Job Discussion Forums

[Alitas]

alaska, what interesting points. I lived in Venezuela in 92-93. In november 92 you may recall Chavez staged his failed coup. I have been watching Venezuela since then. There seems little opportunity for the middle class to rise up against Chavez. I am not sure where those jobs are going but out of my circle, 5 professional nationals left that country!

As for the poor here in the US..it's not like the Friends show. I would fancy to wager that the majority of poverty-stricken households in the country occur in locations with a higher percentage of the population in the uneducated class. So, here there are two distinct classes--those who are educated and those who are not. Pretty much everything falls under that umbrella. That and the traditional Old Money. Everyone on Friends had a degree of expertise.

That said there are some very educated people here who are dirt broke. That is usually because they are not wroking the wheels of capitalism to their advantage. Or maybe they got caught doing something they shouldn't (Hello, Martha).

All I know is my people in Venezuela (porque si son mi gente) can't rely on the usual jobs and they aren't sure hwere they fit in this whole scheme. They'd rather move away then live in poverty, even if their form of poverty is miles ahead of the true lower classes.

So I guess I'm anti-Chavez. But don't see a solution either.

[anonymous_alaska]

It seems there are several models one could propose about what's happening here. I don't claim which is right and I could never know which is right because propaganda from both sides is relentless and truth is a needle in a haystack.

The Chomsky model(from the book Latin America): Venezuela, like most Latin American countries, has a small group of elites(usually white, a historical power structure). This structure seems to be heirarchical. Businessmen under businessmen. The top elites have a strong relationship with the U.S. They like to maintain a hardline free-market structure. The belief in this structure is that the money earned will trickle down to the poor. The problem is these elites do not seem to be putting anything into the government for social or economic programs. They give the U.S. great discounts on resources and create just enough jobs which seem to be created by multi-nationals(I can't name more than a handful of Venezuelan corporations). The corporations extend their power from one or two bases throughout Latin America. For example, Proctor & Gamble has a base here, creates only a certain amount of jobs, but interacts with resources and maybe only two or three other bases in some other Latin American countries which I can't recall. They also rule the market. These corporations won't create more jobs than what is necessary for the market in Latin America and the U.S. which already has several bases. This seems to be why Venezuela, although rich, has always remained poor. If this structure is threatened, it seems the elites talk to the Administrations in the U.S. and the U.S. is willing to send in military and even support a coup. U.S. media even supports this.(See Miami Herald articles on Venezuela. Also the Bush administration just agreed to more troups along the Colombian border. Both the Dems and the Reps seem to support this.) Thus the rich and the middle class go up and down in their status depending on administrations while the poor stay destitute and quite a large portion of the population.

The Culture of corruption model: Venezuelans are in general corrupt especially when they work in government, so it's useless for the businessmen to give money for government programs, which is why they don't. Government leaders never address this corruption issue because if they do, their underlings won't support them and maybe even oust them. I haven't heard Chavez address and get angry at the corruption yet.

The Chavez is really trying to help model: This I can't comment on. I just have to wait and see. I saw a speech at one of the marches and it really turned me off. He's seems like a typical dictator. But here are some facts. Capital flight by the businessmen has handicapped him. He had to put currency restrictions because of this. This in turn caused extreme inflation. So he has no money to do anything except for here and there. I could go more into it which is really interesting but I realize I'm starting to write a book.

[moonraven]

Have any of you seen the award-winning documentary film, "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised"--it had its premiere last April at the solidarity event in Caracas, and has since been circulating around the globe. Its focus is the coup that took Chavez out of the power for 47 hours in April 2002. Great film! I have given several presentations/round table discussions of the film in Mexico and the US, and it's exciting to see the light bulbs go on over the heads of the folks watching. The solidarity event last year expressed an enormous blast of positive another world is possible energy at a time when the Bush Gang was destroying Iraq. Quite a contrast. There will be another solidarity event in Caracas April 13-15. Aporrea.org has info.

I have been living in Latin America for ten years, and I see Chavez'project for Venezuela as one of the very few--if not the only--positive projects in the hemisphere, or in the world. I have made 3 trips there in the past year, have conversed twice with Chavez. He's a man with vision and courage--another rarity at this moment on the planet. What turns my stomach is the 24/7 commerical media clamoring for his death, and the general climate of mass psychosis generate by such propaganda. And as a US citizen, I am ashamed of the US' destructive history in Latin America--the coup they sponsored last month in Haiti and their constant bashing of Venezuela because they want cheap oil.

I don't see Big Brother in Caracas. I know he's taken up residence in the Oval Office.

[Alitas]

moonraven, could you elaborate on Chavez' project for Venezuela? I'm afraid my only contacts are middle class citizens of that country who are deeply angered about the situation they find themselves in. Please, tell me more about this.

[moonraven]

Your contacts are among the oligarchy, the social class of parasites that have controlled Latin America since the time of the Conquest due to the enormous land grants given by the various kings of Spain and Portugal. Those folks would rather lose some of their own privileges than see the rest of the population (which they call "chusma") have any rights. In the timeof Bol�var, they were the problem, and they still are. I don't feel that calling for magnicide is acceptable civic behavior.

The projects of Chavez:

!. Agrarian reform (only in its 2nd year of activity, but making progress--I have had my eyes on that because I am writing a book about the history of agrarian reform in Latin America--despite murders of agrarian leaders.)

2. Access to education--including the creation of hundreds of new Bolivarian schools at all levels (little kids are being taught in the Simoncito schools along the education precepts of Paulo Freire--my basis for teaching and for training teachers, so I see that as very positive). Chavez put his salary in a foundation since he became president and began using the money for scholarships last year for low income university age students.

3. Literacy program--last year 1 million people participated, and the goal is to eliminate illiteracy by the end of July of this year.

4. Job training and placement (Plan Vuelvan Caras)--this plan just got off the ground--unemployed folks are being trained or retrained, with special emphasis on working in cooperatives. They receive a salary/stipend until they are placed in a ob and begin to receive paychecks.

5. Political/Social awareness program--more than just learning about rights under the constitution--folks who have never been political are actively involved in participatory democracy.

There are many more--heath care and other social programs (in 2002 Chavez cut the military budget by 25% and put that money to health and education--what other world leader would consider doing that?) I suggest you consult the website www.venezuelanalysis.com--site coordinator Greg Wilpert is a sociologist and journalist from the US wo has lived in Caracas for 4 or 5 years now. The site is in English, and includes many news articles and opinion pieces from other sites. If your Spanish is good, www.aporrea.org does something similar. Find out what's really going on; Big Brother was wrong: Ignorance is NOT strength.

The main thing to know about Chavez is that he's a visionary (and a very talented poet!). Despite the fact that the racist oligarchy in Venezuela and the equally racist US government believe that all non-white persons are incapable of thoughtful leadership, Chavez daily gives the lie to that--he does not have an IQ of 79 like George W Bush, but is probably one of the smartest people on the planet. It boils down to the oligarchy believes that only they are entitled to the petroleum revenues--and they receive millions of dollars of support from the US because the Bush administration wants oil to go back to 6 bucks a barrell--where it was when Chavez became president of Venezuela in January of 1999.

[Alitas]

Again, very interesting points. You know what the Dominicans say about Trujillo. For some people, that was the "best" time of the island because things were in order. Street were fixed, kids were educated, etc.

As for the oligarchy, I'm not sure I follow. I understand there is a corrupt system that has been employed for a long time...I'm just not sure if myfriends or their fathers were involved.

Why wasn't the referendum passed recently? My sources say the signatures were there. Is it democratic that they need to re-sign? Who's counting these loose chads anyway.

Agrarian reform--when I lived there, I never saw any huge farms in real land use. Instead I saw small farmsteads used by weekenders. I did see roses, large tracts that were under lights all thru the night. It seemed to me that the class of epople living among those roses are perhaps Chavez' strongest supporters. It takes education of some sort or another to run a successful agribusiness. Is that going to happen for these people?


Job training and placement? I have heard there is no money circulating at the moment among the middle classes. Surely these cannot be the oligarchs you speak of. So, who is getting trained and placed, and getting paid to wait for a job? It sounds like such a great program, maybe we can do that here, as well?

The cities are driving the economy right now. These city dwellers are strapped.

What about tourism? Venezuela was once a lovely destination, now marred by the protests and pro-and anti-Chavez hot blood running through the street.

Politcal and social awareness-having worked among the Yanomamo tribe, I can say that these people are truly out of touch with the modern world of politics. The people who have contact with them aren't there to bring them up to speed. There's many an agenda in the jungle. Granted I last went in 2000, maybe things are different. But when I was there, it was still mud huts, no clothing, etc. Life expectancy, 37 or sometging? 12 year old mothers? I am not sure what Chavez would do with such a population.

These are some of your poinst I wanted to address. My opinions, really. Keep the dialogue going.

[moonraven]

I will try to answer your questions. (Please keep in mind that I am not an expert on Venezuela--although I have lived for 10 years in Latin America--mostof the time in Mexico., where I live now.)

1. Trujillo was a dictator, with plenty of political prisoners to prove it. Chavez, despite what the oligarchy claims, is not. He was elected president 2 times (1998 and 2000) with right around 60% of the vote. The Carter Center called both elections "a triumph for democracy", and said they were clean. There are no political prisoners in Venezuela. When Chavez took office in 1999, 10,000 political prisoners were released from jail. I fail to see the connection between Trujillo and Chavez. Read "La fiesta del chivo" by Mario Vargas LLosa (now completely right wing politically, but still a pretty good writer) about Trujillo....

2. I believe I defined oligarchy in my last post. There are also dictionaries floating around in Internet.

3. The referendum is still up in the air. The opposition did not get enough signatures. I was there when they were signing and the tables were deserted. Their leaders claimed 1.9 million signatures, which was also what the CNE allowed--they needed 2.4 milion. They have been given another chance to try to validate the signatures that were rejected. I personally saw pages and pages in the same handwriting but with diferent names. Is it demicratic that they need to resign under those conditions? Hmmm--don't know how you define democracy. In the US they would not be given that second chance. In Venezuela--which has according to US critics "too much democracy", they are. The referendum will not oust Chavez, anyway--it's a process uner the constitution that was forced on the "opposition" by the OEA and the Carter Center--and excuse for them to cry "foul" and provoke the kinds of violence they did at the end of February.

4. Agrarian reform has been inoperation for a year. The pointis not just to redistribute land, but to form cooperatives and to provide appropriate technical assistance. As someone who has been writing about agrarian reform andgiving conferences about it here in Mexico, I can say I am not optimistic. Why? Because so far they have only distributed land owned by the government, and because the history of agrarian reform in Latin America has in almost 100% of the cases, also been the history of coups against governments trying to make the reforms--coups backed by the US. (Yesterday in the news documentation of Lyndon Johnson's backing of the 1964 coup against Goulart in Brasil was made public--since it was 40 years since the coup.) Agribusiness is a name with a real stench to it--the emphasis in Venezuela at this time as I said in the earlier post is on cooperatives. As for education, there are at least 4 enormous projects (missions) for getting folks into the classroom right now.

5. As I mentioned earlier, unemployed people are being trained and placed. Yes, the program is one that would be useful in many countries--here in Mexico since the election of Fox 2 million jobs have been lost--mostly in the manufacturing sector--the same number as in the US since the "election" of Bush--except tat Mexico only has 30% of thepopulation of the US, so the percentage is considerably higher.

6. Tourism has suffered as a result of the international smear campaign against Venezuela. I did meet a lot of tourists when I was running around for a few weeks in November doing tourist things, and in EVERY case they indicated that they loved Venezuela, and that everyting they had heard about it before they went there was untrue.

7. Indigenous groups--they are big Chavez supporters because of the new consitution, which actually safeguards their rights (unlike here in Mexico despite the eforts of Subcomandante Marcos and others.) It's ot going to be a night to morning change in the way they live, though--nor do I believe it should be. Doing away with extreme poverty (another program/mission in Venezuela) is one thing--destroying native cultures (I am Native American) is something else.

I am happy to dialog about Venezuela. But I believe you should be doing some investigation on your own if you are interested--which is why I gave you the websites. I also believe you could become a slightly more careful reader--and avoid asking the same questions over and over.

[Alitas]

Well, Moonraven, I'm no expert. But I do like to read what you've written. And you are right, I am not a very careful reader.

The Feast of The Goat is a fictionalized account of Trujillo, remember. It's not straight facts. All I was referring to was that even though he was a dictator, he had a following.

As far as dictionaries defining oligarchy, I went ahead and did that. Can you give me an example of a country that is not ruled by an oligarchy? Pretend I'm a student instead of a teacher (I teach language, not politics, nor history).

By the way, is this an "us" and them" debate? You keep saying "them". Well, I know lots of Venezuelans! So, I am confused when you keep saying "them". Do you mean "the oligarchy"? I have tried telling you twice now. The people I know are having a very difficult time with the chavez administration. They are very unhappy. I hate to hear from them that things are bad. But are they "them"--they aren't the few!!!

Also, I know very little about the Carter center, but promise to do some research on their role in Venezuela.

I read Globovision for news in that country.

I read Sonia Schott as well.

Again not the most careful reader but certainly willing to try and understand what you are saying.

[moonraven]

Hi-

I am aware that La fiesta del chivo is fiction.

Countries not ruled by oligarchies? The French Revolution tried to do away with rights and power in the hands of a few--not to mention the 20th century revolutions, but I am not ingenuous enough to believe that power is not in the hands of elites in most countries. But probably there is less power in the hands of only a few in places like Scandinavia, Canada, Germany, etc. In Latin America the oligarchy is more entrenched than in other places because of the tradition of large landholdings. That has expanded beyond the agrarian control model to include control of natural resources--for example. petroleum in Venezuela.

Are your friends part of that group? I have no idea--probably not--probably they are middle class wanna-be oligarchs? Because of the oil boom after the last dictatorship folded in 1958, Venezuela became an increasingly unequal society--with the aspiration of middle and upper class being primarily shopping trips to Miami. The middle class is right to be uneasy--its a class whose days are numbered, but not only in Venezuela: they are numbered everywhere on the globe, as savage capitalism creates a bigger and bigger abyss between the rich and the poor. Blaming their lot on Chavez is ironic, though, given that he is one of the few world leaders who continues to expose neoliberalism's failures and conitnues to promote alternative economic models. Is this "us" versus "them"? It doesn't have to be. I am working on a healing through theater project--first phase completed--for application in Venezuela in order to reduce the polarity. Conditions are not quite there for it to work because there is still too much us and them thinking. But I am, yes, definitely against rule by an elite at the EXPENSE of the rest of society.

Globovision and Venevision are media networkscontrolled by the oligarchy, and Sonia Schott is one of the most rabid Chavez-baiters. Those media call for the murder of Chavez daily. They do not present news--only propaganda, and were largely responsible for the coup that removed Chavez from the power for 47 hours in April of 2002. If you want to continue reading propaganda, that's your right--but I have the feeling that you are more inquiring and sensitive than that.--or at least would like to be.

[johnslat]

Dear moonraven,
Not to take away from your argument, but

" . . . probably they are middle class wanna-be oligarchs?"

I suspect that there are a fair number of people in the "lower-classes" who wouldn't turn down the job, either.

Regards,
John

[moonraven]

Of course. Living an unexamined and unconscious life is not the sole property of the middle and upper classes.

[Alitas]

You don't think that there are educational boundaries withn certain classes, simply because of the culture? Take the Yanomamo. I mentioned them before. Culturally, they are sort of stuck in the cycle they are in. But, left untold of the "wonders" of the current age, would they be missing out? Are they living an unexamined live simply because they don't have Gameboys and refrigeration and a church?

It seems to me it is less of "us" vs. "them", and more about how much education, for what purpose. In my own country a good education within the right cycle affords much opportunity. Education transcends class and culture, to a certain extent. That is why globally, the information technology field is employing people from typically "third world" regions. I mean, show me a Yanomamo who even wants to do that! Their world is so different. It's all about how many yucca.

Now, take these Khmer people talked about in other threads. Seems to me something is going right there. I'd like to hear more about them.

This is sort of an anthropological take on the matter. How much have the oligarchy taken anvantage of these people (yanomamo)...??

[moonraven]

I am bailing out on this topic--there is no conection between gameboys and life--examined or unexamined.

[anonymous_alaska]

I was really interested in your arguments and it really made me see how complex this whole thing is here.

I don't really see how the upper class works, but I have had connections with the poor and middle class. And the problem is how the hell do you turn this machine around.

I just met a guy who has quite regular contact with Chavez and is extremely pro-Chavez. According to this guy, Chavez does have a big heart and sincerely wants to help the poor and make the country a really strong country. And it's a long term plan that is extremely difficult because others under Chavez don't have the same ideals.

But anyway, me and this guy drove around Morrocoy. And I notice he has a really nice car, nice dvd player with video and all these gadgets. Then we go buy a refrigerator in Falcon. And all these are imports!!! Isn't that what Chavez was complaining about.

In the corporate field, I taught the top executive at one of the multinationals, and he said Chavez was destroying the country. But I asked him whether the opposition gave a rats ass about the poor. He said no, and that was their mistake. And then he went on to say how he really cares about the poor, which I'm sure he does, but he works long hours and needs to support his son in a really nice private school.

I'm not saying buying technological devices and sending your son to private school is bad, but we all have to look in the mirror sometimes don't we?

At least there's one thing about this experience here which I have learned. I have to look in the mirror myself!!!

[khmerhit]

AA said