third world, and for us as well, see Food First's take on it...
http://www.foodfirst.org/node/1662The ecological and social tragedy of crop-based biofuel production in the Americas
And DU discussion here...
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x272011The upshot: Corn/soy monoculture is going to INCREASE global warming, further harm the food system, destroy small farmers (the most critical component of the food system), REDUCE jobs (due to the mechanization of corporate ag), and cause massive deforestation, pesticide pollution and other grave impacts--just to feed U.S. fuel needs. It is NOT a solution to the global warming crisis. It is the Corporate Predators PROFITEERING from the global warming crisis.
And, in terms of poverty in Latin America, it is the most short-term thinking imaginable, and entirely counter-productive. It will throw tens of thousands more subsistence farmers off the land, and into the urban shantytowns, where there is no work, and where farming skills are not marketable anyway. It is the OPPOSITE of what should be happening in the food system. Corn monoculture for biofuels is ALREADY causing a GRAVE crisis in the price of tortillas--the staple food of the poor--in Mexico. Governments should be doing everything they can to support and encourage small farmers, and to remove corporate predators from our agricultural system.
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This is very likely bad news--that Lulu is meeting again with Bush.
http://money.excite.com/jsp/nw/nwdt_rt_top.jsp?news_id=ap-d8o70rn80&It is perhaps too early to know what-all Lulu is up to. He is a wily leftist politician who has placed himself between the Bolivarian revolution (which aims toward a break from US corporate predator rule, and full self-determination for Latin America) and the Bush Junta (whose plans for Latin America--until recently (see below, i.e., the events in Colombia) were assassination and violent overthrow of democratic countries, and a return to brutal fascist rule). But I am suspicous about Lulu's intent, and, of course, I don't trust Bush at all.
The "Doha" round of the WTO talks was held in Doha because they have a police state. Otherwise, hundreds of thousands would have protested against it.
Further, it looks like Lulu is caving to Corporate Predator pressure, to try to stop (or blunt?) the great democracy movement in Latin America through economic means. He may not see it that way. But that's the way it looks to me.
There seems to be unity among Latin American leaders in resistance to the kinds of gross, violent interference, and imposition of brutal fascist rule, that we have seen in the past, promulgated by the US. On his recent tour, Bush was publicly lectured by Latin American leaders, from Brazil to Mexico, on the sovereignty of Latin American countries, with specific mention of Venezuela. And there is a huge rightwing scandal breaking in Colombia, involving a plot to assassinate Hugo Chavez, drug trafficking and mass murder of leftists, labor union organizers and peasants, that goes to top leaders of the rightwing Uribe government, including the chief of the military (upon which Bush has larded billions of our taxpayer dollars in military aid).
In this sense, the Bush visit was a triumph for the Bolivarian revolution--started in Venezuela--with its major tenets of Latin American self-determination and regional cooperation. Even the rightwing president of Mexico felt obliged to distance himself from these foul Bushite/fascist plots.
HOWEVER, the key to the Bolivarian revolution--the linchpin of its success so far, and its future--is ECONOMIC cooperation and recovery from a decade of World Bank/IMF policy and corporate predator rule. It's not just political. It's not just the empowerment of the vast poor population--the great majority--at long last. Political democracy cannot survive without economic self-determination. The Bolivarians know this. They have been working hard on cooperative regional action, including, for instance, creation of the Bank of the South, to bail Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador, Paraguay and other countries out of onerous World Bank debt (the World Bank--now headed by Paul Wolfowitz--is the tool of corporate interference and profiteering), and the enlargement of the Mercosur, the South American trade group that could lead to a South American "Common Market" and common currency (to get off the US dollar). The Bank of the South has had one spectacular success--Argentina. And it will have more.
But this "deal" that Bush is cooking up with Brazil will mean MORE corporate domination--not to mention MORE global warming impacts--and seems aimed at "divide and conquer." Mercosur has a rule against US "free trade" deals. Members cannot engage in them. And Uruguay recently refused Bush's offer, and stuck with Mercosur. Will this mean that Brazil--and its huge economy--will leave Mercosur? Is this the Bushite plan to sabotage the planned South American "Common Market"? Did the Bush Junta, in fact, succeed in "dividing and conquering" economically, if not politically?
Perhaps I'm reading too much into it. I am not necessarily against third world Latin countries using whatever advantage they can get--from the vast influence of the Bolivarian revolution and the new leftist consensus--for the benefit of their people. If that's what it comes down to--if they cannot defend the ground that the Bolivarians have won for them--I would as soon they drive a hard bargain with the corporate predators, rather than fall into the decrepitude of a country like Colombia, which just caved to corporate rule. But I am concerned that Lulu--shrewd as he is (and he is no dummy)--could be outright selling the revolution to Bush. And I am equally, if not more, concerned about the disastrous course toward corn/soy monoculture to fuel U.S. cars.
Lulu is a former steelworker and leftist (majorityist). Back in December, he pointedly made a big, celebratory, state visit to Venezuela for the opening of the new Orinoco bridge between Venezuela and Brazil, two weeks before the the Venezuelan presidential election, and just after Chavez's remark at the UN about Bush being "the devil." This was a very big, implied endorsement of Chavez, by Lulu. Other South American leaders have also been clear in their support of Chavez--some with great bluntness. (When the Bushites told South American leaders they must "isolate" Chavez and Venezuela, they all apparently refused. Nestor Kirchner in Argentina replied that Chavez is "my brother." Rafael Correa, who was then running for president in Ecuador, commented on Chavez calling Bush "the devil" that it was "an insult to the devil"--and, not incidentally, his numbers soared and he won the election with a surprising 60% of the vote, against the richest man in Ecuador). (Chavez won his election with 63% of the vote.) (We need to know that Chavez calling Bush "the devil" played to roars of laughter to the south of us.)
And when I heard the rightwing/corporatist president of Mexico lecturing Bush on this matter--the sovereignty of Latin American countries, and even mentioning Venezuela--I knew there was consensus on it. "Butt out, Bush!" was the message. The POLITICAL message. And it was enforced throughout the tour. I think it may even have been a CONDITION of the tour--that Latin leaders placed on Bush. No Chavez-bashing. In this sense, Bush's need to provide some "deliverables" to his corporate masters may have resulted in some protection of the South American democracy movement, particularly in regard to Venezuela and the other Andean democracies--the probable targets of the rightwing paramilitary plotters in Colombia (who are now in disgrace).
In any case, this is the playing ground for very wily politicians--for good or for ill. It's a quite new playing field, thanks to the awesome grassroots democracy movement that has swept South America--with leftist leaders elected in Brazil, Chile, Uruguay, Argentina, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Ecuador (and electoral victories likely also in Peru and Paraguay, in the future)--and is moving into central America (victory in Nicaragua--big leftist movement in Mexico, came within .05 of winning the presidency last year, in what many believe was a rightwing stolen election, and a new leftist political movement in Guatemala, headed by Nobel Peace Prize winner Rigoberta Menchu).
I hope Lulu is thinking clearly, thinking long term and thinking democracy. Meeting with George Bush might make that difficult. Is there any worse or more anti-democratic conspirator on the face of the earth? He carries a black cloud with him, to obscure truth and justice.
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