Must-See Video About Venezuelan Student Protests

This speaks for itself.

Here's more on the video and protests:

The Guardian: ShortCutsBlog, February 17, 2014

How a first-time film-maker alerted the world to Venezuela's student protests

Andreina Nash, a 21-year-old student, has brought the plight of student protesters in Venezuela to global attention – with a short film she made in a day

South America News Roundup May 11, 2012: Dignified Death in Argentina, Quinoa in the Andes, Floods in Paraguay, Water Cannons in Chile

article from May 11, 2012

by Julie R Butler

Argentina: Dignified death law

The Argentine Senate has approved a “dignified death” law by a vote of 55-0, with 17 abstentions. The law was already passed in the Lower House last year. It eliminates the need for family members to find a judge who would sign a court order to refuse treatment or put an end to life-support.

Medical ethicists assure that removing feeding tubes is more humane than force-feeding the dying because the human body naturally shuts down its systems and can even induce feelings of euphoria that make the passing more calm and comfortable. Euthanasia is expressly prohibited by the new law, and the patient or representative must have signed document stating their wishes before a notary and two witnesses.

The Andes: Quinoa exports soar

Quinoa, a grain-like member of the spinach family, has been grown for food in the Andean regions of Ecuador, Bolivia, Peru, and Colombia for thousands of years. It is high in protein and has an excellent amino acid profile and good amounts of calcium, iron, and phosphorous. Like many indigenous foods, it was once looked down upon as “Indian food,” fit only for the poorest of the poor. But now, it has become a profitable cash crop for Peru and Bolivia, with a growing market in industrialized nations.

While this is good news for the farmers of these countries, it also raises several concerns. Suitable land is scarce in regions of Bolivia, causing violence over land claims. Another issue is that all of this nutritious food will be exported, leaving none left for the poorest of the poor.

Paraguay: Widespread flooding

Devastating floods began to hit the Chaco region of western Paraguay in mid-April. Some areas could not even accommodate emergency helicopters because of a lack of dry land.

The Paraguayan Chaco is nicknamed “Infierno Verde” (Green Hell), due to its extreme weather. The heat in the summer is intense, and the agriculture in the region has been plagued by extended droughts in recent years.

Heavy rains there continued through the end of the month, causing the affected area to spread to the capital city of Asunción, the latest region to have been declared a “state of emergency” due to flooding along the banks of the Río Paraguay.

As of April 29, 1,000 people had to be evacuated in Asunción and about 500 in Concepción, 570 km from the capital, while some 70,000 have been displaced in the Chaco.

Chile: Piñera, polls, and police

Recent news out of Chile serves as the perfect follow-up to the point I made recently in my article about the "Red Diaper Baby."

First, there is the recent polling that has Piñera’s approval rating dipping lower than it has ever been since he became president of Chile in 2010. This, despite the healthy economy, as food and fuel prices have fallen over the past few weeks. Political scientist Jose Viacava says that Chileans want more than good economic indicators; they are pushing for deeper reform in the country’s political and economic model. At least the president can take solace in the fact that the Concertación, the center-left opposition party, fares even worse in the polls. Perhaps part of the reason for so much discontent is that the carabineros spent US$6.7 million on 10 new riot control vehicles equipped with water cannons, feeding directly into the point that education reform activist, Camila Vallejo, was making in her response, as reported by The New York Times, to Piñera’s comment that “nothing in life is free. Someone has to pay”:

“Obviously someone has to pay, but there’s no reason why it must be families financing between 80 and 100 percent of it.” Why not the state — through taxes on large corporations, the nationalization of resources, a reduction in financing for the military? When yet another march ended in violence, Vallejo and her fellow students collected hundreds of tear-gas shells and brought them to La Moneda. “Here are more than 50 million pesos worth of tear-gas bombs,” announced Vallejo, money, she said, that could have been spent on education. Students formed the shells into a peace sign on the plaza, and Vallejo crouched in the center. The resulting image was published all over the world.

Julie R Butler is a writer, journalist, editor, and author of several books, including Nine Months in Uruguay and No Stranger To Strange Lands (click here for more info). She is a contributor to Speakout at Truthout.org, and her current blog is Connectively Speaking.

email: julierbutler [at] yahoo [dot] com, Twitter: @JulieRButler

Camila, the Red-Diaper Baby

article from May 4, 2012

by Julie R Butler

The fact that The Wall Street Journal’s Mary Anastasia O’Grady called Chilean student activist Camila Vallejo “bebe de pañal rojo” or “red-diaper baby,” has made headlines throughout the Latin American media, to which the young communist responded via Twitter, “How it hurts them that Chile is becoming conscious! This is a sign of us advancing.”

The full title of the WSJ article is “Chile’s Cautionary Lesson for Americans: A free economy is at risk when a demand for equality is not answered by a defense of liberty,” and it begins like so:

“Communists are not taking over Chile. But you wouldn't know it from watching the media frenzy surrounding 23-year-old student leader and avowed communist Camila Vallejo in Santiago.”

O’Grady goes on to express amazement that this charismatic young woman, who was raised by communist supporters of Salvador Allende, could be so effective at putting the center-right government of Sebastian Piñera on the defensive. Whereas the material benefits of the market economy have been piling up for decades, she laments, the leftist ideas that have “intellectually swamped” the country seem to be blind to “the morality of the market and the sanctity of individual rights.”

“Chileans aren’t interested in communism,” she states, citing a dip in Camila’s popularity upon her return from Cuba recently. Chile is on the right track, she points out, having raised its ranking from 53rd to 39th in the World Bank’s Doing Business survey in the past two years. But President Piñeras is not a very good defender of freedom and liberty, and this has O’Grady worried.

The “freedom” she is talking about is that of a corporation to build a coal-fired power plant in an environmentally-sensitive location. And the tax cuts that have been proposed to offset the rise in what was supposed to be a temporary corporate tax increase, instigated to ensure funding after the massive earthquake in 2010, which will probably not pass because Piñera’s coalition is not the majority party in Congress, are, no doubt, the “tyranny” that the leftist ideas are inviting with their insistence on making the education system equally accessible to all Chileans.

Now, I am not arguing that Ms. O’Grady is wrong to state that communists are not taking over Chile. However, I would just like to point out the inconsistencies in her argument, beginning with the observation that there are, indeed, many Chileans who are interested in communism (other than red-diaper girl and her parents). These are not large percentages, but according to Wikipedia, in the 1999/2000 presidential elections, the president of the Communist Party of Chile (PCCh), Gladys Marín, won 3.2% of the vote in the first round; in the December 11, 2005, legislative elections, the PCCh won 5.1% of the popular vote; and the support of the PCCh aided in the electoral victories of the two socialist presidents who preceded Piñera, Ricardo Lagos in 2000 and Michelle Bachelet in 2006.

Since she brings up the topic of popularity ratings... Well, she shouldn’t, really, because the activist known throughout the world simply as “Camila” is far and away more popular than the president, despite any dip she might have encountered. In the Chilean democracy, his party is the minority, so that doesn’t exactly point to most Chileans being on the political right. And after having promised that, under his watch, Chile would be governed in a whole new way, the Aysén Dam project and the attempts to further privatize Chile’s educational system have shined the light on the backroom business as usual. As of March 2012, Piñera’s approval ratings had dropped back down to 29% from 33% in February – and that was up from 22% in September 2011, during the thick of the educational reform movement, which, at that same time, had a nation approval rating of 72%.

Camila’s pretty face began appearing as the leader of the movement in major international media such as Die Zeit and The Guardian during the “Chilean Winter,” and since then, she has become a media darling, designated by Time Magazine as the 2011 “Time Person of the Year.” Just recently, The New York Times ran a lengthy profile on her, and now even WSJ is acknowledging her.

Camila defended her trip to Cuba by pointing out that Neither is Cuba perfect nor does Chile have to follow in its path [Spanish]. She also noted that she did not observe there any of the water cannons or tear gas guns that have been used to disperse crowds in her own country.

So, O’Grady can downplay the popularity of this young woman and the movement that she represents all she wants, but Francisco Goldman, the author of above mentioned article in The New York Times, who actually spent time in Chile and interviewed people involved in the education reform movement, has a very different take. He states,

“I was struck, on my return in March, by the widespread admiration and affection for her among so many Chileans, men and women alike. Her political capital and power, at the national level, seems only to have only grown.”

[Image of Camila Vallejo via Flickr]

Julie R Butler is a writer, journalist, editor, and author of several books, including Nine Months in Uruguay and No Stranger To Strange Lands (click here for more info). She is a contributor to Speakout at Truthout.org, and her current blog is Connectively Speaking.

email: julierbutler [at] yahoo [dot] com, Twitter: @JulieRButler

A Big “Thank You” to Chilean President Sebastián Piñera

article from October 21, 2011

By Jamie Douglas

…for making my life easier by continuously providing material to write about.

For many months now, the student protests all up and down Chile have disrupted President Piñera’s plans to privatize Chile. The protests have shut down almost all educational institutions in Chile’s cities and larger towns. At issue is something going back to the days of the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, the slow but steady strangulation of public education by starving it of public funds. Taxpayers’ monies are supporting private and parochial schools, where the children of the elite are being educated to be the next elite leaders, keeping it all in the inner circle of the rich and powerful who have ruled this nation since its founding in 1818. The children of a lesser God’s parents have to get loans, at way-above-normal interest rates, to send their children to better schools, hoping to give them an equal chance at a bright future by assuming crippling debts that will paralyze them financially for years to come. And this is where the president’s stubborn refusal to even talk about increasing public funding for free education comes in.

First a little background on Piñera: He was born into extremely privileged circumstances, with his father having been in bed with every dictator Chile has had, getting appointed as Ambassador to Belgium and later the United Nations. Sebastián was a smart boy, excelling in school and receiving a partial Fulbright scholarship to attend Harvard University for his postgraduate studies in economics. In 1971, he became a professor of economic political theory at the University of Chile, and in 1972, he became a professor at the Valparaiso Business School. He was a quite but ardent supporter of the murderous regime of the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, even running the campaign for Hernán Büchi, one of Pinochet’s former finance ministers.

With all of his connections, he became a major player in the Chilean financial sector, acquiring ChileVision and 27% of the Airline LAN Chile, along with many other enterprises. In 1982, he used his position as general manager of the Bank of Talca to illegally enrich himself. An arrest warrant was issued, and he promptly went into hiding, leaving little doubt as to his culpability. The Chilean Supreme Court acquitted him 24 days later (Surprise!). In 2007 he paid a fine in the amount of US$680,000 for insider trading, a fraction of what he had gained by it.

Since coming into office March 11, 2010, his personal fortune has increased by $200 million. His net worth is estimated to be around $2.5 billion. He brought Visa to Chile, helping to make his country a debtor nation, and he is heavily invested in the very banks that make the high-interest educational loans to the middle class.

And so it all becomes crystal clear. He has no interest in making education a taxpayer-funded privilege of all citizens, from kindergarten to university, as it can be found in Uruguay, where education is not a consumer good to be exploited by neocons.

Now comes the most astonishing development of all: While the Chilean Burro has hardened his stance, two of the most influential business organization in the country – the Society for the Promotion of Manufacturing (SPM) and the Chilean Export Manufacturer’s Association (CEMA) – have urged the “No new taxes during my administration” president to “Please raise our taxes!” in order to help pay for social demands such as education. Says Felipe Lamarca, head of the influential SPM, “Once and for all we have to do something. Our country has grown a lot, and now we must address the problem of inequality. For that we need a tax reform to help solve the lack of fairness.” And CEMA head Roberto Fantuzzi added, “Nobody likes to have taxes increased, but when you face serious problems and anguish, you must do it.”

Piñera’s response was not unexpected: “There are those who believe that the only education that matters is higher education.” This coming from a man who, as a highly privileged youth, was sent to the finest educational institution money and influence could buy. His Finance Minister, Felipe Larraìn, who vehemently opposes any increase in taxes, backed him up: “Social demands should not be allowed to destroy all that we have managed to achieve in this country.”

Ninety percent of Chileans support the students’ demands and want the system to be changed. And what is their government’s response? Screw the people – let them eat medialunas!

Jamie Douglas

San Rafael, Mendoza

[Official Government Photograph of Chilean President Sebastián Piñera]

I encourage you to write me at cruzansailor [at] gmail [dot] com with any questions or suggestions you may have. Disclaimer: I am not in any travel-related business. My advice is based on my own experiences and is free of charge (Donations welcome). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.

South America News Roundup Sept 5, 2011: Chile, Uruguay, Brazil, Peru, Colombia

article from September 5, 2011

By Jamie Douglas

A lot has happened since my last news roundup.

Chile

Tragedy has struck in Chile, where a Chilean Air Force CASA-212 aircraft was lost with 21 people aboard while attempting to land in deteriorating conditions on Juan Fernandez Island, 400 miles off the Chilean coast. On board were several employees of Chile’s TVN, including Felipe Camiroaga, a beloved on-air personality. They were on the way to the island to do a follow-up report on the earthquake and tsunami damage and recovery from the February 2010 disaster that hit Chile. We would like to offer our sincere condolences to the people of Chile.

The last few weeks have brought a great deal of unrest to Chile in connection with President Piñera’s attempt to make education a “consumer good,” further entrenching the status quo by removing the state from any responsibility to educate the masses of poor Chileans and making quality education something only obtainable by the wealthy. Massive street demonstrations by all classes have shown their disapproval of his position, with the labor unions joining in the protests and calling for a two-day national strike. In the midst of all the chaos, a young boy was shot to death by the carabineros while he was pushing his brother in a wheel chair.

Meanwhile, the general director of the Chilean carabineros was forced to resign, after it was disclosed that he personally covered up his son’s culpability in a hit-and-run accident in Providencia. In his resignation letter, he claims to be stepping aside for health reasons while, of course, denying the allegations raised against him by the investigative group CIPER.

Uruguay

In good news from Uruguay, it was reported that consumer inflation has fallen slightly to 0.56%, or an annual rate of 7.57%, down from 8.25%. But one must keep in mind that these are “official figures” compiled by government technocrats. I am sure my correspondent, Guy in Uruguay, would take issue with these figures. While they no doubt represent a slight improvement over the previous month, they are still well below the targeted rate of 4-6%.

Unfortunately, Uruguay’s economy has been affected by the double-dip recession hitting the “developed” countries in the Northern Hemisphere. In July, the nation’s fiscal deficit ballooned to US$40 million, while in July 2010 there was a sizeable $55 million surplus.

The Uruguayan national oil company, ANCAP, announced that it will start exploring for oil in the inland regions of Tacuarembó and Salto, where the discovery of oil-eating bacteria, in higher concentration than in Argentina’s Neuquén Province, has led to speculation that there may be crude oil in them thar hills. Uruguay could certainly use natural resources of this type, as most of its energy sources originate from outside the country, fanning the flames of inflation and national deficit.

Brazil

Brazil’s Presidenta Dilma Rousseff has just been anointed for a second term by her mentor, former President Lula da Silva, when he announced that he will step down from seeking a third term as president of that economic powerhouse, paving the way for her succession. President Rousseff has been challenged by the same entrenched corruption that plagued her predecessor, which ultimately brought her to the political forefront when she became Lula’s chief of staff before resigning that position to run for president, herself. But Brazil being Brazil, there is no telling what will happen there politically or fiscally in the next three years. The country is not isolated anymore from outside economic calamities, and the huge spending programs in progress now for the Olympic Games and the FIFA World Cup may yet end up draining the treasury. The infrastructure improvements that are necessary to make for a success of the games will have to be analyzed in terms of how much good they will bring to the country’s poor and undereducated. I personally would have liked to see this trillion dollars put into education, housing and sanitation projects in the rural areas that have so long been neglected. In the long run, that would provide security to the nation by allowing more of its citizens to climb the steep socio-economic ladder and eliminating the gap between the lowest class and the middle class.

Peru

In Peru, where the election of Ollanta Humala brought about a collapse of the Lima Stock Exchange because of fears that he would destroy the mining industry and drive investors away, things are going very well indeed. Ollanta Humala has become the darling of Wall Street and big investors. The mining companies that were so worried were happy to go along with his proposals to pay slightly higher royalties for minerals extracted in exchange for long-term commitments. This, in turn, will lead to more equal distribution of the wealth in a country that, like Brazil, suffers from abject poverty and lack of infrastructure in rural areas. We wish him and the good people of Peru much success in this new endeavor.

Colombia

And poor Colombia: Whenever that cocaine-cursed nation seems to be coming out of one crisis, it enters the next. The gold mining industry, an enterprise with the potential to eclipse the drug trade, is being plagued by all the usual suspects with terrorism, extortion, kidnappings and violence. I am rooting for Colombia to be able to leave the legacy of the cocaine cowboys behind. Colombia’s citizens are hard working, aspiring to be more than what they have been limited to by circumstances beyond their control; but through no fault of their own, they have repeatedly been victimized by the crime lords, the paramilitaries and fear of the dark. The current administration came into office on the heels of some great gains, but it seems that for every step forward, they slide back two. Large portions of the country are considered unsafe and unstable, so much so that not even the military is established there. Nobody seems to have a solution to these peculiar problems plaguing Colombia, but the time has come for a renewal.

Jamie Douglas

San Rafael, Mendoza

Where the Malbec grape vines are starting to sprout!

I encourage you to write me at cruzansailor [at] gmail [dot] com with any questions or suggestions you may have. Disclaimer: I am not in any travel-related business. My advice is based on my own experiences and is free of charge (Donations welcome). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.

Chile’s Education Protests

article from August 15, 2011

By Jamie Douglas

This past week has been very hard on Chile’s own version of Ayn Rand’s “capitalism without a conscience” philosophy, also known as “Chicago School of Economics-think,” “Uncle Miltonism” or just plain “neoliberalism.” I guess there are still a few isolated outposts in the world of those completely ignorant of the causes for what happened to Iceland, Greece, Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Italy, the UK and, of course, the good ol’  “it can’t happen here” USA.

Of all the arrogant statements I ever have heard a national leader speak, this one takes the cake. It would have made Ronald Reagan and Howard Jarvis (remember California’s Proposition 13, which ruined the greatest educational system in the Americas?) very proud. It would have been their wet dream to have a president just come out and say what they were feeling: “Education is a consumer good.” This was recently uttered by Chile’s neoliberal billionaire President Sebastian Piñera.

Chile, after suffering through those long years of the military dictatorship of Generalissimo Augusto Pinochet, found itself without an education ministry, as that had been abolished, turning all those responsibilities over to the municipalities. Education had been removed as a responsibility of the state (to save money and keep those hotbeds of dissent, universities and high schools, under control). Pinochet’s harsh rule also rolled back social progress gained over several decades of enlightenment that sought to address the great social inequalities present in that narrow strip of land along the southern Pacific coastline of South America.

Chile is a developed-world economy in almost all aspect, except for the taking care of its less fortunate citizens. While Chile has one of the highest per capita income levels in Latin America, at the same time, it also sustains one of the region’s greatest income gaps. One visit to Santiago de Chile will convince you of that quickly, if you happen to visit between massive protests in the city center. It has all the conveniences of modern life, except a fair and equitable educational system. Remember the voucher program that the Republicans in the USA began to advocate a few years ago, along with privatizing Social Security? Well, Chile has done that with their educational system, and the rest of the world can learn from it.

Those who are wealthy enough never have to send their kids to public schools with vouchers. Instead, the vouchers are used to subsidize private education for the elite, creating a whole new elite which, in turn, will become the ruling class, using the good-old-boy network to fill all-important positions in government and private industry while creating another generation of under-educated laborers, a constant ready supply of cheap labor for the mines and industry.

Having run on a platform similar to that of George W. Bush, an “I’m super rich, but I’m really just one of you” sort of populist platform, he was able to defeat the socialist candidate who was handpicked by his predecessor, Michelle Bachelet, a moderate leftist, by assuring the people of Chile that he represented “change.” Sound familiar? He represented change all right! He moved more than to the center-right when he advocated education reform that would penalize the children of the poor even more by cutting funding for the education that is their birthright as Chileans.

He had no idea what a can of worms he was opening for himself (buen provecho). Working class Chileans have had enough of being treated as second-class citizens and being excluded from the wealth that circulates among the upper crust of the country. Tens of thousands of students took to the streets last week, demanding equal education for all, to which Piñera responded by making it illegal to protest and sending the riot police to bash heads and hose people down with high-pressure cold water in the cold winter temperatures in Santiago. Of course, that served as a catalyst for not only the lower classes, but also the children of the wealthy elite to come out and march in the streets and in front of La Moneda, the presidential palace.

Unfortunately, the carabineros overreacted, quite possibly on orders from higher ups, and then of course, the hooliganism ensued, started by a few looking to cause trouble. Stores were damaged with some looting and a few cars were burned. Overall, there were very large numbers of arrests of many peaceful protesters, but the majority of the injuries were sustained by the police. I watched live television coverage on TV Chile and was taken aback by the indiscriminate attacks on peaceful protesters by the carabineros.

The bottom line: the protest is ongoing, as students and an ever-growing number of supporters insist that there should be no profiteering allowed in public education and that higher education should be equitable and available to all.

President Piñera’s approval rating has hit rock bottom, reaching the lowest level of any Chilean President since the military dictatorship of Pinochet. But there is one good thing: The people of Chile are not imbued with short-term memories, where they quickly forget how badly they got screwed by their leaders. My bet is on Michelle Bachelet coming back to run against the aspiring Ronald Reagan of Chile, and she will beat him handily!

Jamie Douglas

San Rafael, Mendoza

I still have some of that Fine Malbec Wine!

[Image: Chilean protest sign, No Selling of Education, via Wikipedia]

I encourage you to write me at cruzansailor [at] gmail [dot] com with any questions or suggestions you may have. Disclaimer: I am not in any travel-related business. My advice is based on my own experiences and is free of charge (Donations welcome). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.