Bachelet returns to Chile, says she will seek presidency in November elections
Bachelet returns to Chile, says she will seek presidency in November elections
Article by: EVA VERGARA , Associated Press
SANTIAGO, Chile - Former Chilean President Michelle Bachelet announced her candidacy in November presidential elections on Wednesday, saying she would use a second term in office to address the country's enormous income inequality.
Bachelet, 62, returned to Chile following a two-year stint heading the U.N. women's agency in New York. She is widely seen as the center-left opposition's only hope of winning the Nov. 17 vote.
"I have taken the decision to be a candidate," she told cheering supporters in the municipality of El Bosque shortly after her arrival in Chile.
Bachelet, who governed Chile from 2006-2010 before ceding office to conservative President Sebastian Pinera, said that during her first term "there were things we didn't do well and some things remain to be done."
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...par for the course for Corporate Media on the Latin American Left.
Note: This is an Associated Press (AP) article and should be so identified. They are particularly bad--liars and propagandists--on the LatAm Left.
Batchelet did not "cede office" to Sebastian Pinera. She was termed out, and left office with an 80% approval rating. Her high approval rating is noted later in the article as are polls supporting the article's assertion that she is "the only hope" of the center-left winning the Nov. 17 presidential vote. (Chilean law has a term limit, but a president can leave office for a term and then run again.)
Why her designated successor lost to Pinera is an interesting question, which I will discuss in a moment.
But first, I want to further address the article's assertion that she is "the only hope" of the center-left--as opposed to the rightwing, whose president, Pinera, is described in this article as "the most unpopular president since Chile returned to democracy in 1990 after the dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet." (I saw poll results some time ago that gave Pinera a 25% approval rating.)
Here is the key paragraph about Batchelet being "the only hope" of the center-left:
"Bachelet ended her first presidential term with nearly 80 percent approval ratings. And a recent poll by CEP Estudios Publicos consultancy said if the elections were to be held today she would easily win the presidency with 54 percent of the votes. // Without Bachelet, polls show support for Chile's center-left parties barely reaching 20 percent." --from the OP
Questions: Can we trust one poll? Can we trust this poll? And can we trust the notoriously inaccurate and propagandistic Associated Press? They are so bad that I call them the Associated Pukes. This article is several cuts above their usual terrible journalistic standards; still, AP has "oars in these waters," so to speak; they actively campaign against leftist leaders in other countries, and emit a continual spew of rightwing and CIA "talking points" as headlines.
I'm told by people who know more about Chilean politics than I do, that Batchelet's designated successor lost to Pinera because the socialist party had made too many compromises with the rightwing and corporate business, and that the socialist party needed new blood--new younger leaders--and needed to re-commit to the majority poor and working class. I suspected that the election had been stolen (by Pinera) because of Batchelet's 80% approval rating--but I don't have any information about Chile's vote counting system to support that suspicion. The political explanation (failures of the socialist party) is the best explanation I've seen.
Well, in the meantime, not only did Pinera's approval rating drop to 25% but also a huge new student movement arose with some remarkable new young leaders. It may be true that there is no one else for them to support in a presidential election, except Batchelet, and that any leftist has to compromise with the "center" to get elected in Chile, but to make that assertion--that "only" Batchelet can win for the "center-left"--needs more documentation than the article provides.
It seems possible, according to some facts--but, given AP's bigotry against the Left in other LatAm countries, I'm a bit suspicious. Perhaps there is a more leftist candidate that the Corporate Media is trying to marginalize?
My suspicions come from long experience of reviewing Corporate Media articles about the Latin American Left. It's not good when they like some leader or say something positive about them.
I like Batchelet. I'm glad she's running. She did some great things for South American unity and integration during her first tenure as president--especially her help at foiling the U.S.-backed coup attempt against Evo Morales in Bolivia. She was tortured, and her father was tortured to death, by the U.S.-backed dictatorship in Chile, when she was young (mentioned in this article). She knows from personal experience how much the U.S. government and its Corporate Rulers hate democracy and social justice in Latin America. She also seems to have gotten the message of the new student movement in Chile--and the message of other protestors, and of voters in other South American countries--about the unacceptability of big rich/poor discrepancies. It is not only a disgrace to countries that tolerate such big discrepancies but it is a major drag on economic growth and development.
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Batchelet) said that her goal would be ending the inequality that plagues Chile, which has one of the world's largest gaps between rich and poor despite its economic successes." --from the OP
I don't much care for her vagueness, though--as reported in the article: "'I am not going to offer a program prepared between four walls ... I am going to cross the country to listen to people, to hear their proposals,' she said." (from the OP)
She is articulate about the rich/poor discrepancy (as reported in the article). She mentions the "rage" that has prompted huge demonstrations by students and other segments of the left-out population. But it should be obvious to someone with her experience and insight, and with examples of huge poverty reduction by other leftist governments nearby in South America (Venezuela--"THE most equal country in Latin America," according to the UNECLAC--Brazil, Ecuador and others) HOW IT'S DONE. Free education. Free health care. Subsides for the very poor. Increased public services and public sector jobs (which always stimulates the private sector, as do these other measures). Good wages; high employment. Fair taxation. Strong regulation of big business and corporations, among other things, to prevent outsourcing (to avoid labor standards), sweatshops, monopolistic practices, privatization and other corporate ills.
It's not rocket science. It's Keynesian economics ("New Deal" economics). It's been done. It's being done in many other LatAm countries. I get the feeling she's hedging her bets--not as badly as our Democratic leaders--but to some extent. So I repeat my question? Can this article and the poll cited be trusted--that the Left has only 20% support and that Batchelet boosts that support 34 points to 54%?
Is she that personable? Or are they hiding something--such as the viability of a candidate or candidates on the Left who are not vague, and who did not preside over the failures of the socialist party the last time around--a firebrand of the Rafael Correa or Hugo Chavez kind who will rally the poor majority for a real political revolution, or a worker candidate, like Lula da Silva (former president of Brazil, a former steelworker) or Nicolas Maduro (likely to win the Venezuelan special election, a former bus driver)?
Batchelet is a professional--a doctor. She has done a lot for women's rights and for regional unity but she is not an economic reformer. I'm not against politicians "listening," God knows--but I think some strong pushback by the poor majority against whom class warfare has been waged by the rich, is in order--and Batchelet seems a bit shy of it. She calls their protests "rage" but what does she feel? Is she with them? Will she help them change the political dynamics? Will she help to empower the poor majority? Or is her role more like Obama's--to stem the tide? And is there anyone else--whose candidacy is being suppressed, ignored, blackholed?
