by Mike Wolff
Daily Lobo Columnist
Glory to her moral supremacy! Praise her undaunted commitment to liberal democracy throughout the world! Thank her for defending the people’s will in the face of evil!
But last weekend, there must have been some confusion. When one of Latin America’s oldest democracies, Venezuela, fell to a military coup, the United States stood by with a smirk. An interim president from the business elite was installed, and he immediately suspended Congress and the Supreme Court. He promised that new elections would be held within a year — the same promise made by Castro in 1959 and Pinochet in 1973.
Chavez’s resignation turned out to be a lie, and his removal was clearly as unconstitutional as the interim president’s initial actions.
Yet the United States approved of this, claiming that Chavez brought it upon himself when protesters were killed outside of the presidential palace. The Bush administration hates Chavez, of course. After all, the guy who supplies one-third of U.S. oil imports is a lefty who has befriended Castro and has even gone so far as to hug Saddam Hussein. Chavez is also as the most outspoken critic of U.S. foreign policy in the Western Hemisphere, calling the United States an imperialist power.
The harsh words of Chavez resound in Bush’s ears, especially when Chavez, who presides over the largest oil company in the world, has significant influence as far reaching as the Middle East.
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Therefore, the United States forgot about the Organization of American States’ obligation to collective defense of democracy last weekend. There were incentives. The interim president Pedro Carmona, champion of elite-run free markets, would have made a great ally for the Bush team — even if he sort of was an authoritarian.
Unfortunately for the United States, the rest of Latin America unanimously opposed the coup, and threatened sanctions against the new Venezuelan government. This aided in the quick dismantling of the coup coalition, which had already begun to divide once Carmona suspended the constitution.
Sunday evening, heeding the call of many thousands of pro-Chavez supporters, Chavez’s own former paratrooper battalion stormed the presidential palace, opening it up for his return to presidency a few hours later. He quickly reinstated the Congress and Supreme Court, and called for reconciliation and democracy.
Having been caught applauding a failed coup, the United States then admonished Chavez, claiming that under him, full democracy has not been restored. Condoleeza Rice said to Chavez, somewhat patronizingly, “I hope you take this opportunity to right your own ship, which has been moving in the wrong direction for quite a long time.”
The message is, basically, “shape up or ship out.” The United States supports democracy when democracy supports U.S. politico-economic policy. If any democracy sways from this path, it is essentially at fault for whatever extra-legal maneuvering may put an end to that democracy.
The irony is that Chavez really never did much to alter the capitalist economic development of Venezuela. He just talked a lot about it. The only real damage he caused the United States was the recent hike in oil prices that he engineered as chairman of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries. Anti-Chavez sentiment grew out of what Chavez symbolized. It was in this symbolic way that he has repeatedly defied the United States, using inflammatory rhetoric, reminiscent of many other “anti-imperialist” populist leaders in Latin America.
So the United States’ hate for Chavez is not only outdated — still stuck in the Cold War mentality — it also is relatively unfounded. Over a conflict hardly worth the dialogue, the United States has greatly lost credibility in Latin America and the world, and has certainly slipped a bit from the moral high ground — being, of course, that liberal democracy is spiritual enlightenment institutionalized.
The grave miscalculation by the United States was that Chavez was a real threat. By supporting the coup, the Bush administration may have undermined the stability of democracies all over Latin America, which is a much greater threat to the United States than one renegade lefty in Venezuela could ever be.
Whether the U.S. government was strategically involved in the coup is unimportant. It is clear that the “wink n’ nod” approval was given, and this has let the world know where the Bush administration stands on the democracy debate.
Questions and comments can be sent to Mike Wolff at mudrat@unm.edu
