Reply #8: Ha! Thanks, rabs! No, I insist--you are wonderful! What would I have to "analyze" [View All]

[Peace Patriot]

if it weren't for you and Judi Lynn (and a few others, but mostly you two). My Spanish is too primitive to understand original sources. But I am avidly interested both in the leftist democracy revolution in Latin America and in the "treatment" it receives in our corpo-fascist press. (What an eye-opener the latter is!) I have "reversed my poles," so to speak. I no longer look at other countries as foreign countries. I look at MY country from THEIR perspective. MY country--or at least its political/economic establishment--has become "foreign" to me. At the same time, though, I feel more connected then ever to what I believe most Americans of the north want, to the ideals of fairness and equality that have arisen so often in our culture in great peoples' struggles of various kinds. These are direct heart connections to the people of the south. It is one struggle for real democracy. It is the promise of the Americas. What a joy it has been to see this great struggle unfold in Latin America in my lifetime. I hope it catches on here soon. Actually, it has started, hasn't it--in Wisconsin? Long struggle ahead of us, though.

Thanks for the info on Ollanta Humala. (I thought he was 100% Indigenous. He has an Italian mother?) It looks like he has the advantage of being "on the rise." Good positioning (as they say) with the election only a month away. I'm finding it odd that Garcia is considered an asset for Toledo, rather than a severe liability. Last I saw (about a year ago) Garcia had a 25% approval rating. Humala gave them quite a scare in the last election. It sounds like he would make a great contribution to regional integration goals as well as to eliminating poverty in Peru. And, though I don't have a lot of information about Peru, I don't imagine that a "free trade" deal negotiated by the Bush Junta has resulted in benefit to the majority in Peru. Probably they have a new and small but powerful urban elite with their new riches driving their politics, as has happened in other U.S./neo-liberal dominated countries, and they will fight tooth and claw for their new cars and cushy jobs and upscale apartments, allied with the "old" rich and the corporate. Still, I'm wondering if polls are skewed toward the urban areas and to rich enclaves within them. Could be the polls are not that accurate. Humala may surprise everybody again. (He wasn't given a chance in the prior election and almost won it.)