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> Vol. 9 No 39...Dedicated to the Dialogue on Race...
>
> Table of Contents
>
>
> 1. Intuit's Vibe...requiem for America: Wake Up American World Citizens!
> By Mankh (Walter E. Harris III)
> 2. News You Use...Devil in the Details
> 3. Bit of History...Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías
> 4. Disgruntled
> 5. Politics Y2K6...Shadow of the Liberator...By Richard Gott
> 6. Venue for an Artist...The Devil's Recipe (Excerpts from UN Speech)...
> By Hugo Chavez7.Disgruntled
> 7. Mailbox
>
>
>
> ******************************************
>
>
>
> Intuit's Vibe
> Requiem for America: Wake Up American World Citizens!
> By Mankh (Walter E. Harris III)
>
>
>
> Many will not be able to read this
> and most simply won't.
> The civil war has been exported (again.)
> The red and blue are battling with Iraq
> and other foreign turfs.
> Don't kid yourselves,
> the two Americas are at least a dozen–
> Republican, Democrat, neither, other,
> Hispanic, Latino, White, Mexican American,
> African American, Arab American,
> American Indian, Asian American,
> Fill In The Blank Americans…
> It's all done with sleight of hand and demographics,
> b/c the minorities combined
> will soon be (if they aren't already) the majority!
> Yet, many are numb and number,
> numbered and branded like animals,
> many have grown complacent…
> many quietly do the work.
> The war on drugs is
> more about pharmaceuticals than healing,
> the educational system more about
> a pacifier in the mouth than pacifists,
> the homicide numbers another (un)civil war.
> This tripping of tongue is a mixed metaphor
> not a metered foot from my mouth,
> and metaphors mixed are my placebo
> for media-sad-news-world.
> By the way, your Indians are not your Indians,
> they were here so long before you...
> so long before that cameo appearance
> on the cold hard street of fame called Hollywood.
> Shut your loud obnoxious voice and take a rest.
> Quiem!
> Quies!
> Quiet!
> America… hear whispering in the pines
> many tongues talking from one mouth...
> many quietly do the work.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> News You Use
> Devil in the Details
>
>
>
> After calling George W. Bush a devil, Venezuela President Hugo Chavez
> offered the congregation at Mount Olivet Baptist Church in Harlem and
> other needy US citizens 100 million gallons of subsidized oil. The offer
> received warm applause and created warm feelings toward Chavez,
> especially among those struggling to pay energy bills.
>
>
>
> This was not the first time Chavez has offered to spread the wealth
> generated by his country's most valued resource and the current high price
> of oil. While Hugo's oil gifts have been warmly received by poor people
> in the US and other countries, the US federal government has been less
> than receptive. Each blames the other for the situation. Tensions
> between the two countries have grown since the failed US-supported coup
> and the US' ongoing support of anti-Chavez groups inside and outside of
> Venezuela.
>
>
>
> As Greg Palast points out, it is not the oil. Venezuela is the fourth
> largest exporter of oil to the US (June 2006), which imported more than a
> million barrels a day from that country, or less than one-tenth of US oil
> imports. The US could replace this amount of oil from alternative
> sources. It cannot, however, replace the petrodollars that fail to find
> their way into US Treasury Bills and other US dollar-denominated assets.
> According to Palast and others, this is the cash -- the petrodollars--that
> funds multiple wars on credit when the nation is so deeply in debt.
>
>
>
> It is the petro-dollars, where they are stored and how they are used, that
> are the devil in the details, we must examine when looking at US-Venezuela
> relations. For more on US-Venezuela relations, read Greg Palast's
> interview with Hugo Chavez at www.gregpalast.com.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Bit of History
> Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías
>
>
>
> Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías was born July 28, 1954 in the town of Sabaneta,
> Barinas, Venezuela. He is the second son of schoolteachers, Elena Frías
> de and Hugo de los Reyes Chávez. The Chávez family was not wealthy; they
> sold bananas and sowed corn to make ends meet. Hugo and his older brother
> lived with their paternal grandmother, Rosa Inés Chávez, so they could
> complete their education. Very active, Hugo painted, sang, wrote and
> played baseball.
>
>
>
> Chávez enrolled at the Venezuelan Academy of Military Sciences at age
> seventeen, earning a degree in engineering (1975). He pursued graduate
> studies at Caracas' Simón Bolívar University, but left without a degree.
> Inspired by the 19th-century Pan-American philosophies of Simon Bolívar,
> Chávez and fellow activists developed a left-nationalist doctrine called
> "Bolivarianism." Influenced by the teachings of various socialist and
> communist leaders, including Peruvian Juan Velasco, Chávez established the
> Bolivarian Revolutionary Movement in 1982.
>
>
>
> Chávez began his 17 year military career during this time. He rose
> through the ranks, holding command, and staff positions to become a
> lieutenant colonel. Teaching at the Military Academy of Venezuela,
> Chávez's fiery lecturing style and unusually radical critique of
> Venezuelan government and society inspired his peers and students.
>
>
>
> Amidst growing anger at economic austerity measures, Chavez led an attempt
> to overthrow the government of President Carlos Andres Perez in February
> 1992. He spent two years in prison before being granted a pardon.
> Following his release, he relaunched his party as the Fifth Republic
> Movement (MVR) and made the transition from soldier to politician. Like
> 67% of the people, the charismatic populist is a mulatto (African, Spanish
> and Indigenous descent). Leading the leftist Patriotic Pole alliance and
> promising a peaceful social revolution, he won 34% of the seats in the
> National Congress and was elected president in 1998 with 56% of the
> votesthe largest majority in four decades.
>
>
>
> Chavez took office with a mandate to reverse Venezuela's economic decline
> and strengthen the role of the state in the economy on February 2, 1999.
> He ended the privatization of Venezuela's state holdings, took control of
> economic matters, and cut oil production to raise oil prices. The
> constituent assembly wrote a new constitution granting the president
> increased powers, a 6-year term of office and weakened the legislature and
> judiciary. Addressing poverty amongst the landless poor, Chavez acted to
> redistribute the wealth of the rich elite, took measures against
> corruption, criticized the traditional oligarchy, and made more funds
> available for social programs.
>
>
>
> Opposition supported by strikes and demonstrations increased following
> Chávez's reelection in 2000 after he started the privatization of
> Venezuela's social security system, aluminum industry, and the oil sector.
> This led to a short-lived coup in April and a prolonged strike by oil
> workers late in 2002. Briefly overthrown by military and corporate
> interests in the US- sponsored coup, Chávez was returned to power when
> massive demonstrations followed.
>
>
>
> Chávez launched several Bolivarian Missions; their goals are to combat
> disease, illiteracy, malnutrition, poverty, and other social ills. In his
> personal life he is married and has five children, three girls and two
> boys. His wife works as a public official also; she was elected in 2000.
> He also enjoys going home, where his father is currently the mayor.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Disgruntled feels: Rovian! As if Karl Rove, political strategist and
> brain behind Bush, pulled their strings, mainstream media reported on a
> leaked National Intelligence Estimate (NIE). It said what we knew – the
> US is creating enemies, call them jihadists, terrorists or guerillas.
> But, ‘we are fighting them over there,' whispers the media fear mongers.
> We'll never know who leaked the memo because the Bush regime will never
> expose the brain behind the scheme to heat up the political debate on
> national security, the supposed GOP strong suit. Running around like
> headless ducks, Democrats fell for it again. And, to sweeten the deal for
> the sheep, the price of gasoline at the pump is falling, just in time for
> the November elections! How Rovian!
>
>
>
> Disgruntled says: Beginning with Afghanistan, the US entered wars of
> aggression based on the commission of terrorist acts by non-state actors.
> Thousands have died. The UN's failure to stop these acts and others by
> member states, including genocide in Darfur, shows the UN is weak. UN
> Secretary-General Kofi Annan and others support reforms that include
> enlarging the UN Security Council to make it more representative of the
> international community and eliminating the veto of its permanent five
> members – US, Russia, China, France and Great Britain -- a move aimed at
> ending the free ride given international bad actors.
>
>
>
> Disgruntled wants to know: Parents, families and loved ones of those
> killed and maimed in the War on Terror might well have been taken aback
> when George W. Bush described the Iraq war as "a comma in the march of
> history." Iraq is the central front in war on terror, according to Bush.
> One may ask, will Bush unleash more horror and warfare so great as to
> render Iraq insignificant by comparison?
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Politics Y2K6
> Shadow of the Liberator
> By Richard Gott
>
>
>
> Heather Rogers reviewed In the Shadow of the Liberator: Hugo Chavez and
> the Transformation of Venezuela. According to Rogers, there is a huge
> social experiment underway in Venezuela and few on the American left seem
> to be paying attention. Author Richard Gott offers a very different
> picture of the Bolivarian revolution of Hugo Chavez than what is presented
> in the US media.
>
>
>
> For instance, Venezuela's military buys fresh vegetables and meat in the
> countryside and trucks them to poor neighborhoods for sale at subsidized
> markets. New state run pharmacies sell medicine at a 30% discount. The
> government provides breakfast and lunch to children at school, which
> helped boost enrollment by one million over last year. These are just a
> few of the social reforms began since the election of the left-leaning
> president Hugo Chavez. It all began with the rewriting of the
> Constitution which now includes such provisions as civil rights for
> Venezuela's indigenous population.
>
>
>
> Chavez is also rooting out corruption and graft within the government by
> restructuring bodies ranging from the Judiciary to the Constituent
> Assembly. Since leaving prison in 1994, Chavez has worked with both
> military and civilians to build a new political party, the Fifth Republic
> Movement (MVR) which was inspired by Simon Bolivar, the 19th century
> liberator of South America.
>
>
>
> The rise to power began with the insane 1989 Caracazo -- city-wide riots
> and looting by urban poor triggered by IMF required price increases. The
> rage behind this eruption had brewed for generations, and with 80% of the
> population living in poverty, it was an opportunity for Chavez and his
> people to demand change. Chavez built on the popular unrest amongst poor
> and lower ranks of the military.
>
>
>
> Chavez's government is composed of more than the military. His ministers
> include Ali Rodriquez, a former Marxist guerrilla and labor lawyer.
> Rodriquez is Minister of Energy and Mines, which is in charge of the
> nation's oil industry. Chavez's Minister of Development, Jorge Giordani,
> an economist and University professor, is responsible for planning the
> revitalization of the country's rural economy. His ministry works to
> provide affordable housing and sustainable jobs. The government is
> constructing cooperative farming communities for families. The goal is to
> replace shanty towns on the steep hills surrounding Caracas. Mud slides
> killed 15,000 people in 1999.
>
>
>
> In 2003, Chavez launched "Mission Robinson" to provide free literacy
> programs for more than 1.5 million illiterate adults. On October 12,
> 2003, he initiated "Mission Guaicaipuro," a program to protect the
> livelihood, religion, land, culture and rights of Venezuela's indigenous
> peoples. He launched "Mission Sucre" to provide free higher education to
> the two million adults that had not completed their elementary-level
> education. In November 2003, he announced "Mission Ribas" with the
> promise of remedial education and diplomas for millions of high school
> dropouts.
>
>
>
> Economic growth picked up markedly in 2004, reaching double-digit growth
> and a 9.3% growth rate for 2005. Chavez also expanded his land
> redistribution and social welfare programs by authorizing and funding a
> multitude of new "Bolivarian Missions" to construct, fund, and refurbish
> public health care facilities nationwide. Venezuela is jointly
> establishing with Cuba a second tuition-free medical school that would
> provide medical training to more than 100,000 physicians who would pledge
> to work in the poorest communities of the Global South. He announced that
> the project would run for the next decade, and that the new school would
> include at least 30,000 new places for poor students from both Latin
> America and the Caribbean.
>
>
>
> The Bush Administration considers Chavez provocatively dangerous and
> autocratically undemocratic. Chávez offers alternative models of economic
> development to the Washington Consensus and advocates cooperation among
> the world's poor nations, especially those in Latin America. Chavez
> supports Iran's right to develop nuclear power, while President Mahmoud
> Ahmadinejad and other Middle Eastern leaders are backing Venezuela's bid
> for a rotating seat on the U.N. Security Council -- the Bush
> administration supports Guatemala.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Venue for an Artist
> The Devil's Recipe (Excerpts from UN Speech)
> By Hugo Chavez
>
>
>
> "Representatives of the governments of the world, good morning. First, I
> would like to invite you, very respectfully, to those who have not read
> this book, to read it. (Noam Chomsky's 'Hegemony or Survival: The
> Imperialist Strategy of the United States.') It's an excellent book to
> help us understand what has been happening in the world throughout the
> 20th century, and what's happening now, and the greatest threat looming
> over our planet.
>
>
>
> The hegemonic pretensions of the American empire are placing at risk the
> very survival of the human species. We continue to warn you about this
> danger and we appeal to the people of the United States and the world to
> halt this threat, which is like a sword hanging over our heads. I had
> considered reading from this book, but, for the sake of time, I will just
> leave it as a recommendation.
>
>
>
> It reads easily, it is a very good book. It appears in English, in
> Russian, in Arabic, in German. I think that the first people who should
> read this book are our brothers and sisters in the United States, because
> their threat is right in their own house. The devil himself is right in
> the house. And, yesterday, the devil came here; it smells of sulfur still
> today.
>
>
>
> Yesterday, ladies and gentlemen, from this rostrum, the president of the
> United States, the gentleman to whom I refer as the devil, came here,
> talking as if he owned the world.
>
>
>
> I think we could call a psychiatrist to analyze yesterday's statement made
> by the president of the US. As the spokesman of imperialism, he came to
> share his nostrums, to try to preserve the current pattern of domination,
> exploitation and pillage of the peoples of the world. An Alfred Hitchcock
> movie could use it as a scenario. I would even propose a title: "The
> Devil's Recipe."
>
>
>
> As Chomsky says here, clearly and in depth, the American empire is doing
> all it can to consolidate its system of domination. We cannot allow world
> dictatorship to be consolidated.
>
>
>
> They say they want to impose a democratic model. But that's their
> democratic model. It's the false democracy of elites, and, I would say, a
> very original democracy that's imposed by weapons and bombs and firing
> weapons. What a strange democracy. Aristotle might not recognize
> it...What type of democracy do you impose with marines and bombs?
>
>
>
> The president of the US said, and I'm quoting, "Anywhere you look, you
> hear extremists telling you can escape from poverty and recover your
> dignity through violence, terror and martyrdom." Wherever he looks, he
> sees extremists. And you, my brother -- he looks at your color, and he
> says, oh, there's an extremist. Evo Morales, the worthy president of
> Bolivia, looks like an extremist to him. The imperialists see extremists
> everywhere. It's not that we are extremists. It's that the world is
> waking up. It's waking up all over. And people are standing up.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Mailbox: E-Mails, Faxes and Telephone Calls
>
>
>
> Email [EMAIL PROTECTED] War Criminal at Bay...By Dr. Paul Craig
> Roberts...Beguiled by neo-conservatives, who told him that the virtuous
> goals of the US empire justified any means, and misled by an incompetent
> Attorney General, who told him the President of the US is above the law,
> Bush was deceived into committing war crimes under Article 3 of the Geneva
> Convention and the US War Crimes Act of 1996. Bush is now desperately
> trying to save himself by having the US Congress retroactively repeal both
> Article 3 and US law.
>
>
>
> Email [EMAIL PROTECTED] While the NAM (Non-Aligned Movement)
> presidential summit meets in Cuba, news reports on FOX and CNN spotlighted
> billboards which mock President George Bush. One billboard shows Bush as
> an "assassin" with bloody, vampire teeth, while others compare the U.S.
> president to Adolph Hitler.
>
>
>
> Email www.CommonDreams.org America's Moral Decline and the Rise of False
> Christianity...By Karen Horst Cobb...The lust for money, dominance and
> military power is at the core of America's moral decline. It is imperative
> that church leaders and laity boldly proclaim that violence, torture,
> hostage taking, conquests of land and resources are actions Christians can
> never condone. Killing for Christ is an abomination leaving us with
> blood-stained hands and darkness in our hearts! Every church must be a
> peace church or it will be a state church, then it will be no church at
> all.
>
>
>
> Email www.guardian.co.uk The US government has been accused of trying to
> undermine the Chavez government by funding groups via its main
> international aid agency. Millions of dollars have been provided in a
> "pro-democracy program" that Chavez supporters claim is a covert attempt
> to bankroll an opposition to defeat the government. The money is being
> provided by the US Agency for International Development through its Office
> of Transition Initiatives.
>
>
>
>
> *********************************************
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> *********************************************
>
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