On 10/31/06, Louis Proyect <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>"[E]xcept orientated more to the South." That's an important
>exception, imho. What do you think Chavez is doing by counterposing
>ALBA to FTAA, taking part in MERCOSUR, running for a seat in the UN
>SC, etc.?
>--
>Yoshie
Engaging in diplomatic/trade initiatives obviously. That's what the
heads of state do. As a revolutionary socialist in the USA, I am
under no obligation to softpedal my criticisms of the government of
Iran, Brazil or China, however. You would be hard-pressed, for
example, to find articles in the Cuban press that expose the
brutality that Chinese workers and peasants face on a daily basis.
When Castro visited China, he did not utter a single critical word.
When Chavez met with Ahmadinejad, he failed to call attention to the
absolutely repressive character of the Iranian state which has
tortured political prisoners routinely. This is the fate of small,
weak nations trying to carve out an alternative economic development
path. They have to make compromises.
I am under no such obligation. I am not trying to balance a budget or
make sure that my country has access to spare parts, as the
Sandinistas had to deal with in the late 1980s when I was working
with their government. That was about as close as I ever was to
such problems.
Supposing that we care about the struggles of people -- leaders and
masses -- trying to balance a budget or making sure that their country
has access to spare parts, we, too, speak in such a way that we do
won't undermine their struggle to integrate their region on terms
(relatively speaking) favorable to masses rather than capital,
checking US power (even a little bit) to avert the worst in such
places as Iran and Korea, driving a wage between the US, the EU, and
Japan (so that the developed world will present a less united front),
and so on. That's the struggle in which US hegemony or survival of
the world is at stake.
--
Yoshie
<http://montages.blogspot.com/>
<http://mrzine.org>
<http://monthlyreview.org/>
