a new kind of university.

Where is this university? All over Venezuela, because it exists in the realm of ideas, not in a particular set of buildings. The Mission Sucre school of Integral Community Medicine trains students where they live, utilizing the local medical facilities and doctors in their towns and neighborhoods as the campus and professors. The students enter with the expectation that they are choosing a vocation that involves serving the people and their home communities after they finish their training.

This unique form of education could not exist without Cuban doctors. They arrived by the thousands to staff the Barrio Adentro neighborhood medical offices that sprouted up all over the country in 2003 and 2004 and brought free health care to poor barrios and rural areas that had neglected for many decades. The Cubans are helped by a four or five thousand Venezuelan doctors who were trained in the old system, but for reasons of social commitment and political conviction have chosen to work with the poor.

Party time for medical studentsAfter dancing, Doctor Barbara, takes a break at the feet of her students, Magale, Antonio, and Luisa.About a month ago Jonas invited me to walk up the mountain to his house where I joined him and his fellow students for a little rest and relaxation. It was Sunday, time for a little music and dancing, plus sitting and chatting and enjoying the view over the valley below. Barbara, the dynamic Cuban physician who holds the students to a rigorous schedule the other six days of the week, took charge of the family kitchen and prepared a big pot of tasty stew.

All of the students are residents of some part of the municipality surrounding Sanare (comparable to a county in the U.S.) and are enrolled in the second or third year of the Mission Sucre medical program (also see earlier article, Fidel’s WMDs) Their Cuban and Venezuelan teachers work in local “ambulatorios” (free public walk-in facilities in various neighborhoods and villages) or in the Barrio Adentro 2 Diagnostic Clinic in the middle of Sanare.

The medical career is demanding. After completing six months of classroom preparation to make sure everyone is starting out on an equal footing, the students commit themselves to a six-year program. Beginning in the very first year, the students are spending part of each day with patients in medical settings. They spend their mornings accompanying doctors as they see patients and offer treatments, looking after medical records and medications, weighing and measuring babies and children while the doctors attend to the rest of the family. Their afternoons are spent in the classrooms. Nights are for study, reviewing CDs that cover the material of each class lecture, and some sleep.

The first year serves to sort out the serious students, the ones who truly have a vocation for medicine, and the less committed drop out. Jonas thinks that the students who come from the rural villages and farms are most likely to stick with the program, perhaps because they are used to hard work. His fellow student Luisa comes from La Bucarita, an isolated coffee-growing village more than two hours out of Sanare by Jeep. She’s living with an elderly relative in Sanare and really misses the company of her large family, but she’s determined to get her medical degree.

Jonas had been out of high school for a number of years before the new integral community medical program began. During the early years of the Bolivarian Revolution, he and other recent high-school graduates were teaching as temporary rural “maestros,” even though they didn’t have college degrees. They served as literacy volunteers who went to the more isolated areas of the county to work for Mission Robinson, the basic education program that taught illiterate adults to read and now helps them and others to complete their elementary schooling. At the same time, he also continued helping his father with farm work and building a new house for the family.

Doctora Edita is a Venezuelan physician who was serving the poor before the Cubans arrived.

Some Venezuelans, like Doctor Edita Goyo, who trained as a pediatrician in the big city of Barquisimeto, were committed to providing health care to everyone before the Chavez government came to power. The Barrio Adentro program was the answer to Edita’s dreams. It has allowed her to practice medicine for the last three years with dedicated Cuban professionals in the walk-in medical office in Palo Verde, a village just outside of Sanare. Currently she’s works in the same room with the Doctor Barbara, who arrived five months ago and replaced the previous Cuban doctor. (The Cubans generally sign up for a two-year tour of duty, and many re-enlist for another round of service.) They and their six medical students make a formidable team.

Antonio and Luisa bring records and medications as Dr. Barbara consults with a family.Dr. Barbara served in four other countries, including Angola, before coming to Venezuela.Each doctor has a desk, one on each side of the room, where they receive a steady stream of patients while the students perform various tasks. One mother arrived with four little children, two on her knee and two standing and clinging to her. The medical students moved in and entertained the children one by one, then managed to measure them and examine their eyes, ears, and throats. Meanwhile Doctor Barbara took extensive notes on the medical history of the woman, for she was the one who was ill.

The files on individuals and families are extensive and allow the doctors and students to review the various trends within the community. They use this information to create wall charts describing the predominant health care problems in Palo Verde. This provides them with a comprehensive view of the most pressing local needs that “integral community medicine” must address. One important component of the medical team’s work is educating the public about preventative measures. Many of the common maladies enumerated on the wall charts – such as diabetes, asthma, and hypertension – are combated by introducing exercise programs and changing diets.

I saw the wall charts below three years ago in a Barrio Adentro office in Caracas. Volunteers from the local Health Committee had helped the Cuban doctors gather information on every family in the neighborhood. The charts showed exactly how many local residents (and the numbers were high) suffered from preventable afflictions such as malnutrition, hypertension, and asthma. The medical students were having good luck entertaining most of the kids, but this baby simply did not want to get weighed by Jonas. Fellow student Vanesa is amused by the proceedings.

The World Medical Doctors down the street (WMDs part three)

2008-11-12T06:20:00.000-08:00

(originally written in January of 2008)

An innocent, beautiful little village nestled into the mountains at the northern end of the Andes. Hardly the place anyone would look for one of the greatest concentrations of WMDs in the world. Should we leave town before Bush tries to retaliate?

The new generation of WMDs in Venezuela (for those of you who have not encountered them in two previous posts on Venezuela Notes) are World Medical Doctors in training, and they’re living on all sides of us. Monte Carmelo, a village of about 700 people, has 8 residents who are studying Medicina Integral Comunitaria, or Integral Community Medicine, in the Mission Sucre program of higher education that serves this municipality. A ninth resident is studying medicine in Cuba.

On the left, Mariela, Arelys, and Milena live in Monte Carmelo. Next, Inez is from the nearby village of Bojó, and Karen comes from Peru.

Milena and Mariela began studying three and a half years ago as part of the first class that now includes twenty-eight students. They responded to public announcements inviting interested people to take an exam that would qualify them to enter the medical training program. Mariela, who had just finished liceo (or high school), had always dreamed of being a doctor but doubted that she would have the opportunity to study at one of the big city universities. “So, when I heard that we could take the test to enter the program in Medicina Integral Comunitaria, I raced down into Sanare to sign up.”

Milena on the other hand, was already out of school, married and the mother of a two year-old daughter when she took the exam. When she and Mariela passed and were accepted into the medical program, they faced a rigorous 6 month preparatory course that was designed to get all students, those fresh from high school and those who had not attended classes for a long time, performing at more or less the same level.

Then they were ready for the course of study itself, a serious commitment that involves completing six years of work, the same amount required by medical schools at many other universities in Europe and around the world.

Their school, however, is unique in two ways. For one, the university training comes to them in their hometowns and prepares them for spending their careers serving the areas they live in or other parts of the country (or world) that have a shortage of doctors and good health care.

Secondly, they begin spending time with patients in their very first year, working three or four hours in the morning, Mondays through Fridays, in the ambulatorios (walk-in offices) and the larger diagnostic clinic created by the Barrio Adentro program. Besides taking note of various kinds of treatment, the students begin developing their communication skills and abilities to interact sensitively and humanely with patients.

In the afternoons, all the students working in various locations converge on a building in Sanare, the large town in the area, for their formal classes. These consist of watching DVDs of lectures from Cuban medical schools, discussing the material and things they have observed with the Cuban doctors who are their local instructors, reviewing other medical information on computers, and also taking weekly exams.

When Mariela and Milena completed their second year, they and all the other students entering the third year were rewarded with gifts: their own computers to use at home. This allows them to take DVD copies of the Cuban lectures and various readings and films with them for night-time review. They were delighted, of course, because few people in Monte Carmelo are lucky enough to have their personal computer and because they feel the complexity and intensity of their work has increased this year. The two of them mentioned their current physiology course in particular since it demands a lot of rapid memorization -- all those bones, organs, muscles, tendons, ligaments and their various functions.

Every fifteen days, two of the third year students have to be on call all night at the Yacambu Diagnostic Center. From 8 pm to 8 am, they help admit emergency patients and assist the lone Cuban doctor who is on call. Sundays, though they are supposed to be a days of rest, are sometimes devoted to a quick medical tour to one of many isolated villages and hamlets in the area. Students will hop into a jeep with a doctor and plow through the muddy mountain lanes to reach people who seldom ever get to Sanare, let alone to a doctor’s office.

All in all, this is a grueling regimen, so I asked how many had dropped out. “Four of five out of the 39 of us,” the students said, “are no longer with us. There was only one who thought it was too simply much work. Another having a baby. The others felt the financial or family pressures were too great. And then, of course, there are six of our original group who aren’t with us here, but are still studying. They’re at the Latin American University of Medicine in Cuba.”

There are other health care students in Monte Carmelo, such as Elsy Perez, a middle-aged nursing student who helps out at the ambulatorio. She was an original member of the village health committee that worked with the first Cuban doctor who arrived in 2003. Now she and 52 other students from the Sanare area, four of them from Monte Carmelo, are enrolled in the Mission Sucre nursing program. Elsy Perez said that previously only one Monte Carmelo resident had completed her nursing degree by commuting an hour and half to the big city of Barquisimeto.

Elsy also works three days, in 7am to 7 pm shifts, at the small municipal hospital in Sanare that is staffed by two Venezuelan doctors. She says that they, possibly because they were trained years ago in the established medical schools in the big cities, are often unsympathetic and harsh with their patients. The nurses notice that some patients are treated much better than others, and this seems to be due to class prejudices held by the doctors, who sometimes will hardly speak to the poorest campesinos. This is in stark contrast to the Cuban doctors Elsy has worked with who give everyone equal attention and treatment, and often put people at ease with their friendly style.

“This is what we want to do, too,” added Arelys, another mother who is now in her first year of study to become a doctor. “We are thinking of medicine as a vocation, our calling in life, our way of serving the people and building socialist values. We don’t want a profession in the old sense, like some of the older Venezuelan doctors, who are motivated by a desire for money and prestige, and want to feel that they are superior to the patients, the nurses, and everyone else.”

This year, a new development in WMDs

Just arrived in Monte Carmelo last week: Karen from Peru and Georgo from Surinam

This week another 335 World Medical Doctors-in-training were thrown into the potent Venezuelan mix of WMD production. If you will recall from the previous posts on this site, about 23,000 Venezuelans are now studying Integral Community Medicine at home and another 4,000 are in medical school in Cuba as part of the 20,000 foreign students training to be physicians under the auspices of Raul and Fidel.

Nine months ago the foreign students started arriving in Venezuela as well, so they could be prepared to study within the Integral Community Medicine program. Now that they have finished the pre-medical course, they are being dispersed around the country. Seven of them have just arrived in Sanare, including Karen and Georgo, pictured above. The two of them were at work in Monte Carmelo on Thursday when I visited the ambulatorio.

No wonder Bush and Cheney are quivering in their cowboy boots. They thought they had knocked off Doctor “Che” Guevara 40 years ago, and now he’s back, multiplied a thousand-fold. As you may recall, after the young Ernesto Guevara finished his motorcycle journey around South America, he quickly completed his medical school exams, and took off again. This time he was determined to put his training as a doctor to work in the service of humanity, so he headed to the one place in Latin America that was having a peaceful social revolution. Guatemala.

Soon after his arrival in 1954, U.S. intervention put an end to Guatemala’s successful experiments with land and labor reform and unleashed a half century of pro-capitalist brutality in Central America. Ernesto had to flee the country to Mexico where he met a new group of friends who were amused by his Argentine habit of saying “che” all the time. Thus, “El Che” was born, the internationalist physician who picked up a gun, joined the Cuban guerrilla fighters, and became a leading “comandante” in their Revolution. He would later die fighting with a small band of revolutionaries in Bolivia.

So it is interesting that, out of the 335 students who left Caracas this week to begin their six years of training in various parts of Venezuela, about half are Bolivians. Perhaps the CIA, which had a direct role in murdering Che after he was captured by the Bolivian Army in 1967, is alarmed by this new threat. Last week, in an intelligence report to the U.S. Senate, the CIA claimed that Cuba and Venezuela were having a negative effect on the governments of Bolivia, Ecuador, and Nicaragua. The chancellor of Bolivia quickly responded, “I don’t know where they are coming from and where they get their information. The people of Bolivia know what relations are like with Cuba and Venezuela.”

Joining the Bolivians who are studying medicine in Venezuela are students from many Latin American countries, including some who are not native Spanish speakers: a large contingent from Brazil, eight from Surinam, and even some Guaraní speakers from Paraguay. They were enrolled in intensive Spanish courses while completing their six-month preliminary training in Caracas.

Georgo, from Surinam, is now speaking pretty good Spanish after completing his intensive course, and he identified me right away. “I think I detect Spanish with an American accent,” he said in very good English, also with an American accent. He explained that in Surinam, once a Dutch colony, English has become the main educational language.

Georgo heard about the medical training in Venezuela and went directly to the Venezuela Embassy to apply for admission to the program. Karen said that she and most of the other forty Peruvians who arrived with her had applied through various revolutionary youth groups to which they belonged. Many of them had previously applied for admission to the Latin American School of Medicine in Havana, but were put on waiting lists because their was such a backlog of interested and qualified young people. Karen herself had been waiting for two years, so was happy to land a spot in the group that came to Venezuela instead.

The enthusiasm for this revolutionary vocation is clearly contagious and spreading rapidly through all the Americas, not to mention Africa, which is home to many other students studying in Cuba and the site of other medical schools that are staffed by Cuban physicians. A number of U.S. students are now attending medical school in Cuba, and one of them finished his studies and passed his state medical board exam to practice medicine last year.

According to Karen and Georgo, another contingent of 650 foreign students will be enrolling in the Integral Community Medicine program in the next two months. And who knows, perhaps there will be some U.S. students joining the others in Venezuela within the next year. If so, we can expect to hear from Washington that Hugo Chavez and Fidel are promoting one more “negative influence,” this one aimed at young U.S. citizens.

Still it’s doubtful that the U.S. health care system will be inundated with socialist doctors anytime soon. But here in Venezuela, it is a different story. Our little village of Monte Carmelo could be the WMD champion of the world, with one out of a hundred people becoming a World Medical Doctor.

(don´t forget to look for the great film on Cuban health projects around the world, Salud.)

World Medical Doctors go to class (WMDs, part 4)

2008-11-11T07:04:00.000-08:00

(originally written in February of 2008)

After spending the morning helping Dr. Tomasa attend to families at the walk-in office in Monte Carmelo, Jonas will jump on his motorcycle and head for Sanare for afternoon medical school classes.

Last Tuesday afternoon I joined the first-year medical students for classes. There are thirteen students from the Sanare area and seven new foreign arrivals from ELAM, La Escuela Latina America de Medicina (“the School of Latin American Medicine”) which has been training 20,000 foreign students in Cuba and now has opened up an associate branch in Venezuela this year. The idea is to give these new ELAM students the same training that Venezuelans are receiving in Integral Community Medicine.

Doctora Alina, the short, spunky Cuban who was teaching the class, looked a little grumpy when Doctor Umberto, the Cuban director of the local program, told her that I was going to sit in on her class. Perhaps she was wondering if her thirteen Sanare students would perform well on a short quiz on molecular genetics, the previous week’s focus of study; or perhaps she was skeptical about letting a curious, and possibly untrustworthy gringo observe the group. The seven new students – three from Surinam, two from Colombia, one from Brazil, and one from Peru – waited patiently outside while the others took the test because they had not been present for all of the classes during the previous two weeks.

After the quiz, Doctor Alina asked the students to orally explain concepts related to the quiz. Arelys, one of the students from Monte Carmelo, seemed to have no problem explaining the interactions among XX and XY and XYY chromosomes. Then the doctor turned to one of the foreign students, who have been catching up on the readings, and told him to set up a six-part chart related to “operadores, promotores, regulatores, y cistrones.” Frankly, I was a bit lost and so was this particular student, who had a large and sheepish grin on his face as he struggled to write things on the board. The grin didn’t appear to make the doctor happy, and while she refrained from scolding him personally she did suggest to the whole group that a serious commitment to study was necessary. One of the students from Surinam was asked to answer the same question and had no difficulty charting a diagram and explaining the required processes in detail.

Now it was time to change rooms. Up until this point we had all been squeezed into a crowded reception room which had a street entry door on one side, and in the opposite corner, a desk and a computer for Dr. Umberto, the director. He and Dr. Frank, the intensive-care doctor from Sanare’s Diagnostic Clinic were having a discussion about cardiac and arterial blockages. They were searching the internet for discussions of new procedures and then jotting down extensive notes related to the problem they had to solve.

The Sanare area had no intensive care doctor until Doctor Frank arrived from Cuba a few years ago. Now he works in the new Diagnostic Clinic that is equipped with sophisticated imaging equipment and other resources that previously could be found only in the big cities. He dropped by the offices of the Integral Community Medicine program to discuss new emergency treatments with the director. (Very observant readers will note that he is not the only Dr. Frank working in Sanare. The other, an ophthalmologist, appears in the first blog article about Cuban World MDs.)

When the third-year students came out of an adjoining classroom, our group of first-year students moved in there. This room was larger, quieter, and equipped with old-fashioned school desks and a computer and projector that was set up to show a DVD film to the students. Doctor Alina and the film split the lecture time -- about 65% for the Doctor and 35% for the film -- over the next two hours. The film was well-made, a succinct and informative discussion by a female narrator accompanying charts, drawings, and cartoons. This was different than what I had expected. I had developed the impression, in discussions with other Cuban doctors a year ago, that the new films used in classes were going to be videos of live lectures that had been presented by professors in Cuban universities.

This was not the case. The Cuban medical universities have prepared a whole set of video films designed specifically for the six-year program in Integral Community Medicine in Venezuela. We were watching “Morfofisilogia Humana (human morphophysiology): 1st trimester, 1st year.” Previously the Cubans have gained international recognition for the advances they have made in audiovisual education, especially with their new concepts of how to teach language and reading. While I am
ill-equipped to tell you whether this sophisticated or unsophisticated treatment of human morphology, I can say that I was captivated by the class.

Clearly the film was designed to be an interactive tool, and Doctor Alina made frequent use of the TV remote control to stop and start the action whenever she felt like it. She was very sharp and animated as she added detail, emphasized related material, or repeated the information in a fresh way to make sure the students were comprehending things. They felt free to ask questions at any time.

The general theme, which followed naturally on the previous week’s material, was human reproduction: how the cells of a baby are formed, and how a normal pregnancy is achieved. The “sumario” of the film announced associated themes: “Gametogenesis, Fecundacion, Desarollo de Cigoto, Alteraciones, Contracepcion.” After the film presented the different patterns of chromosomal joining and the exceptional cases, Doctora Alina pointed out some of the abnormal processes which were most likely to lead to birth defects. Later, when the film discussed the way in which the fertilized egg is implanted on the wall of the womb, she spent considerable time answering questions from students about unsuccessful pregnancies and the kinds of incorrect implantation that lead to spontaneous abortions, ectopic pregnancies, etc. “This is the kind of material you need to master,” she said, “because some day you’re going to have to explain these processes to some of your patients.”

After the doctor delved into “blastocistos, zona pelucida, trofoblasto” and other exotic (for me, at least) definitions, there was considerable discussion of the “feminine sexual cycle” and various ways to help women understand their individual variations from the average length of the period and the time of ovulation, including the use of a rectal thermometer. As it turned out, this discussion was related to the homework assignments. After Doctora Alina gave them the straightforward assignment of describing in detail the processes of “ovogenesis” and “spermatogenesis,” she went into different territory.

She gave them the hypothetical case of a long distance truck driver who is on the road most of the month and is married to a woman who travels throughout the country regularly to promote one of the new social missions in Venezuela. They’ve been married for three years and she can’t get pregnant. “What would you, as their doctor,” she asked, “advise them to discuss? And what measures could they take to better their chances of having a child?”

One of the students anxiously waved his hand and said, “I think I read an article about long-distance truckers and the possibility that because of all the time they spend sitting immobile in the cab this is cutting down on their sperm production.”
The doctor rolled her eyes toward the ceiling, and then shook her head emphatically, “No, no, no, that’s a bit of hypothetical speculation and it’s not the avenue of inquiry you should be pursuing, since there is a more straightforward approach that should probably solve this couple’s problem.”

Her last homework question was also intended to make them, as young medical people, practice sharing their knowledge and developing sympathy for the people they will treat: “You are in the walk-in clinic in some little village or in a Barrio Adentro office in a poor barrio, and a young woman comes in and says, ‘I’m think I’m pregnant. But I don’t know how I got pregnant.’ What do you need to ask her? What do you need to explain to her?”

The program of Integral Community Medicine is designed to mix intensive practical experience and intensive classroom study in each year of the six-year course. In another three years or so, when those students who are now in their third year graduate, we will see if this new course of study has produced a new kind of doctor. For now, from my visit to the first class in the first trimester of study, I can say that special attention is being devoted to the concepts of “integral” and “community.” In this process, both the curriculum and the professors are coordinated in a systematic effort to develop the humanitarian and humanistic potential of this very special vocation.

Dr. Alina provides the broad humanistic perspective without giving an inch on rigorous expectations of her students. They say she's the toughest taskmaster of the Cuban doctors in Sanare, all of whom demand the strictest attention and professionalism from the students whether they are in the classroom or assisting in the medical offices. After the class, however, she was all smiles and invited me to come visit her at her morning job, the Barrio Adentro clinic in one of the poorest neighborhoods of Sanare.

Who can aspire to this vocation?
Anyone who passes the preliminary exam and the six-month premedical training course is admitted. One of the first-year students in Sanare is José, a fairly old guy -- according to his fellow classmates, he's either seventy-one years old right now, or will be seventy one when he graduates in six years. He told me that forty-five years ago he was a supporter of the revolutionary guerrillas and was carrying supplies to them in their hideouts in the mountains in this region. “I was born a socialist,” he said as we walked away from the classroom building, “so this is a good way for me to finish out my life.”

The younger students say they are proud of him and glad he got a chance to qualify for the training in spite of his age. He says, with a big grin, that he hopes to practice medicine til he’s one hundred.

José wanted to know what was new with the primary elections in the United States, and I replied that Obama appeared to be edging out Hillary. “That’s good,” José said, “but do you think he wants to end that insane war in Iraq?”

“I wish I could say yes, but I really don’t know,” I said.

“Well, if he gets elected and says he’s going to pull the troops out, he had better watch his back. I am afraid they’ll try to assassinate him within five months.”

Meeting at Las Lajitas: Mario Grippo and Fred Magdoff

2008-03-21T05:43:00.000-07:00

Mario, Fred, Rosa Elena and three of her students from the high school agroecology course meet at the farm to discuss farming methods and the world food crisis

This past Wednesday, Fred Magdoff and I scaled the steep hill from Monte Carmelo and talked with Mario Grippo, one of the founders of La Alianza cooperative who works at the Las Lajitas organic farm.

We hadn’t been talking for long when the fourth year agroecology class from the liceo (or high school) in the village of Bojo joined us. They had come walking up the other side of the mountain valley to reach the Las Lajitas farm. The students and Rosa Elena, their teacher, meet regularly with Mario, and he had advised them that there was a special visitor in town who could talk to them about problems in agriculture on the global level.

When Fred Magdoff explained that the world was entering a dangerous period of food scarcity, with prices climbing so high in the last year or two that many poor people could not afford to buy nourishing food, the students had some ready questions. They had heard explanations of the problem by their President, Hugo Chavez, on television and they wondered if the North American could confirm them. “Is it true,” one of them asked, “that using corn to produce ethanol in order to provide fuel for cars is causing problems in the global food markets?”

“Absolutely,” said Fred. “Today 20% of the corn in the United States is being diverted to ethanol production. This is a major reason why the price of corn has jumped an estimated 70% in the past year. Now, this isn’t the only problem driving up world food prices. For instance, the demand for soy products for feeding animals in China, especially the tens of millions of pigs, has helped drive the price of soy prices up by 100%.”

Then Fred asked them if they knew what many people in Haiti were eating these days. Nobody knew. “Cookies,” he said. “Cookies made of soil, cooked with a little baking soda and salt. These can fill up empty stomachs but have absolutely no nutritional value. People can’t afford rice in Haiti because its price on the world market as gone through the roof, too, just like the other basic food commodities.”

The exchanges between the students and Magdoff not only touched on world affairs, but also on practical things like composting and manure. Fred told them a story about a farmer he knows (in Virginia, I think) who slips seeds of corn into his compost piles, then turns his pigs loose to root through the piles for the kernels. When they’re done trampling and rooting for every last one, the whole compost pile has been effectively turned over, so the farmer never has to pick up a shovel and do it himself.

Similar Interests

Father Mario Grippo, who came to Latin America from Italy forty years ago, is a priest who preaches liberation theology and teaches sustainable agricultural and the virtues of organic farming based on his thirty-two years working at Alianza and Las Lajitas. (See earlier articles on La Alianza Cooperative, La Dia de La Semilla, and Campesinos as professors.)

Fred Magdoff, professor of plant and soil sciences at the University of Vermont, arrived in Venezuela for the first time last week. When not teaching, he is preaching a related brand of liberation in his anti-capitalist articles in Monthly Review, the excellent independent socialist magazine that was edited for years by his father, Harry Magdoff, Leo Huberman, and Paul Sweezy. (For those of you who are not familiar with Monthly Review and its books, look for MRzine and Monthly Review Press on-line. Monthly Review has been producing highly readable, non-dogmatic, non-sectarian Marxist analysis of the U.S. – and global - political economy for almost sixty years. Don’t miss Albert Einstein’s essay, “Why Socialism,” published in the very first issue of the magazine in 1949.)

For many years Fred has taught the virtues of sustainable agriculture and the methods of restoring and maintaining healthy farmland. Some of his books and articles are written specifically for farmers and laymen; for instance, Building Soils for Better Crops, soon to be published in a new third edition. My farmer friends tell me this is “the Bible” of organic farmers all over the United States.

As the three of us discussed a variety of agricultural, political, and philosophical issues, Mario decided to tell us how he and Arturo Paoli, two Italians, happened to end up in South America, first in Argentina, then in Venezuela.

Mario shows Fred around some of the many worm bins which produce the rich soil and fertilizer at Las Lajitas

Where did Mario come from?

Mario briefly reviewed the history of his religious order, the Fraternity of the Little Brothers of the Gospel (La Fraternidad de Los Hermanitos del Evangelio, founded on the teachings of Charles de Foucauld in France in the early 20th century as an order of worker priests: they dedicated themselves to living with and working side by side with the poor and working classes in various kinds of manual and agricultural labor.) One of their priests, Arturo Paoli, worked in Argentina beginning in the early 1960s and became involved in organizing campesino groups in an area in the North that had been dominated by a giant English food production corporation — the campesinos had lived and worked under serf-like conditions on the vast tracts of company land and were obligated to follow strict company rules, buy from company stores, and labor for poverty wages under oppressive conditions.

When the government took over the company’s land, selling most of it in large parcels to local Argentinian landlords and farm labor contractors, Arturo campaigned to buy one large piece that would be owned and worked by the campesinos themselves. Since Arturo was a personal friend of the Pope, Pablo VI, he was able to secure funds from the Vatican to buy the land on behalf of the campesinos so they could develop a commune.

The Argentine government was agreeable to the sale, but not on terms providing common ownership, which sounded far too “communist” to them. Thus the large parcel was divided up into many individual parcels campesino families. Arturo was joined by other members of the religious Fraternity (including Mario Grippo), who helped the peasants organize cooperatives nevertheless. There was a marketing cooperative that allowed them to sell their agricultural products at a fair price and a buying cooperative that allowed them to set up their own bodegas that did not charge the exploitative prices that were common in the “company stores” owned by the big landlords that surrounded them.

Mario pointed out that Arturo Paoli, who was writing books and articles about Liberation Theology, was anxious to be as inclusive as possible, perhaps naively thinking that anyone who wanted to join the peasants’ cooperatives must be motivated by their Christian faith. Thus he made a key mistake: he allowed relatives of the local big landlords to join the other peasants in owning small parcels of land and working with the cooperatives. These people started undermining the egalitarian nature of the campesino organizations and instead looked for ways to consolidate the economic power of the latifundios (large estates) owned by the landlord class.

One new member appeared to be a very sincere, hard-working fellow and an enthusiastic Christian who inspired others, while all the time he had a secret relationship with one of the latifundios. He was elected to a management positions in one of the cooperatives and began to undermine its financial stability by entering into covert and wasteful business arrangements with the big business owners in the area. By the time his sneaky manipulations were discovered, he had not only damaged the economic viability of the cooperative but had also sown a great deal of mistrust among the other members.

Mario feels that the semi-feudal history of the people in this part of Argentina, who lived for centuries on large estates under brutal regimes imposed by Spanish, British, and Argentine owners and their overseers, had conditioned people to be passive and obedient to authority. Not that this was surprising, since those who spoke up and showed initiative usually did not survive.

While Mario and the Fraternity were working with their cooperative, one worker on a neighboring latifundio questioned a bill that had been written up by the landlord. The columns of numbers simply didn’t add up to the exaggerated figure the owner had entered at the bottom of the page. “Of course that’s the correct number,” said the boss.

“No, it’s not,” insisted the campesino. A few days later, he was dead. When other campesinos complained to the local police about such crimes, they were told they should shut up or they would be arrested for false accusations and disturbing the peace. The police, in their own way, had been conditioned by hundreds of years of rural feudalism.

By the mid 1970s, the slowly rising consciousness of the campesinos, encouraged by radical church people and young revolutionaries from the cities, was breeding a counter-response among the upper classes, the armed forces, and the traditional Church. It would culminate finally in Argentina with the sadistic and murderous rule imposed by the military dictatorship that took power in 1976 (with the quiet backing of the United States. It was not a coincidence that in 1976 Dick Cheney was Gerald Ford’s chief of staff in the White House, Donald Rumsfeld was Secretary of Defense, and George Bush the Elder was head of the CIA.)

In the years before the military junta was constructed by General Varela and his pals, the local, rural oligarchies in many parts of the country were creating their own paramilitary forces to suppress leftist dissent. Using a combination of their own hired thugs and the local police, they started meting out punishment to those who defied the established order. Many campesinos were killed, as well as a few priests and religious workers. Arturo Paoli, Mario, and other members of the Fraternidad decided that they had better leave.

Arturo somehow found his way to Venezuela and then to the mountains of the state of Lara where he settled in the little village of Bojo, which lies below Las Lajitas farm and over a hill from Monte Carmelo. Mario soon followed with another member of the Fraternidad and they moved into a decrepit farmhouse on the edge of town. This hamlet had been established in the 1960s after a land reform program initiated by the Accion Democratica political party (which once had some genuine social democratic tendencies) had bought out a big landowner and redistributed small parcels to campesino families, most of whom were newcomers who came from another part of Lara. Mario says the people from neighboring Monte Carmelo were more spunky and adventurous, probably because they were well-established in the area years before Bojo was formed and had learned how to fight and work to build their own community.

Arturo and Mario, reflecting on their experience with a peasantry in Argentina, whose minds had been reduced to thinking (or not thinking) like serfs, felt that these local campesinos demonstrated an independence of mind and openness to new ideas that they had not encountered in Argentina. Within a year of Mario’s arrival, they were talking about forming a cooperative again. It would be called La Alianza: 12 members forming an alliance, 6 from Bojo and 6 from Monte Carmelo.

The young men in the Brouwer family plowing a steep hillside at Las Lajitas - Ari on plow, Jan leading the horse. After Christmas the boys started working every day on the cooperative farm, from 6am to 2pm- they will be working there until June. The 23 cooperative members are very happy with their efforts. Even though they are supposed to be working on a volunteer basis, the cooperative voted to pay them last week.

The Booming Venezuelan Economy, and how it affects Monte Carmelo

2008-03-20T06:41:00.000-07:00

A local mason is putting the finishing touches on a wall next door, where our neighbors are adding a large room to their house.

The major media in the United States and Venezuela are overflowing with misinformation about Venezuela and its social and economic indicators, so it was relief to see a reliable appraisal of Venezuela’s economic growth appear recently: “The Venezuelan Economy in the Chávez Years,” by Mark Weisbrot and Luis Sandoval at CEPR, the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, DC, February 2008. ( For those of you who are not familiar with CEPR, you should visit their website at http://www.cepr.org/, since they are primarily engaged in producing reliable information, analysis, and prognostication concerning the U.S. economy – they predicted the dangers of the stock market bubble in the late 1990s, and the housing bubble of the 2000s, when most economists were ignoring the problems because they were giddy with the joys of short-term profit-taking; likewise, they are one of the best, non-hysterical guides to understanding the current state of the U.S. Social Security system.)

In their report, which reviews solid statistics gathered through 2007, they note that Venezuela’s economy has been one of the fastest growing in Latin America and the world over the past five years: “since the first quarter of 2003, Venezuela's real (after adjusting for inflation) GDP has grown by 87.3 percent.”

“…employment in the formal sector has increased to 6.17 million (2007 first half), from 4.40 million in the first half of 1998 and 4.53 million in the first half of 2003. As a percentage of the labor force, formal employment has increased significantly since 1998, from 45.4 to 50.6 percent (2007).”

The figures above indicate, according to my handy calculator, that total employment, including both the formal and informal sectors, was 12.19 million in the first half of 2007, versus 9.69 million in 1998. This is an increase of 26% in nine years, a remarkable achievement for any country.

Such numbers are enough to drive Bush, Cheney, and their gang wild with envy, and makes them determined to destroy Venezuela’s experiment in developing “21st century socialism.” Too bad they only read opposition newspapers and bogus CIA and State Department reports instead of real information from CEPR, where they could find out that one major effect of Chavez’s “dangerous,” “destabilizing,” and “dictatorial” tendencies (the U.S. government’s words) has been to bolster the private sector.

The United States, given its paltry economic growth over the past eight years and its current economic downturn, should be coming to Venezuela for lessons in how to create jobs. Republicans and Democrats alike could re-learn the strategies that were once implemented in the United States through Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal: government policies that redistribute income, democratize and support public education, and invest in broad systems of public works will also stimulate the private sector. Most job growth in Venezuela has taken place in the private, not the public sector. In fact, the private sector is growing faster than the public sector. “Private employment was a larger percentage of the labor force (75.0 percent) in the first half of 2007 as compared to the first half of 1999 (71.6 percent).”

Most U.S. Republicans, of course, would be adverse to the kind of income growth that has taken place. The bottom 80% of the population has seen its incomes increase by 60% to 100% over the past nine years (figures adjusted for inflation – see my previous November article on incomes and social classes). Middle-class income growth has been positive, but not as great as among the lower classes, and upper-class incomes have risen at the most modest rate. A recent article in the opposition newspaper, El Universal of Caracas, has a table of economic analysis indicating that the poorest sector of the population, level E, which represents almost half of the population, enjoyed income growth at more than twice the rate of the highest level AB, which amounts to 2% or less of the population.

Economic activity in the village of Monte Carmelo: a mini-boom in construction

One sure sign that economic growth is benefiting poor and working class people is the amount of construction activity that can be found all around the country. People in the lower-income barrios of the big city of Barquisimeto report that they have never seen so much activity undertaken by homeowners: they are replacing old make-shift construction of tin and boards with concrete and steel, adding on additional rooms or second stories, and re-plastering and repainting entire houses inside and out.

The campesinos of Monte Carmelo are also busy with building projects because they now have a little extra money to pay for materials, and because it’s summertime here. During the three dry months – January, February, and March, many campesinos don’t have enough water to cultivate vegetables for the market, so they take advantage of the dry weather and some free time to fix up their property in various ways. Some are also taking advantage of government loans and credits that are designed to help low-income homeowners and farmers. Alexis and his son are building a new hen house for 50 egg-laying chickens, making use of a government program that is giving small grants and loans to expand agricultural production on small plots adjacent to people’s homes.

The three bodegas (little stores) in town are doing a brisk business. One bodega is located in the front room of a family’s house, and they just decided to lift the roof and create a small, bamboo-walled garret for a couple of teenagers (it’s comfortable during the cool evening and nighttime hours, but baking hot between 10 and 3 in the daytime when the summer sun is blazing.)
The local construction boom means more activity for local carpenters: new rooms and houses will need furniture. Luis and two other 20 year-olds started up production in the carpentry shop at the Las Lajitas farming cooperative where the space and tools had been underutilized in recent years. They used a loan from the Monte Carmelo’s community council (“consejo communal”) to purchase an inventory of high-quality hardwoods, and the orders for furniture immediately started coming. Double beds seem to be their most popular items: they’ve already sold and delivered six, with another six are on order.

Diluvin, the village’s master welder and master folk violinist, and his nephew stand by the new concrete-block tank that will hold 6,000 liters of water to slake the thirst of 4 pigs who will soon be taking up residence in Monte Carmelo.

Local residents eat pork, but campesinos here are not used to raising pigs (they do raise chickens and cows for meat) because they can be dirty and smelly. However, a new program promoted by the Ministry of Agriculture is demonstrating that it is possible to raise pigs in small numbers without damaging the environment or offending your neighbors. In fact, if the pigs are incorporated into a small-scale system that includes organic gardening, overall production of healthy foods can be increased while also enhancing the quality of the local environment.

Diluvin and family just received a government loan that has allowed his family to initiate such a project on their four or five acres of land. In addition to the water tank above, they are constructing a small concrete residence for the pigs and concrete bins where compost, pig manure, and worms (vermiculture) will be combined to produce very high quality organic soil and liquid fertilizers. The new organic material will be used to cultivate an acre of vegetables and fruits while also enriching the soil of two more acres which are already planted with mature and fledgling coffee trees. And the pigs, besides producing valuable manure, will be reproducing little piglets which will be sold to neighbors who can fatten them up for ham, pork roasts, and bacon.
The Brouwer boys took a day off from farm work at the cooperative in order to level the terrain outside a new four room house. The campesino family that owns the property already has an older house next to the main street, and built this new “casita” with savings that they had accumulated over the past several years.

Other kinds of economic activity in the state of Lara

(you will have to wait a couple of days for the photos in this section)

The little village of Monte Carmelo, population 800, has three shops, all little bodegas that sell food and household items. They are doing well.

Ten minutes away in the town of Sanare, population 25,000, there are hundreds of stores and shops, but no supermarkets or malls, so it’s much like a U.S. town circa 1955. Business is good.

The big city of Barquisimeto, with a million inhabitants, has all sorts of shopping centers that are booming: supermarkets, hypermarkets (similar to the big WalMarts in the U.S., only fancier), fast food outlets, big discount warehouse stores, and car dealers – consequently shoppers can buy most anything that we can buy in the United States. There is a huge new, ultra-spiffy mall called Sambil, part of a chain that began in Caracas, but we thought the Metropolis, also quite new, was prettier.

Although we have been living continuously in Venezuela since September, we didn’t venture into a shopping mall until a few weeks ago when we accompanied our friend Ruben to his university classes in Barquisimeto. After an hour or two in these pseudo-environments, where we purchased nothing except some really awful Italian lunches, we happily escaped. But we can report that the middle and upper classes of Venezuela (about 20% of the population, mostly anti-Chavez and continuously complaining about their endangered economic status) are doing well financially and spending their money with wild abandon.

The Metropolis, snazzier than PA malls

A medium-size, well-maintained mall very similar to the kind we have at home in central Pennsylvania

New construction in a middle-class area near the Barquisimeto Zoo

Venezuelan shopping centers have several things in common with U.S. malls: for instance, terrible meals are served at the food courts. Also, most goods are sold in the same multinational brand-name stores -- Levis, Skecher, and Adidas – that you would see in the States or many other parts of the world. While the biggest malls are spiffier than those we have in south central Pennsylvania, they are also much more expensive – you have to pay twice as much here for brand-name shoes and brand-name burgers like Burger King. We did not sample the food at Burger King because there were long lines, and later that night we ate giant hamburguesas and Vikingos (super “Viking size” burgers) for one quarter the price at a small roadside stand along the main road from Barquisimeto to Sanare.

We went to the second shopping center shown above, which looked like any well-kept, medium-sized mall in a middle-class area of the U.S., because our teacher friend, Ruben, wanted to buy his wife a pair of shoes. The mall was busy, although you can’t see the crowds in the picture because everyone was standing around the corner in another corridor waiting to get into one of three shoe stores. The stores were having sales for El Dia de Amor (“Love Day” or Valentine’s Day on February 14) because it seems that a sure-fire way to a woman’s heart in Venezuela is through her feet. There were guards holding back the waves of would-be shoppers and limiting the number of people who could enter a store at any one time. Most customers were women accompanied by their husbands or boyfriends, but a few men, like Ruben, were feeling bold enough to pick out the perfect shoe all by themselves. We were in a hurry to get to a meeting, however, so Ruben decided he had to pass up the shoes in favor of a purse in an empty leather goods store down the corridor.

A Ruined Economy?
There are some faults with the Venezuelan economy, such as high inflation and occasional shortages of food in some stores, but most people are still earning much more (after adjusting for inflation) and eating much more than they did ten or twenty years ago. For this reason, although commentators in the opposition press and the U.S. are constantly claiming that Chavez is ruining the economy, these anti-Chavistas are unable to produce any reliable data to back up their arguments. Besides, they are constantly disproving their contention by engaging in their favorite recreation: going shopping.

Meanwhile, back in the U.S., working people are losing: in the last quarter of 2007 there was 5.6% annual rate of inflation in CPI, and only a 2.3% annual rate of increase in wages – that is, a decrease in income after it’s adjusted for inflation. CEPR recently reported that manufacturing employment in the United States hit a low point, for less than 10% of the working population now labors in factories, the lowest figure ever recorded since statistics were first gathered a century ago:

The loss of manufacturing jobs continues the downward trend of the last decade. Manufacturing employment has fallen by 3,880,000 jobs, or 22.0 percent, since January of 1998. It lost 279,000 jobs in the last year. The newly revised data show that employment in manufacturing fell below 10.0 percent of total employment in October. The loss of jobs has hit every sector of manufacturing, although the auto sector has been especially hard hit, losing 57,400 jobs or 5.6 percent of
employment in the last year. The loss of 18,300 jobs in textile mills and 20,300 in apparel (10.1 and 9.1 percent of employment, respectively) also stand out.

And his recent column in The New York Times, economist Paul Krugman indicated that worse news is yet to come, a product of the insane U.S. government policies that deregulated banking, mortgage, and financial transactions over the past three decades. The American taxpayers, he says, will be forced to bail out some of the biggest U.S. banks, the ones that wasted a large proportion of U.S. savings on bad loans:

“The result of all that bad lending was an unholy financial mess that will cause trillions of dollars in losses.”

‘Consejos Comunales’ – Community Councils – Participatory Democracy (or direct democracy) as practiced by campesinos in Venezuela

2008-02-19T06:15:00.000-08:00

Counting me and the two young fellows, there were 38 people at the meeting of the Consejo Comunal, or Community Council, in Monte Carmelo on February 12, 2008.

Probably the most important development in Venezuela in the past year, in terms of pushing the Bolivarian Revolution forward, is the creation of “Consejos Comunales” or community councils, in thousands of city neighborhoods and rural villages throughout the country. The idea is to create institutions of participatory democracy (or direct democracy), starting from the ground up, so that people will have a direct voice in many decisions that effect their everyday life. Representative democracy (what the Bolivarians would refer to as limited or indirect democracy) still exists. That is, governors, mayors, and local representatives are still elected at the state and municipio (county) levels, but now a significant amount of power is being transferred directly to small groups, usually 200 to 400 families in the cities, and 100 to 200 families in the rural areas.

In these small groups, the “consejos comunales,” every citizen who shows up gets to speak and vote. They also get to control significant amounts of money for various kinds of local development through their committees, including one, the “banco communal,” that oversees grants and loans for various projects. Since the “consejos” are a new concept, their development is still uneven in the first year: the most advanced are flying forward with lots of activity; others are slowly building up the participation level of local families; and in some locations, they are yet to be formed, that is, local citizens have not taken the initiative to start them.

Participation here and in the U.S.
In our village of Monte Carmelo, at the various Community Council meetings that I have attended since last May, attendance has ranged from 51 to 35 people out of a local population of about 800 in 130 families. An informal rule, usually heeded, suggests that just one member per family should attend. The Council meets often, once a week on Tuesdays at 5 pm.

Some residents are concerned that attendance is dwindling, but by my standards it is extraordinarily high. In our part of Pennsylvania, in a half rural, half suburban township of 15,000 people about 20 miles from the state capital, there is one meeting of the township board per month (and another might be scheduled if there is pressing business). Ten to twenty residents show up at the typical meeting along with the five board members, some of whom are motivated by their own real estate interests. Once I recall going to meeting with a big turnout, when about 50 residents showed up to protest some extra charges that had been imposed in a sneaky way by the local water and sewage authority. This is typical representative democracy: the board members are elected every few years; they dominate the public meetings and allow very limited speaking time for residents; they have most of their interactions with developers, businesses, and lawyers who are seeking board approval for their projects; and they occasionally respond to public pressure when enough people turn out at a meeting.

The Pennsylvania example is certainly limited democracy, but this does not necessarily distress my neighbors. They are generally satisfied with the maintenance of the roads and a couple of public parks, and although they grumble about the excessive cost of sewage treatment, the system works. On the other hand, they have little control or say in the haphazard and wasteful development of the township and county, so that some of the most beautiful farmland in the eastern United States is being rapidly destroyed.

Here in Venezuela, where at most 20% of the population enjoys anything approaching a comfortable First World existence, the majority is participating directly in their democracy in order to solve a variety of Third World problems.

The group above includes two professors who teach at different universities in Barquisimeto and four residents from the “paroquia” of Juares: two of the latter are grade school teachers, and the other two are “voceros,” the spokespeople for local community councils in a rural area with villages named “Crocodilo” (Crocodile) and “Piedra del Tigre” (Stone of the Tiger).

Even as community councils are being formed, people are working on the next challenge: how to organize the collective power of various councils to demand services that are needed by all the other people who inhabit their larger geographical area. I attended the meeting above, held at the Museum of Art and Culture in Barquisimeto, which brought university people together with representatives from 22 of the 36 “caserios” (hamlets and villages) from a rural, coffee-growing area of the state of Lara. (The other 14 “caserios” have not yet formed community councils.) The meeting was convened with a concrete project in mind: how to provide public transportation, especially for school children and university students, in a rugged “paroquia” (township) that has no buses and only one paved road. The current condition of the roads and transport means that most local adolescents (up to 80%) never get a chance to attend high school or university.

Some notes on Participatory Democracy in the “Consejo Comunal,” or the Community Council, in Monte Carmelo

January 30

When I attended local community council meetings recently there were about 35 residents in attendance. Nearly 30% of households were represented and everyone was able to speak and vote on all items of business. (Some comparative math concerning my township in Pennsylvania: 15,000 residents and 15 who go to meetings; that is, about 1/10th of one percent of the population, or 1/3 of one percent of all families, attend. And, of course, they don’t get to vote.)

People here, however, are concerned about the decline in attendance since last May, because they are participating in direct democracy, not watching representative democracy. Consequently, at the January 30th meeting, people spent most of the time reflecting on their experience to date. They discussed the quality of their meetings and the things they should do to encourage more attendance. Over the previous two months they had taken the time to go door to door and conduct a survey of their neighbors (who wrote their comments privately in order protect their anonymity), so they had some feedback on how well the “consejo” process was working. On the chalk board at the front of the meeting room, members taped up large sheets of paper with lists of the most common comments.

“Positivos,” good things:
1) The “consejo” was advancing of socialism through direct democracy by letting everyone give their opinions and participate in development
2) There were tangible benefits in terms of granting credits for practical projects and giving help to those who needed it.
3) We are learning to do more things for ourselves.

“Negativos,” bad things:
1) Not enough people participating
2) There was feeling of chaos and too many people talking.
3) Rules were made, then not followed, re: the distribution of light bulbs.
4) While it's good for those who are getting loans, it does little for others.
5) People with old unpaid debts (from pre-Council days) are getting credits.
6) Some members are making derogatory comments about others.

Why not attending
1) Too busy with work or classes
2) overwhelmed by personal problems
3) family and childcare obligations
4) annoyed by people who dominate or sabotage discussions
5) don’t have anything to say

Possible Solutions
1. Streamline discussions, keep people on topic.
2. Spend more time chatting about Council topics with other neighbors (those who are not attending) in order to make them feel like they are being consulted. Maybe some will then be more comfortable attending.
3. Don’t let your arguments sound like personal attacks.
4. Have biweekly, instead of weekly meetings.

February 12 meeting
The community council began with a brief review of the minutes from the previous week’s meeting. Then some announcements: there will be more discussions next week in Sanare, the nearby larger town, about village transportation and the fares for the “taxi” vans and pickup trucks that transport residents to and from Monte Carmelo and the other small villages; the Casa de Cultura in Sanare is offering grants to individual families for such things as the purchase of a musical instrument needed by a school child.

Next there was a report on the environment by Cesar Garcia and two classmates in the Mission Sucre adult education program. Their research for their course in ecology showed five major problems in Monte Carmelo. The council discussed the items and decided that all five are valid concerns, then voted to determine which ones deserve the highest priority. One member emphasized the importance of the forest on the mountain, not only for preventing local erosion on the steep slopes in this area, but also because, on a global level, forests are the primary oxygen producers for the earth’s atmosphere. The meeting prioritized to the environmental problems in this order:

1) deforestation on the mountain above the village
2) deterioration of the sewage oxidation lagoon below the village
3) the use of pesticides by some residents is still too high
4) the contamination of the major stream with the waste from coffee production
5) improper sorting of garbage

One of the three Mission Sucre students proposed a project he hopes the council will consider in the future – giving local high school kids the job of completing a 5 year reforestation project in order to restore trees on the mountain, with the community supplying funds for seedlings and other necessary materials.

Next, Narcisa, who had arrived late, wanted to make another announcement. She informed residents that there would be a new educational program at the university level in Agroecologia, or Agricultural Ecology, and that it would be offered as a pilot program in Monte Carmelo by the Bolivarian University of Caracas. She said it might even start next month, in March, but for sure there would be regular classes getting under way in October. The Bolivarian University is hoping that at least 10 people from Monte Carmelo and 10 from Bojo will sign up, 20 to 30 in all. Someone mentioned that getting enough students should not be a problem, since several people from nearby Sanare are also interested in enrolling.

Elsy, who was acting as secretary and taking notes at the meeting, announced that she needed to collect some payments for water. Most residents were keeping current, she said, but some present at the meeting were not – so they came forward and handed over cash payments.

Speaking of water: a few minutes were devoted to the “aqueducto.”

About thirty residents of Monte Carmelo helped repair the ‘aqueducto’ and water collection system in the cloud forest on top of the mountain. First of all they had to carry all the materials – sand, cement, pipes, and fittings – along a narrow, three kilometer path that winds up and down through ravines and thick forest.

At the top of the mountain, it was necessary to build a new catch basin to receive the water coming from a pure water stream and two springs.

The “aqueducto” is the village water system, a series of pipes, pumps, holding tanks, and valves that carries water for several kilometers across the side of the mountain and then down the steep road into Monte Carmelo. Divulin, the master mechanic in town, presented a series of more than 40 photos of the “aqueducto,” some of which I had taken when I accompanied him on a seven-hour hike up the mountain. Other photos, showing about 30 residents of Monte Carmelo working on this repair project, were taken when the work was underway several months ago. This was one of the first major projects funded by the community council making use of discretionary funds it receives directly from the central government (thus bypassing the wasteful and slow bureaucracies at the state and municipal levels.) The council has to submit photographic evidence of the work and the receipts for materials.

Another major project completed last summer was the installation of lights around the “cancha,” the paved outdoor sports area where young people play soccer, volleyball, and basketball almost every night.

The “Viviendas” or housing committee, reported that government money from the Ministry of Housing in Caracas will be available to build new houses for 11 families who are currently living in crowded conditions with their relatives, but the grants are being held up in the pipeline due to reorganization in the Housing Ministry (new cabinet members).

Next, there was general discussion of the other grants and loans that the Council has given to individual, families, and businesses. It was announced that there would be a meeting of the Banco Comunal, the banking committee, on Thursday the 21st to review projects and get documentation of their progress or completion.

One community member who works in a cooperative wanted to know what level of responsibility and “compromiso” (commitment, dedication) the community should expect from those who are given grants and loans. He thought that the community should have a high level of expectation, just like he has with his fellow cooperative members, so that there would be very little shirking of responsibility on the part of those who get money through the council. He wanted there to be adequate monitoring so that the community can make sure that funds are not used for something other than their intended purpose, so that machinery that is purchased is not broken and left unrepaired, and so that projects do not get so far behind schedule that they never get completed at all.

Now the meeting got very animated as almost everyone participated, sometimes all at once. Occasionally there were interruptions and loud side discussions, but in general people were respectful of each other. The basic fabric of the new “Consejo” was being tested as people asked: what kinds of expectations do community members have of others and themselves? What level of socialist consciousness needs to be created and nurtured so that citizens can trust in their collective ability to get things done?

In general, the group agreed with the very first speaker: we need to find ways to hold people accountable. On the other hand, various residents pointed out that this cannot be done in a personal, accusatory way, or the interactions at Council meetings will disintegrate due to grudges and animosity.

Luz Marina, who is only twenty, demonstrated one way to promote good will and share information with the community. She spoke on behalf of three other young people, including her cousin Sandino, who were unable to attend the meeting. The three have started a carpentry business using a loan from the Council to buy wood and other materials. Luz said that Sandino has been keeping a folder concerning the progress of their work at the carpentry workshop at the Las Lajitas cooperative, and that he would bring it to the next meeting of the Communal Bank.

The Bolivarian Revolution is called “El Proceso” because it is continually in the process of creating itself.
For some of foreign friends of Venezuela, it is enough to know that the nation has resisted the disapproval and meddling of the United States for nine years and has inspired the rest of Latin America to stand up for itself. But it’s worth pointing out that the Bolivarian Revolution has made significant progress, not without some false steps and mistakes, as it has passed through three overlapping processes:.

Consolidation of power, 1999 to 2004: This initial process included passing the new Constitution of 1999, reasserting government control over the nationally-owned oil industry, and instituting the Law of the Land that allowed the government to purchase and redistribute unused agricultural land. The opposition and the oligarchy, angered at such affronts to their power, failed in their attempts to stop the revolutionary process, first in their coup of 2002 and then in the managers’ shutdown of the oil industry in 2002-3. The Chavez supporters, after winning the presidential recall election of 2004 handily, were able to elect their representatives to the National Assembly, Governors’, and Mayors’ offices in 2004.

The social democratic stage, 2003 to 2007: In a many ways, the way the Chavez government has used it resources to bring economic and social benefits directly to the poor and working classes is reminiscent of the New Deal programs enacted under Franklin Roosevelt in the U.S. in the 1930s. One difference is that Venezuela has mobilized a much greater share of its economic resources than the U.S. did when it helped some of the poor during the Great Depression in the U.S.; the benefits are being dispersed to a majority of Venezuelans in the form of health care, higher wages, cheap food, and extensive education programs.

The creation of participatory socialist democracy, 2007 to 2012: President Hugo Chavez declared that he wanted to lead the country in a new socialist direction at the beginning of 2005 (21st Century Socialism), and campaigned on this program when he was reelected by an overwhelming margin at the end of 2006. Since a central premise of 21st century socialism is that it should avoid the undemocratic tendencies of 20th century socialism, the Bolivarian Process needs new models of popular participation at the grassroots levels. This time, unlike some earlier, wasteful experiments with oil profits, the government looked for practical models that were already working. It found a very important prototype for socialist organization at the grassroots level in the city of Carora, here in the state of Lara. A few years ago the mayor there began distributing the vast majority of municipal funds to neighborhoods that established small, self-governing bodies – they were called “Consejos Comunales.” Because this model of popular sovereignty worked, these community councils are now being replicated all over the country.

[There will be more on Carora in a later post]

Still here in this beautiful part of Venezuela

2008-01-28T05:47:00.000-08:00

We live about a mile above sea level on this mountain ridge in the green, rainy region of the State of Lara. Our campesino neighbors grow a wide variety of vegetables that they sell in Barquisimeto, the big city that lies on an arid plain about an hour away to the north.

Late January:

You haven’t heard much from us in six weeks, since we’ve been traveling, enjoying the Navidad fiestas in Monte Carmelo, hosting friends and other members of the family, working on the cooperative farm, planning some educational activities for next year, and exploring the surrounding mountains and villages.

Its “verano” now, or summertime, even though we are living north of the equator (which runs through Brazil, not Venezuela.) “Invierno,” or winter, less than two months of wet, cool weather, ended in late December, and “primavera,” springtime, will begin whenever it feels like it, in late March or April, when it begins raining again. Summer means dry weather, three or four months of dust swirling around our ankles as we climb the steep mountain roads to the edge of the cloud forest.

Jan and Ari

Another son, Jan Brouwer, came to visit with my wife Susan, and decided he would stay until June. He’s working with his brother Ari at Las Lajitas organic farm, part of La Alianza Cooperativa. (Susan had to return to her teaching job in the States.) The boys rise at 5:20 am, join Omar, one of the long-time members, at 5:45, and start ascending the mountainside. Work begins in earnest at 6:30, with breakfast around 8:30, and lunch about 1:30. At 2:00 pm they’re hoofing it down the steep mountain road with plenty of time left to enjoy the day. Since they’re new to farm work, they often head straight for a short siesta.

One of our favorite pastimes is hiking in the “quebradas,” the deep ravines that carve their way into the mountainsides. This waterfall and pool, called “Charco del burro,” are about fifteen minutes below our house, a good place for cool shower after work on the afternoons when the water isn’t running in Monte Carmelo.

Charco del Burro, according to local legend, is haunted by the soul of a donkey who fell into the pool and drowned a hundred years ago.

Upstream from the waterfall is the “angostura,” the narrowest part of the gorge.

Although this land is green, beautiful, and cultivated by hard-working campesinos, it was until recently very poor. Since the early years of the Chavez government, living standards have been rising steadily as fair prices for vegetables and coffee have stabilized or been guaranteed by the government. Many small farmers and cooperatives have taken advantage of loans and grants to introduce new kinds of productive and environmentally-friendly farming methods.

Non-monetary gains, such as the variety of educational, nutritional, recreational, and health missions that are now available to almost everyone, have also contributed immensely to improving the quality of life. Our village of Monte Carmelo now has a paved street, three bodegas, food stands selling empanadas and hot dogs (a Venezuelan perrito caliente, with a about 20 different toppings thrown on at once, bears little resemblance to its U.S. counterpart), a lighted futbalito and basketball court, and a tiny high school for the one hundred and thirty families that live with a kilometer of the little plaza. It also has an ambulatorio, a walk-in medical office served by a Cuban doctor who has just returned after getting more training in Cuba with a six-month course.

We could throw out a number of impressive statistics to go with the list above, but one small number is probably the most astonishing: 8. There are now eight young people from Monte Carmelo, population less than a thousand, enrolled in the first three years of the six year Medicina Integral Comunitaria program (see other two articles.)

There are forty other students studying medicine in this rural municipality, Andres Eloy Blanco, which has a little over 50,000 inhabitants. Many of them live in Sanare, the capital of the municipality located about 7 kilometers, or fifteen minutes, away from Monte Carmelo.

Looking down toward the valley from mountain and the Las Lajitas farm. Sanare, population 25,000, lies in the distance and serves as the hub of this agricultural area that produces as much as 30% of all the coffee in Venezuela.

Will the press, owned by the oligarchy, be able to undermine the popular revolution? (And, are they getting a little help from the CIA?)

2008-01-18T05:59:00.000-08:00

“... private capitalists inevitably control, directly or indirectly, the main sources of information (press, radio, education). It is thus extremely difficult and in most cases quite impossible, for the individual citizen to come to objective conclusions.”
– Albert Einstein,“Why Socialism,” Monthly Review, 1949

In the national and international press, President Hugo Chavez and his government of Venezuela are often accused of dictatorial tendencies even though there is little evidence to support that contention. Anyone who stays here for a considerable period of time will realize that this is one of the most open countries in the world, characterized by a friendly and outspoken population that isn’t hampered by rules and regulations, and by a press that is free to say anything it wants. Aside from the riches generated by the state-owned oil industry, the nation has a thriving economy with millions of small business people and a powerful capitalist sector that asserts oligarchic control over almost all other big business enterprises, including the press.

Most analysts here and abroad estimate that 90-95% of the newspapers in Venezuela support the opposition and are published by wealthy members of the oligarchy. Their papers and the types of information, or disinformation, that they circulate present a major challenge to the government and the two-thirds of the people that support Chavez. These media are located in every major city and are responsible for generating the usual staples required of regional papers: stories on local affairs, sports, business, culture, want ads, etc. Thus they reach an audience far greater than their opposition supporters, including many people who may dislike the anti-Chavista editorial line, but want access to local news and advertisements. This allows the papers to generate confusion by planting outrageous sentiments, some of them disguised as news.

Extreme examples of the outrageous were seen during the recent vote for constitutional reforms in December, when the opposition used their media tools to bombard the population with arguments against the reforms, and advertisers were free to say anything they wanted, even in the few major papers that maintain a stance of neutrality toward the government. For instance, the Cámara Industrial de Carabobo, an organization of industries which includes many subsidiaries of U.S. multinational companies, posted a giant two page ad in Ultimas Noticias, an even-handed paper with the largest circulation in the country. The industrialists told parents that the reforms would allow Chavez to steal their property and their children. The ad read, in part:

If you are a Mother, YOU LOSE! Because you will lose your house, your family and your children. Children will belong to the state.

To William Blum, U.S. expert on the CIA and its efforts to destabilize other countries, this sounded very much like efforts that were mounted against Salvador Allende in Chile in the 1960s and 1970s. Recently Blum described them in his Anti-Empire Report:
…one radio spot featured the sound of a machine gun, followed by a woman's cry: "They have killed my child -- the communists." The announcer then added in impassioned tones: "Communism offers only blood and pain. For this not to happen in Chile, we must elect Eduardo Frei president." Frei was the candidate of the Christian Democratic Party, the majority of whose campaign costs were underwritten by the CIA according to the US Senate. One anti-Allende campaign poster which appeared in the thousands showed children with a hammer and sickle stamped on their foreheads.

William Blum and I both spoke to audiences at the Book Fair in Caracas in November about what´s happening in the heart of the Empire (otherwise known as the United States.) Blum was also invited to appear on Venezuelan television because he has a special kind of expertise. He has written some of the most valuable books that you can find on the destabilizing and murderous activities of the CIA and the U.S. State Department, including Killing Hope, Rogue State, and Freeing the World. Blum once was employed by the U.S. State Department himself, but quit in disgust over the kinds of things he saw done in the name of U.S. democracy. Since the 1970s he has devoted himself to researching and writing about the foreign interventions that most U.S. citizens choose to ignore. Recently, in his e-mail newsletter, “The Anti-Empire Report,” he gave a brief review of the record since World War II:

Attempted to overthrow more than 50 foreign governments, most of which were democratically-elected; successful a majority of the time.

Grossly interfered in democratic elections in at least 30 countries.
Attempted to assassinate more than 50 foreign leaders.

Dropped bombs on the people of some 30 countries.

Helped to suppress dozens of populist/nationalist movements.
(In sequence, details of the five items can be found in Blum's books: "Freeing the World", chapter 15; "Rogue State", chapters 18, 3, 11, 17; see also "Killing Hope" for further details)

The Venezuelan press continues to serve daily doses of propaganda – who is producing it?

The anti-Chavez propaganda attacks continue to appear regularly in the Venezuelan media, which are allowed, and rightfully so, to express these opinions on their editorial pages. The commentators’ rhetoric is overblown and seldom accompanied by rational arguments or a careful exposition of the faults of the government.

The problem is that this kind of heavy-handed indoctrination has spread throughout the news sections of the papers. Last week I perused one of the two major newspapers, both backing the opposition, that are published in Barquisimeto, the city of one million that is the capital of the State of Lara. I wasn’t looking for the worst, since I bought El Informador, the more moderate of the two papers; it allows an occasional pro-Chavez editorial to appear alongside the conservative columnists on its opinion page.

On pages A3 and A4 of El Informador, in the regular news section, I found various articles prepared by news organizations without attribution to individual writers. One of them had a particularly inflammatory headline:

El plan fue diseñado en conjunto con Fidel Castro
Desabastecimiento forma parte de un plan estratégico de Chávez
Intopress, Caracas, febrero 7

The plan was designed with the help of Fidel Castro
Food shortages form part of Chavez’s strategy

This entire article was devoted to repeating, without any analysis or response from other sources, a diatribe circulated by Johnson Delgado, president of the COPEI party in the state of Tachira the previous day. Delgado claimed that the food shortages experienced in some stores in the country were planned by Chavez in conjunction with Fidel Castro in order to create so much chaos and unhappiness among the populace that the government could declare martial law and impose a dictatorship on the Venezuelan people. (The COPEI party, by the way, was once a major party, but was discredited by corruption years ago and has only received a tiny fraction of the national vote in the past decade.)

[By the way, food shortages of particular items, such as powdered milk, are real, and a nagging problem right now. But this should not be confused with a lack of food in general, since Venezuelans, particularly the lower classes, are consuming a lot more food than ever before due to vastly increased wages, low cost markets at Mercal, and a variety of government nutrition programs. And the supermarkets in middle class areas are overflowing with food, just like in the U.S. One factor that is getting no attention from the opposition, and possibly not enough attention from the government, is the huge jump in prices of basic food commodities on the world market.]

This article devoted to Johnson Delgado was generated by a news agency named Intopress that seems to specialize in anti-Chavez articles lacking any factual content. Three other pieces on the page were more conventional reporting concern regional elections, the resignation of a Supreme Court judge, and a debate over hoarding food in the National Assembly. A fifth article, supplied by a news agency called AMM, was similar in tone to the article from Intopress, and also read like an opposition opinion piece – it simply quoted at length the rather wild opinions of Jorge Montoya, a leader in the Un Nuevo Tiempo opposition party, who ranted about Chavez’s ego, and the “fact” that Venezuelan ports are now “the principal points of departure for drugs in the whole world.” There was, of course, no evidence at all presented to back up this assertion.

Another similar article on the previous page was generated by AMM was devoted to quotations from Manuel Rosales, the losing presidential candidate in 2006 (63% to 37%) and governor of the state of Zulia. He claimed that the current national “government is dedicated to the destruction of the country’s economy and values.” Since real economic growth in Venezuela, after subtracting for inflation, has been 8% to 9% per year for several years (the highest in Latin America), it would have been nice if Rosales, or perhaps a reporter, had produced some numbers in support of his argument.

The media strategy is reminiscent of Chile in the 1970s, when the CIA was not content merely with financing anti-Allende political campaigns. It also worked hand in hand with the private media in Chile and flooded the newspapers and radio with negative stories about President Allende’s government and the government. Not only that, but other funds from the CIA were used to create negative events, as when it paid for a massive trucking shutdown by the owners of the transport industry, thus creating shortages of foods and other necessities among the general population.

Can we prove that the CIA or other U.S. organizations are directly manipulating and financing the press in Venezuela? No. But past history, and the direct help the U.S. is giving to the political opposition in Venezuela, suggest that they have some role in the current disinformation campaign being waged against the Bolivarian Revolution.

What should the Chavez government do in response?

Venezuela’s borders are open; its commerce with the rest of the world, especially the United States, is extensive; and there is complete freedom to travel within the country. Thus there are innumerable ways that money and agents from abroad could be at work generating disinformation that is harmful to the government and the populace in general. [There is even the possibility that the hoarding of food by some wholesale food businesses who hope to reap extra profits by forcing prices higher - a practice that has been documented by government raids on a limited number of warehouses - is also being encouraged by economic saboteurs.] The Venezuelan government is not being paranoid to suspect that the CIA and the U.S. State Department, and perhaps, some new “private contractors” are active behind the scenes.

The question for the government is: How to combat this pernicious influence?
One way of dealing with abuses in the press and other media, of course, is to follow the money. The National Assembly is currently putting pressure on the most notorious of the TV broadcasters, Globovision, to open its financial books and demonstrate the true sources of its funds. This may be helpful, but since many of the media-owning members of the oligarchy have substantial business holdings outside of Venezuela, it may be very difficult to show where personal finances end and contributions from foreign “friends” begin.

Another, more positive approach, was talked about last week at a national meeting of the PSUV (United Socialist Party of Venezuela) that was held in the State of Bolivar. In order to counteract opposition/imperialist propaganda, the PSUV activists talked about creating competing news outlets at the state and local levels throughout Venezuela. This probably a very good idea, but – how can it be achieved? And how long will it take?

Perhaps we can talk about the possibilities in a later post.

And now, a brief flashback to another time and another country, where the freedom of information is much more endangered by the corporate oligarchy.

An excerpt from Chapter 15 of my book, Robbing Us Blind: the Return of the Bush Gang and the Mugging of America, Common Courage Press, 2004

Murdocracy in America

John Ellis is George W. Bush’s first cousin and his very close friend since childhood. He was hired by Fox News to be a head honcho on their “Decision Desk,” sitting at the center of election night coverage in November 2000. During the broadcast he periodically took a break from his desk and telephoned George W and Jeb Bush about the progress of the vote counting. He made his fifth call at 2 a.m. and told his cousins,
“Our projection shows that it is statistically impossible for Gore to win Florida.”

He then returned to his desk and made “The Decision” at 2:16 a.m. He called the election for his cousin. Ellis later bragged to a reporter, Jane Mayer of The New Yorker, “It was just the three of us guys handing the phone back and forth – me with the numbers, one of them a governor, the other the president-elect. Now, that was cool.”

John Ellis was the first television announcer to declare George W. Bush the winner of the presidency. Then all the other networks followed suit. Even though the victory declarations at Fox and every other network were later rescinded, many television viewers were left with the impression that having a recount in Florida was unfair to Bush. How could the vote be determined to be too close to call? Hadn’t Bush already been declared “Winner in Florida?”

Some time later Ellis admitted, "I am loyal to my cousin.... I put that loyalty ahead of my loyalty to anyone else."

This explains why John Ellis called the election for the Bush Gang. But the real question is: Why was Fox able to install Ellis as the man in charge of election night reporting – manning the main desk just like Dan Rather at CBS – without revealing to the public that he was the cousin and very close friend of one of the candidates? John Ellis had not been signed on to give occasional right-wing opinions, nor to give political commentary as a family friend – in short, he was hired to report the news. Why didn’t the other news media scream to high heaven before, during, and after the Election night broadcasts? And who placed Ellis in that position on TV and how could they get away with it?

The puzzle fits together quickly. Ellis had been hired on a 30-day contract and worked for Roger Ailes, the director of Fox News and Republican media genius who brought Richard Nixon back into politics in 1968. Ailes was responsible for revving up the campaign of George Bush I in 1988, and later produced the Rush Limbaugh radio show for a while. Ailes was at Fox News because Rupert Murdoch, the Australian-born, multi-billionaire media baron, asked him to run the network.

Fox News is but one part of Murdoch’s world-wide empire, which began when he inherited his father’s newspapers in Australia. There he controls more than 60 percent of the country's metro, regional, and suburban press, which range from a sophisticated national paper, The Australian, to mass-market daily tabloids. The pattern of Murdoch’s scheme for global conquest under the flag of the News Limited, or the News Corporation, became apparent when he went to Great Britain. In the 1970s and ‘80s he accumulated 40% of the English newspaper readership. According to Russ Baker of the Columbia School of Journalism, “During the regimes of Prime Ministers Margaret Thatcher and John Major in Britain, Murdoch ventures -- especially his purchase of newspapers and the launch of his BskyB service -- were repeatedly favored with easing of regulations and with government failure to invoke monopoly oversight. Murdoch's papers, in turn, played a central role in bolstering Thatcher's career and virulently attacked her opponents.”

Murdoch finished circumnavigating the English-speaking world by landing in the United States, where he later assumed American citizenship. He took over print media such as HarperCollins publishers, TV Guide, The New York Post, and The Weekly Standard, as well as 20th Century Fox films. Most of his money and energy, however, went into buying and expanding his American and international TV holdings.

Murdoch has corporate subsidiaries in over 50 countries, but his primary interest has been in dominating the press, TV, and politics of the Anglo-American world. His political preferences are right-wing, even ultra-right, but he does not let politics interfere with his business expansion plans. Murdoch "is far more right-wing than is generally thought," according to Andrew Neil, who used to edit Murdoch's London Sunday Times. "In the 1988 American presidential election his favorite for the Republican nomination was Pat Robertson," Neil wrote in his book Full Disclosure. "Dole is far too moderate a conservative for his tastes."

While Murdoch was living in Britain, he was the major backer of Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government, and then gave her a $5.4 million book contract when she left office. Once settled in the U.S., Murdoch became one of the biggest contributors to the Republican party, giving them about $1 million in 1996. The year before, while he was trying to get Congress to deregulate media laws that restricted his business expansion, he needed the help of Republican House speaker Newt Gingrich. He offered Gingrich a $4.5 million advance for his book, To Renew America. The Speaker was ready to accept, but the House Ethics Committee forced him to give up the contract because it was such a blatant conflict of interest.

Rupert Murdoch is not averse to political flexibility, however, when it serves his business interests. His newspapers have tended to be quite tolerant of China, sometimes publishing very favorable articles, especially at those times when his companies were negotiating for major access to the Chinese television market, the largest in the world. To sweeten the deals, he arranged for HarperCollins, his big publishing house, to print a book by Deng "Maomao" Rong, the daughter of the Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping. The advance, for a volume The New Yorker called "a turgid, barely literate piece of propaganda," was rumored to be $1 million.

Murdoch has also sided with Labor Party governments in Australia and Britain when he thought he could push them rightward on a range of issues. This was the case with Tony Blair, who traveled to Australia to confer with Murdoch and gain his favor before his first election as Prime Minister. The rightward shift of liberals and labor parties has suited two of Murdoch’s business objectives, namely to ease controls over monopoly ownership and to lower corporate taxes. Murdoch’s giant umbrella corporation, the News Corporation, has been a real pioneer in international tax evasion and the invention of new tax havens. It has woven a web of more than 800 subsidiaries which continually transfers profits from different operations in different countries until they find the safest – that is, tax free or nearly tax free – home. The Economist reported in 1999 that “The most profitable of News Corporation's British operations in the 1990s was ... News Publishers, a company incorporated in Bermuda. News Publishers has, in the seven years to June 30th 1996, made around £1.6 billion in net profits. This is a remarkable feat for a company that seems not to have any employees, nor any obvious source of income from outside Mr. Murdoch's companies.”

While the Bermuda angle is great scam for Murdoch, just as it is for U.S. multinational firms, there was a better place for Murdoch to set up shop. As far as the interests of the News Corporation are concerned, it had to be a country where rampant deregulation and a favorable tax atmosphere allowed corporations to overwhelm democracy in a big way. Murdoch decided that the United States fit the bill, especially once the first Bush Gang let the deregulators loose and opened up the country for merger mania in the 1980s.

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Something else to consider: Rupert Murdoch now owns The Wall Street Journal.

Reflecting on the Reform Vote

2007-12-11T06:52:00.000-08:00

Friday, November 30, the Avenida Bolivar

It was late in the afternoon, the sun was about to set, and President Chavez was addressing the huge crowd that stretched up the Avenida Bolivar in Caracas. I had just waded through this sea of red, pushing through the tightly packed, happy crowd that extended down side streets and into neighboring parks. It was estimated that at least 500,000 people showed up, including 15 of us from Monte Carmelo and about 50 other people from nearby Sanare. We had left the State of Lara on two buses at 10 p.m. the previous night and arrived in Caracas early Friday morning. The fiesta atmosphere and the enthusiasm of the huge crowd made us think that the constitutional reforms would surely be passed in the election on December 2nd.

Even the dogs were reds, and they were celebrating.

Why is there no photo here showing that the Avenida Bolivar was also filled with people on the previous day, November 29?

Because we weren’t there and the government was trying to ignore the protest. The political opposition was able to assemble a very large crowd in the same place the Chavez supporters would be the next day. They did not bring out 500,000, but quite possibly 200,000 or more, an impressive number for an opposition that had been divided and ineffectual for a long time.

Shortly before I took my photo on November 30 of the pro-Chavez, pro-reform gathering, I bumped into a friend in the crowd who happens to live in an apartment high above the Avenida Bolivar. He told me that from his vantage point he could see that the opposition had filled the avenue the previous day. He wasn’t pleased to see the sizable crowd, since he has worked very hard for several years on behalf of the Bolivarian Revolution. But he also wasn’t happy that the Venezuelan government television stations chose not to show the kinds of expansive panoramic views that would reveal the size of the march marshalled by their opponents.

On the other hand, long-range photos of the opposition march were given a prominent place in The New York Times and other media sources outside and inside of Venezuela, since they regularly play up events critical of Chavez and tend to ignore the Bolivarian Process itself. But this doesn’t mean that the government television and news outlets should do the same thing on behalf of their side. I’m not suggesting that neutral coverage was possible, but I think the Venezuelan people, and especially those who supported the constitutional reforms, needed to know more about the depth and strength of the opposition forces.

Possibly, if the Chavistas were armed with this information, they would have been able to prevail upon their neighbors - especially Chavez supporters in the barrios who abstained from voting in large numbers - to vote “Si” at the polls. Furthermore, the incident illuminates the need for more criticism within the Chavista movement, whose ‘to the barricades’ attitude about the revolutionary process often keeps them from engaging in a thorough evaluation of where they are going.

While this embattled attitude is understandable, given the constant barrages of vitriol and misinformation coming from the private media outlets and the United States State Department, it is not helping the political process to mature. (See a very informative Spanish video about how foreign right-wing sources have been helping to manufacture the Venezuelan ´student movement´ at Chris Carlson´s Gringo in Venezuela website.)

Critical Support is Necessary
Within any political structure, it seems nearly inevitable that those who feel they have an overwhelming numerical advantage will try to use it to solidify their position and advance their goals quickly. Clearly, the Chavez government felt that, with an electoral victory of almost 2 to 1 in late 2006, it had sufficient power in 2007 to enact the Constitutional reforms necessary for proceeding toward socialism.

If the government had been correct in thinking that a 2 to 1 margin of victory was possible in December of 2007, then we would not be questioning its judgment – we who generally support the Bolivarian Process would still be celebrating in the streets and anticipating the first steps of putting the reforms into practice.

But given that the government lost a close 50/50 vote, and did not get the support of 3 million people who voted for Chavez a year earlier, it’s only right that people question the content of the reforms and the way they were presented to the Venezuelan people.

Wider discussion of the reforms and other issues
In our little corner of Venezuela, Monte Carmelo, 303 campesinos voted in the election on December 2, more or less the same number that had voted in December of 2006. This meant that abstentions were not a factor here, as 255 voted for the reforms and 46 against. Nine more people voted against Chavez in this election, not a very large defection to the opposition.

Local voters are not ignorant or uninformed people, for they had engaged in spirited discussion of the reforms, grumbled about too much complexity and vague language, and then continued their tradition of supporting Chavez. But in a discussion with various neighbors last night, I found that they were ready to press ahead and try to pass some version of the constitutional reforms sometime during the remaining five years of Chavez’s term. This time it will be an effort that begins at the grassroots, gets discussed at length, and is brought to a national vote by means of a petition signed by 15% of the voters nationwide.

Some people in Monte Carmelo think that all the reforms are useful, but that some of them ought to be simplified as part of new education campaign that will reach the 20% of voters who voted in 2006 but abstained this time. Others expressed the opinion that no more than twenty or thirty reforms, rather than sixty nine, should be presented. According to one person it was important to select only the constitutional articles that are key to restructuring the government for a democratic socialist future. Another had a more gradualist view, thinking that the number should be limited to those that would pass easily now, while waiting a few years to push the more controversial articles.

Who knows? Maybe the people of Monte Carmelo will produce their own list of reformed reforms.

Feliz Navidad!

2007-12-11T06:41:00.000-08:00

Maybe you have forgotten to get a really good book for someone for Christmas. If you and your loved ones want to know something about Venezuela, you should read two books that were published this year. One, Cowboy in Caracas, is a short and very accessible book about everyday life in Venezuela written by our friend Charlie Hardy. Charlie came here from Wyoming twenty years ago as a Maryknoll priest and spent nearly ten years living in a cardboard shack alongside some of the poorest people in the city. Although no longer a priest, he is still in Caracas and still on the side of the poor. In his own special, good-humored way, Charlie lets you know why the majority of Venezuelans have chosen to support Chavez and the revolutionary process.

Then there’s Hugo!, seen here sitting in front of our house

Hugo is an excellent biography written by Bart Jones, who spent 8 years in Venezuela, most of the time as an Associated Press reporter. In September, the week after the book was published in the United States, I was the one designated to deliver the three hot-off-the-press copies to three of Bart’s closest friends in Venezuela. Of course, I made sure I read the book completely before giving up the last copy. I’ve been meaning to write a full book review ever since, because this is by far the most comprehensive and informative biography of President Chavez that I have found in either English or Spanish. (There are some opposition versions that are full of invective and misinformation, while a couple of fairly accurate books in Spanish suffer from a bit too much adulation.) Jones´s book is long, at over six hundred pages, every one of which is necessary to give the non-Venezuelan the historical background needed to understand both the Chavez phenomenon and the necessity of revolutionary change. Since Bart writes succinctly and gracefully, you should not find it difficult to keep turning the pages.

And don’t forget to keep checking online articles at Venezuela Analysis (http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/), the only comprehensive website in English that covers politics and social change in Venezuela. Greg Wilpert, who founded the website some years ago, also has a new book about the Bolivarian Process that is bound to enlighten you.

Counter-revolutionary students get attention from the global media,

2007-12-11T06:07:00.000-08:00

but revolutionary changes are taking place at Mission Sucre, a different kind of higher education

In the third week of October, there was another protest against the Chavez government in Caracas by thousands of students who were opposed to the proposed Constitutional reforms that were voted on last week.

In spite of the fact that these protests were often led by young people with ties to extreme right-wing parties, which in turn have direct ties to the U.S. Embassy and the opposition media empires, most of these students were sincerely expressing their desire to stop the Bolivarian Process. And their free speech was being protected. In fact, at one of the protests that week, when some pro-Chavez supporters gathered opposite the anti-Chavez demonstrators, the two groups started throwing stones and bottles at each other. Metropolitan Police of Caracas took measures to shut down the counter-protest even though those demonstrators were voicing support for the government.

Still, those outside of Venezuela should be aware that the anti-Chavez, anti-reform movement did not involve a majority of university-level students. Numbers and percentages are hard to estimate, but it would be surprising if more than a third of all people taking advantage of higher education (the total is somewhere between 1,200,000 and 1,400,000) were campaigning and voting against the referendum. Of those 1,200,000 plus students, about half (more than 600,000 students) are studying in conventional universities. Most go to elite public universities that mostly serve the middle and upper classes, and about 170,000 go to expensive private schools that are home to many of the most conservative protesters.

But this is only part of the equation, because just as many Venezuelans are studying outside of the conventional universities in the Mission Sucre program. This allows them to work toward university degrees by attending classes at night or on weekends in whatever local building – grade school, high school, church or community center – has space for them and their professors. Five years ago there were no Mission Sucre students. Today they make up half of the total number of people who are advancing themselves through higher education.

This huge explosion in education is transforming Venezuelan society. The new constitutional reforms were designed to promote more participation and equality of this kind, thus lessening the advantages of those with extensive family resources.

No wonder students at the elite institutions are worried about their futures.
Will their expensive private education be sufficient for finding employment?
Will they be displaced by students whom they perceive to be less qualified?
Will they be marginalized by those who used to be socially marginalized?

Luis, Ayleen, and Cirilo in the matching shirts they bought for the public presentation of their thesis.

Mission Sucre
I first encountered Mission Sucre when I was visiting a run-down, three-story high school in the barrio of Antímano in Caracas in late 2004. At five or six in the evening, as the high school students were wandering home, the school building was filling up with people who had been laboring all day.

There is an image that still sticks in my mind: men and women were racing down to basement storerooms, grabbing dozens of huge Chinese TV sets, the kinds with 50 inch screens, and muscling them up to third floor. They wanted to make sure the video teaching materials were all in place so that their professors, most of whom were donating their time after going to their regular jobs, could start classes at the appointed hour.

This past year I learned that a large numbers of adults in our rural area of Monte Carmelo and Sanare are enrolled in classes through Mission Sucre. Among them are those who have already completed their training to be teachers and taken jobs at local schools, and others who are beginning a long and rigorous six-year program in integral community medicine physicians (see the article on Fidel’s WMDs).

The same weekend in October that privileged students were protesting in Caracas, three friends of ours, Ayleen, Luis, and Cirilo, invited me to attend the presentation of their “thesis” at La Casa de Cultura (The House of Culture) in Sanare. This was a requirement for those graduating in Social Sciences with a technical degree, which is achieved after three years of study and is similar to the associate degree earned after two years of community college in the U.S. After completing this degree, the students can continue their schooling for another two years and qualify for their “licenciado,” the equivalent of a bachelor’s degree at a U.S. university.

There were six teams that presented group projects in Social Sciences in front of a panel of academic judges in a large hall filled with over 100 members of the public. All the teams had been assigned to analyze the situation of particular barrios (neighborhoods) in Sanare or small caserios (hamlets) in the countryside, and then help these localities develop and organize communal councils. I was pleasantly surprised to see one of my neighbors there. Carmen, who lives across the street from us, was part of a student team that was diagnosing problems in Monte Carmelo.

Each team had to give an oral presentation, complete with slides and maps of the communities, and a description of the methodology of their analysis and their working relationship with the communities. Then they shared their recommendations and conclusions with the audience. Some individuals in the audience were members of the communities that were studied, and they offered commentary on the value of the research done by the students.

During the presentations, which averaged about 40 minutes each, it became obvious that I was watching a new model of education. The students had been asked to engage in practical work aimed at mobilizing people for one of the most important stages of the Bolivarian Revolution, the formation of “consejos comunales” or communal councils.

In the past year, the national government has encouraged a new kind of grass-roots direct democracy that is designed to bypass old inefficiencies and corruption at the state and municipal levels and deliver control to the people themselves. Neighborhood groups of families, up to 400 families in the cities, and up to 200 families in rural areas, are authorized to form communal councils which will decide and administer local affairs. They are entitled to receive government funds directly, give out loans and grants, and embark on the projects that they feel are most important for their communities.

Tens of thousands of the communal councils are already up and running all over Venezuela. In Monte Carmelo, at a May meeting I attended, fifty-one out of 125 families in the vicinity of the village were represented. Almost everyone present engaged in a lively dialogue as they outlined tasks for the months ahead and authorized funds for rebuilding a house for an old man who had been devastated by illness.

Some communities, however, are poorly organized and apathetic, and have been slow in forming councils. For this reason, five of the student groups decided that their major research commitments would revolve around working with these communities.

Our neighbor Carmen and her group chose a different kind of project than the other groups, since they chose to work in a community, Monte Carmelo, that was already highly organized. Their challenge was to collect more information about a problem that had already been identified by activists and organic farmers: the serious medical dangers posed by the overuse of

pesticides.Our neighbor, Carmen (center), and two women from the neighboring village of Bojo presented their thesis on ecological research and education related to the use of pesticides in Monte Carmelo.

Years ago the cooperative farmers at La Alianza [see related article] noticed that they were poisoning themselves and their families and started farming organically. Some of their fellow farmers took notice and sharply diminished their pesticide use, too, but many others continued to believe that only heavy spraying would produce high yields from their cash crops. They still tramp through the fields of Monte Carmelo with spray cans strapped to their backs, and the wind scatters the residues over neighboring houses. The group’s task was multi-faceted, since it involved gathering and disseminating more medical information, as well as extensive interviewing to evaluate the opinions, awareness, and knowledge of the inhabitants.

Some of the other groups had a more elementary problem: How would they get people to attend meetings and identify local problems that they could address through a community council? Luis, Ayleen, and Cirilo went to Las Virtudes, a hamlet located more than an hour outside of Sanare. The village sits amid one of the most important coffee-growing areas in all of Venezuela, but has extremely high levels of poverty and a dearth of social services and educational facilities.
The team described the challenges involved in drawing people into meetings and promoting collective action, with special attention given to organizing energy groups (Mesas de Energia y Gas) that will ensure that everyone in the area has access to electrical energy for lights and gas (propane) for cooking. The three also told the audience about the ways they collected demographic information and historical material about Las Virtudes and then shared it with the community. In an introduction that described the spirit motivating all the Sucre teams, they wrote that they were helping the community councils because “a new era is beginning in the revolutionary process and we have to confront some great challenges.”

Now the “consejo communal” and related committees are up and running in Las Virtudes, and the people are forming cooperatives and applying for government grants and loans. Cirilo, whose regular job is working as a manager in a new coffee export company, says his Mission Sucre experience won’t be ending now that he has a technical degree. “I plan to keep studying further, but it’s even more important that we follow through on our commitment to the people of Las Virtudes. Now we have an obligation to keep working with them and their “consejo communal.”

The Bolivarian Process is urging students to share knowledge with their fellow citizens in a way that is virtually unknown at the traditional universities. Students at the elite universities are not asked to make a social commitment as part of their studies. Most likely they probably aren’t aware of the valuable work that Mission Sucre students like Ayleen, Luis, Cirilo, and Carmen are doing in their communities. This only underscores the kinds of division – by educational institution, by political persuasion, and by social class – that are causing turmoil in Venezuela today.

(Note: Minister of Finance Rodrigo Cabezas recently presented the national fiscal budget for 2008 to the Venezuelan National Assembly. He stressed that Venezuela is spending a much greater percentage of its budget on education than any other country in Latin America. For 2008, nearly 22 percent of the national budget will be directed toward primary and secondary level education, compared to 9 percent in 1998. This includes an increase in the funding of the social missions of the Chavez government, which will receive a total of Bs. 5.5 trillion (US$ 2.5 billion), an increase of nearly 62 percent from the 2007 level. These social missions include the national health program Barrio Adentro and the literacy and education programs Robinson, Rivas, Che, and Sucre, among many others. )

December 2nd, Election Day in Monte Carmelo

2007-12-05T05:24:00.000-08:00

Unfortunately, horse can´t vote.

There was a cloud sitting on the mountain at 7 a.m., and the first voters made their way through the fog on foot, on motorcycles, or on horseback. One of the first in line was Diluvín, who’s the maestro of welding steel and playing the violin in Monte Carmelo, and also the man who looks after the complicated old pipeline that brings water down from the mountain forests. The neighbors say he’s a genius because he can figure out how to make anything. He was ready to cast his vote for the “Si!”

Around 10 a.m. the sun was shining brightly and people who had already voted were sitting on the wall next to the polling place which was located in the elementary school. The voters were chatting with each other and happy to share a few thoughts about the vote and the constitutional reforms. Yocelin Gonzalez said, “My opinion is that we should support the reforms because this is the way that we can assure a brighter future for our children. So I say: Si! Si! Si!”

Isidro Garcia, a retired farmer I had talked to the week before, had a message for people in the United States. “This guy Bush should not be meddling in Venezuela,” he said, “he should be helping all the poor people in his own country. Venezuelan people aren’t against the North Americans or the United States. We just want to be able to pursue our own political course.”

As Isidro was talking to me, a member of the Army Reserve came over and asked us, very politely, to move about thirty feet away from the gate to the school where people were waiting in line to vote. He didn’t want our conversation to influence people who had not voted yet. There was absolutely no election propaganda - no signs, buttons, or cards - anywhere in the village suggesting how people should vote. And the voting system is a dream: one kind of electronic voting machine is used all over the country and it is able to print out paper copies of each completed ballot (which are then deposited in boxes for recounts, if necessary). Just think, if we in the United States had had such an efficient and fraud-proof system, then Bush would not be our President.

At 11 a.m. Boni Gomez, a school administrator from Sanare and a local coordinator on behalf of the “Si!” vote, drove up the mountain in his little red car and informed us that about 35% of the electorate had already turned out to nationwide. They were hoping for at least a 50% turnout, he said. (But 50% of whom? I wondered.)

After lunch I listened to our neighbor, Abigail, who had worked as one of the local election officials for the past four elections, but was happy to be replaced by others this year. The committee had started setting up tables, etc. in the polling place at 5 a.m. and would not leave the school until after 8 p.m. She explained that “the election is very important because the reforms will provide the laws that can advance the peaceful socialist revolution that the president is leading. This is a key moment if we are going to be able to replace the strong capitalist influences that are preventing socialist measures from being implemented.

“Of course, the richest people are opposed to the reforms because their power will be limited in the future. That’s why they have frightened some of the poor people with their propaganda, saying that the government wants to seize their land. I know one man who believes that his tiny parcel of land is in danger, so now he just went and voted “No.” He did this even though he just received a low-interest loan from Fundafe, a government agency, so he could make improvements to his land.”

Around four p.m. I joined Carmen, her granddaughter Paola, and some other people who were sitting in the sun in the plaza in front of the church. “First,” said Carmen, “I want to send a greeting to the people of the United States from the people of Venezuela. Once again we’re demonstrating how to fortify the democratic process in a very civil and peaceful manner. All of our ten elections since 1998 have been very responsible and aboveboard.”

Just then, Pepi walked up, gave Carmen a big hug, and said, “We’re always voting on opposite sides but we still love each other.” “See,” replied Carmen as she turned to me, “we can live together in friendship even though some of us are with the Bolivarian Process and some are against it.”

Some of the other old-timers, like Joel, Pascual, and Miguelito, have strong loyalties to Adeco, or Acción Democratica, the old Social Democratic party that was a major force in Venezuela and local politics for many decades, but now has only a tiny following. All of them were in danger of going blind from cataracts and other eye maladies that are common here, so they were flown to Cuba by “Misión Milagro” (the Miracle Mission) for eye surgery. Now, they’re happy to have their eyesight restored, but that doesn’t mean they are about to abandon their political loyalties – there’s no way will they ever vote for Chavez.

Diluvín, who had been one of the first to vote, joined the conversation around 5 p.m. as the polls were closing because nobody was waiting in line. By 5:30 the sun was getting low in the West and the air was getting chilly, so most people retreated to the warmth of their houses, and Diluvín and I were left alone. “I wish more of the other campesinos could read better,” he confided, “then they would know how many things in this new constitution are going to benefit them. There were an awful lot of Articles to read through in the reforms. I’m afraid that some of them didn’t bother to vote.”

Monte Carmelo votes overwhelmingly for “Si!” The nation votes “No!”

As it turned out, Diluvín did not need to worry about his fellow campesinos, at least those around Monte Carmelo. By 8 p.m. we knew that three hundred and three citizens had turned out to vote and they supported the Reforms overwhelmingly, 255 to 46. In neighboring Bojó, the response was similar, 225 to 34.

But elsewhere, in other hamlets and in the poorer barrios of the town of Sanare (the county seat has about 25,000 inhabitants), there was a high degree of abstention, at least compared to the presidential election of December 2006. This time the nationwide participation rate was 56%, very high compared to off-year elections in the United States (when there is no presidential election and somewhere between 30% and 40% of the people vote), but low compared to the 75% who voted last year in Venezuela.

Around 8 p.m. we also learned that in Sanare, where about 70% of the voters chose Chavez in 2006, a majority of the voters voted narrowly for “No” on the constitutional reforms. This turned out to be a reliable indicator of national sentiment, but we had to spend hours waiting for the first bulletin of electoral results. It was clear to us the tally was going to be very close or they would have made an announcement earlier. Around 11 p.m. I said goodnight to some friends and their TV set, returned to our little house and fell asleep.

I kept sleeping, not knowing that at 1:15 a.m. they announced that the “No” vote had triumphed. According to my neighbors who stayed up, President Chavez handled the news graciously. He appeared on TV and acknowledged that the result was fair and, even though his proposed reforms had been defeated, this was the way that a democracy was supposed to function.

At 6:30 a.m. on Monday I wandered into the house next door to get our yogurt (we use their refrigerator since we don’t have one), and Abigail told me the news: “We lost. The “No” won.”

The she added, “Perdimos la batalla, pero vamos a ganar la guerra.” (‘We lost the battle, but we’re going to win the war’ – a line that would be repeated several times by the residents of Monte Carmelo on Monday.) She kept patting the arepas, the fat tortillas that she was making for breakfast, and added calmly, but with determination,“We just have to keep working and the revolution will go forward.”

I woke my son Ari up at 7, told him the bad news, and then the good news: “Abigail says its time to go to work.” Not political work, but harvesting work. From 7 to 10 we helped Abigail, Gabriel, and their family pick coffee from the trees that grow directly in front of our two houses, and then, from 10 to 12, we picked and husked corn in the large garden area on the west side of their house.

Life goes on, a campesina’s work is never done.

By afternoon the physical labor had cleared up my foggy brain cells, and I was ready to digest some numbers that were delivered by Sandino, the twenty year-old activist who lives down the road. Sandino reported that the voter turnout nationwide on Sunday had fallen by three million people compared to the number of voters who participated in the presidential election of 2006. This was, more or less, the margin of victory that Chavez had enjoyed in that election. It appeared that the referendum on the constitutional reforms had failed because so many Chavista supporters did not turn out to vote. Three million people abstained.

On Monday, the day after the election, some of the “No” supporters enjoyed a little parade around the main plaza in Sanare to celebrate their victory. Previously Sanare had given about 70% of its votes to Chavez.

How the vote went down

2007-12-05T05:09:00.000-08:00

Although many committed Chavistas turned out to support the ¨si¨ vote in Sanare, many stayed home. Thus the opposition won in a town that voted 70% for Chavez in 2006.

The official results of the December 2nd vote on the Consitutional reforms, 50.7% “No,” 49.3% “Si.” 9 million people voted, the winning margin was 125,000 votes.

Last week I tried to give an informed, but quite speculative estimate of the percentage of Chavez supporters among the upper classes (rich and middle class) and the lower classes (poor and working class): 4% upper + 64% lower equaled a total of 68% who were supporters. As for Chavez opponents: 16% upper class + 16% lower class equaled 32% of opponents.

In a footnote, I suggested that since this was a rough estimate, and since many lower class people seem to be confused about the reforms, maybe we should consider a more conservative split. This was a good idea, and also a way of covering my ass given the over-optimistic appraisal of the pro-Chavez forces that I had offered. So now, let’s consider a 60/40 split, a nice round number that is probably more realistic.

60 % of the population is pro-Chavez, 40% is anti-Chavez, so how did the “No” vote win?

Even though Chavez won with a 63/37 majority (nearly two thirds) in 2006, a 60/40 split is very much in keeping with the average pro/anti sentiment in previous elections over the past nine years. Chavez won by three million votes in 2006 because 12 million people voted, 75% of the electorate, a much higher proportion than had ever voted before. (U.S. turnouts for presidential elections, by comparison, have been between 49% and 60% over the past few decades.)

This year because Chavez was not a candidate, and because the constitutional reforms were presented in a haphazard and confusing way (even the wording of some articles was incoherent), election turnout was much lower, 56%. (This has always been the case with referendum and off-year elections, as it is in the U.S., where 35% to 40% of the electorate turns out to vote for Congress people and Senators.) The anti-Chavez people were able to win this year because they turned out to vote at much greater rate than the pro-Chavez people.

Here is a what happened, more or less. About 45% of the Chavez supporters (60% of the population) turned out to vote, but many others did not because they were confused or weren’t sufficiently motivated, so that the reforms only got the backing of 27% of the total population. And 70% of the Chavez opponents (40% of the population) voted, because they were excited and well-organized for a change, meaning that 28% of the voting population wanted the reforms to be defeated.

Supporters 60% x 45% turnout = 27%, Opponents 40% x 70% turnout = 28%, making a total turnout of 55%.

This happens to be very close to the actual 2007 voter turnout of 55.9%, almost 20 points lower than the December 2006 voter participation rate of 75%. In the 2007 election in Venezuela, there was superior interest and commitment on the part of the upper classes, and they won. If the lower classes had participated at the same rate as in 2007, they would have had another 3 million votes. Would all of them supported the reforms? Probably not. But they still would have won handily.

Sounds like the U.S.A.

I have been arguing for years (see my books Sharing the Pie and Robbing Us Blind) that the United States continues to have such a conservative government because the Democratic Party is unwilling to build a popular base and a political program that supports the aspirations of the poor, working class, and lower middle-class people who make up the large majority of the U.S. population.

“Lower-income people, especially the third of the electorate with household incomes of under $30,000 a year, vote overwhelmingly Democratic. The upper twenty-five percent of households, who make over $70,000 a year, have always favored the Republicans. Voter turnout in presidential elections is about 35 percent of the former, versus 70 percent of the latter. If Democrats can get the lower half of the working class to register and vote, they will win handily. If they convince the upper half of the working class” [those earning between $30,000 and $70,000] “to vote for their own interests instead of the interests of the wealthy, they’ll win by an extraordinary margin.” (Robbing Us Blind, 2004, Chapter 18)

On the afternoon after the election, when I talked to Gaudy Garcia, a long-time campesina activist in Monte Carmelo, she was a bit sad and still tired. (She was one of those who had labored at the election tables for 15 hours on the previous day.) But she wasn’t about to stop working for El Proceso.

“What we’re lacking is ideological education,” Gaudy said. “Too many of the Chavistas are still unaware that there is a class war going on. If they don’t show up to fight, they’re going to lose. But don’t worry, we’ll keep fighting.”

Na’guará!

2007-11-27T06:13:00.000-08:00

Na’guará! in the Indian languages of the state of Lara means – Wow! That’s Great!

Guess what amigos? Ari’s futbol team won the championship of the State of Lara on Sunday, 3-2 on penalty kicks. The town of 20-25,000 beat the big city of Barquisimeto, population 1,000,000. No one seems to be sure if Sanare ever won the under-18 boys championship before, but if they did it was long time ago.

Chevere.

The Big Vote: What the Constitutional Reforms are Really About

2007-11-27T05:21:00.000-08:00

About a thousand people turned out in Sanare to march in favor of the Reforms last Friday afternnoon.

The opposition in Venezuela is desperate once again. The country is moving toward a new kind of socialism in an entirely democratic way, and they are screaming, “Democratic Dictator! Constitutional Coup d’etat!”

Why are those in the opposition so desperate? Why are they making these absurd claims that sound like they were manufactured by boneheads in the U.S. State Department? Because they lost the last election in December of 2006 by a huge margin (63% to 37%), and this December they are likely to lose another election that will give a popular seal of approval to sweeping constitutional reforms.

What’s their real problem? The huge majority of the population still likes their President: nearly three quarters of the Venezuelan people think that President Chavez is doing a fairly good to excellent job.

Who are the opposition? Many of the spokespeople and financial backers are members of the “oligarchy,” a small upper class that controls most big business and all private media in Venezuela. They think they are supposed to be “the ruling class,” but they only have the support of between one quarter and one third of the population. They are losing the class war. No wonder the rich have always feared direct democracy.

I have attempted to construct a rough estimate of the way that the rich and poor are divided when it comes to voting. This is a totally unscientific estimate, for I know of no poll by political scientists (who are pracititioners of a very murky “science” to begin with) that tries to estimate voting behavior by income groups in Venezuela. Still, I think the following numbers can illuminate the political and social struggle that is taking place right now, and should be useful for debate and discussion.

Among the upper and middle classes
According to a study commisisioned by the Venezuelan-American Chamber of Commerce, the upper class and upper-middle classes (income groups A, B, C+) make up 2.4% of the population. The lower-middle class (income group C-, made up mostly of technical professionals, small business owners, and bureaucrats) comprise 18% of the population. Together these four groups at the top of the income scale represent 20% of the Venezuelan people. About 4 out of 5 of these people, or 16% of the total population, are likely to oppose Chavez; this would leave one out of five in these groups (4% of the total population) that support him.

Among the lower classes
The poor (34%) and the nearly poor (46%) make up the remaining 80% of the Venezuelan population. About 4 out of 5 people in these groups, or 64% of the total population, support Chavez. This would leave one out of five in the lower classes (16% of the total population) that oppose him.

This adds up to overwhelming support of Chavez[1]

Chavez supporters: 4% + 64% = 68%
Chavez opponents: 16% + 16% = 32%

These total numbers correspond fairly well with the mood of the country about a month before the vote on the constitutional reforms: “According to a recent opinion poll reported by Venezuela's largest circulation paper Últimas Noticias …72% of Venezuelans evaluate Chavez's job performance as being good to excellent, versus 25% who evaluate it as being bad to terrible.”[2]

Women have gained a lot from the Bolivarian Revolution, and so have these medical students in Sanare.

The election for the constitutional reform may be closer than these numbers suggest since the turnout will probably not be as high as the presidential vote in 2006, when a record 75% of eligible voters turned out at the polls. Generally, in countries like the United States (where the best turnouts are only slightly more than half of the eligible voters), rich and middle-class voters vote in much greater percentages than the poor and working classes. This is not so true today in Venezuela, but there may a slight edge for the well-to-do since it often easier for them to get to the polls and register their vote quickly. On the other hand, many opposition voters were talking about abstention two months ago, before ex-General Baduel joined their forces and gave some impetus to the “no” vote for a short time.[3]

There’s another factor that could make the vote close. The same opinion poll by Últimas Noticias that showed high popularity for Chavez also demonstrated that the support for the constitutional reform was a bit weaker, “46.6% of Venezuelans believe that the reform is necessary, while 35.0% oppose it.”

It should be noted that nearly 20% of the people polled above did not express an opinion. This may have changed by now, since there has been a tremendous amount of publicity and information circulating about the reforms. In the last month, the public meetings and marches by the pro-reform forces and students who support the government have dwarfed the earlier efforts at public demonstrations by the opposition.

The Media and the Reforms
Opposition media, which still dominate the dissemination of news, continue purveying fears – “the communists are coming to take everything away from you” – that have little to do with the realities of daily life in Venezuela. Every large city in Venezuela has at least one right-wing opposition newspaper, and in Barquisimeto, the city of one million that is the capital of the state of Lara, it’s El Impulso. This paper devoted the entire first page of Section C on October 28, 2007 to an interview with Guillerno Zuloaga, the president of Globovision. Globovision is the all-news cable TV station that collaborated with the attempted coup against Chavez in 2002, and has continued with all-out attacks against him and his government ever since.

Guillermo Zuloaga is a the grandson of the founder of El Universal, the most influential opposition newspaper in Venezuela, and he’s also the owner of businesses and corporations outside of Venezuela. In El Impulso, Zuloaga claimed that “The reform is the greatest threat that Venezuela has had in its history” and that Chavez has a “marxist-communist vision” of the future. According to him, Chavez’s “socialism of the 21st century” is a step backward because “we’re returning to the communism of the 20th century.”

On other pages of Section C in El Impulso, other Venezuelan opposition figures expressed their displeasure with the government. On behalf of the ultra-conservative Chruch hierarchy, Cardinal Jorge Urosa Savino warned that if the reforms were approved and Venezuela is organized as a socialist country, “this would be going against political liberty, pluralism, and the freedom of thought.”

Since at the present moment there is more “freedom of thought” in Venezuela than in almost any other country on earth, this argument is not likely to shake the faith that most people have in Chavez. If most Venezuelans are concerned about government control, it may be because they want more of it. Their two biggest worries, expressed over and over again in public opinion polls, are crime on the streets and corruption in local bureaucracies. These are the result of many decades of neglect by previous governments that had little desire to curb these kinds of public disorder. In the future, if the Chavez government loses favor with the common people, it will be because it has failed to deal with these problems.

On the other hand, most citizens are not likely to be concerned about protecting the financial and business oligarchy, and would favor the constitutional reforms that attack the latifundios (large rural estates) and monopoly ownership of production. This is one reason that the opposition usually avoids detailed analysis of the reforms the government has proposed: the rewritten articles are, for the most part, very democratic, for they expand the powers of the people.

Yes, It’s true, now you have the proof that this is not an unbiased website. My son Ari was recently seen helping the cause of the “Si!” in Sanare by putting the message on cars and motorcycles.

A quick review of some important Articles
First, there is Article 230, the one that’s emphasized the most, but it’s probably not so important: there are no term limits for the President. This was a measure that used to be found in the U.S. Constitution and allowed Franklin Roosevelt to be elected to four consecutive terms. In 1951, conservatives in the U.S. Congress and state legislatures were successful in passing an amendment that limits U.S. presidents to two four-year terms, but this has certainly did not lead to an increase in democracy in the United States. In recent years, countries that have democratic parliaments and no term limits, such as the United Kingdom and Australia, have decided to give multiple terms to their elected prime ministers Thatcher, Blair, and Howard. We must note, however, that they were greatly assisted in their rush toward neo-liberal, neo-conservative policies by the very undemocratic assistance of Rupert Murdoch’s media monopolies.

It could be argued that the term limits gave more power to elite financial interests in the U.S. which wanted to make sure that a president who was opposed to their interests, and very popular with the electorate, could not be in office for too long. In this sense, the people of Venezuela may be gaining more freedom if they can choose to elect Chavez, who is not supported by any oligarchic/monopolistic forces, to as many terms as they want. Furthermore, Venezuela continues to have the unique, and very democratic “recall” provision in its constitution that allows the people to “unelect” a president, or any other elected official, half way through his or her term of office.

When opponents of Chavez argue that the Constitution will make Hugo Chavez a dictator, what they are really saying is that they think he wants to become a dictator. If this should happen, whether under the rule of Chavez or any other president in the future, it would be because the president does what dictators always do: suspend the laws, abrogate the constitution, and impose personal authoritarian control.

Most other proposed changes to the Articles of the Constitution are remarkably democratic and would be a healthy addition to the United States Constitution. Some like Article 21, guarantee freedom from discrimination on the basis of sex, gender, race, sexual orientation, health, age, ethnicity, religious and political persuasion, and social condition. Article 100 recognizes and protects the cultural contributions of the indigenous people of Venezuela, the Afro-Venezuelans, and those descended from Europeans, then states specifically that the nation will actively promote indigenous and afro-Venezuelan cultural initiatives.

Another, Article 67, declares freedom of political association and includes a provision that must stick in the craw of the U.S. Department of State since we have been so active in supporting the political opposition in Venezuela; it prohibits funding of the political process by foreign governments and by organizations and private entities outside of Venezuela.

Then there are the Articles that many privileged members of the opposition are worried about, especially those who hope to re-establish rule by a political and financial oligarchy in the future. The reformulated Article 328 states that the Armed Forces will always be “at the service of the sacred interests of the Venezuelan people” and never at the service of “some oligarchy or foreign imperial power.” To put some teeth in this sentiment, and to restrict the economic power that makes oligarchic rule possible, Article 113 has been beefed up to say that “Monopolies are prohibited,” while Article 305 follows suit by declaring that “Latifundios are prohibited because they are contrary to the interests of society.” Article 115 continues to guarantee the rights of private property holders, but in its new version also guarantees other kinds of social and communal property.

For Venezuelans who are not trying to protect economic and social privilege, the future looks much brighter. There are millions of people who currently are not covered by labor laws and social security who will now be provided with protection and old-age pensions under Article 87. Their number includes independent workers, small farmers, taxi drivers, shopkeepers, and even housewives, whose work has been judged to be just as valuable as everyone else’s. Furthermore, in Article 90 the mandatory work week, that which large employers can impose on their employees, is shortened to thirty-six hours for a six-day work week (the previous number was 44 hours.) The rationale is that many people, especially poorer people, must travel for considerable amounts of time to get to work and should have some additional hours free to pursue cultural and educational pursuits as well as take care of family responsibilities.

Article 109 is too democratic for some people, at least for the university students who support the opposition. It guarantees democratic governance at the universities, one person/one vote, to all people associated with a university, including professors, clerical and service workers, technicians, part-time teachers, and students. This is something some of us old-timers campaigned for in the 1960s and 1970s on U.S. campuses.

Finally, there are the goals that sound utopian, at least compared with the rest of the world, that are now enshrined in the Venezuelan Constitution. In Article 305, the State vows to promote agricultural ecology as the overarching principle for caring for the land and natural environment, with the goal of making Venezuela independent, self-sustaining, and ecologically sound in all its food production.

Article 184 is perhaps the most ambitious of all, for it delineates a system of direct democracy that is based on small communities meeting in community councils (the consejos comunales.) These in turn will form larger organizations called communes (comunas.) When the communes form larger entities called “ciudades” (literally ‘cities,’ or places controlled by “ciudadanos” or ‘citizens,’ which will also be formed in rural areas), they will replace the top-down political control that has historically been wielded by state and municipal governments.

This quick sketch of the reform package is not comprehensive, but it should allow the reader to recognize two things. One, the proposed reforms are intensifying the revolutionary commitments of the 1999 Constitution, and two, they are doing so in a way that generally reinforces and deepens democracy. Whether they will work remains to be seen. Certainly the major powers in the world thought the U.S. Constitution was a ridiculous travesty in 1789. The fact that the major capitalist powers and the major capitalist media are dismissing the Venezuelan Constitution today should be taken as a compliment, and as an acknowledgment that it really does have revolutionary potential.

[1] Since this is a rough estimate, and since a considerable number of middle-class people support the Bolivarian process, and since many lower class people may be confused about the reforms, we can also look at the effect of a much more conservative 30-70% split that may be a more accurate reflection of the coming vote: 21%vs. 9% in the upper classes, and 21% vs. 49% in the lower classes, or 42% anti-Chavez vs. 58% pro-Chavez.
[2] Venezuelanalysis.com, November 5, 2007.
[3] Kiraz Janicke, “Former Venezuelan Defense Minister Baduel Denounces Constitutional Reform,”November 6th 2007

The Constitutional Reforms and Local People

2007-11-23T05:07:00.000-08:00

There has been animated discussion of the Constitutional Reforms in our area for months. In the past month there have been numerous seminars and discussion panels at schools, cooperatives, and the Casa de Cultura (Cultural Center) in Sanare. Luz Marina and Sandino, two young activists from Monte Carmelo, were out with their friends a couple of weeks ago, encouraging motorists in Sanare to put “Si!” stickers on their cars, trucks, and motorcycles.

Last week, twelve of my neighbors and I were riding up the mountain in the back of a pick-up truck/taxi, and they were all discussing the constitutional reforms that will be voted on next week on December 2. At least half of them seemed to have questions about some of the proposed changes to the Constitution, and one woman seemed to believe the opposition contention that the government could confiscate her house if the reforms are passed.

There are several versions of the “house is not your home” rumor that are being spread by the political opposition; another one is: “the government is going to move at least one Cuban into every household.” Then, so the story goes: “the government is going to take your children away.” These rumors are not only false, but so unbelievable that the opposition is probably hurting its own cause by spreading them.

The owner of a bar and restaurant in Sanare, who I suspect never voted for Chavez and has never read any of the proposed changes to the constitution, recently told me the government would have the right to march in and take over his place. “Then they’ll give everything to the Cubans,” he said.

The most intelligent anti-reform comments came from the pessimistic fruit seller who sold me tomatoes and pineapples on Wednesday in Sanare, then gave me a twenty minute history lesson. “The reforms may sound nice, but Venezuelan governments are incapable of making them work. This has been a corrupt and ungovernable society for a long time, even when Bolivar was alive. He appreciated liberty and he was a political genius, but it took him a long time to recognize our limitations, when he was sick and ready to die in . ‘Colombia,” he said, “is a nunnery. And Venezuela is a cuartel’ (military barracks.)”

Most people here in Monte Carmelo are more optimistic about the future and seem ready to vote “Si!” Some, however, acknowledge that it would have been smarter if the government had limited the number of rewritten Articles to thirty-three (about 10% of the 1999 constitution), the ones originally proposed by Chavez months ago. It’s been a bit overwhelming, they say, to read through the thirty-six additional Articles that were added by the National Assembly, some of which probably could have been passed as regular laws rather than constitutional amendments.

On the other hand, most people have read the amendments and many have an impressive command of constitutional knowledge and can list the numbers and content of various articles. One farmer coming out of the bodega here in Monte Carmelo emphasized, “Article 87, because it’s really necessary for the independent farmer, taxi driver, housewife, or shopkeeper to be guaranteed the Social Security that other workers get.”

A week earlier, a middle-aged taxi driver in Caracas had told me the same thing, and then offered an impressive review of all of the Reforms, all of them necessary as far as he was concerned. He also wanted me to know that the most reliable political pollster in Venezuela, the one whose predictions are always within a point or two of the actual results, predicted that the reforms would pass by nearly a two to one margin (unfortunately I forgot to write down the name of his favorite pollster.) “We need these reforms if we’re going to keep moving toward socialism,” he said, “because the oligarchy still has way too much power.”

Javier, who runs the bodega, or grocery shop, in Monte Carmelo, is a small businessman who knows how to get a good bargain on onions at the giant regional market in Barquisimeto. Because of his facility with numbers, his neighbors chose him to count votes in last presidential election in December of 2006 when Chavez gathered 63% of the vote nationwide. He reports that in nearby Sanare about 70% voted for the President, in Monte Carmelo 80%, and in the nearest neighboring village, Bojo – about 300 voted for the President and exactly 4 people voted against him.

Javier follows politics closely and has always been a Chavez supporter, but a few weeks ago he wasn’t sure he was going to vote. “There are an awful lot of articles, too many, and I haven’t had a chance to study them all,” he said, “there’s a couple I’m suspicious of, so I think I’m going to have to abstain.”

Two days ago we talked again, and he’s changed his mind. “President Chavez has been addressing the issues I had trouble with, and I’ve taken time to read various pamphlets and newspaper articles describing all the articles in detail. Now I’m ready to vote Si.”

One of the major issues for him was private property and the ability of small business people to maintain their autonomy. Now he’s convinced that small and medium business owners are respected and protected by the constitution, and he thinks it’s just fine to clamp down on monopoly ownership.

Carla and Isidrio were waiting with me for a truck ride to town. Carla had no opinion on the Constitutional reforms. Isidro knew he would vote for the “Si!”

On Monday, I asked Isidrio, a campesino who’s retired and living with his son, his opinion concerning the reforms. He, like Javier, mentioned the need to eliminate monopolies. Article 113 was originally meant to discourage monopoly ownership in the 1999 Constitution. The new, improved version uses stronger language and says that monopolies will be “prohibited.”

For Isidrio, the issue of “latifundios” and land ownership is even more important than monopolies. “There are too many people all over the country who don’t have any land and that’s not right. A farmer ought to be able to own his own land, or share land in a cooperative. There are sneaky people on the other side of Sanare who have accumulated 300 hectares (660 acres) after starting with five acres. They had money and credit at the banks and started buying up everybody around them.” (300 hectares generally would not qualify as a latifundio, which in other parts of the country might spread over thousands of hectares; but here, in this mountainous region, 300 hectares is a very big piece of land, and 5 or 10 hectares can support a family.)

“You know how I’m going to vote?” asked Isidrio rhetorically. “I’ll vote for all 69 articles so the government can keep going forward and accomplish what we want it to accomplish.”

The pro-reform student marches

We joined some of our Monte Carmelo and Sanare friends on a march by Mission Sucre students a week ago Saturday. This event in Barquisimeto, the big city in the state of Lara (population, one million) was merely a warm-up march for a gigantic student march that took place on Wednesday, November 22 in Caracas, where hundreds of thousands of students packed the streets to demonstrate on behalf of the Constitutional Reforms.

Luis, on the left, went back to school after he retired to finish a college degree with Mission Sucre. He thinks the constitutional reforms are essential to keep the Bolivarian Revolution going.

Pablo Mendoza, on the right, administrator of schools in the municipality of Sanare, joined the university students of Mission Sucre on their march.

Leonardo, otherwise known as “Cheo” here in Monte Carmelo, gave a rousing speech in favor of “Si” vote at the Barquisimeto march. Cheo is a studying finance at Mission Sucre on weekends so that he can help local “consejo comunales” (the new community councils that are practicing direct democracy) with their budgeting and development projects. On Tuesday night, Cheo joined Sandino, Luz Marina, and others on the overnight bus to Caracas so they could join other students for the mega-march.

La Feria de Libros -- at the Book Fair

2007-11-23T04:45:00.000-08:00

Caracas from the top of Monte Avila

At “La Feria de Libros,” or Book Fair, there were giant white tents with a million books and thousands of people inside. The tents were scattered over several acres in the Parque del Este in downtown Caracas. Publishers from all over Venezuela and Latin America showed their wares, and the public was invited to attend at least six venues, each in a separate tent, for cultural events and lectures.

For once leftists from the U.S.A. put aside their differences (mostly) and were willing to gather under ‘a big tent,’ the Salon Joe Marti.

Ari and I hopped on a few buses and ten hours later we were in Caracas, only a day and a half late. At the last moment, I had been invited to take part in presentations and panel discussions at the Fair. The organizers not only put us in a nice hotel, but they were willing to feed my son, who can decimate any buffet in the world.

There were other writers and activists from the United States, including some who have lived in Venezuela for many years, like Charlie Hardy and Eva Golinger, and others who were making brief cultural visits, like Luis Rodriguez and Tufara LaShelle Waller. We were asked to speak at different times over a five-day period on the topic: “Will there be a revolution in the United States?”

I was tempted to say, “When Hell freezes over,” since it’s difficult to imagine that the U.S., with or without a Bush at the helm, is going to stop acting on behalf of transnational capital and join the wave of change sweeping over the Americas. But on the second day of presentations by my fellow North Americans, I was struck by the optimism of three Latinos, Antonio Gonzalez, Diogenes Abreu, and Luis Rodriguez, who tended to take a long-term perspective. They see the revolutionary potential slowly growing, born of the harsh working-class experience of most Latinos and Afro-Americans and an increasing number of poor whites. For Latinos in particular, there is also the influence of new ideas seeping into the United States via the progressive Hispanic political movements in Central America, South America, and the Caribbean.

We got to hang out with Luis Rodriguez (on the left), Mexican-American activist and author of La Vida Loca. Ari loved his stories about gang life in LA.

Antonio Gonzales emphasized the fact that small changes, even ones that seem like slow reforms, can have a cumulative revolutionary effect for working class people. He thinks that the changing racial configuration of the United States, most dramatically in his home state of California, is producing a more progressive political culture. Graphs in his slide show referred to Census data that predict that 50% or more of the U.S. population will be non-white by the year 2050.

As Diogenes Abreu, a Dominican activist from NYC, talked, he also displayed one of our favorite T-shirts. We have the same Homeland Security t-shirt at home in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, where it’s protecting a piece of beautiful land that once belonged to an Apache named Dick Kaseeta, who at 4 years old was the youngest “student” (prisoner of war) ever to attend the Carlisle Indian School.

On the final day of these sessions, I found myself leading off the presentations in a more optimistic mood. “History teaches us that we should always be ready for dramatic change. Look at the 1920s,” I said, “a backward decade by anyone’s standards, when the rich multiplied their fortunes at the expense of everyone else and controlled the political arena; when membership in the KuKluxKlan surged not just in the South, but in the North, in tandem with increased racist attacks against African Americans and poor European immigrants; when harsh repressive tactics dramatically reduced union membership and strike activity; when rampant gambling on Wall Street drove the stock market to absurd heights and endangered the economy.

“The 1920s were as reactionary as our present era, which began with Reagan and Bush I in the 1980s. Under Bush II, we have reached degrees of economic inequality and crazy financial speculation that are actually as bad as the 1920s. Perhaps times are ripe for a sudden lurch to the left.

“Remember what happened after the 1920s? The next decade, the 1930s, was one of the most progressive in our history. It was not exactly a revolutionary decade, but was characterized by extraordinary labor organizing and major political and economic reforms: there were the sit-down strikes in major industries and changes in labor law that let union membership boom; there were major relief and cultural programs sponsored by the federal government to counteract the effects of the Great Depression; there was the passage of the Social Security laws; and there was a huge increase in the rate of taxation on the very rich. These changes helped initiate a dramatic shift toward economic equality in the U.S. which, over the next four decades, allowed a very large section of the working class (particularly white people, since racism was not wiped out so easily) to enjoy a more or less ‘middle class’ existence.”

I’m afraid that when I tried to explain our current economic mess and the new kinds of destructive financial speculation, I stepped beyond the limits of coherent translation. For who is going to be able to understand the meaning of “hedge funds” and “negative derivatives” in Spanish when these terms are meant to confuse people in English. Luckily, my three fellow speakers came to my rescue with presentations that were more lucid than mine.

Dada Maheshvarananda, a member of the Ananda Marga association, was dressed in orange robes as he presented a sophisticated slide show that described the philosophy and activities of his organization. Dada is the author of After Capitalism: Prout’s Vision for a New World, which he and his associates are trying to implement by working in the Afro-Venezuelan region of Barlovento. With government encouragement they have held numerous workshops and training sessions with groups of farmers and cacao growers who already work in cooperatives or are interested in forming them.

Finally, to end the session on a strong note of artistic performance, we heard from Amina and Amiri Baraka, the revolutionary activists and poets from Newark, New Jersey. Both emphasized that revolution is possible in the United States, and is particularly necessary for Afro-Americans so that they can complete the process begun by Black Revolutionaries in the 1950s and 60s. Amiri reminded the audience that the United States had the first successful revolution, so it was ridiculous to say that we are incapable of launching another one. Then he gave a powerful reading of “Somebody Blew Up America,” the poem that said so much about centuries of home-grown terrorism that it cost him his job as the Poet Laureate of New Jersey.

Amina Baraka read her poem while being accompanied by Pablo, a Venezuelan jazz saxophonist. The poem, Black and Brown Americans, begins like this:

We are
Chained to a trail of tears
We are
Tied to the Rope Around Nat Turner’s Neck
Our tongues are Twisted
Unable to Speak Our Language
Our Culture Ravaged
We stepped in Time with Dance
To Free Our Spirit
We Hear Birds
Of All feathers Fly –
The wind Sings …

It’s hard to shut up “The Mouth of the South” – El Rey versus El Presidente

2007-11-19T05:30:00.000-08:00

In case you didn’t notice, last week Juan Carlos, the King of Spain, told Hugo Chavez, the President of Venezuela, to “Shut up!” They were both in Santiago, Chile where they were attending a conference of democratically elected Ibero-American leaders, including the Presidents of many Latin American countries and the Prime Minister of Spain, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero. (Which makes one wonder: why was the King even invited?)

Most of the international corporate media, which have made a habit of criticizing President Chavez and reporting all kinds of unsubstantiated, ridiculous, and negative stories about Venezuela, immediately sided with the king. In fact, they made it appear that Chavez had been the one who had insulted the King.

But Chavez had merely pointed out that the former Prime Minister of Spain, Jose Maria Aznar, was a “fascist.” Based on the evidence, this seems like a reasonable conclusion. For one thing, when he was the head of the Spanish government, Aznar helped sponsor the attempted coup against Chavez in 2002. Secondly, from the time he was defeated and left office in Spain until the present time, Aznar has been waging an international ultra-rightwing campaign to remove Chavez from office by any means necessary. He has even been employed by the ultra-right media tycoon, Rupert Murdoch, as a means of expediting his mission.

Aznar’s political and family roots are firmly grounded in the Spanish Falange, the fascist political party of Generalissimo Francisco Franco, who ruled Spain as a dictatorship for nearly forty years. When he was Prime Minister, Aznar surrounded himself with many Franco sympathizers and members of Opus Dei, the secretive, rightwing Catholic organization that was founded by a Spanish priest in 1928, but only rose to prominence under Franco. It seems to be no coincidence that Aznar’s first names, Jose Maria, are the same as the founder of Opus Dei, Josemaria Escrivá.

At a meeting of unity, confrontation

One of the major tasks of this Ibero-American Summit was to discuss methods for overcoming the poverty, misery, and social marginalization that have plagued Latin America for centuries. This is a topic whose time has come, since the Latin American countries feel they have a historical opportunity to break with the past and provide a politically democratic, more egalitarian future for their citizens. However, the assembled leaders see themselves pursuing this transformation in two distinctly different ways.

The boldest moves are being made by Venezuela, Bolivia, Cuba, Ecuador, and Nicaragua, which are talking about breaking free of capitalist exploitation and First-World dominance by openly adopting socialist and anti-imperialist policies. Many other countries, such as Chile, Argentina, Uruguay and Brazil, are talking about gradual shifts within a capitalist structure that will provide more public welfare while remaining very friendly to multinational capital and corporations.

In to overcome these differences, President Chavez has worked very hard in recent years to forge stronger diplomatic links between all these countries. He believes their combined economic and diplomatic strength can allow them to pursue their own “Southern” objectives. But at the conference in Chile, he was reaching out to his fellow leaders and explaining that the capitalist powers in the North do not like this process and are actively trying to subvert it. On the last day of the summit, Chavez was very specific about one of the perpetrators of this subversion, "You all know that Jose Maria Aznar, I said it yesterday and I'll repeat it today, that man is a fascist."

The Socialist Prime Minister of Spain, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, responded defensively, “You can be against a certain ideological position, and I am not very close to the ideas of Aznar, but he was elected by the Spanish people, and I demand respect.”

Chavez immediately countered that Aznar was the one who needed to demonstrate “respect” for the democratic aspirations of the Venezuelan people and stop interfering in Venezuelan politics.

This was too much for the King Juan Carlos, who leaned over the table, gestured toward President Chavez, and said, “Por qué no te callas? -- “Why don’t you shut up!?”

Reaction

Chavez was not without supporters, since Bolivian President Evo Morales and Cuban Vice-President Carlos Lage quickly came to his defense. And when Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua denounced Spain and the United States for continuing to act like imperialist powers in Latin America, the King stood up and walked out of the session.

Chavez also had supporters at home, and thousands of them cheered him at the airport when he returned to Venezuela. One of them, Josefina Carbaño, put it succinctly, "A king imposed by the dictatorship of General Franco has no moral or political authority to silence the President of Venezuela.”

True, Juan Carlos was declared a “Prince of Spain” by Franco in 1969, then spent several years appearing at public functions with the dictator, and became King when Franco died in 1975. But fortunately, he was willing to step aside as Spain became a constitutional monarchy ruled by a democratically elected parliament. Over the next thirty years he was mostly stayed out of politics and spent most of his time looking very regal for the society photographers of the global celebrity magazines.

While most of the major corporate media in Spain jumped to the defense of the King, there were other dissenting voices. Gaspar Llamazares, speaking for the United Left coalition in Spain, said there were "documents and information that show that the former government - led by Jose Maria Aznar - not only did not condemn the coup, but also collaborated in changing the democratic regime for a dictatorship."

As for Chavez, he was at all not apologetic about what had transpired in Chile. “We've been here for 500 years,” he said, “and we'll never shut up, much less at the demands of a monarch. If I shut up, the people of Latin America would scream. They are ready to be free of all colonialism after 500 years."

The underlying tension

Now you may be wondering, why did President Chavez want to put so much emphasis on ex-Prime Minister Aznar and his ultra-right sympathies?
Why didn’t he avoid this confrontation, particularly in Chile, where the residual power of the right-wing Armed Forces has Socialist President Bachelet walking on eggshells?

The reason is that this confrontation is much bigger than the question of Aznar’s political sympathies and Chile’s slow road back to democracy. Currently, as Venezuela is about to vote on a very ambitious and progressive package of constitutional reforms, Aznar is just one small weapon in the arsenal of the United States government, its political allies, the global media, the transnational corporations, and their friends in the Venezuelan opposition. They are combining forces in a propaganda campaign that seeks to destabilize Venezuela and they are leaving no stone unturned as they look for low and dirty things to throw at Chavez.

And how could I forget, after mentioning Jose Maria Aznar’s ties to Opus Dei and Josemaria Escrivá, to mention the Church? Some of the dirtiest tricks are being generated by the Catholic bishops, who are using the ecclesiastical hierarchy in an overtly political way to claim that Chavez wants to create a Communist/Leninist/Stalinist state that will restrict all forms of religious devotion and private property.

At lower levels, some of the good fathers are using their priestly networks to spread outright lies about the constitutional reforms. One conservative North American priest working in Venezuelan recently started circulating e-mails to his contacts in the United States outlining the dreadful things that would happen if the reforms are passed. Supposedly, people would be forced to give up rooms in their homes in order to house families they didn’t even know. And money, according to him would simply be confiscated: people with over $2,000 in the bank would be forced to turn their extra money over to the government. The list went on and on, and had no relation to any of the proposed changes in the Constitution.

These particular priests ignore the fact that a great many Christians, both Catholics and evangelicals, support Chavez, because when he talks about “21st century socialism” he explicitly preaches about “Christian” socialism. The priest and religious workers that I know are supportive of both Chavez and the Bolivarian revolution. But I suspect, in a country with only two thousand priests, many of them teaching in elite private schools and colleges, that my acquaintances are in the minority.

Chavez was trying to rally support

Who knows if Chavez’s willingness to use the “f” word (fascist), will win him support from most of the other Latin American countries? Countries with mildly social democratic or liberal tendencies do not have a history of standing up and defending their more revolutionary brethren, and they shy away from the “f” word, not to mention the “i” word. When Salvador Allende appeared at the United Nations in 1973, just a few weeks before General Pinochet overthrew his democratic government, he gave a stirring speech that declared that the forces of imperialism were stalking Chile and were about to strike. And no one came to his aid.

The situation in Venezuela is not so grave, for Chavez and the majority of the people have a strong economy and a loyal military behind them. The constitutional reforms appear to be headed for passage by the democratic vote of the people. (We should recall that U.S. voters have never been able to vote directly for the articles of their constitution, including the one that prohibits U.S. presidents from running for three or four terms like Franklin Roosevelt did.)

Still, the pressure brought to bear on Venezuela by the capitalist world and the capitalist media will be onerous and continuous. In spite of that pressure, the reforms to the constitution (which I’ll try to review for you briefly in the very near future) should enable the people to make strides toward democratic socialism while still maintaining plenty of room for individual freedom and small and medium businesses.

Many of the quotations in this article came from “Venezuelan President Clashes with the King of Spain at Latin American Summit,”November 12th 2007, by Chris Carlson at Venezuelanalysis.com, and “Spanish-Venezuelan Spat Continues As Both Try to Calm Issue,” November 13th 2007, by Kiraz Janicke - Venezuelanalysis.com

Changing Income Distribution in Venezuela: sorting out the data and the bias

2007-11-01T06:16:00.000-07:00

This article of mine just appeared on Venezuela Analysis on November 1, 2007, and it´s easier to read there because the tables of numbers are displayed properly, something I can´t seem to manage yet with the blogger format. Venezuela Analysis also has a number of current, well-informed articles on the Constitutional Reforms that will be voted on in December, and others concerning the political demonstrations for and against.
(Also note: the comments section just opened with the Dia de la Semilla Campesina article. Oliver Woods of New Zealand was the first to send a comment. Feel free to join him.)

The rich have become richer, and nearly everyone else has become poorer in the USA during the Bush years.

Is it possible to go in the other direction?

Venezuela, a country where income disparities have been immense for many decades, has been trying to redistribute income more fairly.

Is the Chavez government succeeding?

(Illustration for Robbing US Blind by Matt Wuerker)

All statistics, including economic statistics, can be manipulated, or only partially revealed, so that they demonstrate a foregone ideological conclusion rather than reality. For instance, from 2004 until the beginning of 2006, the United States State Department and the Venezuelan political opposition claimed that the Venezuelan economy was being destroyed by President Chavez and his policies. As evidence, they kept showing the disastrous results for 2003, a year when economic production plunged and the number of people in poverty climbed.

The enemies of Chavez chose not to reveal that the Venezuelan economy was growing by leaps and bounds in 2004 and 2005, and that more people were employed and enjoying significantly higher incomes. And, of course, they did not mention their part in causing the economic disaster of 2003, which was not a result of government policies, but of the opposition’s effort to sabotage and shut down the oil industry and other business enterprises while the U.S. government cheered from the sidelines.

By 2006 and 2007, it was impossible to hide the evidence that the Venezuelan economy had been growing at a tremendous rate for four years running, and that income was being redistributed to the poorer classes in an unprecedented fashion. Some of the relevant economic numbers appeared in a 2007 report generated by two private consulting firms, AC Nielson and Datos, for VenAmCham (The Venezuelan American Chamber of Commerce and Industry). They showed that the poorest economic class, Level E, had more than doubled its income in three years, but their interpretation was still tinged with an anti-government bias.

For example, the title over the table of figures provided in the AC Nielsen/Datos report sounded discouraging, “In the last three years, only the income of Level E has grown in real terms.” Since there are 6 household income levels customarily used in Venezuela -- A,B,C+, C-, D, and E -- this doesn’t sound like much of an achievement. That is, until the reader learns that level E consisted of a solid majority, or 58% of the population in 2003. Level E’s income grew by a whopping 130%, after being corrected for inflation. This in itself should have been reported as extraordinarily good economic news. [1]

But was there bad news?
The same report from AC Nielsen/Datos showed that the next two income classes, Level D and Level C-minus, which comprised 23% and 15% of the population respectively, were doing poorly by comparison. Level D average incomes declined by 6% and Level C-minus declined by 16% between 2003 and 2006. Since these two groups made up nearly 40% of the population, it certainly appeared as if sizable numbers of Venezuelans were being left out of the economic boom.

But not really. Those who prepared the report made a poor decision, or perhaps, a biased decision. They began their calculations in a really poor economic year, 2003, when the shutdown of the state oil company, instigated by its former management and the economic elite, threw the nation into a mini-depression. It would have been better analytical practice if the report had begun with a relatively stable year such as, when solid economic growth was putting Venezuela on a more even footing. If we look at the numbers for 2004-2006 that were cited by AC Nielsen/Datos (see below), they don’t show a huge single-year jump in the incomes of the poorest citizens, but they do reflect a very impressive picture of movement toward a more egalitarian society where the vast majority is improving its economic status.

From 2004 to 2006, there was growth (after adjusting for inflation) in average incomes for all three income groups, E, D. and C-minu (97.6% of the population).

Level C-minus grew 2.2% from 1,888,000B to 1,930,000B

Level D grew 14.3% from 1,025,000B to 1,172,000B

Level E grew 42.1% from 584,000B to 830,000B
(*income adjusted for inflation in 2006 bolívares; the official exchange rate is 2,150 bolívares to the dollar, so, roughly speaking, 1000 bolívares equal about 50 cents, and 1,000,000 bolívares equal about 500 dollars.)

Add another bit of information, things look even better
But there was more to cheer about that was not included in that particular report. Another study, prepared for the Venezuelan Chamber of Commerce in 2007, showed that people at Level E were doing so well that many of them had moved into higher income classes. When 2004 was compared to 2007, the percentage of the population at Level E had shrunk dramatically, from 58% to 45.7%, while the level above, D, had grown 23% to 33.6%. And at Level C-minus, which roughly consists of the lower-middle and middle classes, the percentage also grew, from 15% to 18.3%.[2]

In the table above, level D showed a healthy increase in its average household income of 14.3%, but this doesn’t appear very significant compared to the average household increase at the lower level E of 42.3%. This perception changes, however, if we note that a great many people, more than 10% of the total population, moved up to level D from level E between 2004 and 2007.

This suggests that there’s another way to look at the social impact of incomes earned by those at level D. Instead of looking solely at the increase in average income, one should also consider the aggregate increase in household income at this level. That is, if the total income earned by everyone at level D in 2006 is compared with the total income in 2004, the change is outstanding. The income growth for level D as a whole jumps to 67%.

Increases in aggregate income at the lower income levels in Venezuela, 2004-2006

Level C-minus aggregate income increased 24.8% as its percentage of the population increased from 15% to 18.3%.

Level D aggregate income increased 67% as its percentage of the population increased from 23% to 33.6%.

Level E aggregate income increased 12.2% as its percentage of the population decreased from 58% to 45.7%.

Discouraging news for a few
A truly discouraging number, at least for the political opposition and the big business class, was the one that demonstrated that the small, high-income classes -- Levels A,B, and C-plus -- were shrinking. Together they comprised 4% of the population in 2004, but only 2.4% by 2007. While it is difficult to assess exactly why this happened, we can speculate that at least two factors were probably at work. First, a considerable number of well-off Venezuelans have been moving to the U.S., Colombia, and Europe in recent years, where they either reinvested their capital or pursued high-salaried professions. Secondly, the high rate of inflation in Venezuela has taken a toll on some higher-income people who have fixed earnings derived from interest, rents and domestic investments.

For this reason, the status of the citizens at income level C-minus might not be as rosy as it appears in the table above. Since the number of households at this level increased from 15% to18.3% of the population in just two years, the aggregate income earned by all the households at level C-minus (that is, all of their incomes added together) grew by 22%.

However, there’s a catch here – obviously some people that moved to Level C-minus are not doing as well as they once did. As the percentage people inhabiting the three high-income levels shrank from 4% to 2.4% of the population, many of the missing 1.6% (those who did not fly off to Miami) ended up living a Level C-minus existence. Because of this factor, it would probably be a mistake to overemphasize the aggregate income growth at this level.

The overall picture looks rosy
Obviously, some people who belong to, or used to belong to, the tiny high-income groups are feeling some discomfort. Perhaps their future looks grim. But otherwise, there are three more ways of measuring economic progress in Venezuela that make things look rosy for the huge majority.

First of all, by combining all of the people in all three bottom income groups, which comprised 96% of the households in Venezuela in 2004, and 97.6% at the beginning of 2007, it’s possible to show their overall average income gain from 2004 to 2006.

Growth of the average income for 96% to 97.6% of households*
For the three bottom levels, C-minus, D, and E combined, monthly income in bolívares

From 2004 to 2006 average houshold income increased from 893,000B to 1,154,000B, an increase of 29.2%

(*these levels constituted 96% of the population in 2004, and 97.6% of the population by early 2007. Income adjusted for inflation in 2006 bolívares)

Second, there is a significant way to measure the egalitarian effects of recent income changes in Venezuela. The rapid growth in the incomes of poor and working class incomes is having a rapid leveling effect. In two years, not only did many from level E and level D move up to higher levels, but those who remained within those two classifications, nearly 80% of the Venezuelan population, made gains in relation to level C above them.

The leveling effect of changes in average monthly incomes in Venezuela

Average income at Level D was 54% of Level C-minus in 2004, and 61% in 2006

Average income at Level E was 31% of Level C-minus in 2004, and 43% in 2006

Third, an October 2007 article in one of the dominant opposition newspapers, El Universal, provides some long-term evidence that confirms the rosy picture above. In an article titled “Consumption grows 16% for the fourth consecutive year,” reporter Mariela Leon quoted experts who work for the business establishment. José Antonio Gil Yepes, director of the consulting firm Datanálisis and featured speaker at the annual convention of the National Association of Advertisers, said that “Level D has increased its real income by 60 percentage points in eight years, and Level E by 100 percentage points.”[3]

There is no particular reason to be alarmed by this increased consumption, since the whole country is simply consuming at roughly the same rate that lower class incomes are increasing. The 16% percent annual increases in consumption, compounded over four years, are equal to 81%, about halfway between the long-term gains in income for Levels D and E (60% and 100%.)

Not all business representatives are upset by the consumption boom. The remarks of Eduardo Hernandez, the president of the National Association of Advertisers, indicated that those in the publicity business are simply adapting to the new economic realities. He said that companies have begun to tailor their messages and their products to a different and larger clientele: “There is an orientation of products and services directed much more toward the families with fewer resources.”

Information needed for future analysis
It would be helpful to have more information about what’s happening at the top of the income scale, at Levels A, B, and C+, which together comprise 2.4% of the population. It is quite possible that their high incomes have gone up at least as fast as everyone else’s, especially since they represent a smaller percentage of the whole population than they did previously, and because many of them are business owners. There has been significant growth in banking and the local stock market, and a big boom in the construction of housing, roads, rail lines, hospitals, schools and other public facilities, and almost all of it is contracted out to private businesses.

An even more interesting number would be an estimate of the value of all the government benefits that are now reaching a majority of the population through the social missions: for example, the 40% discounts on food at Mercal stores, free medical care at Barrio Adentro, free community sports and cultural programs, and free education classes for people studying at all levels. All of these things amount to significant “extra income” that is not included in the calculations above. Perhaps more important than their monetary value is something incalculable. These programs give a sense of full citizenship to a great many people who were previously marginalized in Venezuelan society.

In Conclusion
Under the Chavez government, most Venezuelans, particularly the lower classes, are receiving a much larger piece of the economic pie. No wonder this rattles Bush and the ultra-conservatives in the United States, whose political project is causing exactly the opposite effect: the economic status and social well-being of most U.S. citizens have been deteriorating for decades.

(For more on that score, see Steve Brouwer, Sharing the Pie: A Citizen’s Guide to Wealth and Power in the United States (Henry Holt, 1998) and Robbing Us Blind: the Return of the Bush Gang (Common Courage Press, 2004.)

(A word of thanks to Oil Wars, the valuable website that posted many of the economic numbers that I have used in this article.)

[1] “Rebuilding the middle class, bit by bit,” Oil Wars , August 2, 2007
[2] Ibid.
[3] Mariela Leon, “Consumption grows 16% for the fourth consecutive year,” El Universal, October 17, 2007.

La Dia de la Semilla Campesina

2007-10-30T07:11:00.000-07:00

Campesinos from all over the area set up tables displaying their seeds. So did these girls from the school in Monte Carmelo.

The third annual “Dia de la Semilla Campesina” was celebrated on October 29th in Monte Carmelo. The whole town was involved in preparing for the hundreds of visitors, some of them coming from as far away as Maracay, Trujillo, and Caracas.

Our neighbor, Cesar Garcia, has an extensive collection of local seeds. Many people trade seeds with each other.

Events began at 9 a.m. with a mass celebrated by Father Mario, one of the members of La Alianza Cooperative. He praised the earth and the seeds and emphasized the need for harmonious relationships among humankind, plants, animals, and God. At this particular moment, Mario said, the primary enemy of these relationships is money and global capitalism, especially never-ending drive to accumulate capital by multinational corporations that are attacking the integrity of seeds and campesino life with their reckless production and dissemination of newly invented, transgenetic seeds. Children from the local schools offered prayers they had composed, some asking God to forgive us for the damage we had done to the Earth.

Father Mario, who is usually seen working in the fields above the village, has an easy-going style on the occasional Sundays or holidays when he appears in church. He asks questions of the audience and they feel free to stand and offer social commentary, scientific speculation, and general opinions and anecdotes.

Declaration of the Campesina Seed

We, the campesino seeds, gathered in assembly with

the campesinos and campesinas of Monte Carmelo, declare:

That we are the nutritious hope of our people.

That for centuries we have filled stomachs,

pockets, marusas, bags, and granaries.

That we are part of the Venezuelan people,

because we are all togetherat breakfast, lunch, merienda and dinner.

That, besides being nourishment, we are also medicine

and happiness forthe campesinos and campesinas.

That we create and give life when our love merges

with the love of the humble and unassuming people of the fields;

and that we love being grownas we were grown in the past,

without being mistreated.

That, despite the persecution and mistreatment we have received

from other seeds that are more powerful than us,

we are still curled up safely in Monte Carmelo.

That, with courage and bravery we have resisted the harshness

of herbicides and insecticides that have been spread over us.

That we are born from the womb of Mother Earth
and we cry with her because she’s damaged and unloved.
That we love being caressed by fresh water once we are sowed.
That we are friends of the insects, birds and microorganisms that
sing us songs of love and fertility

in the voice of patriotism and national identity.
For these reasons and many more we proclaim to the world:

That we need to unite with all the seeds in the world,

especially those in Latin-America and the Caribbean.

That all of us seeds should organize ourselves in cooperatives
in order to defend our existence.

That those who aren’t familiar with us should get to know us,
so that they can help us reproduce andsupport us in our struggles for justice.
That the creation of indigenous Seed Banks

should be promoted in every Venezuelan village.

That love for us should be promoted in schools, high-schools, universities

and all other centers of education.

That girls and boys should play with us when they are washing us for dinner.

That, as nourishment, we should never be missing
at the tables of any Venezuelans.

That the campesino seeds should be able to enjoy life
with men, women, boys, girls, and young people
in an environment free of contamination
by toxic agricultural substances and industrial waste;

and to avoid, by any means necessary, being displaced

by imported and transgenetic seeds;

and to be ourselves, with our own flavor, color and aroma.

The seeds of Monte Carmelo, together with their hardworking friends,
the faithful inhabitants of this village;

declare that this day, October 29th,

is the Day of the Campesino Seed

so that it will be celebrated
every year on this date in all of Venezuela,

with the respect and appropriate honors that signify

that this is a memorable a day for the Venezuelan people.

Finally, the seeds present in this assembly
agree by consensus and unanimously
to spread copies of this declaration throughout the whole world.

Signed, sealed, and delivered in Monte Carmelo,
on the 29th day of the month of October, 2005.
On behalf of the seeds named above,

The Paspasa Seed (Gaudy Maria Garcia, 2005)

Friday note: corrections and question

2007-10-19T06:46:00.000-07:00

A nice feature of a blog is that you can easily change, correct, and add to previous posts. On a previous entry on RCTV and freedom of the press, I made some mistakes describing the course of events at the National Assembly when pro-RCTV students walked out on their chance to take part in a nationally televized debate with the pro-government students. After re-reading an excellent article by George Ciccariello-Maher, a doctoral student from Berkeley who lives in Caracas and was at the scene, I´ve corrected the inaccuracies.

This entry is worth re-reading because the opposition is now calling for help from the U.S. State Department. Manuel Rosales, the governor of the State of Zulia who lost overwhelmingly to Chavez in the presidential election last December, just met with Undersecretary of State for the Western Hemisphere Thomas Shannon in Washington and asked directly for help in putting ¨international pressure¨on Venezuela (we can assume he will also get help from the CIA and other experienced ¨helpers¨) in order to derail and/or de-legitimize the constitutional reform process and vote that will take place in December. Rosales makes the strange claim that a vote to reform the constitution is in fact a ¨constitutional coup d etat.¨ (In 2002, Rosales showed up at the presidential palace in Caracas to shake hands with those who carried out a real coup against Chavez)

Also, the other day at the National Theater in Caracas, opposition supporters and reporters acted very aggressively as they tried to interrupt and provoke a confrontation with pro-reform students who were trying to speak. This may be sign that more attempts to provoke violence
or frighten the populace before the vote.

A reader has written to ask what´s happening locally in response to the proposed reforms and I just answered the following (I´ll follow up with a longer article in the future):

The constitutional reforms are being talked about all the time. There are fairly large public meetings, discussions at comunity councils, and also smaller neighborhood meetings. I´ve actually bumped into some of these in Sanare by accident, because neighbors have pulled 15 or 20 chairs out of their houses and set up a meeting on the sidewalk -- people have copies of the reforms in front of them and pick out the ones they want to know more about. Sentiment around here is very much pro-reform, although a couple of small business owners have told me they think Chavez is crazy and they think all private property will be abolished someday, including theirs.

Television talk shows are doing a good job of explaining each provision in detail, the possible ramifications, and changes that are being proposed before the vote in December. I´ve had good discussions with campesino neighbors in front of their TVs -- they have a much better grasp of each provision than the small businessmen above. Last night at one house we talked about the land reform law that would affect latifundios (this is probably a reform that is scaring the small business types),which will no longer be able to larger than 5,000 hectares (still really big, more than 10,000 acres). This seemed pretty huge to me since there are no farms close to that size around here, but my neighbors said the reform was crucial to getting people resettled and working in agriculture. They pointed out that there are many latifundia many times larger than 5,000 hectares in los llanos and the southern and eastern states of Venezuela.

Agro-ecology Activism

2007-10-15T06:38:00.000-07:00

(Our little hamlet is becoming a hot-bed of socialist, environmentalist activity. Gaudy Garcia, author of ¨Declaracion de la Semilla Campesina,¨ is seated on the right, with our friend Gaby from Argentina)

The 2nd Reunion of the Agro-ecologists of Monte Carmelo was held last weekend on Saturday, October 6. About fifty people attended, about one third of them from Monte Carmelo and Sanare, and the rest from the States of Lara, Portuguesa, Yaracuy, and Aragua as well as from the big cities of Maracaibo, Maracay, and Caracas. There were eight hours of spirited presentations and discussion sponsored by William Izarra and El Centro de Formación Ideológica (Center for Ideological Formation.)

Izarra, a retired Air Force commander, is dedicating himself to intellectual projects which will advance socialist thought and practice in the nation. Before Chavez came along, there was already a movement of intellectually engaged, revolutionary-minded officers in the military. Izarra, who as a young officer had studied at Harvard, tried to form a military-civilian coalition for radical change in the 1980s.

The meeting focused on the need to keep pressing forward with models of socialist agriculture based on sustainable development, while discouraging and successfully opposing models of agriculture that are allied with the methods and purposes of the transnational corporations.

Local activists and resource people, such as Omar and Gaudy Garcia and the Morochos, were pleasantly surprised that four of the visitors were Air Force officers from the country’s central air base in Maracay. This was the first time that they can remember that environmental activists from within the military have attended an agro-ecology event.

One officer named Mota said that sustainable development had become a primary concern of their socialist study group at the air base, and they were ready to lend their support to any groups that needed help. Shortly thereafter, a young man from Tamborla, a very isolated mountain area at least 3 hours by jeep roads from Sanare, described the rapidly growing cooperative in his area, comprised of more than 1200 members from 24 scattered hamlets. When he mentioned that it was difficult to get attention from the government, the military men sat down with him and made a firm date for meeting with the cooperative and learning about their environmental initiatives.

Near the end of the eight-hour meeting, Mota relays a greeting and a message of commitment from Air Force officers at the main base in Maracay.

His colleague, a burly fellow named Wilfredo, was taking notes in a planner/notebook adorned with photos and quotations of the Zapatistas, the revolutionary indigenous group that is controlling a good part of the state of Chiapas in southern Mexico. When I complimented him on his notebook, Wilfredo said, “We admire the Zapatistas a lot, not just for their unconventional tactics of resistance, but because they have a real dedication to egalitarian ethics and a respect for biodiversity. Some in our group have traveled to Mexico to meet with them.”

(Clearly this is a different kind of military. One of the Monte Carmelo residents said afterwards, “They’re using their brains for themselves now, not just waiting for orders from the top.”)

Issues and Activists

Izarra and the officers didn’t hog the stage. In fact, they were content to listen and learn from those who have been environmental activists, educators, and organic farmers for many years. El Negro Morocho, Juan Jose Escalona, otherwise known as “the anthropologist,” spoke about the harmonious relationship that humans once had in “Dintas,” the ancient Indian name for the Sanare area. “There was a magic relationship between the Indians, the land, the animals, and the air,” he said. “The first socialists and the first cooperative members were the Indians who lived in this area. In most parts of the municipality, the production system of ‘la mano vuelta’ (families working cooperatively in planting and harvesting) still existed thirty years ago.”
Walterio Lanz, a veteran ecologist and educator from the state of Aragua, gave a comprehensive presentation he entitled “Fraude,” that is, the fraud perpetrated by the so-called “revolución verde” (Green Revolution) in agriculture. The new agricultural processes that were introduced after World War II, according to Lanz, constituted “a state of warfare” which depopulated the countryside and made campesinos flee to the city. But this time, the war against the campesinos was not really about transferring power to elites in the cities (as had happened in the past all over Latin America), for the level of control was shifted not to the transnational level where giant corporations reigned supreme.

Transnational corporations produce and control the five vital elements of modern agriculture that are destroying the countryside: 1) tractors and other mechanized equipment, 2) chemical herbicides, 3) poisonous insectides, 4) synthetic fertilizers, 5) adulterated seeds. Mechanized agriculture, especially in tropical zones, said Lanz, is in the process of annihilating the soil. The adulteration of seeds and the patents on the genetic structure of plants are forces that are wiping out the accumulated work (an enormous, incalculable amount of agricultural “capital”) produced by 3,,500 years of effort on the part of the peoples of the Americas. “What do people and the land have left to show for their collective efforts?” asked Lanz, “when they were the ones who improved the soils, and created and developed thousands of varieties of seeds.”

Local activist and co-op farmer, Omar Garcia, explained the virtues of horse-power as opposed to tractor power.

Local co-op farmer and activist, Omar Garcia, spoke about the virtues of horse-drawn plows that are very practical on many of steep mountainsides in the vicinity of Monte Carmelo and Sanare. “Not only can the horse negotiate terrain that the tractor cannot handle, but he fertilizes the soil at the same time.” Local farmers figure that a horse can plow a hectare of land (more than two acres) in eight hours. Since plots of land are small, there is no reason to have a tractor that can plow twenty hectares in a day. After performing a few days work, limited to the more level pieces of land, the tractor has to sit idle for the rest of the year. Omar and others cited studies that demonstrate that tractor wheels do severe damage as they compact the earth in tropical areas; apparently this is happening in the hot lowlands of Venezuela, where the soils are particularly fragile.

At the end of the meeting, there were resolutions to keep focusing the organizational energy of agro-ecological activists on the state and national governments and pushing them toward models of sustainable development. There were also disagreements based, in part, on the different backgrounds of participants.

Alfredo Mendoza, from the State of Portuguesa, retired after 18 years of working for AT&T so that he could devote his energies to cultivating coffee on his small farm. He believes that small coffee farmers and their families around the world can be turned into 25 million forestry experts, growing and maintaining shade-grown, high-quality coffee plants in ways that preserve the soil and the environment. If they are connected directly through cooperatives to those organizations in the North who sell “comercio justo” (fair trade) coffee, then they can be guaranteed prices that will lift even the smallest producers out of poverty.

Venezuela, he pointed out, is in a better position to do this than other countries, since its 19th century coffee industry was the most highly developed in the world, but was nearly abandoned after the 20th century oil boom discouraged all kinds of agricultural activity in the country. Most Venezuelan coffee plants belong to two of the most desirable varieties for premium coffee, “tipica” and “borbon,” and they are usually grown in the traditional “criollo” method, under high shade trees on small plots of land (the size of the average coffee farm is 6.5 acres.) Thus, most Venezuelan coffee growers could convert to premium, fair trade production almost at once, especially since the government is offering various kinds of support byencouraging cooperative enterprises, alleviating poverty in the rural areas through the “Campo Adentro” program, and offering loans and grants to small producers.

While this kind of agricultural development sounded like an improvement to many participants, Leobardo Acurero, of the Center of Ecological Investigation and Information (CINECO), took issue with all kinds of farming that are primarily for export. He said that producing primary raw materials, including foodstuffs, for the capitalist North has been the downfall of economic and social development for Venezuela and other nations of the South for centuries.

Leobardo felt that coffee production, if anything, should be curtailed rather than encouraged, so that the rich mountain soils can be returned to their most valuable use -- growing healthy, organic food to sustain the farm families and the rest of the nation.
He isn’t just spouting environmental dreams, since for several years he and others have operated a cooperatively-owned, organic farming community, Buenos Aires, that lies high in the mountains on the other side of the nearby city of Tocuyo.

I’m not sure he would approve of my compromise position: encouraging cash-crop production of coffee using organic techniques while also urging each family and cooperative community to expand organic food production in their “conucos,” the large gardens that are traditionally dedicated to growing food for household consumption.

El Dia de la Semilla, October 29th

Some of you may know that October 12th was “El Dia de la Resistencia Indígena,” and maybe you went out into your local community and pulled down a statue of Christopher Columbus to protest the Conquest, which some protesters did in Caracas a few years ago when the first “Day of Indigenous Resistance” was celebrated. (President Chavez criticized the vandals and had the statues restored.)

But you probably didn’t know that October 29th is La Dia de la Semilla, “the day of the seed,” since it was inaugurated right here in Monte Carmelo by Gaudy Garcia and a few other local women two years ago. This year the agro-ecologists who visited on October 6th are returning to join in the celebration. They are hoping it will eventually become a national holiday.

Gaudy and other local activists like the Morochos have also been campaigning for a “banco de semillas,” a seed bank for storing and circulating the thousands of varieties of seeds that are native to this region. If they can find financing for the project, the Seed Bank may be established here in Monte Carmelo.

The seeds speak for themselves in “The Declaration of the Seed” of October 29, 2005.
Here are some excerpts:

“We, the campesino seeds, gathered in assembly with the men and women farmers of Monte Carmelo, declare: that we are our people’s hope for good nutrition.

“…. that we should form cooperatives of seeds to protect our existence

“…. that the campesino seeds should be able to live and enjoy themselves in the company of men, women, and children in an environment without agro-toxins and industrial wastes, and to avoid elimination (‘a capa y espalda’) and displacement by transgenetic and imported seeds.”

(by Gaudy Maria Garcia)

El Dia de la Resistencia Indigena

2007-10-11T10:58:00.000-07:00

CONQUEST AND CAPITALISM 1492-1992

When I painted the illustration for the cover of my book (Big Picture Books, 1992), I dreamed of a day when we would be celebrating resistance and liberation instead of capitalist conquest on the 12th of October. Well, dreams do come true. Tomorrow in Venezuela will be the Day of Indigenous Resistance. I´m hoping that Evo Morales will also be celebrating in Bolivia.

The figures depicted above were being herded into the silver mines in Potosi, Peru (now part of Bolivia) in the 16th century. The third chapter of Conquest and Capitalism begins with a pen and ink version of this picture and reads:

1573 - Potosi, sitting at about 14,000 feet altitude in the Andes, had become a city of 120,000 people. It was probably the most expensive city on earth, and certainly the cruelest:

On Sunday morning the Indians emerged from the mines, they drank, they danced, and then they collapsed on the ground.

On Monday morning they were beaten with iron bars and herded into the mountain where they crept many miles, deeper and deeper into the darkness.

For six days bent over in the dust and the smoke, they mined for silver with their picks and shovels.

On Saturday night they started walking, retracing their steps through the seemingly endless tunnels, so that they might emerge again on Sunday morning.

1600 - a priest who was new in Potosi exclaimed: I don´t want to see this portrait of hell!

So close your eyes! said another Spaniard.

I can´t, with my eyes shut I see even more.

The campesinos are the professors: cooperatives and Bolivarian education

2007-10-11T10:43:00.000-07:00

Las Lajitas and La Alianza have become an integral link in local and national experiments in Bolivarian education. The cooperative farm (see an earlier article about La Alianza and Polilla) has become a teaching resource, and during the last three weeks of September they hosted three different five-day workshops. (For clarification: La Alianza is the farming cooperative that owns three different parcels of land; Las Lajitas is one of those parcels, and it produces 100% organically grown vegetables, makes yogurt, and has the facilities in its “casa campesina” - a large, extended farmhouse - for hosting seminars of 25 or 30 people for a week or more. )

First, they welcomed a group from the traditionally Afro-Venezuelan area of Barlovento, the coastal cacao-growing region just east of Caracas; these people are currently trying to organize a farming cooperative to produce their own food. Next, they hosted some government workers, mostly from Caracas, who labor in the Ministries of Agriculture and Environment -- some of these people had never been on a farm before.

After one of Polilla’s classes on vermiculture and improving soils, one student from the Agricultural Ministry, who had never met a cow, decided she wanted to pet one. When Polilla helped her get closer, she wasn’t sure she needed to touch it after all.

Finally, last week an entirely different group came from Caracas, students and professors from the brand-new UBV, Universidad Bolivariana Venezolana (Venezuelan Bolivarian University), who are in their third year of studying a new academic discipline, “Agroecologia,” or agricultural ecology. The UBV was founded a few years ago in many locations throughout the country as a new kind of university that serves those who were previously excluded from higher education. Most of the students are from the poor barrios of Caracas, and they stand little chance of gaining admission to the elite universities.

I spoke to members of each group and attended some classes with them, and they all found the experience exciting, intellectually challenging, and physically bracing -- not because of the field work, but on account of the cool nights. “It’s frigid up here,” said one guy who is accustomed to the lower altitudes near the coast, “especially after a nice cold shower.”

One of the professors who accompanied the students from Caracas, Isabel Ramon y Rivera, said that the intellectual challenge of Agro-ecology was just as great for teachers as for students. “After all, my university training was in chemistry, so I have to work hard to the develop a curriculum for my students since we’re in the process of inventing a new discipline.”

There was one evening class for the students from UBV that was conducted by someone who is not a member of La Alianza Cooperative, Honorio Dam, the director of rural education for the municipality. Honorio is not really an outsider, however, since he and five other Sanare residents -- including Los Morochos and Renato Agagliato, a linguist and director of the Sanare library -- have been working with the co-op for years as an educational resource team.

Honorio presented a highly concentrated dose of “Venezuelan Agricultural History” that was designed to spur the curiosity and imaginations of the Agro-ecology students. He pointed out that settled populations have been living in villages and cities in Venezuela for more than three millennia. During almost all of this period, he said, more than 29 centuries, society was based on agriculture. What a contrast with the recent social development of Venezuela, based on petroleum production, that has only existed for eighty years.

Honorio pointed out that the agriculture of Venezuela was also the agriculture of all America. The farmers in this hemisphere developed a tremendous variety of nourishing vegetables, foods like potatoes and corn that sustained the great early American civilizations and now nourish a large part of the world. Over thousands of years these foods arrived in Venezuela – corn from North America (Mexico), potatoes from the Southwest (Peru), and yucca from the South (Brazil.) Combined with alimentation of local origin, such as caraota (beans) and cacao, these foods provided a sound basis for sustaining settled communities in an ecologically sound manner over the centuries.

Honorio stretched out a green string that was over thirty feet long and said it was time line going back thousands of years. Along the string he placed archeological objects and different packs of seeds to illustrate when new technologies, such as smoothly crafted stone axes, and new foods were introduced. I was surprised to find out that maiz (corn) from Mexico and Central America arrived in Venezuela a little sooner than potatoes from the western Andes.

Rebuilding a more balanced society

One of the tragic effects of recent economic development, caused by the 20th century petroleum boom, was the drastic shift of the Venezuelan population from rural to urban areas in the past fifty years. Now at least 80% of the people live in and around cities, a great many of them in the barrios where poverty is endemic and opportunities for work and education have been limited. Another effect of this negative economic and social development was the vast accumulation of petroleum dollars in the hands of a well-to-do minority, and this made it possible for the nation to import most of its food, as much as 78% by some calculations. Thus a vast amount of rich and arable land lies idle.

Rebuilding Venezuela as a strong agricultural country with its own means of “endogenous desarrollo” (development from within) will not be easy or quick. This is one reason that the academic discipline of “Agro-ecologia” has been created, so that teachers, consultants, and fellow workers will be available to guide other citizens toward ecologically sustainable methods of farming and living in rural areas. One key to developing long-term local agriculture is the necessity of protecting the species and seeds of plants that have belonged to the people and the geographic area for thousands of years.

This has important political consequences. There is concern here, and in many other developing countries, about the power of multinational chemical corporations, such as Monsanto, Dow, DuPont, and Cargill. Many scientists and grass-roots activists feel that the giant companies threaten (and will ultimately damage) the world’s agricultural heritage as they seek to acquire and change the genetic structure of plants. They are already doing on a vast scale with important foods like corn and tomatoes in the United States, with ill effects for small farmers within the U.S. and neighboring countries like Mexico.

La Ley de la Tierra and national sovereignty over agriculture

I heard about “La Ley de la Tierra,” the Law of Land, when it was enacted in 2001. It was one of the major reasons that the political opposition tried to topple the Chavez government with a military/big business coup in 2002. One part of the law that really frightened wealthy Venezuelans was a provision that allowed the government to confiscate idle land (but only after paying for it at market prices) and redistribute it to landless campesinos.

The opposition still talks about an imminent attack on all private property owners, even though the Chavez government has only used the law very selectively to pressure a few giant landowners. For instance, Lord Vecsey, who resides in England and operates a multinational beef-ranching business with branches all over the world, was required to sell some of his thousands of acres that were either unused or had been purchased with false titles.

But there is another provision of La Ley de La Tierra that was unknown to me until recently, but was mentioned by one of the professors at the seminar at Las Lajitas. Article 19 states that the government must guard the integrity and heritage of the land, and in particular its duty to protect “el germoplasmo de las semillas” – that is to protect the genetic integrity of seeds and cast a wary eye on those who traffic in new genetic substances.

This is one of many developments in Venezuela that legitimize this new field of Agro-ecology, and it sheds light on the importance of creating committed specialists. These students, when they graduate, will be in the front lines of those resisting transnational corporate initiatives that market transgenetic species. They also, in their role of trying to reduce the use of environmentally harmful fertilizers and pesticides, will be trying to counteract the immense power of the chemistry industry and all its associated helpers, many of whom still reside within the old government and educational bureaucracies.

Professor Isabel, right edge of picture, and her students watch Honorio place pottery fragments on the time line of Venezuelan agriculture.

Los Morochos, education, and culture

2007-10-09T05:46:00.000-07:00

They are called Los Morochos – “the twins.” Juan José Escalona and Juan Ramón Escalona are identical, immediately recognizable with their shaggy hair and beards, and known by just about everybody in the Sanare area. And they, in turn, know just about everything that is to be known about Sanare and Monte Carmelo, from the days of prehistory to the present day.

El Negro Morocho (“the black twin”), on the left above, is also known as “the anthropologist” because he has been studying the local population, its origins and its habits, all his life. He never had the opportunity to attend a university as a youth, but he has written ethnographic studies and books on the history and oral traditions of the area. Scholars from other parts of Venezuela visit Sanare to consult with him. Currently he is also employed in the restoration of ancient relics, particularly pottery, at the nearby archeological museum in Quibor.

Then there’s El Catire Morocho (“the light-colored twin” who really isn’t any whiter than his brother – Venezuelans simply like to give each other goofy nicknames like that.) He likes to draw, paint, and write long, narrative poems about political and social events of local and national interest. He is currently employed by the local school district to as a social worker/protector of abused and neglected children. He also encourages neighborhood kids to paint and draw, which means his house is piled high with local art, plus almost any other collectible artifact you can imagine. For instance, “los palos,” or sticks – there’s a big basket full of these next to their couch.

These “palos” aren’t just any sticks, but the traditional walking and fighting sticks once carried by the indigenous people in the surrounding countryside. They aren’t big, a little less than three feet long and about an inch in diameter, but sturdy enough to support one’s weight on the steep mountainsides or to dispatch a sharp blow to a wild pig or dog, a snake in the path, or a disagreeable human intruder. Some are completely plain and stripped of their bark, others are carved and decorated with feathers or paint and serve a variety of ceremonial purposes, especially in the dances that are native to the area.

The view of Monte Carmelo from the Morochos´ farmhouse

The Morochos share some local history

On Sunday, I climbed up the steep and rutted road that twists up the mountainside and leads to the family farm of the Morochos. The Escalona family, which includes their five brothers and sisters (two others have passed away), uses the house on weekends and lends it out for free to various groups and individuals who need to retreat or meet in a tranquil spot. They also let their neighbors graze their cows and pick berries on their ten acres of land.

Both Morochos were relaxing after taking a leading role in a nine-hour meeting on Sustainable Argiculture and the Revolution that took place in Monte Carmelo the day before. But, as always, they were happy to spend a few hours talking, so they filled me in on some personal and local history.

The Morochos now reside in a house in Sanare with their sister and her kids, but the farmhouse was their home as children. After they completed elementary school (the only school in Monte Carmelo in those days), the boys began a rigorous routine: they milked the cows and did other farm chores in the morning, then walked an hour and a half to Sanare to attend the liceo (which is equivalent to middle school and high school combined.) It was a four-mile hike on the winding road that descends a thousand feet to the valley below, then climbs back up about four hundred feet to Sanare. When they made the arduous climb back home, it was dark.

They didn’t mind the trip because life became exciting in the mid-1970s for fourteen and fifteen year-olds. The mountainous regions of Lara and other neighboring states were home to clandestine groups of armed revolutionaries in those days. These rebels were fairly inactive as far as fighting was concerned (the government had already crushed more serious guerrilla rebellions in the 1960s), but they were helping to stir up local protests on behalf of the campesinos who helped shelter them, and were working with other political activists who were not so interested in armed rebellion.

This latter group included the Morochos and other politically active high school students who developed contacts with the different clandestine groups: one group was loyal to a revolutionary named Douglas Bravo, another was associated with the Socialist League, and a third was called El Comite Lucha Popular (the Committee for the Battle of the People). The youths distributed newspapers printed by all three revolutionary factions and their followers, and they joined popular protests over the conditions that local campesinos had to endure: deteriorating schools, lack of health care, and poor quality drinking water.

Within a short time, the Morochos and their fellow students formed their own group, “2 Febrero” (named after the date of a student uprising during Bolivar’s War of Independence), that met regularly to study local problems and work on solutions. Their biggest contribution was their own political magazine, called “Tizon,” which they published regularly for five years.

At the same time that high school kids were learning how to take part in effective protests in Sanare, a few of them were also influenced by a new development in Monte Carmelo.
Three priests, two of them Italians, had come to Venezuela in 1975-76 after being driven out of Argentina by the wave of government terror and repression that swept through the countries of the Southern Cone in those years. They were members of the religious congregation called the Little Brothers of Jesus (a French order of worker/priests committed to living among the poor), and they settled in the hamlets of Monte Carmelo and nearby Bojo.

One of these priests, Arturo Paoli, was an influential thinker and writer in the ranks of those who created a “theology of liberation” in Latin America. Some of his books, such as “El rostro de tu hermano,” were written during his years in Monte Carmelo. As in thousands of other places throughout the Americas, Catholics were forming “base communities” that were determined to change the Church – they wanted to take a hierarchical institution with centuries-old loyalty to the elite, and re-form it into a “people’s church” that would meet the spiritual and material needs of the common people and the poor.

Various people gathered around Arturo Paoli in Monte Carmelo, including campesinos from the fields and students like the Morochos, and they discussed all kinds of things that could effect their lives: an understanding of the Bible and Jesus’ message to the poor, the history of Latin America and Europe, the social inequalities that affected land ownership and food production, and the usefulness of Marxist ideas about the political economy.

Out of this fertile mix of politics and religion new kinds of local institutions emerged. For instance, there was a highly popular theatre group that wrote and performed plays that outlined the history of rebellions and protests in the area. There were also two initiatives that survive to this day: the creation of farming communities that produce high quality, mostly organic food, and the idea of a “campesino university” that would serve rural people who never had the opportunity to attend high school or college. Both of these ideas are embodied today in the activities of La Cooperativa Mixta La Alianza, which is currently teaching other cooperatives in Venezuela how to organize and how to farm.

Dintas

Over the years, the Morochos have found time to keep writing about local history and legends. One outstanding work that they produced jointly is called Dintas, the ancient Indian name for the Sanare area (the Andres Eloy Blanco municipality); it was published as a complementary school text with the approval of the Education Ministry of the State of Lara in 1997. This illustrated, 110-page book is designed to introduce elementary school students -- 4th, 5th and 6th graders -- to the history and geography of the area.

Dintas traces the course of historical change over thousands of years and gives a vivid depiction of the natural environment, and it also urges students to make some historical and social judgments: “Are we living as happily as our ancestors, the Coyones Indians, did in ancient times? What good things and bad things have happened over the centuries? How are we going to make this little piece of Venezuela turn back into the paradise that we would like?”

(Another blog entry on Bolivarian Education and the Cooperative will appear soon.)

Freedom of the Press in Venezuela

2007-10-01T07:43:00.000-07:00

A conversation today with Carlos “El Navegante” (The Navigator, according to the sign on his jeep) reminded me that I had never posted the article I was writing in June about freedom of speech and the media here in Venezuela. Carlos is a driver in the taxi cooperative that transports 8 to 12 people at time between Monte Carmelo and Sanare in an assortment of old jeeps, SUVs, and pick-up trucks.

While we were waiting for others to arrive at the taxi stop, Carlos said he was glad to know I was writing about Venezuela. “I don’t think people in the United States have any idea how much freedom we have here, we can say and write anything we want. I think we are practicing a unique kind of socialism here, since the government never censures the press and businesses are free to pursue their private affairs and make money. The media in the U.S. is spreading lies about Chavez being a dictator and a tyrant.”

“True,” I replied, “the Bush Administration and the U.S.media really played up the story about RCTV and freedom of speech, as if RCTV was being shut down unfairly.”

“That had nothing to do with freedom of the press!” insisted Carlos. “RCTV did not get to renew their lease as a nationwide network, but this is exactly like someone who rents a house from you. You allow them to stay in the house until the end of their lease, but then, when the time is up, you are free to rent it to someone else who can make better use of the house. In this case, another channel has a chance to use the publicly owned airwaves and produce better programming for the nation. I don’t think this concept is so difficult to understand.”

Some Opinions about “Free Speech” and Private TV in Venezuela, June 2007

Mario thought the government had made a mistake: five years ago.

When Mario exhibits his work, he tries to get gallery owners and museum officials to allow the forbidden: “Let people touch the sculptures!”

Mario says that those with perfectly good eyesight, who all their lives have been admonished by museum guards “not to touch,” are really excited when they get to lay their hands on the sensuous curves of his sculptures.

Mario lives in Maracaibo and creates beautiful works in ceramics and wood. Because he himself is blind, he sometimes offers sculpture workshops for sight-challenged students. At the end of May, as he was heading to one of these workshops in San Carlos, he spent the evening chatting with us in Sanare.

While Mario was willing to talk about art that night, he was more interested in discussing politics and intellectual freedom. This was the week that the Chavez government was being accused by the national and international press of suppressing free speech because it did not renew the nationwide broadcasting license of a major station, RCTV. Most of the Venezuelans I talked to thought the government had done the right thing in denying the station an extension of its license.

Except for Mario, who spent many years in the U.S. and was educated there; he thought the government was at fault. “I think the government should have shut down RCTV four or five years ago,” he said. “The government was weak at the time and didn’t respond at all after Granier [the owner of RCTV] and his station participated in the coup against Chavez in 2002 and then encouraged the sabotage of the national oil industry in 2003. Granier lost all legal right to hold a broadcast license. There was no reason to wait for his 20-year license to expire this year. Besides, the quality of their programming has always been awful.”

Irlanda, a progressive Catholic and a school teacher, had emphasized the same thing earlier that day. Because she works with women’s groups and students on issues of violence, sexuality, and gender discrimination, she was elated that RCTV’s soap operas would no longer be aired. “They are blatantly sexist and stupid and, in a sense, pornographic. The relationships depicted between men and women -- most of them rich and white, materialistic and shallow -- are demeaning to everyone concerned. I’d like my high school students to see shows where the people have more respect for each other, where sex is connected to feelings of love, and where the actors look more like the rest of us.”

Antonio, whom we had just seen in Caracas, disagreed with the decision not to renew RCTV’s license: “Of course, they deserved to be shut down – not only does everyone know that RCTV participated in the coup in 2002, but they admitted it themselves. But my worry is that right now this simply plays into the hands of the U.S. State Department and right-wing media around the world – they keep looking for reasons to make our government look like a dictatorship – this episode with RCTV will only be used to present us in a bad light.”

Antonio has worked as a petroleum engineer and as a manager of construction projects in the private and public sectors. He holds a masters degree in business management from the University of Dublin, but he also has many friends who are writers and film directors. He thinks the government’s proposal, to replace RCTV with a public station that produces its own independent programming, something like the BBC or PBS, is quite feasible: “The government has already invested in studios and projects that are giving lots of these young artists the opportunity and freedom to produce their own videos and films and documentaries. So, they are already prepared to make some good shows from a variety of perspectives.”

Then he added a cautionary note, “Let’s hope the things they produce find their way onto to the new channel, TVes.” He said he hopes that the government will keep itself out of the process and allow these new TV creators the freedom they deserve. In his experience, the Venezuelan bureaucracies often are cumbersome and inefficient, and are not yet free of the old Venezuelan curses of corruption and cronyism.

“Freedom” to own the press, freedom to monopolize the news

For two weeks at the end of May and the beginning of June, thousands of Venezuelan university students began marching in the streets of Caracas. Most of them had two distinct minority characteristics: they were white and upper class. They complained about the loss of their freedom of speech, but they were speaking and yelling very freely.

In fact, the protests had nothing to do with freedom of expression, but rather with the freedom of capital to assert unlimited control over the public broadcasting airwaves. They were supporting the right of one rich Venezuelan, Marcel Granier, to renew a broadcasting license that had expired. Granier was one of a handful of citizens in Venezuela who enjoyed real freedom of speech on TV. He owned a major television station (Radio Caracas TV) that had nationwide network status, and he asserted personal control over the programming.

In most countries of the world, including many others that have a great respect for human rights, Granier would have been stripped of his broadcasting license years ago (and perhaps, put in jail.) In 2002, he and RCTV directly aided the coup that ousted President Chavez from office for two days, yet he and many other co-conspirators were never arrested for treason. For the next five years RCTV kept broadcasting a steady stream of anti-Chavez invective.

This busload of demonstrators – who supported the government – got stuck in traffic jam next to us and may not have made it to the demonstration in favor of closing RCTV.

The Protests and Coverage by the “Free” Press of the North

The U.S. media gave considerable attention to the students protesting on behalf of RCTV. These young people were allowed to march, stop traffic, and chant, even when they did had not complied with the requirements of requesting a police permit in advance. Generally they were handled very gently by the police, although a couple of times the police broke up a march after some participants bombarded the peace officers with stones and big chunks of concrete sidewalk. There were many more police injured than demonstrators. Some of the early marches drew ten thousand participants, but gradually the enthusiasm for street demonstrations waned.

While the demonstrations were still going on in the streets, the North American press kept the headlines coming on a daily basis. The Bloomsburg network ran a typical headline, “Thousands protest closing of television station,” that was a fair enough description, because at some of the marches there were 5 or 10 thousand people showing up.

One day, June 2nd, the U.S. media had a chance to provide some balance by covering the other side of the issue, since many people were also demonstrating in support of Chavez. Once again, a typical headline read: “Thousands march in support of government shutting down RCTV.”

This may seem like balanced coverage, but it was not. The media conveniently avoided mentioning that on this particular day “thousands” meant five hundred thousand (the low estimate), or a thousand thousand (many sources estimated over a million participants) – fifty to a hundred times more than the biggest turnout in support of RCTV earlier in the week.

On that day, Saturday June 2, I was returning to Caracas from the city of Barquisimeto and hoping to see the march before getting on a plane for Miami. But I never got close. An enormous traffic jam of would-be demonstrators engulfed us for more than two hours. Alongside us were hundreds of buses and thousands of cars full of people waving banners and chanting -- they didn’t get to the march on time either. As we were waiting, I telephoned a friend, a fellow U.S. citizen and long-time resident of Venezuela who was at this pro-government march, and he said it was like a gigantic fiesta.

In the case of the smaller, pro-RCTV demonstrations, there had also been people from the United States taking part, including some Venezuelan-Americans who flew down from Miami and were interviewed by The Miami Herald. Among the other North American participants, according to veteran journalist and essayist Luis Britto Garcia, was Rowen Rosten, CIA chief for Latin America. A picture of him grinning amidst the protests was captured by an enterprising Caracas cameraman.

The Pro-RCTV students blow it

Several days after the huge anti-RCTV, pro-government march, the National Assembly hosted a remarkable event. It invited twenty students, ten who supported the pro-RCTV
position and ten pro-Chavez students who were against renewing RCTV’s license, to speak and debate before the legislative representatives. When they arrived, the ten pro-RCTV students were wearing red T-shirts, which are usually associated with Chavez supporters.

Douglas Barrios, who supported RCTV, spoke first. He read a statement about supporting RCTV in the future without much inflection or emotion, and he did not really present arguments about the freedom of expression. At the end of his speech, Barrios said, “I dream of a country in which we can be taken into account without having to wear a uniform.” Then he and his nine colleagues pulled off their red T-shirts and revealed other T-shirts that had pro-RCTV messages on them. They were about to walk out of the National Assembly when pro-Chavez students and members of the Assembly convinced them to stay, and asked them to take part in the debate and listen to their counterparts’ arguments against renewing the license of RCTV.

The second speaker was Andreina Tarazon, a student at the Central University of Venezuela, and she supported the moral and legal position of the government. She said that the opposition students were confused and could not distinguish between “libertad de prensa” (freedom of the press) and “libertad de empresa” (freedom of big business). Eighteen more speakers were scheduled to follow, evenly divided between pro- and anti-positions. Andreina and the other nine speakers who supported the government were well-prepared, and they proceeded to defend their position with reason and passion.

But not the anti-Chavez students. At this point they really blew it. The third speaker, and the second spokesperson for the pro-RCTV side, Yon Goicoechea, stood up briefly to say that his group’s position was non-political, and so they were not going to continue with the debate. They were giving up on an unprecedented opportunity, for this was the first time in Venezuelan history that university students had been invited to address the national legislature, and the debate was being broadcast on national television.

Goicoechea and his followers simply walked out of the National Assembly, and from that moment they lost the limited amount of public sympathy they had built up in the previous two weeks.

Yon Goicoechea, it turns out, is not just a student at the private Catholic University, Andres Bello. He is also an experienced organizer for Primera Justicia, a small, ultra-right political party which gets most of its support from the richest neighborhoods in Caracas and meets regularly with representatives of the U.S. Embassy to chart anti-Chavez strategies. When Goicoechea and his nine cohorts marched out the back door of the National Assembly, they left an incriminating document behind on the speaker’s lectern.

The first and only speaker on behalf of RCTV, Douglas Barrios, had been reading his speech from printed pages, but he forgot to take the last page with him. This page, it turns out, was printed by ARS Publicity, a Caracas public relations firm owned by Globovision, the stridently anti-Chavez media empire. Globovision and ARS had helped orchestrate the attempted “media” coup of April 2002 and the shut-down of the oil industry in 2002-3. The page not only contained parts of Barrios’ speech, but also the scripted directions that instructed Barrios about the exact moment he was supposed to remove his red T-shirt.

So, even though they had taken a beating in the international press, Chavez and his supporters had emerged victorious, at least on the domestic scene. Ariela Mamreia, a law student from the Central University who also spoke at National Assembly, explained in a newspaper interview that opposition media and foreign media had focused on a minority of students, mostly at elite and private universities, who did not represent most university students (there are over 600,000 in Venezuela), who were firmly behind the government. The margin of support for Chavez is even more overwhelming, she said, if one considers the hundreds of thousands of adults who have returned to school, usually at night, to finish their college level studies under the Mission Sucre program.

But what about freedom of the press?

The majority of television stations in Venezuela continue to be owned by wealthy Venezuelans and they still criticize Chavez constantly. An even larger percentage of newspapers are privately owned and critics of the government. The spectrum of opinion in the major media is far wider than in the U.S.A.

In the United States and many other parts of the world, the ownership of the major media is concentrated in very few hands, so that a rich oligarchy gets to choose what you see or don’t see, what you read or don’t read. They have succeeded, at least in part, in getting most North Americans and many Europeans to view Hugo Chavez as a dangerous leader and a “menace to democracy” (to quote the Bush Administration.)

Yet we English speakers in the North (and in Australia) may be the ones suffering from the biggest deficit of democracy, especially when it comes to the opinions that are expressed in the news. In 2005 British/Pakistani author Tarik Ali questioned how much “free press” really exists under the ownership of Rupert Murdoch, the media baron who has just taken over The Wall Street Journal. Why is it, asked Ali, “that all of Rupert Murdoch’s 247 editors in different parts of the world supported the war in Iraq?”

After the pro-RCTV students embarrassed themselves by not taking advantage of their opportunity to speak in front of the national legislature, their marches ended. But a few of the hard-core kids decided to do what they do best: Go shopping! The last protest photograph I saw was of several young women riding the fancy escalator in the Sambil shopping mall. (Unfortunately I can’t get that photo to upload onto the page.) They all looked similar to the young woman to the right and they also wore tape over their mouths.

If you need to know more about why Venezuela is not becoming an authoritarian country, or you need more evidence and arguments to put in front of others, please read the opinion of one of the best-informed Latin American scholars in the U.S.

“Freedom of Speech Alive and Well in Venezuela”
By Greg Grandin
June 15, 2007

The government of Venezuela has decided not to renew a broadcast license for RCTV, one of the oldest and largest opposition-controlled TV stations in the country. The U.S. media, in keeping with its reporting on Venezuela for the past eight years, has seized upon this opportunity to portray this as an assault on "freedom of the press."

It's not clear why a TV station that would never get a broadcast license in the United States or any other democratic country should receive one in Venezuela. But this is the one question that doesn't seem to come up in any of the news reports or editorials here.

RCTV actively participated in the U.S.-backed coup that briefly overthrew Venezuela's democratically elected President Hugo Chavez in 2002. The station promoted the coup government and reported only the pro-coup version of events. It censored and suppressed the news as the coup fell apart.

Even ignoring RCTV's role in the coup, its broadcast license would have been revoked years ago in the U.S., Europe, or any country that regulates the public airwaves. During the oil strike of 2002-2003, the station repeatedly called on people to join in and help topple the government. The station has also fabricated accusations of murder by the government, using graphic and violent images to promote its hate-filled views.

The whole idea that freedom of expression is under attack in Venezuela is a joke to anyone who has been there in the last eight years. Most of the media in Venezuela is still controlled by people who are vehemently (sometimes violently) opposed to the government. This will be true even after RCTV switches from broadcast to cable and satellite media. All over the broadcast media you can hear denunciations of the president and the government of the kind that you would not hear in the United States on a major national broadcast network. Imagine Rush Limbaugh during the Clinton impeachment, times fifty, but with much less regard for factual accuracy.

Pick up a newspaper — El Universal and El Nacional are two of the biggest — and the vast majority of the headlines are trying to make the government look bad. Turn on the radio and most of what you will hear is also anti-government. Television now has two state-run channels, but these only counterbalance the rest of the programming that is opposition-controlled. Venezuela has a more oppositional media than we have in the United States.

In fact, if the government carries through on its promise to turn RCTV's broadcast frequency over to the public, for a diverse array of programming, then this move will actually increase freedom of expression in Venezuela. It wouldn't suppress it, as the media and some opportunistic, ill-informed politicians here have maintained.

Sadly, some human rights officials here have also, without knowing much of the details, jumped on the media and political bandwagon. In a press release this week, José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at Human Rights Watch, said that "The move to shut down RCTV is a serious blow to freedom of expression in Venezuela." (Of course RCTV will not be "shut down," since it can continue to distribute its programs through cable and satellite media).

But in an interview the same week Vivanco gave a different view, criticizing "those who claim that the fact that the Chavez government is not renewing the license for RCTV, per se implies a violation of freedom of expression. That is nonsense. ... you are not entitled, as a private company, to get your contract renewed with the government forever."

So why is a station that has repeatedly violated the most basic rules of any broadcast license entitled to another 20-year, state-sanctioned franchise?

It is not surprising that a monopolized media here would defend the "right" of right-wing media moguls to control the airwaves in Venezuela. Still it would be nice if we could get both sides of the story here — like Venezuelans do from their major media, which is right now saturated with broadcasts and articles against (as well as for) the government's decision. Then Americans could make up their own minds about whether this is really a "free speech" issue. Is that really too much to ask from our own "free press?"

Greg Grandin is one of the foremost historians of Latin America in the United States, Professor of History at New York University, and served on the United Nations Truth Commission for Guatemala. He wrote this piece for the Center for Economic and Policy Research — www.cepr.net. His recent book, THE EMPIRE’S WORKSHOP, (Metropolitan, Henry Holt, 2006), is one of the best guides to understanding current and past conflicts between the U.S. and Latin America.

George Ciccariello-Maher, a doctoral student from Berkeley who lives in Caracas, was on the scene at the National Assembly for the student debate and produced a detailed article about the nature of the so-called ‘student rebellion’ – “Who’s pulling the Strings? Behind Venezuela’s “student rebellion,” which appeared online at Counterpunch, June 9/10, 2007.

The next two you have to find for yourself. For other good articles on the RCTV controversy by North Americans who have spent many years in Venezuela, see Charlie Hardy (at his website, http://www.cowboyincaracas.com/, also see his fascinating new book of the same name, COWBOY IN CARACAS) and Bart Jones, a former Associated Press reporter in Caracas who has just written the best biography in English on President Chavez, titled HUGO!

An excursion with the Mayor, Alfredo Orozco…. and a revolutionary plan

2007-09-28T06:54:00.000-07:00

The mountains around here rise over 7,000 feet high, often shrouded in mist

The mayor suggested we go for a little ride in “el campo,” the countryside. Eleven hours later, at least six of them spent bouncing around the muddy mountain roads in a big Toyota Land Cruiser, I had some appreciation for imposing geography of this municipality, Andres Eloy Blanco. Sanare, the capital of the municipality, is a pretty mountain town of about 25,000, sitting at 4,500 feet above sea level. Our little village, Monte Carmelo, is about 500 feet higher and overlooks Sanare and the valley below, with the high peaks of the Venezuelan Andes forming a shadowy backdrop far to the west.

The rest of the municipality, which lies over the mountain behind us, is just as beautiful as Sanare and Monte Carmelo, but much more rugged. Most of the area consists of steep mountain slopes and deep valleys that are accessible by gravel and mud roads that only jeeps and four-wheel-drive trucks can negotiate. Another 20,000 people live in this area, most of them inhabiting more than 150 caseríos (hamlets) that are scattered throughout the rich green landscape.

On a rainy day, waterfalls flow over the higher roads, and the lower tracks fill up with mud.

These campesinos live in the midst of two magnificent resources: water and coffee.
The municipality of Andres Eloy Blanco receives abundant rainfall, is crisscrossed by two rivers and countless streams, and manages to produce 30% of all the coffee grown in Venezuela. In spite of this, most small farmers, who rely on coffee as their cash crop, are living in poverty. The local government estimates that out of 8,500 rural families, 6,000 should be classified as poor.

The Plan for Local Sustainable Development “Argimiro Gabaldón”

Adding to the potential misery of the rural population is the newly completed Yacambú Dam, which is going to displace 1,500 families two years from now, when an artificial lake fills up a section of the Yacambú River valley. Decades ago, when the project was started, the dam and lake were designed to provide water to dry land and millions of people in the arid parts of Lara and other states. But, as in many developing countries, previous governments in Venezuela had no plans to insure the well-being of local residents who were going to be displaced by ambitious hydro projects.

Today, the local administration of Mayor Orozco, backed by generous funding from the national government and the state of Lara, is making amends for this policy of neglect. The municipality is implementing an ambitious plan for sustainable development named after Argimiro Gabaldón, a local revolutionary hero and guerrilla leader. Gabaldón and his followers staged an armed rebellion against government repression and maltreatment of the campesinos during the early 1960s, and he was killed in 1964.

Mayor Alfredo Orozco (right) talks with a campesino group in the village of Guapa

The first step in the Sustainable Development Plan is to create new communities and work opportunities for the 1,500 families that will soon be displaced. Among these families, many of whom are forming new cooperatives, are a number of older men and women who were fighting against the dam construction project many years ago. For this reason, one group likes to call itself the Indigenous Resistance Cooperative, “La Cooperativa de Resistencia Indigena,” a name which celebrates their own Indian heritage and also echoes the centuries of resistance to the oppression imposed by the Spanish and the local landowning elites.

[Perhaps some readers do not know that Venezuela no longer celebrates Columbus Day. A few years ago, the Chavez government decided that October 12th should be celebrated as “Él Dia de Resistencia” (Day of Resistance). I believe the same day is celebrated in Bolivia now that Evo Morales is President.)]

We met this cooperative group and its lively leaders outside the little village of Guapa, where the mayor signed an agreement acknowledging the cooperative’s title to agricultural land and a pledge of municipal support. One co-op leader, who likes to call himself “el cacique” (the chief), remarked, “This is what socialism is all about. Being treated with respect, as equals.”

El Cacique, one of the leader s of the Indigenous Resistance Cooperative

Admiring the NUDES

Nearby the Mayor pointed to parcels of land that the municipality is buying in order to construct one of the first Núcleos de Desarrollos Endógenos Sustentables, or NUDES (Centers of Local Sustainable Development), which will serve the families displaced by the dam. There will be considerable new construction around this particular NUDES (called Guapa-La Cruz) during the coming year: a new clinic, sports facilities, schools, and other public buildings that can serve as the community hub for several small villages of new residences that will replace those that will be submerged by the nearby artificial lake.

The Nucleo at Guapa-La Cruz will be the first sustainable development community built in Venezuela. The national government has also approved financing for the much larger expansion of Plan Argimiro Gabaldón, which will serve 28 other caseríos or villages within the municipality, including Monte Carmelo.

By consensus, all the co-op members (including the woman on the left) voted to sign the land agreement with the municipality.

The Plan Argimiro Gabladon is very bold, and the mayor, the governor, and the president all see it as “revolutionary,” that is, as the practical embodiment of the Bolivarian Revolution and as a model for development in other rural parts of the nation. It combines several very worthy goals: 1) the ecologically sound development and conservation of agricultural land and forests; 2) the establishment of a coffee production center that serves all the small producers and farm laborers through a network of cooperatives that guarantee just prices and decent living conditions for all; 3) the expansion of tourism throughout the municipality in a way that allows guests to share in the local culture, stay in the homes of area residents, and take advantage of agro-tourism, nature education, and hiking opportunities; 4) the renovation of the town of Sanare itself, including the restoration of colonial buildings, the rerouting of major roads, and the addition of new cultural, sports, and artisan centers.

Since Mayor Orozco grew up on a small coffee farm in “el campo,” he enjoys every Thursday, the day of the week he devotes to visiting his constituents in the countryside. Since he’s invited me to ride along any time I like, you can expect to read more reports on campesino life in remote parts of the municipality, some of which lie more than three hours away from Sanare. (In contrast, the campesino hamlet of Monte Carmelo, where we live, is only a 10 minute ride from the central plaza in Sanare.)

Monte Carmelo makes the national news

2007-09-24T06:44:00.000-07:00

Governor Luis Reyes Reyes talks with Gaudy y Omar (on the right) about new initiatives in cooperative education and development

Our friends, Gaudy Garcia and her husband, Omar, have been organizing and working in cooperatives for more than thirty years. Among other things, they helped start La Alianza Cooperative farm, a cooperative grocery shop, and the MonCar Cooperative, a women’s co-op that produces and bottles vegetables, sauces, fruits, jellies, and jams. On September 17th, the governor of Lara, Luis Reyes came to celebrate the success of cooperative and sustainable development in Monte Carmelo and the neighboring villages around Sanare.

Gaudy is one of the friendliest (and most tenacious) political organizers in the region and has traveled abroad to meet with women’s groups and organic food organizations. Through her interest in promoting proper alimentation and fair labor practices, she has also joined the international “Slow Food” alliance.

This was a big day in Monte Carmelo as political dignitaries and television reporters descended upon this little village of about 700 people. One of Chavez’s cabinet ministers joined the governor, and they both spoke with President Chavez, who was conducting his Sunday afternoon TV show, Alo Presidente. This week the show emphasized various efforts throughout Venezuela that are promoting sustainable development. Chavez praised several local efforts in the state of Lara, including Monte Carmelo and Sanare, and also presented information about a wide range of new environmental initiatives.

The Minister of Popular Power for Land and Agriculture congratulated the various local cooperatives, and especially La Alianza, for being pioneers in sustainable development and organic farming. And he came bearing gifts, in particular a valuable donation from the Tierra Fertil (“Fertile Earth”) foundation: a brand-new, three-ton Ford truck for La Alianza.

Polilla and a fellow co-op member with their new truck (see the other posting about La Alianza

President Chavez’s television presentations can be very informative. Besides talking about Desarrollo Endogeno Sustenible (“sustainable development within the community”), he also outlined a number of ways that Venezuela is promoting the use of energy-saving and pollution-reducing appliances and vehicles. The chart above shows how a combination of new kinds of household appliances (many of them powered by natural gas and hydroelectric power) will enable an average family to reduce its monthly utility bill from over 100,000 bolivares (about $50) to 13,800 bolivares (about $7 dollars.)

The widescreen TV is broadcasting ¨Alo Presidente¨ by satellite to the meeting outside of Monte Carmelo

Luis Reyes Reyes, Governor of Lara

The governor seems like a thoughtful and responsive man, generally liked around here, although two people told me they wished he was more dynamic and forceful in his speaking style. What they mean, I think, is “more like Chavez,” but I don’t think anyone can entertain and motivate people like the President does. The governor and I spoke briefly, and he was very supportive of the idea that students from the United States might come here for classes in organic farming and sustainable development (which was, after all, the theme of the day’s event in Monte Carmelo.)

By pure coincidence, the night before the governor came to Monte Carmelo, I was reading an interview with him that appears in the appendix of a fascinating book by the English writer Tarik Ali, Pirates of the Caribbean: the Axis of Hope (Verso, 2006 -- if you haven’t read any of his books, or the periodical he has edited for decades, The New Left Review, you should take a look some time; he’s one of the most incisive and independent left-wing essayists in the world, and a good historical novelist, too.) The interview was recorded in 2004 by Rose Elizalde and Luis Baez).

In this interview, Governor Luis Reyes Reyes speaks about being a fellow student of Hugo Chavez at the National Military Academy, graduating the same year but going into the Air Force instead of the Army. Like Chavez, Reyes Reyes came from Barinas, a poor rural area far from metropolitan Caracas, and worked his way to the top levels of the class at the academy. After rising through the ranks, he, like hundreds of other disgruntled officers, was willing to join Chavez in the failed military/civilian rebellion of 1992.

In the interview, the governor described the kind of corruption and undemocratic behavior engaged in by high-ranking officers and their government cronies. “As lieutenant, they gave me the job of picking up a ballot box in a mountain town… a colonel told me not to bother delivering it … ‘But what about those voters?’ [I asked]… ‘Pick up the ballot boxes and throw them off the plane!’”

“These were crimes that the Armed Forces participated in every day,” Reyes Reyes explained, “not to mention the overt affluence that the officers who served that political system flaunted.”

After the attempted coup, the governor was imprisoned nearly as long as Chavez, but he was released a little earlier in 1994 because his young son was dying of cancer. Following his son’s death, he decided not to follow Chavez into the political arena, but instead devoted himself to the social plight of street kids. He and his wife set up a home for homeless children on a small farm in his home state of Barinas. He did not enter politics until 1999, when Chavez asked him to head one of the government ministries. In 2000, after the constitution was rewritten, he ran for and won the governorship of Lara.

Los Mangos

2007-09-24T06:11:00.000-07:00

(Remembering a visit to Los Mangos in 2004)

Some of the poorest people in metropolitan Caracas live in the richest parts of the city. And a few of them live on the land of the richest man in South America.

Thousands of acres of mountains and valleys belonging to Gustavo Cisneros are about ten miles from downtown Caracas, if you’re traveling by helicopter.

I ran into Nikari, a sociology student at the Central University of Venezuela in Caracas, while visiting Antímano, one of the many large “barrios” which house the millions of poor people living on the steep hillsides that surround the central city. She and three other students were working with more than 60 neighborhood health committees and helping them correlate their medical statistics on computers.

In one neighborhood we were served a very tasty meal at the “community kitchen,” a government-funded effort that enabled five women to serve free meals to over 100 of their most impoverished neighbors. Antímano, just like the four other Caracas barrios I have visited, is exceptionally well-organized. Its citizens take advantage of all the new government-supported programs – Barrio Adentro medical care, community food distribution, and the various education missions, to name a few.

“It’s true, people here are poor,” said Nikari, “but on Sunday I can show you some places that are much poorer. In Baruta and El Hatillo. You feel like you’re walking back into time. You take these paths through the jungle, one to Los Mangos, another to a more wretched place, La Libertad, that’s more than a half an hour’s walk.”

On one corner of the city, to the south east, the hillsides are not densely packed with slums. The bus ride out of the city takes you past beautiful terraces, with trees and gardens scattered around spacious homes and luxurious apartment complexes. As the road ascends to the mountain ridge, the land gets even richer, and the upper-middle class housing gives way to walled estates for the truly wealthy. I looked at the other bus passengers, who looked far too poor to inhabit this region, unless they were maids or gardeners, and I asked, “When do we get to Baruta?”

Nikari laughed, “This is Baruta, it’s the richest part of the Caracas. Just be patient.” As we kept winding along the top of a high ridge, she pointed down a side road. “Look, there’s La Mata. That’s where the National Guard arrested the Colombian paramilitaries a few months ago. A right-wing, Cuban-Venezuelan guy named Alonzo sneaked them onto his big estate, the Hacienda Daktari. People say they were here to try to instigate another coup d’etat against Chavez. It’s easy to hide up here.”

Very easy. On either side of us, steamy clouds from the morning rain were rising from the thick rain forest that plunges into the deep valleys. Now there were no more estates, just a few poor huts scattered among the trees along the road.

When the bus finally stopped, the rain resumed, so Nikari decided we should forego the forty minute walk to La Libertad -- “too treacherous,” she said. Instead we took a muddy path that looked treacherous enough, winding down a 45 degree slope and disappearing into the forest. I landed on my backside twice.

Nikari, talking with Leo

Soon, we could see the roof of the first house in Los Mangos, and someone was shouting “Ciao, Nikari” and bounding down the path. It was Leo, a nineteen-year-old guy in a pony-tail who wore a t-shirt, running shorts, and torn-up tennis shoes. He was just returning from his morning training run, limbering up for a soccer match in the afternoon.

As we continued down the path, Leo pointed through the trees to the other side of the ravine and said, “That’s our house. Do you see my horse?” You couldn’t miss the horse, who was very fat and standing under a tin roof beside a little girl.

Their house, a one-room shack with a roof over the entry area, was home to Leo, his mother, his older brother, and three little sisters. The earth, inside and out, was swept very clean. The brother, in an immaculate white shirt, was heading up the hill to catch a bus going back toward the city, where he had a class at one of the education missions. After we exchanged greetings with Leo’s mother and sisters, who were hanging out the wash, we kept descending through a community of dozens of homes, all more or less like Leo’s.

Suddenly there was a roar overhead and I jumped back to see a big black helicopter flying in low over the tree tops. “Wow!” I exclaimed, “Is that the army or the national guard? Are they still looking for Colombian paramilitary guys who escaped from La Mata?”

Leo laughed, “No, that’s not the army, that’s Cisnero’s helicopter. It flies over all the time.” He pointed over a hill. “His hacienda is over that way.”

“Cisneros?”

“Si, Gustavo Cisneros.”

Gustavo Cisneros is the richest man in Venezuela, perhaps in all of South America. His holdings, once estimated by Forbes magazine to be worth over $6 billion, include the Venevision TV network, the nation’s largest, and a controlling ownership share in Univision, the biggest Spanish-language network in the United States.

Leo later informed us that Los Mangos is part of his giant hacienda, which spreads out over thousands of acres. “Cisneros wants to pay us to leave our ranchos, so he can tear them down and start up commercial coffee production again. But none of us want to sell because our families have been here so long. We hope that someday we can get legal title to all of Los Mangos, plus some more land down below that is more suitable for growing beans and other kinds of agriculture. Right now another hacienda owner has given us permission to plant on his land.”

Los Mangos consists of about 35 one-room “ranchos” scattered around a steep hillside that was once part of a coffee plantation in the 19th century. Gustavo Cisneros purchased the abandoned plantation along with thousands of acres of adjoining forest several years ago. But the thirty-some families who live in Los Mangos and their predecessors have been there much longer, many for several decades, and they have certain rights. It is illegal to evict them from their mud and tin huts.

Los Mangos from a hill-top

Los Mangos ought to be a paradise, for mangos, papaya, banana, and coffee trees are growing everywhere. Edible creatures, such as chickens and turkeys and ducks, are scurrying around some of the shacks.

On the other hand, Nikari and her fellow students have collected data that shows the distressing depth of poverty here, especially when compared to the high standard of living enjoyed by other residents of Baruta and Hatillo. Only one quarter of the families have running water, and there is no provision at all for sewage. Many people are unemployed and malnourished, and most who are employed have to travel for a couple of hours each way to their low-paying jobs in downtown Caracas. Children can attend an elementary school at the top of the hill, but the overall education level in Los Mangos is very low.

Some highly energetic residents, like Leo and his brother, are traveling to other parts of Caracas to take advantage of the new Bolivarian schools that support continuing education. Leo, who loves animals, is training to be a veterinary assistant. He also works in a riding stable, where the owners gave him an old horse that they no longer wanted to keep.

Other young people in Los Mangos get despondent about their prospects. On the day I visited, Nikari spent a couple of hours consoling one of the women who lives at the very bottom of the hill. Her 22 year-old son had committed suicide the week before, with a shotgun.

Leo and hisyoungest sister and horse

----------------------------------------------------------

Later, the same night,
Nikari and a fellow sociology student, Carlos, met me for a few drinks. Apparently they thought a little sociological contrast was necessary. They took me to the multi-story mall of San Ignacio in a wealthy section of Caracas -- the people, the glitzy shops and bars, and the gleaming gold escalators all shouted out “Conspicuous Consumption!” as loudly as any rich neighborhood in Miami or Los Angeles.

They told me that some students at the Central University of Venezuela were strong Chavistas, like Nikari, whose mother works as a secretary in Caracas. Others, not necessarily just the rich ones, supported the opposition. And many, including Carlos, who is the step-son of a professor who supports Chavez, consider themselves “ni ni” (“neither …nor” – neither for nor against the government).

In Carlos’ case, he totally supported all the social missions, health care and food distribution programs, but didn’t approve of Chavez’s rhetoric or his harsh treatment of the oil company employees, mostly white collar, because they took part in shutting down the industry in 2002-2003. One of his neighbors was one of 19,000 people who were fired, Carlos said, and the family had been in rough economic circumstances ever since.

“The government says they were trying to wreck the national economy,” I pointed out, “and they nearly succeeded.”

“True, but people like my neighbor were only doing what the chief executives and the big media were telling them to do,” replied Carlos. “I think they should have rehired a lot more of the people who were fired.”

And what about Cisneros and Los Mangos?

Gustavo Cisneros and his TV network, Venevision, were major supporters of the oil industry shutdown, as well as the attempted coup in 2002. Cisneros, who has been a friend of the Bush family for years, seems to have adopted a quieter, semi-conciliatory position now that Chavez and his supporters have won so many elections overwhelmingly. His TV network, which still supports the political opposition, now refrains from the vehement attacks and unsubstantiated rumors that are peddled, in a style that makes Rush Limbaugh look innocuous, by many other private media such as RCTV.

Will Gustavo Cisneros ever be willing to give up a tiny portion of his vast property so that the little settlement of Los Mangos can prosper? Will the citizens of Los Mangos get organized so that they can fight for their rights? Will somebody in the national government give a little push, so that the Law of the Land (La Ley de Tierra) can be implemented? La Ley de Tierra, which took effect in 2001, allows the government to purchase unused land from very large landowners at market prices, then turn it over to small farmers and cooperatives.

Such things are happening all over Venezuela, where millions of acres of public and private land have been redistributed to hundreds of thousands of poor families. But not in the Baruta and Hatillo districts of metropolitan Caracas – they are still controlled by the wealthy opposition, including the ultra-rightwing mayor of Baruta, Henrique Capriles Radonski, who has no interest in implementing the Bolivarian programs.

Less than a week after visiting Los Mangos in 2004, I attended “El Encuentro de Artistas y Intelectuales en Defensa de Humanidad,” (Conference of Artists and Intellectuals in Defense of Humanity) in Caracas. Of all the commendable things that Hugo Chavez said to us at this international conference, one sentence seemed to sum up the aspirations of the Bolivarian Revolution in a way that speaks directly to the people of Los Mangos.

“Yes, it is important to end poverty, to end misery,” said the President, “but the most important thing is to offer power to the poor so that they can fight for themselves.”

And now you know why this particular quote appears on the opening page of Venezuela Notes underneath the picture of Erica and her sister, who kindly served me a cafecito while we were waiting for the rain to stop in Los Mangos.

Bolivarian Education

2007-09-14T11:36:00.000-07:00

Honorio Dam, on left, and Rafael, a teacher of agriculture, at the office of the “maestros rurales.” The slogan on their office wall says: “Constructores de sueños, profesionales de la esperanza” ---- “Builders of dreams, professionals of hope.”

When I first met Honorio Dam, the director of rural teachers in the rugged, mountainous region that surrounds Sanare, he took me to a unique graduation ceremony. The first class of adults, more than 200 people, had just finished Mission Ribas, a Bolivarian initiative designed for adults who wanted to complete their high school education. It was a festive occasion as relatives, teachers, and the mayor celebrated with the most jubilant group of graduates I have ever seen.

In January of 2007, when I accompanied a group from Dickinson College in Pennylvania on a visit to Sanare, Honorio introduced the North American students to area residents who were enrolled in Mission Sucre, an education program for adults who are studying at the university level. Afterward, Honorio said to me, “You know, nearly all of that first graduating class from Mission Ribas, the ones you saw two years ago, are now studying in Mission Sucre.”

One of the major achievements of the Bolivarian revolution is its massive investment of money and human resources in education, an effort that has been matched by the overwhelming response of campesinos and working class people who are enrolling at all levels.

About 6 million people were going to school in 1998 before Chavez was first elected. By 2005, approximately 12 million, or nearly half of Venezuela’s population, were enrolled in all educational programs.

The statistics for the mountainous municipality that includes Sanare (a municipality here is similar to a county in the USA) are even more impressive. “In 1999,” Honorio explained to us, “when Chavez first took office, there were 8,000 students in our municipality of Andres Eloy Blanco. Now, in 2007, there are 25,000 students. That’s out of 47,000 people. More than half of our population is in school.”

Diego gives a cheer for his friend who finished the Mission Sucre program last spring and now is a teacher in the liceo (high school) in Monte Carmelo

Although part of this increase is due to intense efforts to keep children in school who previously would have dropped out, the majority of the new students are adults. About twenty of those participating in Mission Sucre, some with their small children in tow, came to the meeting with the Dickinson students and shared their stories. Many had aspirations of embarking upon new careers, but one single mother of three emphasized a theme that was common to all. “What is important to me,” she said, “is that I am growing as a human being.”

The Zaragoza School

School children also enjoy some new opportunities. There are several Bolivarian schools in the area that offer classes, cultural activities, and athletics all day long, as opposed to the traditional school day of 4 or 5 hours that is still the norm in other schools. While the Bolivarian schools are experimenting with revolutionary educational philosophies and curriculum, they also offer very practical kinds of assistance to students and their families. For instance, all students are fed two free meals during the school day.

This region in the state of Lara was experimenting with progressive education long before Chavez assumed the presidency of Venezuela. One successful example of radical schooling was developed at the Zaragoza School in Palo Verde, a small community on the edge of Sanare. Zaragoza serves as an inspiration to educators in the area and as a model for the new public schools.

The Zaragoza school is a private institution created in 1991 by parents and teachers who were unhappy with the poor quality of public education. Since most of those involved were campesino and working class families, they needed some financial help from progressive Catholic charities to get started. Their own efforts have been considerable: the parents have constructed all of the school buildings themselves; each family contributes as much money as it can toward salaries and expenses; and parents meet regularly to hire their school directors and teachers, as well as choosing the curriculum and setting school policy.

Goya, a founder of the school and one of the current teacher/directors, says that Zaragoza is a “communitarian education project” that really works. In part, she attributes this to the traditions in the surrounding small communities of Palo Verde, Bojo, and Monte Carmelo, which have successfully organized and operated various cooperative ventures for many years.

As for intellectual inspiration, much of it comes from proponents of revolutionary educational methods like Paolo Freire, the Brazilian author of The Pedagogy of the Oppressed. According to Goya, the teachers are trained to be progressive educators who create learning experiences that they are sharing with the students, instead of dictating from above. In keeping with this egalitarian tradition, teachers and students are on a first name basis, and they always sit down to eat together at lunch time. In fact, the teachers take their place in line with the students as they wait to be served. Furthermore, because there are no janitors at the school, teachers and students work together on all maintenance tasks, including cleaning the bathrooms.

Isn’t this anti-authoritarian atmosphere going to create chaos? What about discipline? “It’s hardly necessary,” says Goya, “since the kids are excited to be here every day. Because the parents and teachers run this place together, we’re able to meet comfortably and discuss the case of a child who is having problems learning or socializing with his peers. I can’t ever remember having to expel anyone.”

La Alianza Cooperative

2007-08-28T10:18:00.000-07:00

His nickname is Polilla (that's "Termite" in English), and he's one of the founders of La Alianza, an agricultural cooperative located just outside of Sanare, a mountain town in the state of Lara.

Yes, that's a big pile of worms in Polilla's hands. Vermiculture, or composting with worms, is one of many organic farming techniques utilized at La Alianza. There are twenty-five giant concrete bins filled with composting soil, various kinds of manure, and millions of worms. The end products, incredibly rich humus and liquid fertilizers, are used to invigorate the mountainside fields of the cooperative and are sold to other small farmers and gardeners in the area.

The co-op produces a wide range of purely organic products, including yogurt from its own cows and many kinds of vegetables and fruits. While the farmers have been successful in utilizing natural means of warding off pests and diseases, there are exceptions. Some crops, such as coffee and tomatoes, still require spraying with modest amounts of pesticides. The co-op plants these items in isolated fields and treats them with the least toxic chemical products that they can find.

La Alianza (The Alliance) owns three different parcels of land that lie between the small villages of Monte Carmelo and Bojó, where most of the co-op’s 42 members live. They are strong supporters of Hugo Chavez’s government and are enthusiastic about building a new kind of socialism for the 21st century, but they don’t see themselves as followers. Instead they see themselves as the forerunners of the political process that is remaking Venezuelan society. La Alianza was started in 1976, more than twenty-five years before Hugo Chavez decided to promote the formation of thousands of new workplace cooperatives throughout the country.

In order to help these new cooperatives, Polilla and nine of his co-workers have formed an education committee that serves as an important resource for farmers, students, and government officials from all over the country. This education committee, which has members who never completed elementary school, offered 15 one-week seminars on organic farming and co-op organization in 2006, as well as many more one and two-day workshops on weekends.

When we visited La Alianza in January of 2007, Manuel Saralegui, a sociology student from Argentina, conducted a lengthy video-taped interview with Polilla. In the process, we learned a lot about the history of the cooperative.

The early years at the co-op
“We began with people from nearby communities,” explained Polilla. “They worked with us, in the indigenous tradition of ‘mano vuelta,’ where everyone gives a hand to his neighbor. At the same time, a few members of the fraternity known as ‘the little brothers’ came to our area and they had the idea of helping us create a cooperative.” [‘The Little Brothers of Jesus’ is a small Catholic order that was founded in France in the 1930s and is dedicated to living and working among the poor.]

“Their idea of cooperative organization was a great success around here, because of our own traditions and because of the interactions the priests and brothers had with us. They didn’t impose anything on us, but they adapted themselves to our community, and that was what we liked about them. And even today, two of the founders are still working with us in the fields.”

One of them is Father Mario, an Italian who first worked with campesinos in Argentina in the early 1970s. Large landowners there, emboldened by the reactionary violence that followed Pinochet’s coup in Chile, began creating their own paramilitary organizations that murdered the peasantry and terrorized the religious workers who allied themselves with the poor. Mario was forced to flee, and he found his way to rural Venezuela.

According to Polilla, “These were not the usual kind of priests. They came preaching the word of God, but they were willing to work along side us, too. And the God they talked about was different than the one we had heard about in church – their God was on the side of humble people, the poor campesinos like ourselves.”

Polilla, who has a droll sense of humor, likes to suggest that the priests were like the first visitors from Europe who came to the New World. “We weren’t sure where these priests came from – Italy? Spain? France? I think that when they set sail from Europe, they were trying to find their way to the East, to the Indies. Or maybe they were going to Africa. But on their journey, they got completely lost. Somehow they landed here in the mountains with us, and they liked it here, so they decided to stay.”

In the beginning, the members of the cooperative were farming on rented land, while also laboring for low wages for neighboring landowners. Polilla discussed the difficulties they faced in the late 1970s: “We were campesinos who only had the dirt that was under our fingernails, nothing more. We wanted to do our own agricultural production, but without land what could we produce? Some neighbors lent us a little piece of land to try out some plantings, but when others said we were ‘communists’ and ‘guerrillas’ they got afraid and stopped letting us use the fields.”

Although La Alianza cooperative prides itself on many years of self-sufficiency and its ability to support all its members and their families, there was one important act of charity that helped them get started. One of the priests put the members in touch with a group of nuns in Caracas who were interested in donating money to support new initiatives by poor farmers. The nuns gave La Alianza enough capital to acquire their land, but it was still difficult to start up farming operations.

“We didn’t have a lot of foresight," explained Polilla, "for we were campesinos, nothing more, and so we never thought of asking for the extra capital that is necessary during the start-up period of a farming operation. So, at first we had to work three days outside the cooperative in order to eat, and then three days on the cooperative land without pay.”

Healthy farming and a better world
In these start-up years, the co-op farmers did not practice organic agriculture, even though they had heard about some of the concepts involved. “At first, because of our limited knowledge, we worked with an excess of chemicals. Father Mario gave us the idea that we could farm organically. And we didn’t believe him because other people had sold us on the culture of the ‘green revolution’ – using chemicals in order to produce more. On the other hand, we thought, if our ancestors could farm without chemicals, why couldn’t we? So, we learned slowly and found we could plant a small parcel of land and get good results. These experiments provided some of the food we consumed at home.”

Finally, it was concern about their own health that pushed the members of La Alianza toward a more serious engagement in organic farming. “We were using poisonous chemicals so much, we did not know how sick we were making ourselves and our local environment. And then some girls studying medicine came along and examined us to see what levels of toxicity we had in our blood. Everybody was poisoned, even those who didn’t work in the fields. My comrade Adan had a really high level of toxicity, and ever since that day he has insisted on working in fields that are completely organic, and for 15 or 16 years he has had no contact with any kind of toxic chemical.

"My wife, when I took her my dirty clothes to wash, was also contaminated. She transmitted the poison to my little daughter through her breast milk. Because it accumulates faster in fats, she was poisoned more rapidly than I was. This made us try to change some things.”

Polilla and his associates realize that their efforts to organize and educate others about healthy living are undermined by some powerful adversaries. Among them is the global system of agribusiness. “One sees that the great transnational companies are poisoning 100% more than we do, but because there’s so much money in this business, hardly any government will put a stop to this. I don’t know much about the United States, but its one of the only nations that didn’t want to sign the Kyoto agreement about global contamination. We know that our North American brothers and sisters aren’t the ones who want the destruction of the world. It's the elite that is governing them.”

However, these farmers in the mountains of Lara also realize that big corporations are being encouraged or abetted by a global culture of waste. “If we don’t put an end to exaggerated consumerism, in this case in the United States and Europe, and to burning fuels without control, and to contaminating with transnational factories, we are on our way to extinction, isn’t that true? I would like it if the most powerful countries, instead of investing in war, would invest their resources in the salvation of our planet. Not one of them wants to slow down development on behalf of the land, the water, and us human beings. What’s this development for, if we are destroying ourselves?”

This chart at La Alianza displays the chemical compositions of various composted soils that are made by adding different kinds of manure - cows, goats, horses, pigs, sheep, and chickens.

Manuel asked, “What role can be played by campesinos who are producing organic food? How can your warning reach the people?”

“That is what La Alianza cooperative is fighting for. It’s a problem of education. The transnational corporations are inundating us with propaganda... and organized groups like ourselves don’t have the possibility of flooding the market with things that are organic. We have tried to spread our ideas in a modest way. People come from all the states in Venezuela to workshops we are giving about the effect of chemicals on the environment.”

Polilla also had a message to send to the Bush Administration. “The thing that we ask, in a humble way, is that the oligarchs in the United States, those who are in command, let us go about our work. We don’t ask for anything else. Just leave us in peace.”

Manuel remembered something that Polilla had mentioned earlier: “You were saying that the Revolution faces some major obstacles. What obstacles do you see?”

“The obstacle I see within Venezuela is the need to change our culture. We have to educate a new man, and we are very far away from accomplishing the formation of a new man. As Venezuelans, we have to throw out corruption and bureaucracy, and act like sisters and brothers who are building an economy of solidarity. And everyone in the United States should realize that we are not enemies of the North Americans; we simply have differences with their leader. We need the North Americans if we are going to save the planet Earth. It remains in your hands to support us in making a true democracy.”

This story is based on my conversations with Pedro Segundo “Polilla” García at La Alianza Cooperative and video interviews conducted by Manuel Saralegui.

Looking for a baseball hero?

2007-08-27T19:02:00.000-07:00

Our friends at Radio Rebelde had invited us to come back to their part of Catia, one of the largest barrios in Caracas, for a big Saturday fiesta. When we walked into the crowd, we were approached by five young guys who handed us cups of beer and introduced themselves: “We’re Zapatistas.”

We were confused, since they didn’t look like guys who just flew in from Chiapas. They were kind enough to explain, “We’re a revolutionary group in the neighborhood, and we admire the Zapatistas in Mexico, so we borrowed their name. We helped organize this fiesta.”

One of them held up a video camera: “How about a quick interview?”

They chose to focus their attention on Meredith, a young woman from Baltimore. So did a tall, slender man who had just appeared at my side, sipping his beer and staring intently. Meredith looked a little uncomfortable.

At that moment, one of the Zapatistas stepped forward and pointed to the plastic identity card that hung from the man’s belt. “This is Felipe, our sports trainer.

The card read: “Felipe Fernandez.”

Meredith suddenly broke into a wide grin and reached into her small purse. She yanked out fifteen or twenty cards, flipped through them quickly, and held one up in the air.

“Felipe!” she cried, “Look, I still have your baseball card! What are you doing here?

Good question.

What was Felipe Fernandez, a pitcher who played in the national league of Cuba and was a member of the renowned Cuban national team, doing in a poor neighborhood of Caracas?

He smiled and pointed at his ID card. “I’m a sports trainer right here in this barrio.”

Meredith took a moment to explain: “Last year I went with some college friends on a Global Exchange program to study Spanish in Havana. Since we all love baseball, we attended a lot of games. Once, after an evening game in Camaguey, we drank beer and talked with Felipe. And he signed one of his baseball cards for me.”

One of the announcers from Radio Rebelde, a teenager who usually hosts a punk rock show, was excited -- “The crowd is going to love this story” – and he dragged Meredith and Felipe over to a big microphone on a card table and sat them down on two folding chairs. Radio Rebelde was broadcasting live from the fiesta.

“So, you two always seem to meet when you’re out drinking beer.” The young announcer couldn’t resist teasing Meredith and Felipe, much to the delight of the gathering crowd. His lively interview, interspersed with music and public service announcements, lasted at least half an hour.

Near the end, Felipe managed to insert a serious comment, “It’s wonderful that a Cuban and an American can meet again, right here in a country that is initiating a revolutionary process, a place where progressive people are doing things to lift up humanity instead of trying to destroy humanity.”

Felipe’s second career

As the big crowd danced and partied into the night, Felipe chatted with me I listened to a story that would be totally foreign to the kinds of athletic professionals that predominate in North America, Europe, and much of the rest of the world.

A star athlete, who had been a relief pitcher with the national team that demolished the Baltimore Orioles at Camden Yards in 1999, was nearly forty years old when he retired. He was tall, slim, and good-looking. So, what did he end up doing? Making TV ads selling shaving cream? Modeling tight-fitting T-shirts?

Not Felipe. He volunteered to live in a poor, crime-ridden barrio in South America. Minimum contract: a two-year commitment, with an option to renew. Contract pay: $200 a month. Contract accommodations: a tiny, spare bedroom in the home of a barrio family. Leisure activities: tossing balls to raggedy kids, exploring the city on the Metro, and dancing at neighborhood fiestas.

While Felipe was still playing baseball, he had begun preparing himself for a second career. For several years during the off-season, he enrolled in a rigorous university program for athletic trainers, a profession that emphasizes health and fitness education. After retiring, he worked briefly as a baseball trainer with the Camaguey team and the Cuban national team, but then took notice of a more challenging opportunity. The Cuban medical teams that were providing care for millions of poor Venezuelans wanted to sign up sports trainers to work with them.

Felipe gets to spend some of his afternoons coaching kids in baseball and basketball, but his primary duties revolve around fitness programs that are coordinated with the Barrio Adentro, the “inside the neighborhood” medical program. Every morning he leads aerobics and exercise classes for middle aged and elderly residents, many of whom have been in poor health for years. Detailed lists in each medical office show that large numbers of the older population are suffering from hypertension and poor nutrition. Emphasizing preventative medicine, Felipe and the medical team devise new exercise and nutrition regimens in their discussions with the families of those individuals who are most at risk.

The enthusiasm for physical fitness seems to be catching on with everyone. At the fiesta, Felipe introduced me to five of his “abuelitas,” a group of older ladies who meet with him every day for aerobics classes. They danced all night.

When we left the barrio that night, I asked Felipe if I could bring him anything when I returned to Venezuela. “Sure,” he said, “a baseball magazine with an article about my favorite player.”

On my next trip, unfortunately, my travel plans were disrupted and I had no time to stop in Caracas. Now it’s two and a half years later and I have no idea if Felipe renewed his contract in Venezuela, returned to Cuba, or volunteered for another medical/athletic assignment in some other country.

I still have the slightly rumpled magazine in the bottom of my suitcase. Almost the whole issue is devoted to a great pitcher from the United States, Randy Johnson. Some day I hope it will find its way to an even more admirable pitcher, a true baseball hero named Felipe Fernandez.

Sowing the Oil -- Dester Rodriguez

2007-05-15T13:09:00.000-07:00

On a Friday afternoon at the beginning of January, Dester Rodríguez cut short his Christmas vacation and returned to Caracas. He walked into an imposing room at the headquarters of PDVSA, the national oil company of Venezuela, where a special group of people sat around an enormous hardwood conference table and settled back in their soft, upholstered chairs. As he began his presentation, an image appeared on the big screen beside him. "It’s a map of the world at night,” he said.

And then he asked, “Is this world just?”

Some in the audience looked a little bit uncomfortable, maybe because they didn't know that corporate directors ever considered questions of global justice. Or, was it because one part of the world, their part on the eastern side of North America, was lit up more brightly than any other place on earth, even Europe? Perhaps Rodríguez was talking about them when he suggested, “We need a crusade against excessive consumption of energy.”

He followed up with another question: “Do you know the position of various governments in regard to Kyoto?” Murmuring sounds from the audience suggested that they did know at least one country that had not signed the Kyoto agreements to limit global warming.

Dester Rodríguez has one of the most important jobs in Venezuela. He's not only a director of PDVSA, Petroleos de Venezuela, S.A., but he's also the person in charge of the oil company’s “social development” programs. In this capacity, he oversees the billions of dollars of oil revenues that are funneled into the various social missions that serve the Venezuelan people. So why was he making such an effort to communicate with nineteen young students from Dickinson College in Pennsylvania?

Rodríguez’s map indicated that the United States, and Europe and Japan as well, were gobbling a tremendous amount of the earth’s energy, even though most of the fuel originated in other parts of the world. "The rest of America,” he said, “and the rest of the world, cannot afford to live like you do."

He smiled. He wasn’t trying to scold his guests, but simply wanted to point out that Venezuelans, even with their oil wealth, could not aspire to a “first world” lifestyle. Furthermore, he didn't think life on earth would be sustainable if everyone tried to use as much energy as the advanced industrial countries of the North. Was it possible, he wondered, for other countries, especially those outside of the “first world,” to pursue their own course and establish different priorities?

“You know,” said Rodriguez, “for about three hundred years, Venezuela was a colony of Spain, and for most of the last one hundred years, we were, for all practical purposes, a colony of the United States. There were 100 years of exploitation of petroleum. Where did all our riches go?

“After the election of Chavez in 1998 and the new constitution and the new laws of 1999-2001, we had the choice of going in two very distinct directions. One choice was to continue being a colony. The other was to assert ourselves as an independent country. These choices clashed. If the coup of 2002, which was immediately recognized as legitimate by the United States, had succeeded, then we would still be a colony.”

PDVSA and the development of 'new weapons'
“After the attempted coup and the petroleum sabotage at PDVSA in 2002-2003, we were able to take control of the ‘crown jewel,’ our national oil company. That meant that the government was exerting real control over our natural resources, so that from moment PDVSA has been able to support the improvement of the quality of life of the Venezuelan people.

“PDVSA,” Rodríguez continued, “has a key role in producing the most powerful weapons ever known to mankind, more powerful than atomic weapons or any other weapons…”

His eyes sparkled and the animated indigenous features of his face broke into a grin. Dester Rodríguez is also General Rodríguez, a career military man whose background is remarkably similar to his commander-in-chief, Hugo Chavez. He grew up in poverty, sold newspapers on the street as a child, and scrambled and studied to win entry into the national military academy. Like Chavez, he also spent some of the most important years of his career as a professor at the academy.

“… these weapons…” The eyes of the students grew wider and they leaned forward in their upholstered seats. Was he talking about new WMD’s? (After all, Bush’s men in Washington have been constantly trying to convince the rest of Latin America that Venezuela poses a military threat.)

“…these weapons can create conditions for bettering the life of our entire population and lifting up the consciousness of everyone. Our weapons are missiles of love.”

“We call on the whole world to fight against death and fight for life. This is our true purpose. Our missiles of solidarity with the people, created over the past four years, consist of the various social missions. "

The PDSA director than proceeded to describe all the social missions that serve the Venezuelan people: the education Missions - Robinson, Ribas, Sucre; the health missions like Barrio Adentro and Misión Milagro; Mercal and the other food missions; Misión Vuelvan Caras, Misión Guaicaipuro, and Misión Viviendas, which produces housing. These are not small demonstration projects, but major efforts to redistribute the nation's resources. The neighborhood medical offices of Barrio Adentro are now serving at least 60% of the population, most of whom previously had no access to health care. The Mercal food stores, which are stocked with basic provisions at very low prices, are said to be providing 40% of the country's groceries.

“Back in 1998," Dester Rodriguez explained, "they still talked of the invisible hand -- Mr. Smith controlling everything. What did the market have to say to the people in the barrios of Caracas who had to eat dog food? We had forgotten about worshiping the real God and were worshiping the God of Money. We had converted ourselves into rational beasts. We were falling into a deep moral abyss.”

“Fortunately this country, with the help of God, has reversed course. The people are the essence of everything. The people are made in the image of God, money is not the image of God. Here at PDVSA we have been able to accomplish everything that the Evangelist [Jesus] commands without forfeiting our position as the third largest business in the world. Now we can provide for all the things that are basic to human existence: education, health care, food and housing. In the past four years we have created the social missions, and in the next six years we are on our way to socialism.”

Some final advice
For two hours, Rodríguez mesmerized his audience with arguments about Venezuelan sovereignty, the necessity of conserving the earth’s resources, the obligation of serving humanity, all woven together with a creative mix of revolutionary Christian imagery. This convergence of faith and social justice is shared by many in the government, including the president. In a speech in December of 2004, Hugo Chavez first announced that Venezuela would create a new kind of socialism, "a socialism for the 21st century," and he put it in this personal context: "I am a very Christian man and I believe in a revolutionary Jesus who wanted social justice."

As Rodriguez was answering questions from the students, one of them asked if there were plans to replace the Cuban doctors who were providing care in the barrios. “We will have 20,000 new doctors trained in integral family medicine by the year 2012,” he replied. “We have a dream, that some day soon Venezuelan doctors will join Cuban doctors in going to Central America and South America in a gesture of solidarity. It might seem strange to you that a man like me, who has devoted his life to the military, is now devoting his energies to promoting the social missions,” said Rodríguez. “We have a new civic responsibility now. Our dream is to replace our soldiers with doctors, so that we have the opportunity to prevent death instead of causing death.”

Another student asked, “What do you want from the United States?”

“First of all, that you listen to us. We recognize that the United States is great country and its people are very special people. We ask you to recognize Venezuela as a sovereign nation and also give the same consideration to the other nations of the world. We hope your country will accept the fact that we have our own reality. Day to day, we try to live values of solidarity instead of egoism, fraternity instead of war, government for the masses instead of government for the minority, so that we can manage to put the human being at the center of everything.”

Then he addressed a rhetorical question to his audience: “What can you students do?”

He paused and looked at all of them. “Put on your sunglasses so the sun doesn’t blind you. Protect yourselves, keep a space where your thinking can be clear, so that the God of Money does not mess up your dreams. You have to protect yourself every day so that the God of Money does not eliminate the dream of a just society.”

Based on talks at PDVSA headquarters in January 2007, when the author accompanied Susan Rose, Professor of Sociology at Dickinson College, and her nineteen students on a two and half week tour of Venezuela. After meeting with Dester Rodriguez in Caracas, the students visited rural areas of the country and stayed in the homes of campesino families.