Why did democracy succeed in the U.S. and Canada, but not Latin America?

[Ignacio Upton]

(This post is not racist in any nature. I'm trying to look at historical differences between former English-speaking colonies and former Spanish-speaking colonies.)

The Western Hemisphere is filled mostly by former colonies of Britain and Spain. Both the U.S. and each Spanish-speaking country underwent costly wars of independence against oppressive colonial powers, and both the U.S. and Latin America have had racial polarization in their countries (Canada being the historical exception of both factors.) What I'm wondering, however, is how did the United States suceed in self-governing and sustaining democracy, while Latin America did not? (Note: while aspects of our government are not as democratic as we would like them to be, for its time in the 18th and early 19th century, the U.S. WAS the most liberal country on Earth)
While our founding fathers were able to unite the 13th colonies, Simon Bolivar, Bernardo O'Higgins, and Jose de San Martin all became dictators or fled the nations in which they founded (at least only briefly.) My theory is two-fold:

1. The 13 colonies, and the territories that became confederated into Canada had a history of self-governance. The British colonial policy of "salutary neglect" allowed for colonial legislatures to flourish, with colonial governors not quite as powerful as the Spanish viceroys that ruled their viceroyalities with an iron fist. America's distrust of big and oppressive government has prevented the public from accepting it, whereas Latin America had a history of being ruled in a more direct and centralized way by Spain.

2. Class structure. The class structure of Latin America, while racially-charged, was much more aristocratic than America's. Possibly only the antebellum south could compare to the mostly white landowners of Mexico or Venezuela. Incidently, many of the south's problems of the past are partly responsible for it having education and socioeconomic problems worse than the rest of the country. Latin America had a similar set of troubles.

3. Geographic isolation and ethnic differences. While geography certainly made the English-speaking peoples of the 13 colonies develop regional dialects, the landmass of the region wasn't as diverse or rugged as the landmass that the Spanish-speaking colonies were situated on. For example, one Viceroyality comprised of present-day Argentina, Boliva, Paraguay, and Uruguay. Columbia, Ecuador, and Venezuela were once part of "Gran Columbia," upon independence. Within these Viceroyalties, different Spanish0speaking cultures developed around the local Native Americans. The mestizos of Peru were different from the inhabitants of Costa Rica.

4. Foreign intervention took place in Latin American countries (particulary from the United States in the 20th Century.) Whereas, with the exception of the years before the War of 1812, the United States was strong enough to repel foreign meddling to the extent that Latin American had. (I added this factor after suggestions in the thread.)

[LeftCoast]

1. Are you actually saying there are no democracies in Latin America?

:wow:

[Ignacio Upton]

2. I'm not saying that

I'm saying that Latin America, a region with similar problems as the U.S., was not able to prosper and hold stability after independence. They have democracy today (with the exception of Casto in Cuba,) but this has only happened recently.

[LeftCoast]

4. Well, you might want to update your topic

And...any post that has to start with a disclaimer that you're not racist is probably something you don't want to post. I'm just sayin'.

[Ignacio Upton]

8. THe only reason why I posted that is because

Some people may respond by saying: "you don't think that Latin America can self-govern because they are brown people, and you're saying that only a white country can govern!" Which is not my claim. I've heard racists make that arguement before about Latin America, which is bullshit.

[niyad]

3. the catholic church?

[Ignacio Upton]

5. I was thinking of including that as a factor

but chose not to. There were state-established Churches in the U.S. (the Congregationalists were subsidized in Massachusetts, and the Anglicans/Episcopalians were subsidized in Virginia.) However, America was the only country to specifically write in its Constitution that no one church should be favored over the other (separation of church and state.) Perhaps I should incude this as a factor.

[niyad]

19. subsidized and ruling are two different things, as are the differences

between catholic empire-builders and others.

[robinlynne]

28. nope. at least now a days the catholic church tends to be very left wing.

They support and have supported workers movements, farm movements.
They actually do quite amazing work.
not true of the american christians who go down there though.

[mmonk]

52. If that were a factor,

Europe wouldn't have as many democracies. Also, Canada has more Catholics than Protestants.

[Dhampir Kampf]

6. Well, for one..

..the Latin Americans were 'mostly', I'm not saying 100%, but mostly natives. All of the colonies of the US were comprised of immigrants FROM their ruling nation.. While the natives of Mexico were being run by the Spanish.



So that could lead to what you mentioned, about the people being so used to being ruled by a totalitarian, foreign government. Thereby, they thought that being run by one of their own ethnicy, would be so much better.

[bainz]

7. Machismo? n/t

[EST]

9. Many of the democratic failures in south and central America

can be traced, in large part, to US intervention and oppression, or, more correctly, the interference by US gov't forces in service of big business.

[Dhampir Kampf]

10. I agree.

Banana Republics and all.

[Ignacio Upton]

12. It could have happened here too

And there were two or three "almost" incidents from 1781-1800 that could have caused it.

[Ignacio Upton]

11. Some of it has been through our intervention

Latin America's problems in the 20th Century were mostly our fault. But in the 19th Century, we are not to blame as much. Even without the Mexican War, Mexico was having problems with stable government and secession (besides Texas, the Yucatan peninsula also tried to break away and become its own country.) Why did some of the founding fathers of Latin America rule briefly as dictators (Bolivar even supported the idea of a hereditary Senate.)

[Solon]

25. For most of the 19th century, it was because of Europe's intervention...

mostly, also, the Mexican-American war and the secession of Texas was American Citizens if not the Federal Government's fault, the Mexican Government at the time simply didn't care about the American born squatters, and when they finally did care, the squatters fought a war to stay where they settled, in fact, you could have called them the "original" illegal immigrants.

[VelmaD]

56. The Texas settlers were generally legal immigrants...

who lived fairly happily under the Mexican constitution. Go read the Texas Declaration of Independence and some of the Mexican history of the time. Texas declared its independence because Santa Anna rescinded the constitution and tried to rule by fiat. Texas wasn't the only Mexican state that tried to declare independence over the whole thing...just the only one that succeeded.

[arcos]

51. Ever heard of William Walker?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Walker_%28soldier%29

[Ignacio Upton]

16. Support for many of the dicatorships were from the elites

Also, Argentia, which is a Latin American country that is mostly white (or with mestizos who only have small amounts of Native American blood.) has had a history of dictatorships, despite having a lifestyle just as good as parts of Western Europe.

[John Q. Citizen]

27. Not only US but European. n/t

[robinlynne]

30. I wou8ld say ALL of the democratic failoures, excepting only Peron.

[Ignacio Upton]

13. I should also add that many of the dictators and supporters were white

In the early days, whites and people with only small amounts of Native American blood ruled.

[RoyGBiv]

14. I reject the question ...

I reject the question as based on an invalid premise. You could ask this question in a far more reasonable way, such as why the economies of Latin America developed in radically different ways than the economies of the US and Canada, and you could tie this into a question about the more frequent tendency in Latin America for violent struggles between propertied and unpropertied classes and how this affected the various forms of government. You might also ask why more Latin American regions didn't unite in the same ways as the various regions and eventually states that formed the United States did.

Wholesale studies have been conducted attempting to address these questions. Ten years ago, this kind of question was one of the more popular subjects for PhD candidates in history and international relations.

In all the answers, regardless of focus, you will find a relationship between the development of the United States and Europe and the lower rate of development in Latin American nations.

[John Q. Citizen]

31. I think the premise of the question is false also. For one thing,

Latin America refers not to a political entity but to a region that has many diferent political entities.

Chile has a very long and proud tradition of democracy, for instance.

Guatemala, (with the help of the US) has remained almost a fuedel state into the first half of the 20th century. Both these countries have very seperate histories with the exception of the fact they were both Spanish colonies at one time.

To try to lump Latin America together is like trying to lump the US and Jamaica together. After all, we were both former British colonies, but the simularities kind of end there.

[RoyGBiv]

34. Exactly so ...

In reference to what I mentioned was a hot topic ten years ago with PhD candidates, programs attempting to implement studies in Latin American history, politics, and economics quickly found that the "academy" had been sorely ignorant and even biased in its treatment of Latin America as a subject of study. Smaller schools were attempting to put together Latin American history programs as a subset of their overall history degree program, for example, and they discovered the manner in which they had conceived such a thing was utterly inadequate. Latin America doesn't have "a" history. Latin America, as you imply, has multiple histories depending on the region, nation, or ethnic variety. A subject such as the study of the history of Brazil is every bit as complex as the history of the United States. To lump the history of Brazil under a blanket of "Latin American history" is of minimal utility to those seeking a greater understanding of the region.

[Amonester]

15. I look at it this way:

Real democracy is growing fast in many countries there ("catching up fast")...
Real democracy is almost gone away from the U.S. as it is TODAY.
DieBold + greedy fascists a la PNAC took over...

[Ignacio Upton]

17. I fear that what you are saying might be true

Democracy will only die in this country if people are complacent. I'm also glad that Latin America is becoming more stable, and freeing itself from the IMF. I'm glad that Argentina managed to pay off its debt and is no longer dependent on them.

[Amonester]

23. I truly wish the millions of real democrats in the U.S. will succeed

in their struggle to restore their real democracy as soon as possible. It takes courage and determination (and even some "little good luck from time to time") to do it in a non violent way.

I can't see how the obviously incompetent criminals at the top could stay there in the long term, though. DieBold or not, one day, a big majority of voters will want a "massive" CHANGE.

Be strong and determined and the good people will be back.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

18. US is a corporatocracy/fascist state

We have the pretense of democracy.

Our elections are a fraud.
The 3 branches of govt and the media have been hijacked.
Our national treasury has been emptied into the pockets of big corp.
CEOs pay themselves 1,000 times what their measly slaves get.
No one has a job for more than 3 years at a time, till they get thrown to the wolves/temp agencies.

What democracy?
When your vote doesn't count?
When you have an illegal war?
When your govt uses your tax dollars to pay the media to lie?

The US should NOT EVER hold itself up as an example for other countries.

If we are better off than others, our govt certainly abuses this power.

[NNN0LHI]

20. The School Of The Americas trained death squads didn't help

Our gunboat diplomacy worked for a long time in Latin America but I think even that is has outgrown its usefulness.

Don

[robinlynne]

21. You've got to be kidding!!!!!!!!

The United States is directly responsible financially, politically, and militarily for destroying the democracies in Latin America.

[willing dwarf]

24. That's the truth! Well said!

[EFerrari]

32. Yes, that was us. Is us. n/t

[willing dwarf]

22. History of colonized people & oppression has a price

Unless you have read the history of Latin America, you will happily blame the victims. The countries of Latin America had the misfortune of having real mineral wealth that has led to the complete raping of the land and oppression of the people. There were people who lived in balance with nature for thousands of years, who were then turned into slaves for the profit of the "Christian" colonizers. Forced to work like animals to provide gold and silver to their oppresors, they had no rights to own land. After the colonial period, the take over for the most part was not democratic but oligarchic. The few land owning families in these countries run everything. The many poor indigineous people until 50 years ago owned nothing, and had no influence at all.

The better question might be why did the colonies in the US & Canada not get raped and gutted in that same way? There's a long history involving banking, debt and capitalism that encouraged England to export people (they were capitalizing on the Spanish gold being pumped into their economy as a result of the Spanish national debt)and build up trade & industry in North America which resulted in a more egalitarian society and eventually democracy.

Of course these days, as the wealth goes into fewer hands, we are seeing the rise of the American oligarchy. Seems to me that democracy today is the thinnest shadow of what was conceived in the Consitution...of course even then it was only going to include white men...

[robinlynne]

26. I spent most of my life in latin america.

The democracies in latin america were thriving and quite beuatiful, thank-you, until the US went in and destroyed them one after another.
Please remember history:
Chile/ Allende
Brasil
on and on.

[John Q. Citizen]

33. We killed off and effectively imprisoned the indigeous population

here in the US.

In some Latin American countries there are majority populations of indigenous peoples still.

[efhmc]

29. The Magna Carta.

[bananas]

35. Just ask Smedley Butler

I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902–1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smedley_Butler

[Eric J in MN]

36. Is it a success to have corporate control of the government,

from corporate lobbyists in Washington to machines made by corporations which count the votes?

[bananas]

37. Here's a list of U.S. Interventions in Latin America

http://www.zompist.com/latam.html

U.S. Interventions in Latin America
Just thought you should know about this.
© 1996 by Mark Rosenfelder

Key:
Military incursions
Covert or indirect operations
! Other events of note



1846
The U.S., fulfilling the doctrine of Manifest Destiny, goes to war with Mexico and ends up with a third of Mexico's territory.
1850, 1853, 1854, 1857
U.S. interventions in Nicaragua.
1855
Tennessee adventurer William Walker and his mercenaries take over Nicaragua, institute forced labor, and legalize slavery.

"Los yankis... have burst their way like a fertilizing torrent through the barriers of barbarism." --N.Y. Daily News

He's ousted two years later by a Central American coalition largely inspired by Cornelius Vanderbilt, whose trade Walker was infringing.

"The enemies of American civilization-- for such are the enemies of slavery-- seem to be more on the alert than its friends." --William Walker

1856
First of five U.S. interventions in Panama to protect the Atlantic-Pacific railroad from Panamanian nationalists.
1898
U.S. declares war on Spain, blaming it for destruction of the Maine. (In 1976, a U.S. Navy commission will conclude that the explosion was probably an accident.) The war enables the U.S. to occupy Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines.
1903
The Platt Amendment inserted into the Cuban constitution grants the U.S. the right to intervene when it sees fit.
1903
When negotiations with Colombia break down, the U.S. sends ten warships to back a rebellion in Panama in order to acquire the land for the Panama Canal. The Frenchman Philippe Bunau-Varilla negotiates the Canal Treaty and writes Panama's constitution.
1904
U.S. sends customs agents to take over finances of the Dominican Republic to assure payment of its external debt.
1905
U.S. Marines help Mexican dictator Porfirio Díaz crush a strike in Sonora.
1905
U.S. troops land in Honduras for the first of 5 times in next 20 years.
1906
Marines occupy Cuba for two years in order to prevent a civil war.
1907
Marines intervene in Honduras to settle a war with Nicaragua.
1908
U.S. troops intervene in Panama for first of 4 times in next decade.
1909
Liberal President José Santos Zelaya of Nicaragua proposes that American mining and banana companies pay taxes; he has also appropriated church lands and legalized divorce, done business with European firms, and executed two Americans for participating in a rebellion. Forced to resign through U.S. pressure. The new president, Adolfo Díaz, is the former treasurer of an American mining company.
1910
U.S. Marines occupy Nicaragua to help support the Díaz regime.
1911
The Liberal regime of Miguel Dávila in Honduras has irked the State Department by being too friendly with Zelaya and by getting into debt with Britain. He is overthrown by former president Manuel Bonilla, aided by American banana tycoon Sam Zemurray and American mercenary Lee Christmas, who becomes commander-in-chief of the Honduran army.
1912
U.S. Marines intervene in Cuba to put down a rebellion of sugar workers.
1912
Nicaragua occupied again by the U.S., to shore up the inept Díaz government. An election is called to resolve the crisis: there are 4000 eligible voters, and one candidate, Díaz. The U.S. maintains troops and advisors in the country until 1925.
1914
U.S. bombs and then occupies Vera Cruz, in a conflict arising out of a dispute with Mexico's new government. President Victoriano Huerta resigns.
1915
U.S. Marines occupy Haiti to restore order, and establish a protectorate which lasts till 1934. The president of Haiti is barred from the U.S. Officers' Club in Port-au-Prince, because he is black.

"Think of it-- niggers speaking French!" --secretary of State William Jennings Bryan, briefed on the Haitian situation

1916
Marines occupy the Dominican Republic, staying till 1924.
! 1916
Pancho Villa, in the sole act of Latin American aggression against the U.S, raids the city of Columbus, New Mexico, killing 17 Americans.

"Am sure Villa's attacks are made in Germany." --James Gerard, U.S. ambassador to Berlin

1917
U.S. troops enter Mexico to pursue Pancho Villa. They can't catch him.
1917
Marines intervene again in Cuba, to guarantee sugar exports during WWI.
1918
U.S. Marines occupy Panamanian province of Chiriqui for two years to maintain public order.
1921
President Coolidge strongly suggests the overthrow of Guatemalan President Carlos Herrera, in the interests of United Fruit. The Guatemalans comply.
1925
U.S. Army troops occupy Panama City to break a rent strike and keep order.
1926
Marines, out of Nicaragua for less than a year, occupy the country again, to settle a volatile political situation. Secretary of State Kellogg describes a "Nicaraguan-Mexican-Soviet" conspiracy to inspire a "Mexican-Bolshevist hegemony" within striking distance of the Canal.

"That intervention is not now, never was, and never will be a set policy of the United States is one of the most important facts President-elect Hoover has made clear." --NYT, 1928

1929
U.S. establishes a military academy in Nicaragua to train a National Guard as the country's army. Similar forces are trained in Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

"There is no room for any outside influence other than ours in this region. We could not tolerate such a thing without incurring grave risks... Until now Central America has always understood that governments which we recognize and support stay in power, while those which we do not recognize and support fall. Nicaragua has become a test case. It is difficult to see how we can afford to be defeated." --Undersecretary of State Robert Olds

1930
Rafael Leonidas Trujillo emerges from the U.S.-trained National Guard to become dictator of the Dominican Republic.
1932
The U.S. rushes warships to El Salvador in response to a communist-led uprising. President Martínez, however, prefers to put down the rebellion with his own forces, killing over 8000 people (the rebels had killed about 100).
! 1933
President Roosevelt announces the Good Neighbor policy.
1933
Marines finally leave Nicaragua, unable to suppress the guerrilla warfare of General Augusto César Sandino. Anastasio Somoza García becomes the first Nicaraguan commander of the National Guard.

"The Nicaraguans are better fighters than the Haitians, being of Indian blood, and as warriors similar to the aborigines who resisted the advance of civilization in this country." --NYT correspondent Harold Denny

1933
Roosevelt sends warships to Cuba to intimidate Gerardo Machado y Morales, who is massacring the people to put down nationwide strikes and riots. Machado resigns. The first provisional government lasts only 17 days; the second Roosevelt finds too left-wing and refuses to recognize. A pro-Machado counter-coup is put down by Fulgencio Batista, who with Roosevelt's blessing becomes Cuba's new strongman.
! 1934
Platt Amendment repealed.
1934
Sandino assassinated by agents of Somoza, with U.S. approval. Somoza assumes the presidency of Nicaragua two years later. To block his ascent, Secretary of State Cordell Hull explains, would be to intervene in the internal affairs of Nicaragua.
! 1936
U.S. relinquishes rights to unilateral intervention in Panama.
1941
Ricardo Adolfo de la Guardia deposes Panamanian president Arias in a military coup-- first clearing it with the U.S. Ambassador.

It was "a great relief to us, because Arias had been very troublesome and very pro-Nazi." --Secretary of War Henry Stimson

1943
The editor of the Honduran opposition paper El Cronista is summoned to the U.S. embassy and told that criticism of the dictator Tiburcio Carías Andino is damaging to the war effort. Shortly afterward, the paper is shut down by the government.
1944
The dictator Maximiliano Hernández Martínez of El Salvador is ousted by a revolution; the interim government is overthrown five months later by the dictator's former chief of police. The U.S.'s immediate recognition of the new dictator does much to tarnish Roosevelt's Good Neighbor policy in the eyes of Latin Americans.
1946
U.S. Army School of the Americas opens in Panama as a hemisphere-wide military academy. Its linchpin is the doctrine of National Security, by which the chief threat to a nation is internal subversion; this will be the guiding principle behind dictatorships in Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, Central America, and elsewhere.
1948
José Figueres Ferrer wins a short civil war to become President of Costa Rica. Figueres is supported by the U.S., which has informed San José that its forces in the Panama Canal are ready to come to the capital to end "communist control" of Costa Rica.
1954
Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán, elected president of Guatemala, introduces land reform and seizes some idle lands of United Fruit-- proposing to pay for them the value United Fruit claimed on its tax returns. The CIA organizes a small force to overthrow him and begins training it in Honduras. When Arbenz naively asks for U.S. military help to meet this threat, he is refused; when he buys arms from Czechoslovakia it only proves he's a Red.

Guatemala is "openly and diligently toiling to create a Communist state in Central America... only two hours' bombing time from the Panama Canal." --Life

The CIA broadcasts reports detailing the imaginary advance of the "rebel army," and provides planes to strafe the capital. The army refuses to defend Arbenz, who resigns. The U.S.'s hand-picked dictator, Carlos Castillo Armas, outlaws political parties, reduces the franchise, and establishes the death penalty for strikers, as well as undoing Arbenz's land reform. Over 100,000 citizens are killed in the next 30 years of military rule.

"This is the first instance in history where a Communist government has been replaced by a free one." --Richard Nixon

1957
Eisenhower establishes Office of Public Safety to train Latin American police forces.
! 1959
Fidel Castro takes power in Cuba. Several months earlier he had undertaken a triumphal tour through the U.S., which included a CIA briefing on the Red menace.

"Castro's continued tawdry little melodrama of invasion." --Time, of Castro's warnings of an imminent U.S. invasion

1960
Eisenhower authorizes covert actions to get rid of Castro. Among other things, the CIA tries assassinating him with exploding cigars and poisoned milkshakes. Other covert actions against Cuba include burning sugar fields, blowing up boats in Cuban harbors, and sabotaging industrial equipment.
1960
The Canal Zone becomes the focus of U.S. counterinsurgency training.
1960
A new junta in El Salvador promises free elections; Eisenhower, fearing leftist tendencies, withholds recognition. A more attractive right-wing counter-coup comes along in three months.

"Governments of the civil-military type of El Salvador are the most effective in containing communist penetration in Latin America." --John F. Kennedy, after the coup

1960
Guatemalan officers attempt to overthrow the regime of Presidente Fuentes; Eisenhower stations warships and 2000 Marines offshore while Fuentes puts down the revolt.
1960s
U.S. Green Berets train Guatemalan army in counterinsurgency techniques. Guatemalan efforts against its insurgents include aerial bombing, scorched-earth assaults on towns suspected of aiding the rebels, and death squads, which killed 20,000 people between 1966 and 1976. U.S. Army Col. John Webber claims that it was at his instigation that "the technique of counter-terror had been implemented by the army."

"If it is necessary to turn the country into a cemetary in order to pacify it, I will not hesitate to do so." --President Carlos Arana Osorio

1961
U.S. organizes force of 1400 anti-Castro Cubans, ships it to the Bahía de los Cochinos. Castro's army routs it.
1961
CIA-backed coup overthrows elected Pres. J. M. Velasco Ibarra of Ecuador, who has been too friendly with Cuba.
1962
CIA engages in campaign in Brazil to keep João Goulart from achieving control of Congress.
1963
CIA-backed coup overthrows elected social democrat Juan Bosch in the Dominican Republic.
1963
A far-right-wing coup in Guatemala, apparently U.S.-supported, forestalls elections in which "extreme leftist" Juan José Arévalo was favored to win.

"It is difficult to develop stable and democratic government , because so many of the nation's Indians are illiterate and superstitious." --School textbook, 1964

1964
João Goulart of Brazil proposes agrarian reform, nationalization of oil. Ousted by U.S.-supported military coup.
! 1964
The free market in Nicaragua:

The Somoza family controls "about one-tenth of the cultivable land in Nicaragua, and just about everything else worth owning, the country's only airline, one television station, a newspaper, a cement plant, textile mill, several sugar refineries, half-a-dozen breweries and distilleries, and a Mercedes-Benz agency." --Life World Library

1965
A coup in the Dominican Republic attempts to restore Bosch's government. The U.S. invades and occupies the country to stop this "Communist rebellion," with the help of the dictators of Brazil, Paraguay, Honduras, and Nicaragua.

"Representative democracy cannot work in a country such as the Dominican Republic," Bosch declares later. Now why would he say that?

1966
U.S. sends arms, advisors, and Green Berets to Guatemala to implement a counterinsurgency campaign.

"To eliminate a few hundred guerrillas, the government killed perhaps 10,000 Guatemalan peasants." --State Dept. report on the program

1967
A team of Green Berets is sent to Bolivia to help find and assassinate Che Guevara.
1968
Gen. José Alberto Medrano, who is on the payroll of the CIA, organizes the ORDEN paramilitary force, considered the precursor of El Salvador's death squads.
! 1970
In this year (just as an example), U.S. investments in Latin America earn $1.3 billion; while new investments total $302 million.
1970
Salvador Allende Gossens elected in Chile. Suspends foreign loans, nationalizes foreign companies. For the phone system, pays ITT the company's minimized valuation for tax purposes. The CIA provides covert financial support for Allende's opponents, both during and after his election.
1972
U.S. stands by as military suspends an election in El Salvador in which centrist José Napoleón Duarte was favored to win. (Compare with the emphasis placed on the 1982 elections.)
1973
U.S.-supported military coup kills Allende and brings Augusto Pinochet Ugarte to power. Pinochet imprisons well over a hundred thousand Chileans (torture and rape are the usual methods of interrogation), terminates civil liberties, abolishes unions, extends the work week to 48 hours, and reverses Allende's land reforms.
1973
Military takes power in Uruguay, supported by U.S. The subsequent repression reportedly features the world's highest percentage of the population imprisoned for political reasons.
1974
Office of Public Safety is abolished when it is revealed that police are being taught torture techniques.
! 1976
Election of Jimmy Carter leads to a new emphasis on human rights in Central America. Carter cuts off aid to the Guatemalan military (or tries to; some slips through) and reduces aid to El Salvador.
! 1979
Ratification of the Panama Canal treaty which is to return the Canal to Panama by 1999.

"Once again, Uncle Sam put his tail between his legs and crept away rather than face trouble." --Ronald Reagan

1980
A right-wing junta takes over in El Salvador. U.S. begins massively supporting El Salvador, assisting the military in its fight against FMLN guerrillas. Death squads proliferate; Archbishop Romero is assassinated by right-wing terrorists; 35,000 civilians are killed in 1978-81. The rape and murder of four U.S. churchwomen results in the suspension of U.S. military aid for one month.
The U.S. demands that the junta undertake land reform. Within 3 years, however, the reform program is halted by the oligarchy.

"The Soviet Union underlies all the unrest that is going on." --Ronald Reagan

1980
U.S., seeking a stable base for its actions in El Salvador and Nicaragua, tells the Honduran military to clean up its act and hold elections. The U.S. starts pouring in $100 million of aid a year and basing the contras on Honduran territory.
Death squads are also active in Honduras, and the contras tend to act as a state within a state.
1981
The CIA steps in to organize the contras in Nicaragua, who started the previous year as a group of 60 ex-National Guardsmen; by 1985 there are about 12,000 of them. 46 of the 48 top military leaders are ex-Guardsmen. The U.S. also sets up an economic embargo of Nicaragua and pressures the IMF and the World Bank to limit or halt loans to Nicaragua.
1981
Gen. Torrijos of Panama is killed in a plane crash. There is a suspicion of CIA involvement, due to Torrijos' nationalism and friendly relations with Cuba.
1982
A coup brings Gen. Efraín Ríos Montt to power in Guatemala, and gives the Reagan administration the opportunity to increase military aid. Ríos Montt's evangelical beliefs do not prevent him from accelerating the counterinsurgency campaign.
1983
Another coup in Guatemala replaces Ríos Montt. The new President, Oscar Mejía Víctores, was trained by the U.S. and seems to have cleared his coup beforehand with U.S. authorities.
1983
U.S. troops take over tiny Granada. Rather oddly, it intervenes shortly after a coup has overthrown the previous, socialist leader. One of the justifications for the action is the building of a new airport with Cuban help, which Granada claimed was for tourism and Reagan argued was for Soviet use. Later the U.S. announces plans to finish the airport... to develop tourism.
1983
Boland Amendment prohibits CIA and Defense Dept. from spending money to overthrow the government of Nicaragua-- a law the Reagan administration cheerfully violates.
1984
CIA mines three Nicaraguan harbors. Nicaragua takes this action to the World Court, which brings an $18 billion judgment against the U.S. The U.S. refuses to recognize the Court's jurisdiction in the case.
1984
U.S. spends $10 million to orchestrate elections in El Salvador-- something of a farce, since left-wing parties are under heavy repression, and the military has already declared that it will not answer to the elected president.
1989
U.S. invades Panama to dislodge CIA boy gone wrong Manuel Noriega, an event which marks the evolution of the U.S.'s favorite excuse from Communism to drugs.
1996
The U.S. battles global Communism by extending most-favored-nation trading status for China, and tightening the trade embargo on Castro's Cuba.

Where to go for more info

* Black, George. The Good Neighbor. Pantheon Books, New York: 1988. Highly recommended. An often amusing history of U.S. attitudes toward its southern neighbors.
* Burns, E. Bradford. Latin America: A concise interpretive history. 4th ed. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs: 1986. Not only what the U.S. does to Latin America, but what Europe and the Latin Americans do to Latin America.
* Chomsky, Noam. Year 501: The Conquest Continues. South End Press, Boston: 1993. Packed with documentation.
* Galeano, Eduardo. Century of the Wind and Faces & Masks. Pantheon Books, New York: 1988. (Originally published as Memoria del fuego II, III: El siglo del viento, Las caras y las mascaras.) Vignettes from history, from a master Latin American novelist. As history, take it with a grain of salt.
* Gleijeses, Piero. Shattered Hope: The Guatemalan Revolution and the United States, 1944-1954. Princeton, Princeton NJ: 1991. The definitive study of the Arévalo/Arbenz administrations and the U.S. coup.
* Kwitny, Jonathan. Endless Enemies: The Making of an Unfriendly World. Congdon & Weed, New York: 1984. By a former Wall Street Journal reporter.

[Peace Patriot]

49. Thank you, Bananas, for this simply awesome list!

I was trying to find a bit of hope in this tragic story--between the lines. JFK did NOT support the invasion of Cuba--and may well have been assassinated because of that (also possibly because of his executive order withdrawing US military "advisers" from Vietnam--or from a combination of these and other affronts to the war profiteers). His brother, RFK, was definitely moving in a more enlightened direction on Latin American policy (probably influenced by the US Catholic leftist movement). Also assassinated (likely more because of his anti-Vietnam war campaign for president--he would have won).

And, in the 1980s, Congress voted to forbid a war against Nicaragua--a law that Reagan violated (and should have been impeached for*) with the infamous "Iran-Contra" death squads. Positive: definite raising of the nation's consciousness about intervention in Latin America during that period. Negative: although some Reaganites were prosecuted and punished, they lived to ride again (alas).

*(--the first major crumbling of the Democratic Party leadership--the failure to impeach Reagan; the other was Reagan's re-write of the tax code to favor the rich.)

Also, the CIA assassination of Salvador Allende in Chile led to the end of the policy of CIA assassinations of foreign leaders (until the Bush junta came along).

The remarkable leftist/democracy movement that is sweeping Latin America today may in part be attributed to the consciousness-raising in the US about past US intervention, and a change of policy under Carter (a rather big change in the culture of the CIA--which Bush is trying to reverse). Most of the heinous, US-backed dictatorships have been overthrown--and we now have truly democratic, leftist governments in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay, Venezuela and Bolivia--and soon Peru (and maybe in Mexico as well). Virtually the entire map of South America has turned "blue" over the last several years. And these governments are determined to throw off US economic imperialism, and are cooperating to do so. (Venezuela, for instance, bought up a third of Argentina's IMF debt, to help them get out of hock and to foster programs that help the poor.)

In Chile, they just elected their first woman president, socialist Michele Batchelet, who was tortured by the US-backed dictator Pinochet.

In Peru, they just elected their first indigenous Indian as president, Evo Morales, who campaigned with a wreath of coca leaves around his neck (sacred plant in the Andes), and opposes the murderous US "war on drugs." Next door in Peru, another indigenous, Ollanta Humala, is ahead in the polls.

The leftists in this country who fought so hard, against such great odds, in the 1970s and 1980s, to end the US assassinations and death squad activity in Latin America should be very proud of this result. I know people who were involved in those public education efforts--many US Catholics, as a matter of fact.

But that's only part of the story (the US leftist movement). The other part is the poor, the brown and the black, and the indigenous of Latin America--and their unstinting bravery, and resistance, and hard, hard, hard organizational and community work over a long period of time, and their unkillable desire for justice, peace and democracy.

They have also been assisted by the OAS, EU election monitoring groups and the Carter Center in achieving TRANSPARENT elections. (US voters, take note!)

---------

"The time of the people has come." --Evo Morales

[EST]

58. Not to hijack the thread, but I was under the impression that

JFK's biggest sin (in bringing on his assassination) was his intention of calling off the intervention in VietNam. If you would like to pm me a link or reference where I might follow up on your info, I'd sure appreciate it. Thanks!

[Peace Patriot]

60. Sorry, EST, I don't have the cites any more. I read about it a long time

ago. I remember seeing a secret Executive Order signed by JFK withdrawing US military 'advisers' from Vietnam shortly before he was killed. I can't recall how the author got hold of it (possibly a declassification). One of LBJ's first acts in office was to rescind this JFK order, and he immediately started escalating the war in Vietnam. More well-known is that JFK refused to back the CIA invasion of Cuba. The expatriate Cuban fascist elite in Florida, who fled there from Castro, has long been believed by many JFK theorists to have had a part in his assassination. JFK also strongly opposed other dreadful anti-Castro CIA schemes (such as blowing up a commercial airplane and blaming it on Castro's Cuba).

All in all, Vietnam and Cuba provide a lot of motive for war profiteers to kill JFK--and also his brother, five years later.

And when you realize that Martin Luther King was likely killed for the same reason (he had recently come out publicly against the Vietnam War, against the advice of cautious and/or war profiteer Democrats), the war profiteer motive for these three dreadful murders in the space of five years (1963-1968--the very years of the biggest Vietnam war escalations) becomes compelling.

------

I imagine a Google search for "JFK Executive Order Vietnam" will bear fruit.

[EST]

61. You're right.

I was having a brief senior moment.

[tomp]

38. well, maybe it succeeded in canada.

frankly, i think it has failed here, but that's just my humble opinion.

but i think the real answer to your question is: u.s. imperialism.

[davekriss]

39. Why? Brutal, persistent imperialism, of course

All of what you say applies, Ignacio, but I'd like to expand upon item 4 in your OP. In the words of Major General Smedley Butler, USMC (available here).

I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902–1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested.

Of course, over the years, the USG has refined how it grinds down populist expressions of social justice, equality, and democracy, this from Steve Kangas, available here, written in the mid-nineties before Steve was Wellstoned:

CIA operations follow the same recurring script. First, American business interests abroad are threatened by a popular or democratically elected leader. The people support their leader because he intends to conduct land reform, strengthen unions, redistribute wealth, nationalize foreign-owned industry, and regulate business to protect workers, consumers and the environment. So, on behalf of American business, and often with their help, the CIA mobilizes the opposition. First it identifies right-wing groups within the country (usually the military), and offers them a deal: "We'll put you in power if you maintain a favorable business climate for us." The Agency then hires, trains and works with them to overthrow the existing government (usually a democracy). It uses every trick in the book: propaganda, stuffed ballot boxes, purchased elections, extortion, blackmail, sexual intrigue, false stories about opponents in the local media, infiltration and disruption of opposing political parties, kidnapping, beating, torture, intimidation, economic sabotage, death squads and even assassination. These efforts culminate in a military coup, which installs a right-wing dictator. The CIA trains the dictator’s security apparatus to crack down on the traditional enemies of big business, using interrogation, torture and murder. The victims are said to be "communists," but almost always they are just peasants, liberals, moderates, labor union leaders, political opponents and advocates of free speech and democracy. Widespread human rights abuses follow.

This scenario has been repeated so many times that the CIA actually teaches it in a special school, the notorious "School of the Americas." (It opened in Panama but later moved to Fort Benning, Georgia.) Critics have nicknamed it the "School of the Dictators" and "School of the Assassins." Here, the CIA trains Latin American military officers how to conduct coups, including the use of interrogation, torture and murder.

The Association for Responsible Dissent estimates that by 1987, 6 million people had died as a result of CIA covert operations. Former State Department official William Blum correctly calls this an "American Holocaust."

The CIA justifies these actions as part of its war against communism. But most coups do not involve a communist threat. Unlucky nations are targeted for a wide variety of reasons: not only threats to American business interests abroad, but also liberal or even moderate social reforms, political instability, the unwillingness of a leader to carry out Washington’s dictates, and declarations of neutrality in the Cold War. Indeed, nothing has infuriated CIA Directors quite like a nation’s desire to stay out of the Cold War.

USG foreign policy, even in Smedley's time, is in major part about punishing those that show signs of opting out of neo-liberal arrangements that benefit the capitalist class (this the legacy of Nitze, Kennan, et alia). We don't invade Panama, escort a leader out of Haiti at gunpoint, mine the harbors of Nicaragua, or march into Baghdad because anyone in the know perceives them, in themselves, to be a geniune threat. It's all about crushing the example of alternate models. The capitalist says Greed is Good in one breath and whispers apathy is better in the next -- all the more easy to exploit those when they have no hope for a better future! We've spent the last 50 years crushing hope to extort behaviors conducive to preserving US elite advantage.

The US has about 50% of the world’s wealth but only 6.3% of its population. In this situation we cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national security. To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and day-dreaming, and our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives.

We need not deceive ourselves that we can afford the luxury of altruism and world benefaction. We should cease talks about such vague and unreal objectives as human rights and raising of living standards and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better.
-- George Kennan, PPS 23, 1948

The Bush Regime takes Kennan's old advice to heart -- Bush dispenses with all sentimentality and daydreaming and adopts straight power concepts in his dealings with the rest of the world. Why, the USG even drops use of proxy and now torture to terrorize and defeat democratic aspirations in local populations the world over. After all, for what other purpose does our State torture?

This, from Orlando Tizon, "Torture: State Terror vs. Democracy", 2002 (available here):

Modern torture is designed to destroy the personality of the individual and by extension the community. Ultimately, it is a strategy designed to defeat democratic aspirations at the root, which makes it a tool of choice for unpopular regimes around the world.

<snip>

Torture as practiced today is primarily for the purpose of maintaining unpopular governments in power. "We therefore refer to torture as an instrument of power. Our research has shown that the torturers who work for governments try to break down the victims' identity, and this affects the family and the society as well." Thus the main purpose of torture is not to extract a confession but to break the individual's humanity and make an example of the victim before the community and thereby suppress all political opposition. Torture is the ultimate weapon for terrorizing and controlling the individual human being and the community. When members of a community are made powerless and lose trust in themselves and in one another, building a democratic community is rendered extremely difficult and complex. Torture then is an instrument to destroy democratic aspirations and actions, as history has clearly shown.

Bottom line: With neighbhors like us, no wonder democracy has had a rocky road in this hemisphere!

[radwriter0555]

40. What makes you think democracy is a success in the USA? the 2000 + 2004

'elections' were stolen and there is an illegitimate, war mongering, criminal regime in control of the USA.

I'd hardly call that a success.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

41. When's the last time the U. S. was a Democracy?....

...It's not even close to one now.

[RagingInMiami]

42. The class system

The main difference between us and Latin America is that our forefathers killed the Indians or forced them into reservations.

In Latin America, the Spanish and the Portugese to some extent, intermarried and interbred with the Indegenious people. So the ensuing generations that remained mostly Indegenious in their bloodline, remained in their role as the lower peasant class, and the ensuing generations that remained mostly European in their bloodline, continued their reign as the ruling class.

So you ended up with generation after generation of a ruling class and a peasant class.

In the U.S., after we killed off all the Indians or forced them into reservations, we became a "melting pot" where people were allowed to start a new life, regardless of what their role had been in Europe.

But we do have a version of the historical class system between Whites and Blacks, which hopefully, one day, we will overcome.

[Ignacio Upton]

43. I've always wondered why the situation with blacks

never got as bad as the situation did between white landowners in Latin America, and the mestizo poor?

[RagingInMiami]

44. Well, that depends on who you ask

The situation between Blacks and Whites in this country was horrible. Blacks were lynched, raped, falsely arrested and forced into ghettos. Things may have improved, but it's still far from being perfect. Katrina was a perfect example of that.

[Solon]

46. Actually, it did soon after the Civil War...

Up until today, actually. Sharecropping in the south was actually quite horrible for blacks, but also, one thing to make clear, blacks are a minority, and hence, couldn't do all the lower class work, so poor whites worked many of the same jobs as poor blacks. Unlike in many Latin American countries, the United States never really had a HUGE pool of permanent underclass outside of black slaves, for much of its history. We had indentured servants, mostly from Scotland or Ireland, along with many other immigrants, like the Chinese and Mexicans that took up those positions, at least temporarily. Our underclass cannot be easily recognizable, at least in the past, because while blacks have always been an underclass they were not the only one, whether it was people of European descent, or from Latin America, or the Far East, they had the capability, at least in some places in the country, of becoming landowners along with being sharecroppers and laborers.

We don't, at least today, emphasize "good" bloodlines versus "bad" bloodlines, most immigrants who came here were from the so called "bad" bloodlines in their nations, so they abandoned that idea pretty quickly when they realized it didn't really apply here. Americans do not, as a general rule, emphasize the past achievements of ancestors as being anything that should apply directly to them, we don't see descendants of George Washington claiming the "right" to be president. While we do have dynasties of sorts, the Kennedies, Bushes, and Rockefellers, unlike in nations with recognized nobility, we usually allow these people into power on their own merits, assuming they don't steal elections, of course.

[Ignacio Upton]

47. Thank you for your post

It makes more sense regarding the nature of an underclass.

[McCamy Taylor]

45. Brazil and Mexico sort of blow your theory to hell. They just dont annex

all the little countries around them like the US because they are not imperialist swine like we are, so there are lots of little independent South American states.

Get a clue.

The world's best democracy right now is India.

The US is basically the Roman Empire redux. We are happy because we are glutted on wealth which we bleed from poor weaker countries around the world.

PS Mexico became a secular state free from the control of priests long long ago. Meanwhile, the religious right is still calling the shots here.

[Squeech]

48. Problem

Most basic problem is, too many variables. Democracy "succeeds" in some countries at certain times. Right now it's arguably doing better south of the equator than it is here.

To the extent that the premise holds merit, I would say there's something to the idea that we have a constitution that rejects the concept of aristocracy and attempts to assure one (hu)man, one vote. Without that a democracy is on shaky ground; excluded classes don't feel like stakeholders and don't have any reason to temper their demands in the name of a soi-disant common good that they're not part of.

But I think you could argue that the real reason is money. We had a large, well established middle class much earlier in our development than any other polity in this hemisphere. (Brazil is just developing theirs right now; that's why they're the new world's entry in the BRIC bloc.) I think it's no accident that the Republican undermining of democracy coincides with the squeezing of the middle class. (American Marxists used to say that their goal was to educate the bourgeoisie in the reality of economic class conscionsness, in order to bring on the revolution. Turns out the Repukes were much better at it, which is why they're calling the shots in the real revolution. :scared: )

Trying to take a longer view here too. I think we tend to assume that the current assault on democracy is completely unprecedented, and it occurs to me that that may be wrong. I just thought of the Rutherford B. Hayes selection, and I wonder whether that had anything to do with the power of the trusts, the corporate assault on workers' rights, the insertion of corporate personhood into that Texas railroad court decision, etc. To be nasty, brutish and short about it (not to overlook solitary and poor), my own cynical view is that oligarchy and despotism are more likely the natural state of human society, and democracy thrives only under unusual conditions of economic equality and civic tolerance, which since we grew up with it we didn't recognize as unusual.

[Peace Patriot]

50. I just want to comment that, although the US was certainly founded by

landed white males, and tolerated slavery in the South for its first 85 years, the US has, over its 200+ year history, undergone remarkable democratization, if you look at the overall picture. Blacks and Native Americans (by far the roughest history), Jews, Catholics, the Irish and all the dregs of Europe, scads of Latin Americans, Chinese, Japanese, women, gays, and workers in general, have all waged struggles for equality and full citizenship, and have mostly succeeded.

This is the amazing multicultural society--unique on this earth--that the Bush junta is trying to destroy. But they are low-minded pigs, and will certainly fail. They have to rig elections in order to "win." Few Americans are with them, really--just the same minority of bigots we've always had to deal with. They are losers in history's inexorable enlightened, progressive march. (They also seem to be trying to destroy capitalism--with their unbounded greed--and they might succeed in that.)

If you look at history as a series of static pictures, yes, you could say that democracy and egalitarianism are rare. But we are living at THIS end of historical development. History is an organic revelation of themes that we are the inheritors of. We can't forget Hitler. We can't forget the French Revolution. We can't forget corsets and chastity belts. We can't forget witchburnings and the Inquisition. We can't forget woman not being able to vote. We can't forget slavery! We can't forget "No Irish need apply." We can't forget the exclusion of Jews, and blacks and women from social clubs. We can't forget the slaughter of the Indians.

Bigots would LIKE us to forget these things--but we can't, and we don't.

Back in the 5th century AD, the 'christian' bigots DID nearly wipe out human knowledge, when they burned the Alexandria Library. But we have no such concentration of knowledge today. Knowledge is available all over the place, in numerous formats. It cannot be "burned" and nearly annihilated any more--except perhaps by some horrid catastrophe (nuclear war? a meteor hitting the earth?).

History is WITH us. You may say that history is poorly taught, and a lot of people (Americans) don't know much history. And we certainly see an effort by powermongers like the Bush junta and its rightwing billionaire-supported 'think tanks' to create a sort of enforced stupidity--and to erase parts of history. But the knowledge survives and is rekindled. And people GET knowledge in interesting ways, even in oppressive circumstances. I was raised in rightwing Catholic schools and learned history as "the story of the Church"--an almost wholly fabricated tale, with not a word about democracy in it--a story that I soon began to criticize and suspect in my own mind.

I have great faith in human curiosity, and creativity, and in the inherent NEED of the human mind to be free. The human brain is built to be free. Oppression and tyranny are the artificial things. That IS the story of history.

I think that both 'christian' and Islamic fundamentalism--both with only a small minority of adherents, really--have us all a bit worried. But I think that, in so far as these ideas are genuinely held (and not just stoked up by powermongers, for political purposes), they are an emotional reaction to the vast and swift alteration of our environment over the last hundred years: the very big decline of natural resources; pollution; industrialization; huge expansion of communications; and mind-boggling social change. They are a REACTION--a crisis of identity among the few who can't evolve--but they are small, retarded eddies in a mighty river of progressive change that has swept over the world, and which has been accompanied by a grave environmental crisis, and a certain amount of consequent panic among the super-rich (how will they stay super-rich amidst quickly dwindling resources?), and among the vulnerable minds of the few who tend toward "Armageddon" scenarios (in which only they will be "saved").

The hysteria of the rich, and of psychic projections of the religious nuts, could affect us all, I suppose--and simply send the human race off the cliff. That's the fear, anyway. But when you look at humanity as a whole, right now--what you see is about 90% of the world's population yearning for peace and justice, and working very hard toward democratic ways to achieve them. You also see a REJECTION of violence, generally--and the new empowerment of vast populations, all across Latin America, in large parts of Asia, in fits and starts in Africa, and in many parts of the former Soviet Union.

The TREND is toward democracy and equality (as represented by the culture of the United States, if not by US foreign policy) and toward socialism, or a combined socialist/capitalist model (a la Europe). And in some places, there are added components of a progressive/democratic trend that we don't have--such as the huge campesino/peasant movement in Latin America and parts of Asia (family farms, small business, land reform, food self-sufficiency, traditional organic agriculture).

I once again want to stress human MEMORY of history--something that is very much at work in Latin America, right now, for instance, but it's also at work HERE: the memory of our first revolution and its firebrand liberal documents, the memory of the great labor movements of the 1930s-1950s, the memory of the 1960s civil rights and antiwar movements. These latter events are LIVING memories, and all is being rekindled--because these panicked oligarchs and fascists are trying to rob us of those great advancements in human freedom and democracy.

Once you have fixed the idea of a certain advance in freedom in the historical record--say, women's right to vote--you cannot take away that right, except temporarily by bludgeon power, because you cannot undo that memory. The same may be said of the freeing of the slaves in the US. It is a done deal. And whenever some new form of slavery is invented--say, the indentured slaves in sweatshops in Saipan, or poverty and slave wages here--the past history of slavery comes into play again, as the ikon of what we must never again repeat.

The ACCUMULATION of memories of these triumphs over "oligarchy and despotism" is making all the forms of "oligarchy and despotism" less tolerable and less feasible. We now have corporate despotism, which is just being recognized, in this country, for what it is. (Latin America is way ahead of us on this.) We will probably overthrow it (if they don't kill the planet first). Or we may slide further into corporate medievalism here--for a time, anyway--while the rest of the world progresses past it. (They do have their teeth and talons into us, in the United States, with particular viciousness--so it may take a while here.)

Anyway, that's what I see--a dynamic of accumulated history and memory and inherent human determination--based on the capacity of the human brain--toward throwing off shackles and rebelling against every form of tyranny. Freedom, progress, equality have accumulative power that cannot be put into reverse, except by brute force, and then, only temporarily.

[mmonk]

53. Democracy in the US?

[malaise]

54. British and US imperialism

aided by an imported ruling class who willingly did their bidding.

[dusty64]

55. It seems to me that

elections are fairer and more free in Latin America than here. To me it ironically seems that democracy is much more alive south of our border than it is here.

[Odin2005]

57. 2 reasons:

Culture and western intervention

[Zomby Woof]

59. I am waiting for democracy to succeed in the U.S.

Fascism and authoritarianism have done quite well though.