John McCain goes to Colombia and Mexico! The REAL reason!

[Joanne98]

Free Trade with Colombia: McCain’s Misguided Campaign

Last Tuesday, John McCain announced he will visit Colombia next week, where he is scheduled to meet with various government officials, including President Alvaro Uribe. McCain will use the visit to showcase his conservative policy agenda toward Latin America. One issue sure to be discussed is McCain’s support for the proposed free trade agreement between the two nations, which will give a good indication of how he will shape his policy to the region. Ultimately, the Republican nominee wants the U.S. Congress to ratify the trade deal as a reward for Colombia’s progress in fighting the illegal flow of drugs within its borders. McCain’s hope is to strengthen Colombia’s position as Washington’s major regional ally, which is logical given the harshly conservative leanings of the Uribe Administration.
McCain’s foreign policy in Latin America is seen as misguided, and sends the wrong message to the region. Overall, his approach almost duplicates the Bush Administration’s hemispheric policy, which is seen around the world as being deeply flawed. The Arizona Senator’s tenure as the chairman of the International Republican Institute (IRI) gives a good indication of how he will approach Latin America, if elected. The IRI, under McCain’s leadership, has a long history of undermining various legitimately elected governments in the region, beginning with the Reagan Presidency. Despite their commitment to ‘democratic initiatives’, the IRI backed decidedly undemocratic groups in order to advance US interests in the region. Fittingly, McCain has frequently referred to Hugo Chávez as a dictator, an opinion that has no basis in fact given Chávez’s popular election. McCain’s stance on Chávez makes it clear that he will do whatever is possible to contest the legitimacy of the various left-leaning, democratically elected governments in Latin America. Moreover, McCain’s support for the Colombia Trade Promotion Act (CTPA) demonstrates how he will continue to rely on the failed policies of his IRI days. The CTPA, then, is a not so subtle method of bolstering Colombia’s position as a regional power to challenge the influence of Chávez and other leftist leaders. In the end, McCain’s support for the CTPA tends considerably toward the erroneous policies of the IRI, which used whatever means necessary to destabilize legitimate governments. In this case, McCain’s support of the CTPA is myopic and fails to recognize obvious problems with the trade deal. The proposed trade agreement with Colombia is yet another example of opportunistic and self-serving U.S. policy in the region.
http://octavioislas.wordpress.com/2008/06/30/1324-coha-report-free-trade-with-colombia-mccain%E2%80%99s-misguided-campaign/

McCain and the International Republican Institute
By NIKOLAS KOZLOFF

Though Arizona Senator John McCain seldom talks about it, he has gotten much of his foreign policy experience working with a cloak and dagger operation called the International Republican Institute (IRI). Since 1993, McCain has served as Chair of the outfit, which is funded by the U.S. government and private money. The group, which receives tens of millions of taxpayer dollars each year, claims to promote democracy world-wide. On the surface at least, IRI seems to have a rather innocuous agenda including party building, media training, the organization of leadership trainings, dissemination of newsletters, and strengthening of civil society.

McCain, IRI and Chevron
Though George Bush has scoffed at suggestions that the invasion of Iraq had anything to do with oil, recent press reports give some credence to such claims. In April, Chevron announced that it was involved in discussions with the Iraqi Oil Ministry to increase production in an important oil field in southern Iraq. The discussions were aimed at finalizing a two-year deal, or technical support agreement, to boost production at the West Qurna Stage 1 oil field near Basra, Iraq's second-largest city.

It turns out that Chevron, like Blackwater, has donated to McCain’s IRI. What’s more, since McCain solidified his position as the GOP’s nominee, Chevron Chairman David O'Reilly gave $28,500 to the GOP. Meanwhile lobbyist Wayne Berman, McCain’s National Finance Co-Chairman, counts Chevron as one of his principal clients.
According to Progressive Media USA, a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit, the Arizona Senator has benefited handily from Big Oil. McCain has taken in at least $700,000 from the oil and gas industry since 1989. In Congress, the Arizona senator has worked tirelessly to advance the interests of the oil industry. For example, McCain’s tax plan gives the top five oil companies $3.8 billion a year in tax breaks. McCain meanwhile has voted against reducing dependence on foreign oil, has twice rejected windfall profits tax for Big Oil, and has voted against taxing oil companies to provide a $100 rebate to consumers.
http://www.counterpunch.org/kozloff06092008.html

THE MEXICAN ELECTION!!!!!!!!

There is every reason to assume that the military mobilization in Mexico City had been endorsed by the Bush White House. Despite its concerns in the Middle East, the US government has not forgotten Mexico. A column by Greg Palast, investigative reporter for the British newspaper Guardian, reported that the Calderón camp received campaign advice and tactical support from the International Republican Institute (IRI), a sinister organization created in the 1980s as part of Washington’s support of repressive regimes in Central America. The IRI has also been linked to the attempted coup against Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and to the opposition to the Aristide regime in Haiti. IRI President Lorne Cramer denied that the organization that he heads “meddled” in the Mexican elections; “they asked for our help,” said Cramer.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/sep2006/mexi-s04.shtml

Confrontation over Mexican Oil Privatization Plan Intensifies
By Alan Benjamin
From the June 26, 2008

MEXICO CITY—Proposals to privatize Mexico’s state-owned oil industry have sparked a powerful movement in the streets, led by a leftist political leader who narrowly lost the 2006 presidential election.
The National Movement in Defense of Oil (Movimiento Nacional en Defensa del Petróleo or MNDP), headed by former presidential candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador, formally presented a resolution to the Mexican Congress on June 3. It calls on the Congress to organize a Nationwide Referendum to let the people vote on the six privatization planks in the energy “reform” plan initiated by Mexican President Felipe Calderón.

The conservative majority in Mexico’s Congress has refused to approve such a referendum, saying it would be unconstitutional. Ironically, Mexico was the first Latin American nation to nationalize its oil reserves in 1938, and is now moving to loosen state control of the industry just as oil prices are hitting record highs. The privatization plan is also being pushed at a time when other Latin American nations, such as Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador, are moving to assert greater state control over their own oil resources.
Mexico is the world’s sixth largest oil producer and oil revenues fund 40 percent of the government’s budget.

Lopéz Obrador officially lost the 2006 presidential election by 0.2 percent of the vote, amid widespread allegations of fraud by Calderón’s ruling conservative party.

Critics have accused the promoters of the national referendum — and López Obrador in particular — of “fomenting instability, violence and chaos” across Mexico. In addition, both Calderón and Jesus Reyes Heroles, the director of Pemex, Mexico’s state-owned oil corporation, have insisted that a referendum is out of the question, as their reform plan is too complicated for the Mexican people to be able to understand. Such accusations have not prevented defenders of Mexico’s oil resources from moving forward.

Pushing a People’s Referendum
In early June, a wing of López Obrador supporters in the leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), all mayors, announced that in their cities and villages, they will convene referendums on the national energy reform plan. Marcelo Ebrard, the mayor of Mexico City (which holds about 10 percent of the country’s population and is its nerve center), announced that he would convene a referendum July 27.
Ebrard’s announcement was met with protests by top-level Calderón government officials, who warned Ebrard not to go ahead with the referendum, hinting that he might face impeachment proceedings.
http://www.indypendent.org/2008/06/25/mexican-oil-privatization/

JOHN MCCAIN IS HELPING CALDERON STEAL THE OIL COMPANY! JUST LIKE HE HELPED HIM STEAL THE ELECTION!

That's what they will be talking about when they meet Wednesday! After McCain talks to Uribe about starting a war with Venezuela and privatizing their oil company!
JOHN MCCAIN IS AN OIL STEALING CRIMINAL. JUST LIKE BUSH!

[Joanne98]

1. Paying off Mexico! Gee, I wonder what for?

June 30th, 2008

Congress gave final approval to the Merida Initiative for anti-drug security assistance to Mexico and Central America and sent the bill to the White House. The plan calls for $400 million in anti-drug and security assistance for Mexico, whose government sounds happy with the plan. It also provides for $65 million to be split up between seven countries of Central America from Belize to Panama plus Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Here’s WOLA’s take.

The bill’s language recognizes the “shared responsibility between the United States and Mexico to combat drug trafficking and related violence and organized crime.” It’s good to see the U.S. Congress accept that fact, but Mérida is definitely a mixed bag and, in some ways, a missed opportunity for the United States to finally start getting it right on fighting drugs. It has some positive things — $3 million in technical assistance to help Mexico establish a unified national police registry, $10 million for drug demand reduction and rehabilitation in Mexico — but a lot of misguided spending on military hardware ranging from helicopters to surveillance systems to aircraft platforms. And it doesn’t address at all the critical need for drug demand reduction in the United States and controls on the smuggling of firearms over the border into Mexico from the United States. These are the twin traffics — drugs into the United States, guns into Mexico — that threaten to erase any chance Merida has of succeeding even before it starts.


http://blog.thehill.com/2008/06/30/aiding-mexico/

[liberal N proud]

2. I think he is just on a drug run

His plane will not pass through customs like commercial and private planes.

[eleny]

3. They're going to make a killing from Peak Oil

[Joanne98]

4. kick