Cuban, Venezuelan Leaders Woo Latin American Nations to Trade Pact Minus US

[NNN0LHI]

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBHXKFF48E.html

HAVANA (AP) - Hoping to create a model for developing nations across the Western Hemisphere, the leftist presidents of Cuba and Venezuela strengthened their economic ties and promoted an alternative trade pact not led by the United States.
The meeting between Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro in Cuba coincided with an international meeting here of opponents to the U.S.-backed Free Trade Area of the Americas, or FTAA, which failed to take effect as scheduled early this year.

Both men were addressing the gathering Friday morning.

"Venezuela used to be an American colony," Chavez told business people from his country Thursday at a trade fair exhibiting their products here. "Now we are liberated, we are free to make these commercial integration agreements with all countries."

[Dhalgren]

1. Good for them!

I hope that the various independent countries in South and Central America (hell, all of the Americas) can get together and work to improve the lives of their peoples and the progress of their nations. Later, if the US can ever become a free country, maybe they will let us participate - on strictly equal terms. Wouldn't it be great to be at peace, as an equal, with every nation in this hemisphere?

[Spazito]

2. This is good to see, imo

It makes eminent sense for countries with similar interests to work together closely. The US (bush cabal)has proven itself to be untrustworthy, rapacious in coveting other countries resources and it is obvious it's interests are antithetical to the people of Venezuela, Cuba and other Central and South American countries.

NAFTA has proven disastrous, imo, for the people of Canada, the US and Mexico and has been beneficial only to corporations.

[MisterP]

3. I forecast something like this in 2004: all the exploited nations

of Africa and Latin America and Asia would band together and shuck the WTO and IMF and WB that'd drained them dry with neocolonial policies.

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Spazito]

5. If he was such a 'small' player, why are the bush cabal

obsessing over him? Chavez is a threat to the cabal in that he is very persuasive, very influential and a strong leader, all of which the cabal despises.

[Judi Lynn]

6. Why would you compare a small Caribbean island under a 45 yr.old embargo

to large South American countries? Something seems missing somewhere.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
On edit, from a very non-liberal publication, a look at how countries are aligned in Latin America, concerning their need to get from under the boot of the American right-wing, for survival's sake:

Venezuela, which recently spent $150 million on Russian arms to equip its Cuban-inspired "military reserve," may top the list of America's Latin nightmares -- Venezuela is often called the "Saudi Arabia of Latin America" -- but it may be only the beginning of sorrows. Leftist governments are now in charge in Brazil, Argentina, Chile, the Dominican Republic and Uruguay, and Mexico and Peru may move left in elections next year. In Bolivia, the Socialist opposition has controlled the agenda since the fall of President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada in 2003, and the recent ouster of Ecuadoran President Lucio Gutierrez has left the U.S. fretting about "constitutional processes" as it refuses to recognize the new government. The danger, as the U.S. sees it, is that Venezuela could not only become a second Cuba but also serve as a focal point for Latin American opposition to U.S. foreign policy. But the shift might not be that bad:

N]ot all "leftists" have the same agenda.... Left-wing politics in Brazil and Argentina has little to do with the old-school, hard-line ideology of Chavez. Instead, it was frustration with the half-hearted reforms, crony capitalism, and lack of economic development of right-wing governments in the 1990s that elected leftists in Brazil and Argentina.

http://www.plastic.com/article.html%3Bsid=05/04/29/04021559

It would seem they don't have the benefit of your insight.

[AP]

9. Yeah, Chavez is a bad lesson for the rest of the developing world.

There's more to gain from going from zero to 55 mph in your own country then there is to stay at zero so that people in Houston and NYC can go from 65 to 85 mph on your back.

Ok, that's not a great metaphor. But there's a kernel of something funny in there somewhere. I'm going to work on that one.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

7. I find your posts very interesting. n/t

[chlamor]

8. kick