Evo Morales threatens to close US embassy in Bolivia as leaders weigh in

[cali]

yes, yes, he's an overemotional baby. He's ridiculous. Histrionic, etc. But you might, for a minute, consider the history of the U.S. in South America. It adds a bit of context.

Bolivia's president, Evo Morales, has warned he might close the US embassy in his country, as South America's leftist leaders rallied to support him over the rerouting of his presidential plane.

Morales again blamed Washington for putting pressure on European countries to refuse to allow his plane to fly through their airspace on Tuesday, forcing it to land in Vienna, in what he called a violation of international law. He had been returning from a summit in Russia during which he had suggested he would be willing to consider a request from the NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden for asylum.

<snip>

Morales made his announcement on Thursday as the leaders of Venezuela, Ecuador, Argentina and Uruguay joined him in Cochabamba, Bolivia, for a special meeting to address the diplomatic row.

At the end of the summit a statement was issued demanding answers from France, Portugal, Italy and Spain. The United States was not mentioned in the statement.

<snip>

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/05/bolivia-morales-close-us-embassy

[MADem]

1. Well, he threw the ambassador out a while back, so what else is new?

We operate on a charge d'affaires system with Bolivia these days--no ambassadors, and that's because of foot-stompin' Evo.

He can do what he wants, but he might not like the aftermath. His largest non-energy sector trading partner isn't the rest of South America, or Russia, or China.

[cali]

2. countries like Argentina and Venezuela and Ecuador are firmly on his side

as are others. it's difficult to predict, but it seems like a lot of pent up anger at the United States, that has as much to do with our wretched history in the region as anything else, is bubbling to the surface.

context, context context.

[MADem]

5. Of course they are--they're all good friends, and they back one another up, even when they

crack down on freedom of the press, and do other pesky "unprogressive" things .... for the good of el pueblo, of COURSE.....! Because, ya know, father (or in the case of Argentina, mother) knows best....

Such good buddies, thick as thieves, really! http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/united-against-world-in-latin-america/2013/07/04/dc38c59e-e4f4-11e2-bffd-37a36ddab820_story.html

First, Rafa phoned Cristina late Tuesday during the crisis. That’s Rafael Correa, president of Ecuador, calling his Argentine counterpart, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. “Rafa, how are you?” she recounted on her Twitter account. “He answered angry and anguished. ‘Don’t you know what’s happened?’ ”

“Cristina,” Correa explained, “Evo’s plane has been detained, and they won’t let him leave Europe.”

She was outraged, she told her Twitter followers, and so was Pepe. Soon Ollanta was working to convene a continent-wide meeting of leaders and making sure the influential ones, including Nicolás and Dilma, were there......Presidents accused of violating norms — as in Ecuador, where Correa is corralling the media, or in Venezuela, where the April presidential election was marked by irregularities — know their fellow leaders will side with them against human rights groups.

“They act with the conviction that at least no one from the club is going to cross the line and publicly question their internal affairs,” Vivanco said.....

[cali]

7. That criticism is deserved over restrictions on the press

doesn't really have much to do with the issue at hand. And have you any links for a crack down on the Argentinian press? Oh, horrors, they're good friends. That changes everything.

gad, pathetic.

[MADem]

13. You fired up the issue of relationships in post two, and now you're crabbing that I expounded on it?

"Gad, pathetic," indeed.

One hand washes the other, both wash the face. It has everything to do with the issue at hand. Associations, alliances, the willingness to support endeavors and look the other way at excesses, this is what "friends" do.

FWIW, Argentina's big problem is a shitty economy with obscene inflation, currency problems, a crappy real estate market, and a number of other issues.

[cali]

18. oh ffs

do you not grasp at all why South American countries have legitimate complaints about U.S. policies?

[Catherina]

21. You're wasting your time. That poster is a top defender of US policies in the LatAm forums n/t

[MADem]

23. Do you not grasp at all that US trade policies with these countries in recent years have been

VERY favorable to the nations in question? Notwithstanding that, these countries continue to beat dead horses. After a while, as I say, it is human nature to go where you are celebrated--not where you are tolerated, or worse, scorned.

[Catherina]

16. AND GOOD FOR HIM. The Press he RESTRUCTURED was owned by the 1%

to LIE, to DISTORT, to DESTABILIZE, to MISLEAD.

He took it in hand and restructured it so that the independent Press that actually REPORTS according to established journalistic standards would not be drowned out by a bunch of PROPAGANDISTS and LIARS.

Owwwww, how it hurts the interests of the 1% when they can't WAPO a country. This *Freedom of the Press* is one of the elites rallying cries when they lose their propaganda tool and the US' biggest tools to spy and lie.

The same as in Ecuador, USAID created “monitoring” programs for freedom of press and of “training” of journalists in Bolivia

Quito, 23 July (Andes).- A known script in Ecuador, was implemented in Bolivia by the United States government, through the USAID (the US Agency for International Development) with the financing for monitoring programs for freedom of press and training journalists.

Diplomatic cables filtered by Wikileaks reveal that under a vague title of “Democracy,” it was allowed to state and private institutions from the United States to finance activities with political parties and non-government institutions, implementing monitoring programs for freedom of press and training journalists.

According with the President Evo Morales government that was the bridge through which the North American State Department fired up press campaigns against it.

In Ecuador, this role was fulfilled by “the Andean Foundation for the observation and study of the media,” Fundamendios. This organization which visible head is Cesar Ricaurte was a tenacious critic of excesses of the media, but lately it aligned to the interests of them, and it shares the same agenda of regime political opposition.

Ricaurte and the organization that he runs receive funding from the USAID, and it maintains monitoring and observation programs of the media to generate alerts to international organisms generally painting a disastrous state of the freedom of speech.

Another programs developed by the NGO are the strengthening of the civil society, training of journalists, and informational “freedom.” Among its donators is the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), Faro Group, IFEX, Pichincha Bank, and Ecuavisa.

Cesar Ricaurte – now became by the media to which he formerly criticized into a kind of champion of the freedom of speech – figured among other journalist of the private media (Carlos Jijon, Jorge Ortiz, Alfredo Negrete), as an informer of the United States Embassy in Quito according to Wikileaks cables.

Going back to Bolivia, on July 9th, 2003, the Planning and Development Ministry informed to the United States Embassy the suspension of USAID “Democracy” programs. According with the diplomatic cables, the North American delegation in La Paz received the news with irritation and skepticism due to the fact that they did not expect that the reprisal would be so harsh.

Though its closeness, the United States Embassy was very critic with its media allies in Bolivia. “President Morales is right when he says that the rich families are the owners of the media, and that generally they have a conservative perspective, pro-business,” the cable emphasized on December, 2008.

The information and multimedia content, published by the news agency Andes, are public, free of charge. May be reproduced with full acknowledgment requirement. http://www.andes.info.ec/en/en-ingl%C3%A9s/4512.html

I'd find a much better article about this but it's not worth the time because you're willfully misleading people on Latin America. Again. My response to you is more for other people's benefit so they know what's going on here.

[MADem]

17. You're serious!!!

You don't have a clue as to what is happening in Ecuador, apparently. It's so ironic that Correa is stuck with Assange, because if Assange made Correa's information "free," he'd be in Very Hot Water.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/15/world/americas/ecuador-legislature-approves-curbs-on-news-media.html

It is packed with controversial measures. The law creates a Superintendency of Information and Communication, with the power to regulate the news media, investigate possible violations and impose potentially hefty fines. It creates a five-member Council for the Regulation and Development of Information and Communication, led by a representative of the president, to oversee the news media.

The law prohibits “media lynching,” which it defines as the repeated publication or broadcast of information intended to smear a person’s reputation or reduce one’s credibility. And it bans content that incites violence or promotes racial or religious hatred.

Carlos Lauría of the Committee to Protect Journalists, a group that promotes press freedom, said the wording of such measures was vague enough that it left ample room to define a variety of content as being in violation of the law, opening the door to censorship.

“This is the latest step in the deterioration of press freedom in this country that has occurred under Correa,” Mr. Lauría said. “This law, if it’s put into practice, is not only going to undermine the ability of journalists to report critically, but it also threatens the rights of citizens to be informed on issues like corruption or other sensitive issues.”

[Catherina]

20. Yes indeed I am and bullshit to your bullshit backed up by NYT bullshit

Now please forgive me as I excuse myself from further conversation. I don't have time to spin around in the mud with you.

[MADem]

22. Whatever--tell the elephant in the room to stand in the corner and try to not poop too much. nt

[dballance]

3. It's not as if that was necessarily unfounded or a bad idea on Morales' part.

Morales threw out USAID and the Ambassador. It's an open secret that USAID is closely tied with the CIA and does help stir opposition in countries where we don't have our own puppet dictator/president/PM. That's particularly true in Latin America - think Venezuela these days as we've totally lost control of the area and all its resources for our corporate masters. The US Ambassador was meeting with Morales' opposition. So I can't say I blame Morales for trying to protect his own behind.

Before you go all off on me and my tin hat you might remember that the compound next door to the one that got attacked in Benghazi turned out to be a CIA facility and where was our Ambassador? Right in the thick of it.

If you don't believe we use the State Department and billions through USAID as arms of the CIA and our covert desires to control other countries you're being naive.

[cali]

4. I do believe it and I wish you'd post an OP about it

(USAID)

[MADem]

6. Again, he can do what he wants, but he might not like the aftermath.... nt

[cali]

8. yes, because we're the big bad boss.... of everyone.

hey,k we could always engineer a coup. we've had lots of practice.

[MADem]

10. Don't be absurd.

Ever heard the expression "Go where you're celebrated, not where you're tolerated?"

We're so mean to that country that we have a very large trade relationship with them....and they don't sell a damn thing we can't get elsewhere. They're landlocked. They're fractured internally, with many competing groups that don't get along and a shocking imbalance in wealth distribution--talk about the One Percenters!

If there are any coups in Bolivia, it'll be neighbors looking to make a land grab working that angle...or it'll be home-grown. Check this out (this group is not fans of the USA):

http://ain-bolivia.org/2007/03/bolivias-regional-tensions-a-history-of-conflict/

[cali]

11. sorry, but the history of the U.S. in South America doesn't suddenly

get erased by current trade relationships.

And furthermore, Bolivia is hardly alone in this mess created largely by the U.S.

[MADem]

14. No one is talking about "erasing history" so I don't know why you're even going there.

You don't feed your population with "history." You feed them with TRADE.

[cali]

19. no, you're just ignoring it entirely.

[MADem]

24. No point in having any relationship at all, then--because, according to you, USA must be perpetually

UNFORGIVEN. Policies of long dead leaders must be heaped on the current occupant of the WH.

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

[Cleita]

9. Closing the embassy is something Morales has been itching to so. He does not trust

us after our attempt to overthrow and assassinate Hugo Chavez and he knows he's in our State Department's gun sights since he refused to stop the coca farmers from growing the plant because of our war on drugs. The less there is an American presence in Bolivia the less are the chances of our CIA plotting to overthrow him. I think that's his motivation for seizing on this opportunity to give the USA the boot.

Our drug war goons have no understanding that coca is a traditional plant used to acclimatize the natives to the high altitudes. It also fuels our illegal cocaine trade. But it's part of the native culture and us going in and demanding that all the coca fields be destroyed is part of America's tradition of bullying other nations to do what we want. Morales has stood up to us in this regard and now we are gunning for him.

This latest incident is part of that, but I think we really stuck our feet in hot water this time.

[ProSense]

15. Why doesn't he just do it? n/t

[Cleita]

27. He probably will unless Kerry smooths this over. n/t

[MADem]

25. He has more to worry about from his own fractured population than from any outside actors. nt

[Cleita]

26. The outsiders are who back up his domestic enemies. We have been doing it for some time.

Even an article in the NYTimes yesterday mentioned the fact that the US had a history of backing up coups in South America.

[MADem]

29. And we also had a history of slavery.

The past does not guide the present or the future. Why bother providing aid packages and favorable trade relationships if we're going to pop in a do a coup?

[Cleita]

30. This is not the past. We have a policy of doing this to the present day when we

can get away with it. What aid and favorable trade relations have we given Bolivia recently? Morales kicked out our aid agency a year or so ago. All the aid we give in South America is to bribe the officials in charge. I lived in South America and I know that nothing trickles down to the needs of the people for building infrastructure, schools and hospitals. It goes to keep the rich oligarches in style and feather their off shore banking accounts. The US government knows this.

[bike man]

12. There's not much of a downside. The Ambassador was kicked out, as was USAID. Several years

ago, USAID was banned from one of the larger coca growing regions.

We don't *really* need their coca products, some even say that cocaine can be harmful to the health.

We don't *really* need to send them foreign aid in the form of money and/or military supplies. Plenty of other countries are waiting with their hands out. OR, we could keep the money here and spend it on our own homeless. IIRC, the $ amount in 2012 to Bolivia was $150 million.

We don't *really* need all Bolivia's friends and neighbors who have precious little to offer the US but their willingness to receive aid. There are children in the US who could use that same aid.

Close the foreign aid pipeline today and all their posturing would end by tomorrow.

[Cleita]

28. I think we have stopped sending them aid. I read something about it yesterday

on another website.

[Tarheel_Dem]

31. It would be great to have a link, because according to this we appropriated almost $29m in 2012.

$22 mil has been requested for 2013, and $18.7 mil for 2014.

http://foreignassistance.gov/CountryIntro.aspx

[Cleita]

32. It was wikipedia. You need a link for that?

Back in 2004 we sent them $150 mil. $18.7 mil is a huge reduction down from that. I doubt if Morales is having a meltdown about losing that.

[Tarheel_Dem]

33. You didn't say where you got your "information" in the other post. Why request aid if you don't....

it? We've had our own problems, and supporting hellholes like Bolivia has been one of them. Glad we're pulling back.

[Cleita]

36. I take it you've never been to Bolivia. It's hardly a hell hole. It's just a poor

country trying to recover from years of exploitive rule by a minority, elitist, upper class aided by our foreign aid handouts which frankly never got to the people who needed it but was diverted into the pockets of those same elites. Fortunately, they are mostly gone from the political scene.

[Tarheel_Dem]

39. My statement stands.

[cali]

34. lol $22 million

a huge percentage of U.S. foreign aid, by god!

In 2011 total foreign aid was 49.5 billion.

[Cleita]

37. Yes, Morales is so going to miss that change we are throwing at him.

I'm surprised he's not expected to grovel on the ground picking it up.

[Tarheel_Dem]

38. And that $22 million can feed the kids we're kicking off of SNAP, and maybe keep a couple of....

Headstart Programs running. I could give a shit about Bolivia.

[bike man]

42. Suspend ALL foreign aid to all of them, everywhere, every bit of it. Even the

"lol $22 million a huge percentage of U.S. foreign aid, by god!"

That percentage, especially when combined with the remainder of the 49.5 billion, would go a long way toward easing the homeless, jobless, foodless, schoolless (I made that word up), medicalless (that one also) right here in the U.S.

Besides, all those despots getting all that money don't like us anyway, and many live in luxury while their people are not getting the benefit of the money/aid.

[bike man]

40. Suspend foreign aid not just to Bolivia, but everyone, all of them, everywhere. The

other recipients will put enough pressure on Bolivia the posturing will end, and the US can resume the position of 'ATM for the World', while US citizens sleep on sidewalks and school children have no lunches.

Here's an excerpt re Bolivian aid http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-05-01/world/38954658_1_president-evo-morales-usaid-andean-information-network

As U.S.-Bolivian relations soured and Washington canceled trade preferences, total U.S. foreign aid to the poor, landlocked South American country has dropped from $100 million in 2008 to $28 million last year, with counternarcotics and security aid set to virtually disappear in the coming fiscal year. With Colombia and Peru, Bolivia is one of the world’s three major cocaine-producing nations.

[Cleita]

41. I'm all for keeping our aid domestic. Foreign aid is just bribery anyway.

It hardly ever reaches those who need it. If Morales does close the US embassy, the aid will be stopped, I'm pretty sure. But I don't think he cares. His real goal is to nationalize the resources then he won't need any aid from us. Also, if we withdraw, the Chinese will be more than willing to help out.

As far as the coca industry. Sure it's financed by our addictions to it. If we don't address our drug problems here, it will continue to be a cash crop for those countries. Also, chewing coca is part of the culture. It helps cope with the high altitudes in the Andes.

[KittyWampus]

35. Morales is doing what many Latin American leaders do> spout off against the US as often as possible

If he wants to make the threat, he should follow through on it.

He'd probably get a lot of support for it at home, in surrounding countries and here on DU.