Two articles on Venezuela. The first is on the takeover of an abandoned Clorex factory, by the Venezuelan government. The second is about the assassination of a young member of the Venezuelan Socialist Party.
Rightwing parties in Latin America give themselves populist names, keep the manifesto rhetoric modest and talk of appealing to the street. But they aren’t winning many votes. Meanwhile business is learning to work with governments of the left.
Reader Comments - Cecily McMillan; Prison Labor; William Worthy; Syria; Timothy Geithner and Wall Street's Bailout; College Debt; U.S. Subversion in Latin America; Venezuela;
Announcements - This Weekend - Left Forum (May 30 - June 1) - Reform and/or Revolution: Imagining a World with Transformative Justice;
Raising America's Pay - Launches June 4; Meet UnionWiki; Call for Papers - Fighting Inequality: Class, Race, and Power
Mark Weisbrot shows the daily protests are anything but peaceful. In fact, about half of the daily death toll from Venezuela that we see in the media - now at 41 -- are actually civilians and security forces apparently killed by protesters. Dario Azzellini argues the protests in Venezuela represent a vicious attack on the country's social progress under Hugo Chávez, spurred on by anti-Chavista politicians in affluent regions.
Reader Comments - U.S. Military Policy, Foreign Policy and Aggression; Public Education and New York's Segregated Schools; Obamacare; Bernie Sanders for President - exchange on electoral politics and tactics; Trade Policy; Venezuela; Congress and the 1%; Pope Francis; poverty;
Announcement - Call for Tributes and Reflections: The Life and Work of Rod Bush - San Francisco - Aug. 18, 2014
The Obama administration seems surrealistically unaware that this is a very different hemisphere than it was 15 years ago. Governments representing the majority of Latin America are now from the left. These governments emphatically reject Washington’s depiction of the recent events in Venezuela as a government trying to “repress peaceful protesters."
John Kerry’s rhetoric is divorced from the reality on the ground, where life goes on – even at the barricades
This new Cold War is not about communism taking over the world. It is more about returning to 19th century balance of power interests, borrowing the phrase John Kerry has used against Putin. It is about dividing up the spoils of the first Cold War among the triumphal capitalist democracies, as if Russia is defeated and short-lived. Pushing Western capitalism and NATO towards Russia was sure to touch off the current escalation, and worse may come.
Reader Comments - International Women's Day; Cecily McMillan; Ukraine; Venezuela; Are Unions Necessary?; Gov. Christie and Bridgegate; What the Hell Is Barack Obama's Presidency For?; War in Iraq;
Announcements - Dignity in Action -San Francisco -Mar 8; Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire Commemoration -New York - Mar 25; New book - Save Our Unions: Dispatches from A Movement in Distress;
Today in History - Supreme Court rules in Dred Scott - March 6, 1857
None of the mainstream media narrative accurately reflects the complex reality of Venezuela. U.S. news and analyses are routinely distorted, manipulated, and even manufactured to support the corporate media's narrative which is that student-led protests have been violently repressed amidst severe government repression of speech and press in Venezuela.
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