My letter to my old senator about the Colombia Free Trade deal

[JohnnyCougar]

Dear Mr. Feingold,

I am writing to you over my concern about the President's proposed free trade agreement with Colombia. I have three very large concerns about this agreement. I was born and raised in Wisconsin, and am very proud to know that a distinguished and respectable man such as yourself gives the word "politician" a good name in my home state. I know I can trust you over any other nationally elected politician, so I am sending this letter to you.

My first concern about this agreement is that at a time when our economy is struggling and already losing quality jobs overseas, it seems like the absolute wrong time to allow another free trade agreement to pass. If the intention of President Bush is to turn the United States into India or China where there is a dirt poor, helpless class of laborers (which at this point, it would be hard to believe this is not Bush's intention), I fully expect every member of the Democratic party to oppose this nonsense. The last thing we need at this point is repressed competition from overseas weighing down our own lower class even more.

Secondly, I wholeheartedly oppose this trade agreement on human rights grounds, and so should all Democrats. Colombia is arguably the worst human rights abuser in the Western Hemisphere. Right-wing paramilitary death squads roam the countryside gunning down labor activists and journalists. The Uribe Administration is notoriously nonchalant about cracking down on these death squads, and several members of his government are under investigation for links to these groups that we would be labeling terrorists were it not for our blind support of the Uribe government. The fact that the FARC exists in Colombia is unfortunate, but it does not at all justify the human rights abuses that come from the right-wing in Colombia. What a slap in the face to America's workers if we are to agree to free trade with a country where union organizers are executed. It would be hard to think of a more arrogant and insulting fashion in which to conduct policy.

Thirdly, and most controversially, this agreement is simply aimed and agitating left-wing leaders throughout Latin America -- and most obviously Hugo Chavez. Hugo may have a big mouth and not know when to shut up, but he is the product of democracy that is working fairly well for most Venezuelans. I find it entirely hypocritical that the US government supposedly is out to spread freedom and democracy -- yet its policy towards Latin America has been to subvert freedom and democracy for a long time. One could argue that it is in our national security interest to manipulate Latin American governments so that we have US friendly leaders in charge of every country down there, and it would be a valid point. However, it would be a point that would have to be made with total disregard for human life and human rights. Latin America is on the brink of getting their act together and standing up for itself. It is well known what US foreign policy stands for in their own area of the world, and I think we are past the point where we can cover up our unjust foreign policy down there. The fact is, we have aided several undemocratic movements down there -- the most recent being the aristocrats in Venezuela. It should be no surprise, then, that Latin America as a whole is turning against US interests. It is a shame that our neighbors to the South cannot trust us anymore.

In light of Latin America standing up on its feet, one has to question whether our grade school bullying tactics are more likely to be counterproductive down there. By conducting our foreign policy in an undemocratic and undiplomatic fashion, we only force blossoming democracies further away from us. We support the worst human rights abusers to our South, and we subvert the true democracies. Nevermind human rights for a second; is it really in our long-term business interests to push a major developing economic bloc away from us and towards real enemies like Russia and China?

What I dream of seeing is a US foreign policy that respects human rights and freedom instead of working against it. I dream of seeing a break from our ideological dogmatism where you are labeled a "dictator" if you do not cooperate fully with our business interests (regardless of whether your people elected you and love you), and you are labeled a "friend" and a "great leader" if you help us out (regardless of whether you are actually a dictator and repress human rights). I understand that it is in any great world power's interests to act in a Machiavellian fashion and wield its power as barbarically as it can get away with, but I can't help but wish with all my heart that the US can be better than that. I'd like to see diplomacy with Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Argentina, Chile, Brazil, and all other nations to our South. And I hope that Colombia, too, can join them in creating a government that cares for its people the way the US has cared for its own people after FDR's New Deal policies and LBJ's civil rights policies.

Maybe I'm too idealistic to be living in this country anymore, but hopefully in the coming months, the Democratic party can lighten my heart and help me fully believe in my country for the first time since my naive youth. Hopefully the Democratic party -- yourself included -- will stand firm against political one-upsmanship of a grade school variety that puts personal vendettas above both American workers and human rights. The Democratic party should show no shame at all in dismantling the Colombia Free Trade Agreement, and stand on the principles of years past once again.

Thank you,
John

I also sent a similar letter to my current Democratic senator.

It is important that this bill is NOT PASSED. There will be pressure on conservative Democrats to pass this charade, so if you live in a state with one of those (or in a congressional district), let them know how you feel.

[Judi Lynn]

1. Congrats! Your letter to Russ Feingold is excellent, and it comes from a good, sound heart.

It reaveals you've been paying attention, you've made a point of keeping track of US policy, you've done research, and you have deeply felt principles.

It should make an impression that Americans who really care, STILL can read through the smoke we're being fed in daily doses and see the outline of some very dirty undemocratic policies going back a long time.

It should make an imprint on the guy if he ever reads his mail.

As I was reading through your message, it started becoming clear you had really been watching these things with interest, and then it suddenly hit me: you're the "Official DU Hugo Chavez Right-Wing Falsehood Debunking Thread" guy! I had filed that away for future reference as soon as I discovered it, back in February, of 2006!

You could do one (debunking thread) for Uribe, but there's nothing good to say about him after you point out all the criminality which has been covered up by our corporate media. He belongs in prison. That's the way it is with these right-wingers. Have you EVER heard any of these freeper mutants who could offer even ONE good thing to say about any of their right-wing idols? NO WAY. What has any one of them EVER done to make the world a better place? It doesn't happen.

As for Du'ers Congressmen, I've got two hideous Republican senators in my state, Brownback and Pat Roberts, but at least I do have a great Representative. I'm going to have to contact him A.S.A.P., too.

Also, if you see anyone with a petition to anyone, don't hesitate to post a link here, in the Latin America forum.

I hope Russ Feingold will see your letter: it's great. If your other one is similar, so much the better. They need to know some of us are paying very close attention to the things they do in our "backyard," as it's been designated by some of our thicker politicians.

You're an encouragement to those of us who really need to get busy, too, before time runs out. There's not too much wiggle-room time here. Thanks.

[JohnnyCougar]

2. Yeah, I started that thread a while back

I want to start a blog that goes more in depth than that thread, but achieves the same purpose. I want to create a one-stop place for facts about Venezuela and Hugo Chavez that come from unbiased and easily believable sources, and debunk the fantasy about Chavez perpetuated upon the rest of the world issue-by-issue.

[dalus]

3. Support human rights, stop the FARC

I'm going to have to disagree with you on this.

I'll deal with your second point first: you oppose the agenda of Alvaro Uribe because he is right-wing. For me, that's not a very good reason. The man has done a lot of good for Colombia, as hard as that may be for you to accept.

There are three main parties to Colombia's civil war: the government, the right-wing militias (the AUC was the most prominent), and the left-wing militias (the FARC is the most prominent). The war was started by the FARC insurgency. All sides use child soldiers. All sides are guilty of murders and of applying their own brand of what we in the USA might call "frontier justice". Militias of both sides are linked to drug lords, protecting their operations in exchange for financial support.

The Uribe family has ties to right-wing militias. In a country like Colombia this is unsurprising because civil war has permeated the society for so many decades. Few people have clean hands, and those that do are powerless. Uribe used his ties to good advantage when he convinced those militias to lay down their weapons. Because of that, the AUC and other forces are no longer the threat to peace that they once were, although renegade elements still exist and must be dealt with. Meanwhile, he pursues an aggressive agenda of combating the FARC with military force. Both of these approaches are working, and Colombia is already safer than it was when Uribe took office. If the trend continues, Colombia may finally have peace in our lifetime.

Uribe's fearless stand against chaos, and his success in the measures that he has undertaken, have won him massive popularity in Colombia. If you were paying attention, you might have noticed that recently there were worldwide protests by millions of Colombians around the world (inside and outside of Colombia). Those protests were not against the government, they were against the FARC and their decades-old reign of terror. People are tired of being terrorized by the paramilitaries.

If you have met a few Colombians, and they were forthcoming about their past, you will know that an immense number of them have personal stories about being terrorized by, kidnapped by, or losing a loved one to the militias. Violence is the number one problem in Colombia and until it is solved, nothing else can be accomplished there.

Now, my impression is that you would like to punish Colombia, and the right-wing Alvaro Uribe in particular, for the human rights abuses perpetrated by the government. I fail to see what this would accomplish except prolong the fighting and the suffering of the Colombian people. What we need to do is get behind the current effort to eradicate the militias. That is the best way to defend human rights in that region. Those who will negotiate a peace should be negotiated with; but some will not and they should be killed.

All of this does not necessarily mean that free trade would be a great thing for either Colombia or the USA in economic terms. You haven't presented any case on that, though, you seem to adhere to have an abhorrence for free trade despite the benefits we've seen from it in other parts of the world.

Our current economic crisis is not due to free trade, it is due to poor regulation of the financial sector. Our faltering competitiveness in the world market is likewise not caused by free trade, it is caused by a combination of health care costs that make hiring US workers very expensive (witness export of manufacturing jobs to Canada), poor education, and government incentives for companies to offshore production. Our worst trade imbalance is with China -- no free trade there!

Colombians are seeking free trade with the US. They already pay few if any tariffs on goods that they buy from us, according to the White House (a dubious source perhaps but I have little reason to doubt them on this matter). So, the question is really whether we are willing to reciprocate.

Colombia has been a steadfast ally of the US in South America. The only steadfast ally, in fact. Why do you want to throw them under a bus? Is that how we treat our friends? Is that how YOU treat YOUR friends?

And your third point? That we should avoid antagonizing HUGO CHAVEZ? The man lives for antagonism. He will NEVER stop criticizing us no matter what we do! Do you propose bending over backwards to satisfy a man who doesn't like you at all and will never be happy with anything you do? Not to mention that the man is also busy ruining the economy of his own country through foolish price controls and lack of investment in the oil industry, even as his cronies get rich by entrenching themselves as the new power elite. That is not a friend we need or want to have.

Recent articles on the topic:
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/04/24/opinion/edkristof.php
http://www.economist.com/world/la/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11053186

< Edit: Just found this. The offical line from the Venezuelan ambassador in Washington: "Venezuela has no opinion on Colombia's free-trade agreement with the United States." So, "antagonizing" Venezuela is really a non-issue. Link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/23/AR2008042303211.html >

[Judi Lynn]

4. The war started long before the FARC existed. Anyone would know that.

Many sources point to old customs by the land owners exploiting the people who worked on their land, in normally unacceptable ways, but ways the people felt they had to accept due to their helplessness.

I've seen this many, many places, but this is the last place I've seen it recently, so I returned to this article since it was fresh in my memory. The custom of using the daughters of poor people by land owners goes back a VERY long way, far longer than the example in this article from:

The paramilitaries' worst massacre in 10 years
El Tiempo (Bogotá)
Tuesday, 28 February 2000

~snip~
Twenty years ago, this zone belonged to tobacco plantation owners. The attitude of some, which even included demands that peasants pay for their crops by "lending out their daughters", generated a lot of resentment among the peasants. It also motivated a strong movement for the land that led to an extensive agrarian reform led by the ANUC {National Association of Rural Land Users}.

Around the mid-1980s until about six years ago, when the Socialist Renewal Current was legalized, the Maria Mountains were a sanctuary for the ELN . During the peace process with this group, the government promised to formulate a Development Plan for Sucre and to award land from the zone to those who rejoined civil society. Those promises were never kept.

So, the void created by the state was filled by the FARC. And it has now been "recovered" by the paramilitaries.

Thus, while one group kills for the sake of social justice in the country and the other group, for a Colombia "cleansed" of guerrillas, a country is being built on a foundation of fear.

http://www.colombiasupport.net/200002/eltiempo-massacre-0228.html

Concerning the protests "around the world," it's clear even from the corporate media sources we've had to settle for, that the Uribe government encouraged employers and schools to give the day off to their employees and students so they could participate in this "protest." As for its being a "grass roots" project as has been claimed by propagandists, don't insult us.

People were told about it WEEKS in advance, and given the day off. What would most people do, work, or take the day off and go to the protest?

As for the protest against the death squads, threats started being flung as soon as the government heard about it. The organizers started receiving personal threats, and not to anyone's surprise, SIX ORGANIZERS WERE ASSASSINATED immediately, no questions asked, they were blown away.

This was after public media became useful in targeting them, naming them personally.

As for the paramilitaries having been retired, that's a spectacular lie. Even Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, usually very quick to take the position preferred by the U.S., have admitted the death squads (or the unconvincing euphemism, "paramilitaries") have NOT been dismantled, but have been reorganized and are operating under different names, and the killings continue. Easy to locate that information in any quick search. Other human rights organizations confirm this, as well, and the people who are being terrorized of course are so keenly aware.

The very tone of your post almost completely convinces me you work for one of the public relations companies which have been hired to try to cover every single bit of adversarial information you hear or see anywhere as soon as possible. Your profile also indicates you got here the moment Uribe started getting in deeper trouble than he can easily handle (since all this information has been known for a very long time). Apparently the pressure of having this information Álvaro Uribe has long been connected to El Aro massacre, a filthy, evil, heartless event, actually get into the mainstream corporate media is presenting a challenge to the future prospects of the FTA the Democrats do NOT want to see finalized.

Repeating a handfull of snotty, inaccurate right-wing lies to slur Hugo Chavez is NOT the way to defend your guy. It points to your lack of real conviction of any reason to support Uribe at all.

[dalus]

6. Insults are really not necessary

Your baseless personal accusations make me un-inclined to take you seriously, but I will try to anyway. Such accusations are simply a distraction and point to a lack of desire on your part to focus on facts. I joined this forum specifically to post on this issue, since it is one that I feel strongly about. Unlike some other people, my main concern in the matter is seeing peace in Colombia in our time. I do not have any special agenda, nor do my employment or personal interests (in the financial sense) touch on politics in any way. I will not get extra satisfaction from "sticking it to" characters like Alvaro Uribe or Hugo Chavez that I may or may not find unpleasant. I am also not out to prop up US industry with lopsided tariffs on Colombian imports.

Colombia has been fighting throughout much of its history since independence. In that sense it's true that the war started long before FARC. Many historians trace the origin of the current conflict to La Violencia, but you could go back even farther if you wanted. And through the entire history of the conflict, its main result has been to stunt the country's growth due to perpetual insecurity. Colombia could well be one of the jewels of Latin America if it could just stop fighting for a while. I don't pretend that either side is right, but I do believe that if peace can be brought for a while then the country can change for the better.

The claim that Uribe's policies are not working and that militias have simply reorganized under other banners is belied by the drop in violence, especially kidnappings, since he took office. That would seem to be evidence that quite a few fighters on both sides HAVE decided to call it quits. Certainly there are plenty of AUC and other "demobilized" fighters that have simply changed their name, but it's still an improvement; and you will find this statement to be consistent with what I said in my first post. I don't pretend that peace has already been achieved, so providing evidence that the killings continue does not falsify my claim.

Trade unionists are considerably safer than they were ten years ago. Their murder rate has gone way down. Are they still in extra danger because of their positions? Probably. They are actually killed at a lower rate than the overall population, though some charge that this ignores other factors (I think that's the line from HRW). Presumably these critics think that unionists live in generally safer environs and are thus killed at a higher rate than their immediate neighbors. I don't know if that's true or not. But, given the way that organized crime permeates Colombian society, I have to think that a portion of these murders were common crimes, unrelated to efforts to silence their activism.

Uribe reportedly enjoys an 85% approval rating, so apparently my appraisal agrees pretty closely with that of the majority of the Colombian people. Certainly such a poll result might be faked, but I doubt it could be faked too drastically. He has been elected president twice and could probably win a third election if it were allowed. With all that, it certainly looks like he is the democratic choice of Colombia and has a popular mandate to continue his agenda.

As for Chavez, he is really not involved at all in the question of the trade deal, as I have already stated. However, rather than claim that I am lying, I would encourage you to provide some facts to back up your claims. Do you deny that his price fixing has caused food shortages and soaring prices on the black market? Do you deny that his sticking his hand into the oil funds cookie jar for his projects is causing a decline in Venezuela's annual oil output (as has happened in Mexico as well)? Do you deny that Venezuela is one of the few countries in Latin America (the only country?) where wealth disparity has actually risen in the past decade (edit: correction, in South America, I don't know about Latin America as a whole)? Do you deny that Chavez is coming under increasing criticism from his own supporters because of the corruption of his party bureaucrats? Do you deny that he is widely considered, from Argentina to Canada, to be an irritating character that is widely disliked? Do you deny that he has based a large part of his public persona on rants against the United States? By all means, present any evidence you want to refute these claims but don't just state categorically that they are untrue, that's a waste of everyone's time.

Sure, Chavez has done probably some good for Venezuela. I don't think anyone should get rid of him except the people of Venezuela who can do so by popular vote if they so choose. He was elected democratically and the people can vote him out if they want; I believe he will probably accept such a vote. (He's not Robert Mugabe. At least not yet.) So be it, that's their choice; he's probably better than what preceded him. However, respecting the choice of the Venezuelan people to be ruled by the leader of their choice doesn't mean I can't argue, based on the facts as I have seen them, that he is an incompetent administrator and a tiresome blowhard who seems to believe that ideology can overcome reality.

Don't pretend that everyone who doesn't see the world your way is basing their beliefs on lies while you are the holder of truth and light. If you want to convince me, convince me with facts, not insults. I will not be intimidated by smears, although they will make me lose respect for you if they continue.

[AlphaCentauri]

7. Free trade would be a big washing machine

there should be some aspects that washington should consider before going into a free trade agreement with Colombia. It's not just about union leader been killed by Uribes followers, there are other factors and conditions that should be met before any agreement, like for example cocaine production and export from colombia, at this moment all attention is focus on the leftist guerrilla as media campaign to make the government look good as seen in the current events. Colombia economy is depending of drugs export and production, Uribe has not stop the production and his government is colluded with the drug lords. In the past and today business and financial companies have been laundering billions of dollars from the drug trade controlled by right-wing extremists. So why americans should be worry about this? no american citizen want to see their kid poison with drugs to satisfy the agenda of some political movement. Also remember that the Iran-Contra deal poison a lot of black kids with crack in the poor neighbor hoods, there could be another deal like that to fund a movement that would destabilize other countries in latin america. A free trade agreement should not be a loop for drug cartels to laundry dirty money so for such a reason Uribe must stop drug production in Colombia before any trade agreement is in effect.

[Bacchus39]

5. good post, nice to hear from someone that actually knows a bit about Colombia

although I would elaborate that the opposition to the free trade agreement for Colombia is not to punish Colombia, but to punish Bush. Colombia is the scapegoat. as you correctly pointed out, Colombia is and will be the strongest ally of the US when a Democrat is elected president this year.

[AlphaCentauri]

8. I believe that any people killed in Colombia is far more important

than punishing Bush

[JohnnyCougar]

9. I appreciate your point of view...

...but when you throw out questionable statements like Chavez is "ruining" the Venezuelan economy and getting his cronies rich, it sort of puts a dent in your credibility. There are plenty of economists that disagree with that statement. Here is one report:

http://www.cepr.net/documents/publications/venezuela_update_2008_02.pdf

That's by the CEPR. But Joseph Stiglitz also agrees the Chavez isn't ruining the economy:

http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/news/2719

Furthermore, Chavez has paid off huge sums of Venezuela's foreign debt and spend billions on healthcare, education and food. His price controls are meant to provide food for everyone, not just for those who can afford it. I don't know why this bothers you so much.

I also think you falsely attribute my dislike for Uribe to his being right-wing. I don't like him because his administration has a poor human rights record. Much, much worse than Venezuela does. He may have had a long way to go, but numerous reports have come out stating that his government is being lax with the prosecution of paramilitary murderers. Trade unionists continue to get killed over there as well. And there are anti-Uribe protests as well. I don't know if your story proves anything other than both sides are willing to protest. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch do not like the trade deal either.

I do agree with some of your comments about why our country is in an economic crisis right now, though. I don't think that free trade is the only problem, but anyone will tell you that free trade acts to level the playing field. When our competitors are countries that suppress workers' rights like China and Colombia, then yes, that competition is going to take the power away from our own blue collar workers and unions. And that causes economic problems -- not for investors, mind you, because the company is reaping more profits exporting labor to countries that have repressive regimes -- but for our workers who have to work for less or fear having their jobs shipped away. And of course, the less these people make, the less consumer spending they do, and the less retail jobs we have, etc. Which is what you see right before your eyes with this current economy.

Anyways, it was the Bush Administration itself that was pushing the line that it would be something to counter Chavez. I never even heard Venezuela mention anything about it. But I enjoyed reading your post.

[dalus]

10. Very long post ahead, beware

Thanks for your reply. I have been wanting to respond for a while, but I had hoped to be able to do a bit more research to follow up on the links that you posted. Those articles certainly have made me reconsider my views on the economic foundations of Chavez policies. Nonetheless, I still have some criticisms of his handling of some situations:

1. Price controls. Anyone could have told him that if you lower the prices that farmer are allowed to charge for their products (which is an effect of lowering retail prices), they will produce less and cause shortages. That's implied by the law of supply and demand. The normal way to reduce prices is for the government to subsidize the industry. Chavez knows all about this because he already subsidizes gasoline at great expense to the national budget. Mandating lower prices without funding the mandate essentially makes farmers pay for it out of their own pockets. It's not surprising that this isn't of interest to them. There are only two justifications I can think of for Chavez's price controls, the first is blind ignorance of economics and the second is that he's betting that it will generate popular support for him to nationalize the production and distribution of food. I don't think Chavez is stupid (despite the Bush-like boorishness of his public persona) so I'm betting on the second one.

2. The restructuring of the oil industry. From one point of view, Chavez had to purge the oil industry of political opponents because PDVSA was controlled by his political adversaries. This was probably one of the biggest union busting operations in world history. Probably justified, though. The root of the problem, as I see it, was that the labor union was tied to a political faction. However, Chavez didn't really remedy this situation, he simply kicked out his enemies and brought in his friends. The new PDVSA regime is at least as partisan as the old, not to mention it is reputedly quite a bit less competent. It is also allegedly more corrupt than before. In fact, it would be hard to believe it could possibly be as competent as it was before 2003, even without the corruption issue, since the oil industry requires a lot of highly specialized workers and there just aren't that many people in the world with that kind of expertise once you've disqualified thousands because of their political affiliation. This is no doubt one factor behind the decline of oil output from Venezuela, despite the fact that PDVSA leadership continues to claim output figures well above what outside observers believe to be the real levels. The only reason this has not become a major economic issue for Chavez is that skyrocketing world oil prices have offset the decline in productivity.

Anyway, enough about Chavez. Honestly, to the extent that he's not interfering with other countries besides Venezuela (which he probably is, but that's a separate issue), I couldn't care less about what he does. It's up to Venezuelans to love him, hate him or tolerate them as they see fit.

But we were supposed to be talking about Colombia. I've read the opinions of Amnesty and HRW. They continue to seem quite out of touch with reality.

From HRW: “Colombia has yet to show concrete results in breaking paramilitaries’ power and holding the killers of trade unionists accountable,” said José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at Human Rights Watch. “If Congress ratifies the FTA now, it’s very unlikely the Uribe government will follow through on its promises to tackle these issues.”

As I've mentioned above, this statement is just false. Uribe has made quite a bit of progress in breaking paramilitaries' power and in holding killers accountable. His overhaul of the Justice System -- funded by Plan Colombia, I might add -- has made progress in trying killers. Unionists are far safer than they were in 2000. That is clearly progress. Definitely not enough, but significant movement in the right direction nonetheless.

I'd like to address this article from Amnesty:

"In fact, paramilitarism has not been dismantled, it has simply been "re-engineered." Many demobilized combatants are being encouraged to join "civilian informer networks," to provide military intelligence to the security forces, and to become "civic guards". Since many areas of Colombia have now been wrested from guerrilla control, and paramilitary control established in many of these areas, they no longer see a need to have large numbers of heavily-armed uniformed paramilitaries."
http://www.amnestyusa.org/Colombia/Justice_and_Peace_Law_and_Decree_128/page.do?id=1101862&n1=3&n2=30&n3=885

The main thrust of the article is that the dismantling of the AUC and other right-wing groups is a sham and that they haven't disbanded, just reorganized. Now, I agree that this is happening to some extent and it is disturbing. On the other hand, there has been a large decline in violence, something that the quote above actually acknowledges. What disturbs me about this Amnesty report is that it seems determined to completely dismiss this progress. The fact that Colombian gangsters "no longer see a need to have large numbers of heavily-armed uniformed paramilitaries" is a success and it means that steps toward peace are being made. With continued pressure, hopefully the trend toward demobilizing these paramilitaries in all of their forms will continue.

This is just the kind of dividend we should be hoping for from the Colombian government's efforts to end this civil war. However, critics seemingly would have you believe that not only has no progress been made in Colombia, things are actually going in the wrong direction. It's difficult to think of a type of change that would actually please these critics.

Another major aspect of this article is the issue of impunity. Combating impunity is an extremely popular cause among human rights crusaders these days, but I have yet to see proof it is always a valuable goal for improving people's lives. From a moral standpoint it would seem imperative, and I think this is the reason for its popularity, since human rights proponents are usually acting out of a sense of universal justice. However, many countries find that it's just not practical; that sometimes you have to buy off criminals with promises of amnesty in order to get them to desist their bad behavior. This has been an ongoing debate in Uganda, for example, where the government has been trying to negotiate with the Lord's Resistance Army but European activists demanding impunity have derailed potential agreements that might have brought peace. Now, I'm against impunity when it involves a war criminal like George W. Bush or Donald Rumsfeld, but when it comes to defusing a widespread conflict involving many factions, all of which have committed extensive human rights abuses, it seems unrealistic to expect everyone to lay down their arms and consent to be locked up.

By now I think I've already made my position clear on the violence issue. That still doesn't resolve the question of whether or not this free trade pact would be a good thing, however. The remaining and most obvious question is whether the pact would be economically beneficial to either country. I think it's unfortunate that critics of the treaty have focused on human rights issues, I believe those objections to be an intentional distraction from the core issue of free trade, a smokescreen based heavily on lies and half-truths designed to gain sympathy from people who would not otherwise care about the politics of trade.

That is a much more difficult issue to tackle, and I don't pretend to have all the answers. However, if I'm going to have an opinion on the issue then I have to take a stab at it.

Colombia already has no tariffs on US goods. Therefore, US workers are already benefiting from free trade with Colombia. This is a lopsided agreement in which one party has an advantage over another. In that environment, it's not hard to see why Colombia would be interested in lowering our tariffs on their goods as well. It seems that a country of 45 million should be more afraid of being flooded with goods from a country of 300 million than the reverse.

Thus, I admit it is hard to see what the USA has to gain from this pact, especially from a worker's perspective. Indeed, the current status quo seems to be an ideal situation of imperial exploitation where we reap benefits without paying a price. When I look at it that way I guess I'm pretty dumb to want to give up such a good deal.

From the Colombian perspective, the situation is rather more complex. Free trade is certainly an economic stimulus, but the growth that it brings doesn't get distributed evenly. It tends to accrue more to highly skilled workers and leave the unskilled out in the cold. At least, that's the pattern that Mexico has seen, and China seems to be having the same experience with globalization. So, that's the downside.

What's the upside? Colombia has been increasing their exports recently, especially with their neighbors. However, their relations with their neighbors are fragile. During the recent flare-up with Hugo Chavez, he stopped trucks from crossing the border, disrupting the thriving Colombia-Venezuela trade. That suggests that Colombia needs more reliable trading partners. Closer trade relations with the USA could provide them with one such partner.

Also, there is the rather obvious possibility that increasing economic opportunities in Colombia will help create a path out of the seemingly perpetual morass of violence and exploitation that afflicts that country. Legitimate opportunities, alternatives to drug production and organized crime. I see this new economic opportunity as the carrot that, along with the stick of law enforcement against paramilitaries of all varieties, might finally bring peace and justice to Colombia.

[Zorro]

11. Good, sensible post

Of course you'll be told you're ignorant about the real situation in Colombia by the usual loudmouths, though.

[prolifedemq]

12. Sorry your letter is BS

Investigate the numbers of human right abuses and compare them retroactively to the years that Uribe has been president. You'll find that the number of human right abuses have dropped by more then half within 2 years of his presidency.

More important look at the amount of murders and the amount they've dropped. Or kidnapping. Or crime rate. Or look at the economy and the amount of growth its experienced.


Punishing Bush throught Punishing Colombia is a stupid idea. You are only hurting innocent people as a result.

[prolifedemq]

13. Sorry your letter is BS

Investigate the numbers of human right abuses and compare them retroactively to the years that Uribe has been president. You'll find that the number of human right abuses have dropped by more then half within 2 years of his presidency.

More important look at the amount of murders and the amount they've dropped. Or kidnapping. Or crime rate. Or look at the economy and the amount of growth its experienced.


Punishing Bush throught Punishing Colombia is a stupid idea. You are only hurting innocent people as a result.