Lula Shuns Davos Elite for Anti-Capitalist Jamboree With Chavez

[Robbien]

Source: Bloomberg

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is shunning the World Economic Forum in Davos this week and the chance to hobnob with business leaders and 41 heads of state. Instead, he’ll join more than 100,000 activists from around the world at an anti-capitalist jamboree in the Amazon.

Lula’s government is spending 78 million reais ($34.4 million) to bring groups from 59 countries to the 8th World Social Forum. They include a sex workers union from India and Belgians seeking to abolish the World Bank. Today, he’ll discuss the global financial crisis on a panel with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, one of the U.S.’s harshest critics, and Chavez’s presidential allies from Bolivia, Ecuador and Paraguay.

“He’s picked sides,” said Oded Grajew, a former businessman who organized the first Social Forum as a counterpoint to Davos in 2001 and has been a friend of Lula’s for 20 years. “Lula doesn’t want go to Davos and hear the same ideas that led the world into bankruptcy.”

Lula’s decision to attend the forum is a slap at the bankers whose “casino” mentality he cites almost weekly as bringing about a crisis in capitalism. It also helps shore up support among his leftist base, who heckled him at his last appearance at the forum in 2005 for allegedly governing on behalf of Brazil’s elites.

Read more: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601085&sid=aNeoGpGOZ8o8&refer=europe

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"He's picked sides"

Makes me smile.

[Arctic Dave]

1. “Lula doesn’t want go to Davos and hear the same ideas that led the world into bankruptcy.”

This little statement say a lot. Why listen to the same people who have the same ideology that created the economical problem to begin with.

[Idealism]

2. The revolution will not be televised

You will know of it only by whispers and prayers for a greater tomorrow

[99th_Monkey]

7. Did you see the documentary by that name?

I assume you did, since you put this in a Chavez-related string ... but just in case you haven't;
it's one of the best historical documentaries ever produced, due to it being mostly shot in real
time as the US-supported coup unfolded & then collapsed under the pressure of Chavez's popularity;
... because as chance would have it ... the film producers were already on-site to do a relatively
generic interview with Chavez, when they got caught up in the drama as it unfolded, with cameras
rolling the whole time from within the Presidential Palace. It's amazing.

Here's a link ... just in case
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5832390545689805144

[Peace Patriot]

10. I agree! A great documentary! The events caught on camera by the Irish filmmakers

who happened to be inside Miraflores Palace when the U.S.-backed coup attempt unfolded, are, in my opinion, the most important turning point in Latin American history--at least the history of the last century or so. The Venezuelan people's brave and peaceful, and quite amazing, defeat of this violent, rightwing coup inspired and galvanized the Left (the majority) throughout South America. It marked the end of the long, horrible period of brutal US domination of Latin America--or, rather, marked the beginning of the end. Since that time, Leftist (majorityist) governments have been elected in Bolivia, Ecuador, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Brazil (center-left), Chile (center-left), and also strong leftists elected in Nicaragua, Guatemala and soon in El Salvador--as well as being re-elected in Venezuela (and withstanding a US-funded recall election, in addition). (Also, in Mexico, a strong leftist came within 0.05% of winning the presidency in the last election, and the lefti will likely win next time.)

These leftist and progressive leaders have also now--at long last--created a South American 'common market'--UNASUR--formalized last spring, an organization that does not have the US as a member, and that is already superseding the OAS (where the US can and does blockade Latin America's true interests). And guess what the very first major action of UNASUR was? To provide strong and unanimous backing to Evo Morales' government in Bolivia, in the face of a US-funded and organized violent, rightwing coup attempt, this last September, which was peacefully defeated.

It all started in Caracas, with the coup attempt that is documented in "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised," in which the star is not Hugo Chavez--who was kidnapped and whisked away; the star is the Venezuela people. A truly inspiring film, in which you will also learn why Chavez, after the Venezuela people restored him to rightful power, declined to renew RCTV's license to use the public airways. The assholes who claim that Chavez is against "free speech" never tell you what RCTV did during the violent--but blessedly brief--overthrow of Venezuela's democracy.

[NashVegas]

18. What's Happened In South American During the Bush Administration

Is one of those things that makes me think that there are parts of the world that should be thankful for his ineptitude.

[Idealism]

13. I agree, great documentary

I wish more people would watch it and realize he isn't an enemy of the people, but rather to the Washington Establishment.

[Nevernose]

15. "...Black people will be in the street looking for a brighter day." 1970

Gil Scott-Heron, 1974 (or close to that) -- An American treasure if y'all didn't know
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UqWMmwH4p6w

You will not be able to stay home, brother.
You will not be able to plug in, turn on and cop out.
You will not be able to lose yourself on skag and skip,
Skip out for beer during commercials,
Because the revolution will not be televised.

The revolution will not be televised.
The revolution will not be brought to you by Xerox
In 4 parts without commercial interruptions.
The revolution will not show you pictures of Nixon
blowing a bugle and leading a charge by John
Mitchell, General Abrams and Spiro Agnew to eat
hog maws confiscated from a Harlem sanctuary.
The revolution will not be televised.

The revolution will not be brought to you by the
Schaefer Award Theatre and will not star Natalie
Woods and Steve McQueen or Bullwinkle and Julia.
The revolution will not give your mouth sex appeal.
The revolution will not get rid of the nubs.
The revolution will not make you look five pounds
thinner, because the revolution will not be televised, Brother.

There will be no pictures of you and Willie May
pushing that shopping cart down the block on the dead run,
or trying to slide that color television into a stolen ambulance.
NBC will not be able predict the winner at 8:32
or report from 29 districts.
The revolution will not be televised.

There will be no pictures of pigs shooting down
brothers in the instant replay.
There will be no pictures of pigs shooting down
brothers in the instant replay.
There will be no pictures of Whitney Young being
run out of Harlem on a rail with a brand new process.
There will be no slow motion or still life of Roy
Wilkens strolling through Watts in a Red, Black and
Green liberation jumpsuit that he had been saving
For just the proper occasion.

Green Acres, The Beverly Hillbillies, and Hooterville
Junction will no longer be so damned relevant, and
women will not care if Dick finally gets down with
Jane on Search for Tomorrow because Black people
will be in the street looking for a brighter day.
The revolution will not be televised.

There will be no highlights on the eleven o'clock
news and no pictures of hairy armed women
liberationists and Jackie Onassis blowing her nose.
The theme song will not be written by Jim Webb,
Francis Scott Key, nor sung by Glen Campbell, Tom
Jones, Johnny Cash, Englebert Humperdink, or the Rare Earth.
The revolution will not be televised.

The revolution will not be right back after a message
bbout a white tornado, white lightning, or white people.
You will not have to worry about a dove in your
bedroom, a tiger in your tank, or the giant in your toilet bowl.
The revolution will not go better with Coke.
The revolution will not fight the germs that may cause bad breath.
The revolution will put you in the driver's seat.

The revolution will not be televised, will not be televised,
will not be televised, will not be televised.
The revolution will be no re-run brothers;
The revolution will be live.

[xchrom]

3. recommend -- here's a guy who sees a real human future. nt

[harmonicon]

4. I just hope that he's picked sides

Lula is a complex figure. There's a chance that this is just pandering to a certain faction of the Brazilian population that he needs to support him. I don't think he'll stop supporting massive agribusinesses, complete with rain forest destruction any time soon.

[Peace Patriot]

9. Lulu reminds me of Governor Pat Brown of California ('60s-Jerry Brown's Dad).

Gov. Pat Brown was a populist in the great Hiram Johnson, railroad baron-busting, populist tradition. Never was California more prosperous, more labor-friendly, more progressive and never was there a more vibrant Democratic Party grass roots in California, than with Pat Brown as governor. It was during his tenure that the Democratic Party National Convention was held in Los Angeles and nominated John F. Kennedy for president. California had arrived as a national political and social force, that, by the sheer weight of its population and wealth, and its forward-looking social and political trends, would bend the nation in a progressive direction. I came to political consciousness in California during that era, at a very young age, and volunteered for both Brown's and Kennedy's campaigns. It was a heady and highly spirited era and place.

Many years later, for various reasons--a shift in my focus--I discovered that the 1960s was the era of the most rapacious logging of the ancient California redwood forest--a unique resource found only on the west coast of the U.S., with trees that started growing at the time of Christ, and that grow to 300 feet tall and 20 feet in diameter, producing an extraordinary ecosystem that literally generates its own rain, and in which the trees have no taproot, but rather hold themselves in place (hold trees the height of a skyscraper in place) on steep hillsides and ridges, by linking their shallow roots together underground. Old growth redwood is the most beautiful wood on earth, and is uniquely resistant to fire, insects and disease.

The ancient redwood forest was essentially destroyed under Gov. Pat Brown's tenure, with the timber industry one of the driver's of California's astonishing economic growth and wealth. Corporate logging practices profoundly disrupted the ancient, interconnected root system that held it all together, and wiped out great swaths of the habitat of numerous unique species such as the marbled murrelet, the northern spotted and the coho salmon (which spawns in particular rivers or streams of this ecosystem and in no others). A bit later, the California Forest Practices Act was created, and the California Environmental Quality Act (which empowered the public to review logging plans, among other things), but it was no contest between the rapacious and powerful corporate timber industry and the public. Over the next thirty years, 80% of the volume of the remaining ancient redwood forest was removed, and every one of its most critical species placed on the Endangered Species list (imminent extinction).

Gov. Pat Brown was one of the good guys--a highly progressive humanitarian, who got hammered by the rightwing for his famous opposition to capital punishment. Yet he could not see the true cost of an economy that nature could not sustain--the loss of a huge, more than 2,000 year old forest and all of its power to control the climate and cleanse the air and the water for the species that lived in it, and for us. Couldn't see it, or simply could not do anything about it, politically--because his focus was jobs, wealth and the good life for the maximum number of human beings.

We are most certainly in an era of much higher consciousness of the environment, and Lulu (a former steelworker, born into poverty) is certainly aware of the vital function of the Amazon forest to the ecology of our planet. But Brazil--economically, socially and politically--for all its wealth of natural resources and industry--is a 'third world' country, with an enormous poor population, that must be fed, schooled and bootstrapped into a better life, and must be given employment. Lulu just preserved (by presidential edict) a wide swath of the Amazon as habitat for several as yet uncontacted indigenous tribes (which also protects the trees, birds, fish and other species/ecosystems that sustain them), and has worked to improve government enforcement of environmental protections in the Amazon (parts of which are something of a 'wild west'). He has worked on many environmental protection initiatives--with local and world environmental groups and projects. He understands the situation, in my opinion--but is pulled in the direction of JOBS and also revenue, not out of corruption, but rather out an acute identification with the poor majority. Long term planning is difficult in such a poverty crisis. That the jobs of the corporate biofuels deal may (will likely) have negative social and environmental consequences, and that campesinos are displaced (small organic farmers) is weighed against the temporary spurts of money to the poor, and the boondoggle of so-called 'green' fuels (they are not).

It is an excruciating dilemma for a leader with good intentions and high consciousness. He cannot re-engineer his country and the world over-night--any more than Pat Brown could have saved the redwood forest, if he had been of a mind to. Hugo Chavez faces the same dilemma, and see-saws back and forth on environmental issues, much like Lulu (but with a stronger anti-multinational corporation view). (In Chavez's case, he inherited a society, economy and entrenched, rightwing political structure that was completely screwed up, from top to bottom, and just to get the oil industry revenues flowing into Venezuela's social programs, and not out of the country, has been a brutal battle--with Bush, with Exxon Mobil & brethren and with Venezuela's fascist oil elite.)

Ecuador's people and president (Rafael Correa), and Bolivia's people and president (Evo Morales) are perhaps pointing the way to better environmental achievements, by fighting for and winning battles over Constitutional enshrinement of Mother Nature's (Pachamama's) right to exist and prosper, apart from human needs (Ecuador--vote of the people--almost 70% for it), and over control of the land itself by campesinos and the indigenous, who practice sustainable agriculture (Bolivia--vote of the people--62% for it, just this week). Both Lula and Chavez have more difficult, complicated countries and political situations, but could possibly benefit from Ecuador's and Bolivia's example--a fundamental "law of the land" principle, away from the human notion that Nature is there for us to exploit, and establishing the notion that Nature sustains us, and must be reverenced, or we all die.

Such an enormous shift in consciousness occurred around the time of the American Revolution, which cast off the rule of ancient monarchies, and declared the equality and sovereignty of the people. This notion startled the world, like a bolt of lightning, and swept the old order away. It is, of course, not really sudden--it is the result of long struggle--but the "lightning" phenomenon does occur, whereby, quite suddenly--in that case--everybody is a "citizen" and not a "subject" (even those who are still ruled by a monarch). It is "in the air"--liberty, equality, justice. One democratic revolution then spawns another. Let us hope that this phenomenon works to save our planet and our species--a sudden general Enlightenment that supports and sustains leaders like Lulu and Chavez, very popular leaders with good intentions and progressive views, who need help in balancing the problems of vast poverty with the problem of the planet's dying ecosystem.

[harmonicon]

11. well, I hope it turns out far better than California did

How sad would it be if the Amazon rain forest, instead of spreading across a vast area of Brazil were confined to a few small parks?

Maybe there has to be a push to label and market biofuels the way that food has been - I think that importing biofuels from Brazil is a massive mistake, but I think that using ones which are locally and sustainably produced is great.

[Peace Patriot]

12. Also, a lot depends on WHICH plant is grown for biofuels, WHERE and by WHOM (who profits?)

See this BRILLIANT article/report on biofuels and food sovereignty. It is MUST reading, to understand this enormously important issue:

Food First Backgrounder: Biofuels--Myths of the Agro-fuels Transition
Posted July 6th, 2007 by admin
By Eric Holt-Giménez, Ph.D., Executive Director,
Food First/Institute for Food and Development Policy
http://www.foodfirst.org/node/1711

---------------------


If you permit corporate-grown corn for biofuels, you are risking pollution of organic farm lands with GMOs, pesticides and chemical fertilizers, as well as further damaging the corporate-controlled land itself, and, with the displacement of FOOD farmers, you are contributing to massive worldwide food shortages as well as pricing food out of the market.

However, if you restore land with damaged soils and ecosystems, and plant, say, marijuana or sugar cane or switchgrass--where nothing else will grow well--and harvest those for biofuels, on a smaller scale, organically, in a vast network of small farmers and communities, you thereby gradually restore the lands to food production, and contribute to solving multiple problems created by past, bad, corporate practices. It can be done, I agree, but it's got to be done right. And encroaching on the Amazon rainforest--with its fragile, thin layer of fertile soil--or any forest--to fuel automobiles, is a very, very bad idea. Damaged, non-forest land needs to be reclaimed, and its fertility restored. The crops that are planted, and the agricultural methods used, need to be designed NOT to create even worse problems, down the line.

As I recall, Lulu wants to import sugar cane biofuels to the U.S.--which may be slightly better than the corn biofuels grown here (because displacement of food corn production, by biofuel corn production, is basically producing starvation in Mexico). But even sugarcane production (or switchgrass, or the other alternatives), on a corporate scale, or that encroaches on the Amazon, or negatively impacts the campesinos (small organic food producers) is bad policy. It is a complicated problem, and one that is intimately connected to the bloody battles at the WTO and in other forums, between "first world" and "third world" countries, over the export/import of ag products. The "third world" has been trying to get fairer treatment in trade rules. They fight that battle, and start winning it, then they get slammed from the other side--environmentalists and campesinos--for the kind of ag product--corporate-farmed biofuels--high value, high price, extensive market--that someone like Lula da Silva sees as the best revenue producer and job-creator for Brazil. Lulu led the group-of-20 countries that walked out of the WTO meeting in Cancun, a great victory for the "third world." And now he gets it from the very people who were allied with him in that fight. I'm on the environmental side of this--because I think sustaining and restoring the environment, and saving the planet, are in the best interest of the poor, and of everyone, and CAN create general prosperity (sans greedbags), but I DO see his dilemma. And I also see that, without Lulu--if a rightwing government were in power--there would be NO consideration given to the environment AT ALL.

Bad, corporate biofuel production is the reality. It IS happening--because even good, well-intentioned politicians like Lulu cannot re-engineer their countries, their economies and the world, by themselves. They WILL make these kind of compromises for short-term gain. The answer must come--and IS coming--"from below"--from grass roots agriculture and grass roots political organizing--as the Food First article reveals. That is what is happening in South America, and that is what needs to happen here on an even more extensive basis than we currently see.

The other thing that happened at the WTO meeting in Cancun was the suicide of a South Korean farmer, who had lost his beloved farm and his future, and his children's future, and had seen his passionate devotion to local food production, destroyed by the US-dominated WTO and its cruel and destructive, corporate-written trade rules. He is not alone. Thousands of small farmers in Asia have committed suicide for the same reason. We must all work to create a world in which that does not happen, and in which an honest living can be made fulfilling truly human needs, in cooperation with Mother Earth.

[autorank]

5. Good for him, outstanding!!! Davod people

The "geniuses" who brought us the global economic meltdown

http://www.weforum.org/en/events/AnnualMeeting2009/index.htm

[dipsydoodle]

6. Good man

:fistbump:

[Blue_Tires]

8. k+r

[unkachuck]

14. K&R....n/t

[Judi Lynn]

16. Latam leaders join Brazil forum

Latam leaders join Brazil forum

Five South American leaders have headed to the World Social Forum in Brazil to join more than 100,000 activists at an alternative to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

The presidents of Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador, Paraguay and Venezuela arrived on Thursday to join those protesting against the Davos.

The forum, in the town of Benem in northeastern Brazil, is aimed at drawing attention to the destruction of the Amazon forest, as well as the rights of indigenous peoples and the current global economic crisis.

Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, the Brazilian president, made his first social forum appearance in three years.

He was given a warm reception when he appeared alongside the other four presidents at a forum event.

More:
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2009/01/2009129171518297634.html

[Usrename]

17. kick

great thread