Support the Venezuelan Protesters?
Weekend Edition Feb 28-Mar 02, 2014
Be Careful
Support the Venezuelan Protesters?
by ALAN MACLEOD
In recent days, angry anti-government protests have erupted in the Venezuelan capital, Caracas. If we are to believe some influential Venezuelan bloggers, the government is sending teams of motorbike-riding death-squads roaming around rich neighbourhoods looking for people to kill. Social media is awash with pictures of children, apparently having been beaten to within an inch of their life by government thugs. This, the New York Times eagerly reports, is making Secretary of State John Kerry “increasingly concerned.” Surely this must be the beginning of a democratic uprising against an authoritarian dictator?
~snip~
But what on Earth has the White House got to do with all this? And why are so many respected international bodies talking about imperialism? You would be forgiven for not knowing, as no New York Times or Washington Post article has revealed the fact that Washington has been funding and training the heads of these protests for at least 12 years. Indeed, the US government has spent hundreds of millions of dollars trying to overthrow the Venezuelan, Bolivian and Ecuadorean governments.
Those leading the protests, Leopoldo Lopez and Maria Corina Machado, are not students, but two of the wealthiest people in South America; Machado is a personal friend of George W. Bush. She was also involved in the last three opposition attempts to overthrow the government: in 2002, 2002-2003 and 2004. In 2002, with the financial, technical and political help of the US government, she and her co-conspirators kidnapped President Hugo Chavez and installed Pedro Carmona as President. He immediately suspended the constitution, sacked all politicians, sacked all judges in the country, suspended human rights, gave himself power to rule by decree, and even changed the name of the country. They were only stopped by a massive revolt, some 25-50 times the size of the current protests, of ordinary, poor Venezuelan citizens.
Prominent among the current protesters are students from Caracas’ elite, fee-paying universities, who wish for change in the country. And yet Venezuela has changed enormously since Hugo Chavez’s election in 1998. Poverty was reduced by 50%, extreme poverty by 72%. The bottom 40% of Venezuela’s population have seen their slice of the economic pie expand by nearly half and those in the economic percentile 40-70 have also seen their incomes rise.
More:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/02/28/support-the-venezuelan-protesters/
= new reply since forum marked as read
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Maria Páez Victor is a sociologist, born in Venezuela and educated in Caracas, New York, Mexico City, and Canada. For several years she taught the sociology of health and medicine as well as health and environmental policies at the University of Toronto. Páez Victor has national and international experience in policy analysis and impact assessment, with expertise in the areas of health, environment, and energy.
http://www.thesolutionsjournal.com/user/115450
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Dr. Maria Páez Victor is a sociologist, born in Venezuela, educated in Caracas, New York, Mexico City, England and Canada. She has twenty years national and international experience in policy analysis and environmental assessment, with particular focus in the areas of health and energy. She is an active member of the Latin American community in Canada.
Career
•Administered the Sustainable Energy Development Scholarships, an international graduate grant program of the G8 energy companies, 2002-2011
•Lecturer, University of Toronto, Sociology of Health and Medicine course; Health and Environment Policies course, part-time, 1992-96;2003-2005
•Consultant, Victor Research, 1993-2006
•Policy Advisor, Law Society of Upper Canada, 1998-2000
•Policy Advisor, Liberal Leader of the Opposition, Ontario Legislature, 1997-1998
•Head of the Multicultural Health Services at the Toronto Hospital/Western Hospital, 1995-97
•Community Planner, Ontario Hydro, Nuclear Division, 1991-93
•Voluntary work, Mater Misericordia Hospital, Nairobi, Kenya, 1985-1987; Board of Directors Citizens for Public Justice 2007-10
Education
•Licenciada (5 year Social Science degree), Universidad Católica Andrés Bello, Caracas, Venezuela,1969
•MA (Sociology) University of Kent at Canterbury, England, 1971
•Ph.D. (Sociology) York University, Toronto, Canada 1987
http://www.lco-cdo.org/en/maria-victor
Thanks for making a scene over this lady, enough that it seemed appropriate to look her up.
