I count eleven diaries so far on Wednesday's speech to the United Nations by Hugo Chavez, president of Venezuela. I offer this, a twelfth, because none of the preceding diaries seem to have offered a link to a
full transcript of Chavez' address, one that would enable Kossacks to come to their own thoughtful, informed conclusions as to the accuracy and value of his remarks.
Below I offer blockquoted excerpts from Chavez' speech, with brief remarks of my own. Spirited debate in the comments is encouraged, though I would hope members of this site's anti-Chavez cabal, as well as Chavez supporters, would confine themselves to discussing here Chavez' remarks to the UN, rather than plunging, once again, into the usual debate about whether Chavez is a Dangerous Menace or the Second Coming of Simon Bolivar.
First, and with all respect, I highly recommend this book by Noam Chomsky, one of the most prestigious intellectuals in America and the world, Chomsky. One of his most recent works: Hegemony or Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance (The American Empire Project). It's an excellent work to understand what's happened in the world in the 20th Century, what's currently happening, and the greatest threat on this planet; the hegemonic pretension of the North American imperialism endangers the human race's survival.
We continue warning about this danger and calling on the very same U.S. people and the world to stop this threat, which resembles the Sword of Damocles over our heads. I had considered reading from this book, but for the sake of time, I shall just leave it as a recommendation. It reads easily. It's a very good book.
I think that the first people who should read this book are our brothers and sisters in the United States, because their threat is in their own house.
I haven't read this particular work by Chomsky, but Chomsky is certainly worth reading by anyone who desires an understanding of international relations. Certainly people who live in the United States should be the first to read Chomsky, because it is their nation that, at least since the seppuku of the Soviet Union, has the greatest political, economic, and military influence over the world. Which is why it is not unsane to assert that "the greatest threat on this planet" is "the hegemonic pretension of the North American imperialism," which "endangers the human race's survival."
Yesterday, the devil came here. Right here. Right here. And it smells of sulfur still today, this table that I am now standing in front of.
Yesterday, ladies and gentlemen, from this rostrum, the president of the United States, the gentleman to whom I refer as the devil, came here, talking as if he owned the world. Truly. As the owner of the world.
Over the past five years, George II has ceaselessly referred to his opponents as "evildoers," as members of an "axis of evil." It is fair that a man who has been so quick to consign his opponents to the realm below hear at least once a comparison of himself to the Lord of Darkness. Unlike George II, who is always as stiff and stern as the puritan he is when issuing such denunciations, Chavez' remarks were at least larded with humor.
I think we could call a psychiatrist to analyze yesterday's statement made by the president of the United States. As the spokesman of imperialism, he came to share his nostrums, to try to preserve the current pattern of domination, exploitation and pillage of the peoples of the world.
George II has in fact been psychoanalyzed, albeit from afar, and has been found to be a dangerously disturbed man who has no business serving in public office.
As Chomsky says here, clearly and in depth, the American empire is doing all it can to consolidate its system of domination.
This is an accurate statement. Both the cabalists of The Project for a New American Century, and the reign of George II which they birthed, have explicitly stated that it shall be the goal of the United States to enjoy permanent and overwhelming superiority both economically and militarily over the entire planet. As well, Karl Rove has explicitly stated that it is his goal, with the reign of George II, to institute a permanent Republican majority, to so mariginalize the Democratic Party that the US becomes a one party state. This goal of Rove's, it should be noted, is drawn explicitly from the goal of "The Party" in George Orwell's 1984.
They say they want to impose a democratic model. But that's their democratic model. It's the false democracy of elites, and, I would say, a very original democracy that's imposed by weapons and bombs and firing weapons.
It is true that the US wishes only to impose a "democratic" model, and recognize "democratic" results, that comport with its own interests. Nowhere has this been more true than in Latin America, as Chavez is well aware. Democratic governments, like Chavez' own, are spurned by the US when they are perceived as opposing US interests. Anti-democratic regimes, such as the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile, are embraced, even when they violently subvert and overthrow democracies, so long as these anti-democratic forces are perceived as promoting American interests. And of course it is true that "weapons and bombs and firing weapons" have been used by the US to bring "democracy," most recently in seeking to bring "democracy" to Iraq.
The president of the United States, yesterday, said to us, right here, in this room, and I'm quoting, "Anywhere you look, you hear extremists telling you can escape from poverty and recover your dignity through violence, terror and martyrdom."
Wherever he looks, he sees extremists. And you, my brother--he looks at your color, and he says, oh, there's an extremist. Evo Morales, the worthy president of Bolivia, looks like an extremist to him.
The imperialists see extremists everywhere. It's not that we are extremists. It's that the world is waking up. It's waking up all over. And people are standing up.
No one knows better than the people on this site that any opposition to the policies of George II will be denounced as the work of "extremists." Every day we are denounced by George II cat's-paws like Runt Limprod as "extremists." But we are not "extremists." Just like the people of Latin America who, in free and fair elections, are selecting governments opposed to US hegemony, are not "extremists." We, as they, are indeed "waking up."
If we walk in the streets of the Bronx, if we walk around New York, Washington, San Diego, in any city, San Antonio, San Francisco, and we ask individuals, the citizens of the United States, what does this country want? Does it want peace? They'll say yes.
But the government doesn't want peace. The government of the United States doesn't want peace. It wants to exploit its system of exploitation, of pillage, of hegemony through war.
Seems true to me. The American people do not want to kill people in other countries. Only that clutch of chickenhawks who have seized control of our country wish to wash death and destruction across the globe.
And you can wonder, just as the president of the United States addresses those peoples of the world, what would those peoples of the world tell him if they were given the floor? What would they have to say?
And I think I have some inkling of what the peoples of the south, the oppressed people think. They would say, "Yankee imperialist, go home." I think that is what those people would say if they were given the microphone and if they could speak with one voice to the American imperialists.
This was the role played by Chavez at the UN. He indeed, I believe, spoke for the great majority of people in not only Latin America, but throughout the world. Those people do no want Americans controlling their countries. No more than Americans would want Venezuelans or Lebanese or Iraqis controlling their country.
The U.S. has already planned, financed and set in motion a coup in Venezuela, and it continues to support coup attempts in Venezuela and elsewhere.
This is true.
And how, I wonder, would the president of the United States speak of the president of Venezuela, if the president of Venezuela had supported a coup that for two days ousted the president of the United States?
Thirty years will have passed from this other horrendous terrorist attack on the Cuban plane, where 73 innocents, in a Cubana de Aviacion airliner, died.
And where is the biggest terrorist of this continent who took the responsibility for blowing up the plane? He spent a few years in jail in Venezuela. Thanks to CIA and then government officials, he was allowed to escape, and he lives here in this country, protected by the government.
And he was convicted. He has confessed to his crime. But the U.S. government has double standards. It protects terrorism when it wants to.
This is true. Even as George II ceaselessly rails against terrorism, his government, and that of his brother, continue to shelter the terrorist Luis Posada Carriles--a "good" terrorist, "good" because his terror snuffed out the lives of Cubans.
As Silvio Rodriguez says, the era is giving birth to a heart. There are alternative ways of thinking. There are young people who think differently. And this has already been seen within the space of a mere decade. It was shown that the end of history was a totally false assumption, and the same was shown about Pax Americana and the establishment of the capitalist neo-liberal world. It has been shown, this system, to generate mere poverty. Who believes in it now?
Yes, The End of History has indeed been exposed as arrogant error. Pax Americana will inevtiably wither and die, as every Pax has and must. And neo-liberalism in truth brings poverty to the vast majority of the people it touches.
We want ideas to save our planet, to save the planet from the imperialist threat. And hopefully in this very century, in not too long a time, we will see this, we will see this new era, and for our children and our grandchildren a world of peace based on the fundamental principles of the United Nations, but a renewed United Nations.
I hope so, too.
You know that my personal doctor had to stay in the plane. The chief of security had to be left in a locked plane. Neither of these gentlemen was allowed to arrive and attend the U.N. meeting. This is another abuse and another abuse of power on the part of the Devil. It smells of sulfur here, but God is with us and I embrace you all.
I would suggest, Mr. President, that, especially after this speech, you firmly resolve to yourself stay off of planes, at least for the duration of the reign of George II. For "crashed" and "exploded" planes are one of the traditional means by which the devil disposes of people who speak and think and act the way you do.