> Los Angeles Times
> May 29, 2001 Tuesday Home Edition
> In Latin Economies, a Sinking Feeling
> BYLINE: CHRIS KRAUL, TIMES STAFF WRITER
>
> * Brazil has a full-blown energy crisis on its hands and will begin
> rationing electricity June 1 in a bid to cut consumption by 20% over
> the next six months. The rationing won't bother just consumers. It
> will hurt industrial output to the point Brazil will lose 1
> percentage point of its growth this year, economist Porzecanski said.
I was chatting with this dude from Brazil in town for this theory shindig, in one of Jameson's seminars, he said the situation in Brazil is very similar to California -- the providers were all privatized to hell and beyond, and now things are so bad, customers are being told to cut their usage 20%, or face three day blackouts. He was very optimistic about the PT's chances in 2002, though, saying the Right has a serious lack of contenders for the Presidency. We chatted about the potential of a debtor's cartel throughout Latin America, and I said at one point (I'll admit, with a McGoohanesque gleam in the eye), the one good thing about NAFTA is that US capital can't afford to put a trade embargo on Mexico, the way the Empire did to Cuba or Nicaragua: GM, VW and Ford would go bankrupt overnight, due to their supply chains and investments in the maquilas, so there's actually more space there for a campaign against foreign debt than one might think. He laughed and said, Brazil plus Mexico plus Argentina would have the economic muscle for a regional cartel, the question is what do you put into place instead of the current neoliberal madness.
-- Dennis