Obama reorganises visit to Argentina to avoid 1976 coup anniversary

[forest444]

Source: The Guardian

President Barack Obama has rescheduled a trip to Buenos Aires following criticism over his planned presence in the Argentine capital on March 24, the 40th anniversary of the brutal 1976 coup that installed a military dictatorship - which the US initially supported.

The U.S. president will now travel to the southern tourist resort of Bariloche, nearly 1,000 miles from Buenos Aires, on March 24 to play golf.

The shuffle came after Nobel Prize laureate Adolfo Pérez Esquivel and other human rights activists called on Obama to cancel ­or at least reschedule ­his visit. According to the new schedule, Obama will arrive in the capital on the night of March 22, where he will meet President Mauricio Macri the next day before leaving for Bariloche.

A military junta imposed martial law on March 24, 1976, and began the killing of thousands of mostly young opponents of a regime that continued until democracy was restored in 1983.

Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/04/obama-urged-not-visit-argentina-40th-anniversary-military-coup

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Considering Argentine President Mauricio Macri is a vocal sympathizer of the 1976 dictatorship, belives human rights are "a scam," and is flouting UN calls to release a political prisoner (indigenous activist Milagro Sala), President Obama should have skipped the visit altogether.

Rescheduling his arrival by one day was nevertheless a very thoughtful concession on the president's part.

[Judi Lynn]

1. It was looking as if Pres.Obama had some very questionable advisors with the arrival in Buenos Aires

scheduled for the very beginning of the US-supported Dirty War which destroyed 30,000 leftist dissenters after torturing them endlessly before dumping them in mass graves or throwing them out of airplanes either into the Atlantic Ocean or into large rivers.

Shockingly sadistic.

They also tortured pregnant mothers, sometimes giving them C-sections when viable, sometimes allowing them to come to term, and handing around their infants like door prizes as favors to notable supporters of the regime, before throwing the mothers themselves out of airplanes.

Sometimes they chained them together, so they resembled paper dolls falling out of the sky into the water to drown together.

Sick, sick people, and they are still publicly supported by the current President of Argentina, as mentioned in the original post.

[forest444]

2. My guess is that some genius in the State Dept. thought it might placate the Miami Cuban exile mafia

This visit, after all, is on the next leg following the president's historic state visit to Cuba - the first since Silent Cal visited that thug Machado in 1927!

The Miami exile leadership, as you know, likes to think of itself as the arbiter of what is and isn't "freedom" in Latin America. And for them, it's still a crass, simplistic matter of left-versus-right - no matter what the nuances or local history in each Latin country. Obviously, they know next to nothing about Argentina just as most Argentines only have a vague idea of Cuba and her problems.

Nevertheless, they're very fond of Macri (as I'm sure you've noticed) because they tend to see his election as a trophy of sorts in their "fight against the leftist scourge" - a scourge they see the Kirchners as part of, despite the fact they were very good for business in Argentina.

Frankly as bad for business as Macri has been in his pretty disastrous three months in office, you'd think they'd think of him as the "leftist scourge."

On a lighter note, I think President Obama was very considerate to modify his itinerary like that.

Enjoy your golf game in Bariloche, Mr. President.

[FairWinds]

3. Some of us made the point about terrible timing

for the visit weeks ago . .

And got scolded by the resident DU righties.

I wrote then . .

"Obama CANNOT visit at that time without
the trip being totally wrapped up with the Dirty War.

Is he taking cluelessness advice from HRC?

UFB

Veterans For Peace"

[forest444]

4. I think I know the ones.

The Colombian-American Uribe fan club.

How nice for Uribe that a drug traffickers' stooge like himself has any fans at all.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/jun/11/colombian-president-uribe-extradition-drug

http://articles.latimes.com/2004/aug/02/world/fg-drugprez2