I heard part of an interview of Dick Cheney the other night, and he was criticizing Barack Obama for, I guess, shaking hands with Hugo Chavez. Cheney said the Bush administration's hands-off policy was the right choice.
And I thought: Evidence for that? Anybody want to argue that Chavez is weaker today than he was when Bush took office? Or that America is stronger? Or that our overall position in South America is stronger?
Didn't think so.
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Hugo Chavez is a bad boy, like many before him. His crime? He has bucked the Washington Consensus, and taken on the IMF.
IMF is a neoliberal organization that lends money to developing countries, but with many strings attached. It insists that recipients drop trade barriers, allow unfettered investment by foreign corporations, and privatize public programs like pensions, health care and utilities. Chavez has opted out of this model, and has gone so far as to lend money to other South American countries directly, without strings, and bypassing IMF. This has enraged Washington, which had already tried to boot him in 2002 by means of coup d'état.
The fact that he is elected, that he is popular - it doesn't matter. He's a bad boy. Shaking hands with him is intolerable.
Chavez gave Obama a book to read on South American history. It would be nice if our scholar president would actually do so, but I know better
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