because,
a) the Chavez government recently earned Venezuela designation as "THE most equal country in Latin America" on income distribution, by the UN Economic Commission on Latin America and the Caribbean;
b) Venezuelans rate their own country 5th in the world on their own welfare and prospects for the future;
c) Venezuelans enjoy free universal health care, greatly expanded educational opportunities, good wages and benefits, low unemployment, dramatic drops in poverty (50%) and extreme poverty (70%) and an expanding economy (7%) despite the Bushwhack-induced depression (following a period of yet more growth, a sizzling 10%, during the 2003-2008 period); and
d) over the last decade, with Chavez as president, Venezuelans have seen greatly expanded citizen participation, high voter turnouts and one of the most honest and transparent election systems in the world (far, FAR better than our own).
I wonder what this rightwing "meme" means, that "not following the Chavez line" is somehow a good thing. I suspect that it has to do with the main offenses of the Chavez government against the transglobal corporate rulers who control the media, that:
a) the Chavez government survived the rightwing coup attempt in 2002, a plot driven by RCTV that has been called the first "media coup," and then had the nerve not to renew RCTV's license to use the public airwaves;
b) the Chavez government socked Exxon Mobil in the nose (wouldn't we like to see a president who did that?!), by demanding a better deal for Venezuela on the oil contracts, and, when Exxon Mobil tried to pull their bully crapola, told Exxon Mobil to talk a walk (--nobody does this to Exxon Mobil and gets away with it!);
c) the Chavez government and the people of Venezuela were the pioneers of the leftist democracy movement that has swept South America into Central America, with leftist governments also elected in Brazil, Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador, Uruguay, Paraguay, Peru, Nicaragua and other places, which are now COOPERATING on goals of social justice, the use of resources for public benefit, establishment of LatAm independence, rejection of usurious and destructive IMF/World Bank "loans," rejection of "austerity," and so on--Venezuela is a key actor in the UNITY of Latin American countries AGAINST transglobal corporate rule (war, "privatization" of public resources, looting of public programs, "austerity" for the poor while the rich get richer).
d) Venezuelans and Chavez also provide the most innovative example of a "New Deal"-like government in the world--the very thing that transglobal corporations want us to forget about.
For these offenses--for being the leader of the "New Deal" movement in LatAm--Chavez and his government, and, by implication, the people of Venezuela (who are never mentioned) suffer non-stop slander, lies and disinformation from the corporate media and the U.S. State Department, and all kinds of attempted interference (including, for instance, USAID funding of the rightwing opposition in Venezuela, and CIA dirty tricks, like the "suitcase full of money" caper out of Miami, circa late Bush Junta).
I do sympathize with Amlo and other leftists who have to deal with transglobal corporate media control and who, like Ollanta Humala in Peru, feel that they have to "distance themselves" from Chavez in order not to suffer character assassination by the corporate media or, indeed, actual assassination or "dirty tricks" by the CIA and/or its local agents--or, once elected, U.S. supported coup d'tats, as in Honduras. Only one leftist LatAm leader has gone this route--Humala--probably because Peru was already saddled with a U.S. "free trade for the rich" agreement, which curtails Peru's sovereignty and independence, but I imagine that it is thought especially necessary in Central America, for several reasons, among them that Central America is the U.S. "circle the wagons" region, where the U.S. is attempting to firmly establish "free trade for the rich" and Pentagon "Southern Command" control, in the face of the massive rebellion against the U.S. in South America.
As one Honduran coup general put it, their coup was intended to "prevent communism from Venezuela reaching the United States" (quoted in the report on the coup by the Zelaya government-in-exile). Venezuela, of course, is a democracy, where the voters have voted themselves a "New Deal." THAT is what the corporate rulers and their tools, like this Honduran general, fear--that we will remember that democracy can produce social justice.
How might we remember that, given our rigged elections and total dominance of corporate cash and corporate media in our political system? By there being an actual, on-going example of it, right in this hemisphere--an example that has already inspired other people to elect "New Deal" governments.
The Honduran coup is probably the main instiller of fear in good leaders like Amlo, in Central America. They KNOW that that coup was aimed at them--and that Zelaya's offenses were that he was an advocate of the poor majority, had raised the minimum wage (offending Chiquita International and U.S. clothing retailers), opposed privatization (offending John McCain in his telecommunications interests in Honduras), championed the labor unions (offending U.S. "free traders" like Clinton), was working with the unions and other progressive groups to address constitutional reform (Honduras' constitution was written by Reagan's henchmen in the 1980s, to insure military and the "ten families" control of Honduras), advocated conversion of the U.S. air base in Honduras to an international commercial airport (badly needed in Honduras) (--thus offending the Pentagon) and, worst of all, joined ALBA, the Venezuela-organized trade group for Central America/Caribbean countries (by which Honduras was receiving discount oil from Venezuela, so that Zelaya, for instance, could lower the price of bus tickets for poor Honduran laborers).
The goddamned LIE that Zelaya was trying to amend the constitution to extend his own term of office--a lie cooked up by a Washington P.R. firm--is STILL BELIEVED by most North Americans. This is what Amlo fears. And he has very good reason to fear it, not only because the end result of this "Big Lie" was Zelaya being removed from his own country at gunpoint (with a re-fueling stop at the U.S. air base in Honduras), but also because Amlo himself has already been smeared, during the previous election (which he lost by a hairsbreadth, probably rigged by the Bushwhacks). He was smeared, a) as being "pro-Chavez" and b) as being "messianic"--in a corporate "narrative" that was probably designed to accompany the stolen election.
They smear Chavez, unmercifully--building up an entirely false image of "dictator." Then they use that goddamned lie to tell OTHER goddamn lies! Against Zelaya. Against Amlo. Against ANY leader who dares to champion the poor majority, and who dares to challenge U.S. corporate/war profiteer interests. Against Morales in Bolivia, Correa in Ecuador, Fernandez in Argentina, Ortega in Nicaragua. They are a little more circumspect about powerful Brazil, but they clearly loathe Brazil's alliance with these other leftist governments, and have been trying "divide and conquer" tactics on that front (all failed).
Chavez is their great bugaboo. What does "Chavez" mean? To most Venezuelans that name means FAIRNESS and the rise of LatAm independence, at long last. To our corporate/war profiteer rulers, it means the greatest horror of all: the "New Deal." (Please remember that FDR was ALSO called a "dictator" by the rich few and by the rightwing assholes who serve them in government and media, of that day.)
Leftist political strategists in some cases MUST deal with this kind of corporate media LYING. It has been defeated in Venezuela and other LatAm countries by awesome grass roots organizing and by the determination of the poor majority to elect governments that will do the will of the people--but it is a hard row, to say the least. We North Americans have failed at it, thus far. Our corporate rulers have ground us into the dust. We are broken and bleeding, as a people, and we are only just starting to raise our heads once again in our own defense and defense of our once great democracy. Latin Americans have already done it, in many countries--with the Venezuelan people and their elected government in the lead. THAT is why our corporate rulers hate and loathe Venezuela so much, and so demonize their president--a leader who has actually DONE the will of the people, with considerable courage and creativity and success.
This utter phantom--"dictator Chavez"--has been made "real" by its repetition NOT by facts. And thus--however unreal and non-factual it is--it is a political reality that a leftist leader like Amlo, especially in a country that is right on the U.S. border, must respond to in some effective way, so that it can't be used to throw dust in the eyes of Mexican voters.
"Chavez the dictator" is no more real than the WMDs in Iraq. Hundreds of thousands of innocent people were slaughtered by the latter lie. It is no more real than that "austerity" will end a depression. Millions of people are being DELIBERATELY impoverished by that lie, to enrich the rich ever more and to destroy democratic government altogether. Leaders who are on our side--on the side of the majority (the poor, the workers, the middle class, those who love peace and justice and fair play, and good government)--MUST deal with these lies, one way or another. The lies are very powerful and they are pounded into peoples' brains, day in, day out, by corporate control of our public airwaves and virtually all media (except the internet, and they're working on that).
So, what I see in the people you describe, is the word getting out--probably by grass roots networks--that "not following the CHAVEZ route" is a complete shibboleth, created by the corporate media, to serve corporate/war profiteer interests. The "Chavez route" repeatedly endorsed by Venezuelan voters, by big margins, in several elections, in a fair and transparent election system, is a "route" TOWARD more democracy and more fairness. The "dictator" phantom is completely irrelevant because it is a phantom. But these Mexican voters are sort of between phantom and true reality. Amlo and his supporters have been able to detach Amlo from this "Big Lie." And the next lie that has to fall is that increasing citizen participation, running fair and transparent elections, supporting education, helping the poor majority--and the many other accomplishments of the Chavez government--are somehow "dictatorial."
I feel for people who are trying to understand reality in the "Alice in Wonderland" world of the corporate media and U.S. government propaganda. These folks seem to me to be half-way there--half way to recognizing the "Big Lie" that has been perpetrated about "Chavez" AND about Amlo. If Mexican voters elect Amlo, they will find that Mexico is in good company in LatAm, with leaders like Chavez in Venezuela, Dilma Rousseff in Brazil (and Lula da Silva before her), and all the others COOPERATING with each other, to help the poor, to create prosperity in which all share and to better democratize their societies.
It is NOT EASY to see this reality through the "Iron Curtain" of blocked information and disinformation that we live under, here and there. But that IS the reality--and Mexicans, who mounted one of the most awesome democracy revolutions in the world, at one time--deserve to be part of this: American Revolution II.
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and this ballooned into an image of being something like CHAVEZ, but that he has "learned" about his mistakes, that now several "entrepreneurs"/empresarios are financially backing him now and that he cannot buck them like before and will be "kept in line" and "not follow the CHAVEZ route."
