If you read the Washington Post as religiously as I do, you probably have a pretty good grasp of the taxonomy of Latin American leaders.

I've had worse reasons to get joyously drunk than the potentially epoch-making electoral victory of Fernando Lugo in the Paraguay's presidential election.

For anybody with any rudimentary knowledge of the last 100 years of Latin American history, the norteamericano hand in economic manipulation, dirty wars, coups, undisguised fascism and a seemingly endless war upon the poor is not something for which the United States can soon atone, even were its leadership willing. Institutionally confabulated rationalizations of Cold War exigency aside — which some will surely still argue — American guns, chicanery and capital have served as an ominous, razor-wire-dressed bulwark against the merest, most modest steps towards inclusionary democracy and social and economic justice for half the hemisphere.

Chavez may be nuts, but this time, beneath his usual huffing and puffing,  he's right. Colombia attacks inside Ecuador's border, Uribe lies to President Correa of Ecuador by saying it was done 'in pursuit' of FARC rebels, fails to apologize even when the lie is exposed and instead begins accusing Correa of wrongdoings.  Hello? Let's say Mexico bombed Texas because rebels had managed to cross the border. And that's excused away by saying, 'yeah but...it was in pursuit' only later to have that turn out to be a lie.  Ya' think the US would be a little pissed another country bombed inside its borders without permission or forewarning?

Next, Chavez pulls an Al Sharpton...as usual...and now, miraculously after bombing a rebel campsite, Colombia apparently has such such advanced weaponry, it only killed people and left a laptop untouched.  

Correa, Chavez and Castro exchange calls. Uribe and Bush exchange calls. FARC rebels are suddenly aspiring to global terrorism and Chavez should be charged with genocide for funding them?   Well, if the Bush backed Uribe says it's true, it must be true.  And God knows, err... some may still believe, that the US would never lie to justify a preemptive measure where they can't control a head of state.

Unlike those of just about every other Latin American nation, Venezuela's governments have always been left leaning and populist, perhaps even guilty of demagoguery, but corruption was their downfall, and the current regime is no different.

Like many readers here and throughout most of the political world, I was shocked by the way my own expectations, manufactured by the polls, the blogosphere, the punditocracy, and (honestly) my own hopes, were dashed tonight with Clinton's remarkable victory. Clinton appears to have made something happen in New Hampshire, but I must say that I will be very troubled if it can be determined that her too-publicized tear was the catalyst for her surmounting the polls' tolling her demise.  The misogyny of the Chris Matthews of the punditocracy is not a firm foundation for continued victory in a tight race.  And now, there will be no more tears; whether genuine or not, that card has been played.

Danny Schechter: "The News Dissector" on television coverage of the Venezuelan referendum

Hugo Chavez' defeat in the recent Venezuelan referendum on a package of 69 proposed reforms to the constitution was probably a healthy development for the revolution, although that will largely depend upon how the government deals with it.

Over in AlterNet's Foreign Policy area, I'm running a commentary by The Guardian's Seumas Milne about the narrow defeat of Hugo Chavéz' reform package* in Sunday's referendum in Venezuela.

It's well worth reading, but Milne makes one point with which I have to disagree:

I have a good friend who writes on Venezuela, as an insider and knowledgable commentator.

I'd like to present his views, from dissidentvoice.org, as an antidote to some of the poisoned CIA-backed propaganda so much circulated.

His name is Clifton Ross, and he's a college teacher and writer.

His essay is produced below, with permission: I agree with it, but think he could have indicated which Articles should have been voted on separately.

I thought the MSM in unison told us that Chavez was a "dictator" that controlled "the levers of government" and that he "bought" his support by parsing out his oil wealth to the poor. How could this have happened? Was yesterday's vote a "victory" or a "defeat" for Chavez?

Yup.  Brother Frias, or whatever he's called, has managed to pull victory out of defeat again.

(all that dialectic, victory out of defeat again talk)

Hey, Mister Hugo,

Why don't you sell your culture.

Your fabulisious coulture,

not on the tv.

What about those blogs?

What about those crazy blogs?....and those beachs?  and those mountains   and those plains?

And all those people.    And all those people.

Note the fact that he just conceded defeat, on a referendum on which he had pinned immense personal hopes -- with less than a 1% vote difference.

A dictator -- or our current administration in Washington for that matter -- would just have tweaked the results a bit to get a win.

With so much controversy over this vote, I am astounded there is no real thread for following

the returns and the outcome. So I am creating one with some links for coverage and infomation.

http://en.wikipedia.org/...
(The Constitution of Venezuela)
World Coverage::

Chavez

Supporters Set To Rally In Midtown Ahead Of Venezuelan Election December 02, 2007

http://radiovenezuelaenvivo.blogspot...
(English)

For

Venezuela and beyond, vote today is pivotal

Official Coverage: Spanish:

http://rnv.gov.ve/... Only)
http://venezuelanalysis.com/...

Well, something non-nuclear/energy related, at least directly. A break from those polemics is called for.

We were treated yesterday to good ol' cold-war liberalism by Roger Cohen, columnist for the venerable liberal, US paper-of-record, the New York Times.

Due to copyright restrictions I cannot repost the entire column, but I will respond to some of his nonsense.

The democratic vote on the Constitutional Reform is tomorrow, December 2nd. Now, to the meat of the issue at hand:

Donald Rumsfeld, our dear beloved ex-SecDef has written a magnificent op-ed in the Washington Post for this coming Sunday the 2nd of December.  I'm not a fan of his, I'm sure you're not a fan of his, and this article reads like he's preaching to us his pawns in the chess game of international relations.  I'm not saying I wholeheartedly disagree with his statements in this article with my title for this, I'm just saying I dislike this man wholeheartedly...and he deserves to be mocked at every turn.  So, mainly this diary is to make you aware that Donny-Boy is still writing and living it up.  

Enjoy, here's the link:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/...

The mainstream press is not mainstream.  It is radical.  It is a willing instrument of U.S. foreign policy makers to help prepare the public to accept, and often cheer, U. S. coups, invasions, and assassinations. A large part of building acceptance for aggressive and illegal actions against sovereign states is to demonize the democratically-elected leaders of those states.  It  has certainly been the case with Hugo Chavez.

Editorial "hit men"are leading the charge against President Chavez from the pages of major newspapers throughout the country.  The problem is that they are advocating rejection of reforms that the majority of Venezuelan's support and, by doing so, jeopardize the overall democratic process in Venezuela.

I started off writing a fairly trivial piece about more indicators that the US Dollar is in decline. Accidentally broadcast remarks by the Saudi foreign minister at the OPEC meeting this weekend will probably cause a further drop when markets open on Monday. I have now posted that on European Tribune.

Since then there have been further developments that indicate the two most radical members of OPEC are now well aware of their power in controlling the oil supply. Neither country needs to develop a nuclear bomb to devastate the US economy and Bush has handed them the equivalent of plans to a hydrogen bomb when they only had a simple fusion bomb by his invasion of Iraq. Simply the reduction in output from Iraq has added to the insecurity of oil supply and has reached the stage of demand outstripping supply if anything disrupts the output of any country.

To watch NEOLIBERALISM in action right now, check out what's happening in Costa Rica. They are set to vote on membership into CAFTA on Oct 7. The opposition to ratification is being outspent 10:1 or more but polls show the vote going either way.