Is 30 years ago short-term or long-term memory?-- either way, remember the truckers strike against Allende? If you don't that doesn't mean it didn't happen and it doesn't make that action any less reactionary.
This strike is exactly that, reactionary. As always the big deal is property and profit and those who own the former will do anything to protect the latter.
And one more thing, Venezuela borders on..... Colombia, home to one pipeline constantly attacked by leftist guerrillas, and planned home for a second more extensive pipeline.
So the attempted overthrow of Chavez is part of the pincer move to crush the Colombian insurgency.
David Schanoes
----- Original Message ----- From: "Yoshie Furuhashi" <furuhashi.1 at osu.edu> To: <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com> Sent: Saturday, December 28, 2002 5:11 PM Subject: Re: Brazil Sends Gasoline at Venezuelan's Request
> >Cue to Nathan to tell us how this is strike-breaking.
> >
> >Doug
>
> ***** This article can be found on the web at
> http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030113&s=ellner
>
> Venezuela on the Brink
> by STEVE ELLNER
> [from the January 13, 2003 issue]
> Caracas
>
> ...While the success of the strike call has been at best mixed in
> commerce, public education, public transportation and the steel and
> aluminum industries, a large majority of administrative employees and
> executives of the all-important state petroleum company PDVSA (the
> fourth-largest US oil supplier and owner of Citgo) responded
> positively, as did many in charge of fuel transportation. When delays
> in gasoline distribution produced three-hour lines at the pumps on
> December 18, the government decreed that private trucks carrying fuel
> and food could be taken over and run for the duration of the
> conflict. Carlos Fernández, president of the main business
> organization Fedecámaras, called the measure a "violation of property
> rights." A point of honor of the pro-Chávez movement is 100 percent
> state ownership of PDVSA, incorporated into the nation's new
> Constitution in 1999.
>
> The opposition's militancy dates back not to 1998, when Chávez was
> elected president, but to 2001, when he radicalized his government by
> prioritizing economic and social reform. In November of that year he
> passed agrarian reform and legislation prohibiting private control of
> joint ventures for oil exploitation. Fedecámaras reacted by calling a
> one-day general strike. The business organization was joined by the
> main labor federation, the Confederation of Venezuelan Workers (CTV),
> whose leadership Chávez refused to recognize on the grounds that it
> had held fraudulent internal elections. Since then the CTV and
> Fedecámaras have called three more general strikes, including the one
> in April that led to the abortive military coup.
>
> One unique feature of the general strike that began on December 2 is
> the absence of any demand other than the removal of President Chávez,
> either by resignation or immediate elections. All rhetoric is reduced
> to one simple message: Chávez must go. Recently, CTV president Carlos
> Ortega began calling Chávez "the dictator." Every evening Ortega and
> Fernández sit next to each other and read a statement summing up the
> day's strike activity, which is broadcast live on the nation's four
> major TV channels....
>
> Chávez has offered to hold a recall election in August, in accordance
> with the 1999 Constitution. But opposition leaders are unwilling to
> wait, claiming that by August, Chávez will have further consolidated
> his control of the armed forces by favoring his military loyalists
> with promotions. According to government supporters, the real reason
> is that the opposition wants Chávez out by January 1, the date of
> Lula's presidential inauguration in Brazil, which, along with the
> recent election of leftist Lucio Gutiérrez in Ecuador, fortifies
> Chávez's position. Both Lula and Chávez place antineoliberalism at
> the top of their agenda rather than promoting such radical visions as
> socialism, an approach now shared by many leftists throughout the
> continent. The two favor a government that plays a strong role in the
> economy in favor of economic development and social justice rather
> than bowing out to the private sector.
>
> These explanations are just part of the story. A more decisive factor
> is the built-in vulnerability of the opposition. A political
> opposition based exclusively on attacking the head of state without
> presenting demands, proposals or alternatives tends to lose steam
> over time. The political parties of the opposition were discredited
> by the rampant corruption and economic contraction of the twenty
> years before Chávez's election. Now the media, Fedecámaras and the
> CTV have displaced them as key actors, a role that is unnatural and
> discredits them as time goes on. The CTV's alliance with the business
> sector is widely criticized even by those opposed to Chávez....
> *****
> --
> Yoshie
>
> * Calendar of Events in Columbus:
> <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/calendar.html>
> * Anti-War Activist Resources:
<http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/activist.html>
> * Student International Forum: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/>
> * Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/>