Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Chavez’s nightmare

Venezuela’s president Hugo Chavez found a way to use openly the enormous amount of information gathered secretly against his political opponents (practically all those who are not with him , according to very pre-modern conceptions of state and society). September 2008 Human Rights Watch released a detailed report on the permanent deterioration of the Venezuelan democracy and subsequently of the bad human rights record, ten years after Chavez seized power. The various left movements in US or Europe could see in Chavez a “hero”, mainly because his flamboyant “anti-gringos” speeches. He could consider himself the new Bolivar; he’s quite far away and is not perceived too much as a treat at the level of South America, where he even found “political friends”. The “patriotic” rhetoric has always been helpful, everywhere in the world, mainly in countries facing serious socio-economic problems and with a precarious – if any – democratic record. Ideologies and political dreams are useful for a hand of people, deeply in love with power, their power. The rest are simply victims.







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