Cyrano's Journal

Universal rejection in Latin America: "Get lost, Bush assassin! The government invites you, but the people repudiate you" reads a typical accolade.

Reading one of our bloggers' [rustydude] reportage on What The Media Are Not Reporting In Colombia, I'm struck by his theory about the two reasons they're protesting Bush's visit so violently over there in Latin America -- Colombia, specifically.

The first reason [he adduces] is fairly self-evident (all emphases are my own):

"... The U.S. has sent nearly $4 billion in mostly military aid to Colombia since Uribe took office in 2002. ...Ahh, you mean the US aid is sent to prop up a right wing thug and the trickle down in this case is US manufactured bullets to quell dissension?"

But the second reason isn't quite as manifest; at least, it wasn't to me. Might be I'm just slow to catch on (it wouldn't be the first time). rustydude continues...

However, if the MSM bothered to venture off the Presidential motorcade path and ask a few Colombians why they are so angry, another reason would emerge. They're pissed because they know their government is having to spend millions for Bush's security during his visit. Millions which will come directly out of the pockets of your average Colombianos in the form of taxes. People in a foreign country resent higher taxes to cover the travel of a Republican US President.

I just don't know if I can get down with that second reason. I mean, sure, they're pissed about paying for it; it's got to be something like being the parents of the bride and having to shell out a damned fortune to watch your daughter marry a sneering, ignorant, manipulative, pretentious twerp they're hoping might up and die before he gets the chance to impregnate their daughter...

Their first reason is reason ENOUGH for the Colombians to register their protests, their anger, their utter disgust at finding this grotesque mockery of a world leader in their country.

I would wager the fact of paying the cost of Bush's security during his visit is merely a "last straw" kind of a deal. Surely it can't be the mere fact of his Republicanism; or have all American Republican presidents received this greeting in Colombia? Well, scratch that... Probably the last few decades have seen protests against any American Republicans with the gall to alight on Colombian soil, given that party's systematic, relentless support of every oppressive, non-democratic regime to be found anywhere south of the Mexican border. I suspect the recent canonisation of the late Ronald Wilson Reagan did not catch on in Nicaragua, for instance...

Still, if for no other reason, I imagine Colombians wouldn't give a shit about an American president's party affiliation because they, unlike most Americans, more fully understand how very little difference there is between the two parties when it comes to things that affect them (Colombians). We sure as hell haven't seen much of a difference between the two parties in the past several years as concerns foreign policy in the Middle East; why should we expect the Democrats to suddenly decide to take up rhetorical arms against the Republicans and fight the neocon imperialist agenda the rest of us have seen coming a light year away?

Back to the President and why it is that those so-called "socialists" in the streets of Bogotá are raising such a fuss over his visit to their country...

I suspect those people are not nearly as one-dimensional as the bare-bones MSNBC article that inspired the diary that in turn spurred me to write this piece. I suspect that many of those people rioting in the streets are very much like you and me. They're just further along the path of "You've almost got nothing left to lose; shall we go for broke or would you like to start fighting now?" than we are. For now.

Where is the leadership on ending extreme poverty? AIDS? Preventable disease?

With one snap of his finger, the American President could have every single member of the G8 lined up, eagerly awaiting their turn to sign on the dotted line and become the generation that ended world hunger, needless illness and death — and all the other attendant tragedies that are the inevitable offspring of extreme poverty — in toto.

Instead, he uses his power to collect money for himself and his friends, with no-bid contracts and skyrocketing oil prices and suffering elderly people to pay triple what they used to for their necessary pharmaceuticals so his buddies in the pharmaceutical companies can make that extra profit... He uses it to make war... He uses it to provide the machinery of war to poor countries, paving the way for the slaughter of millions... He uses it to sacrifice women's medical autonomy and privacy and physical health and safety and their very lives to the appeasement altar of the ChristoFascist Neocon Zombie Brigade...

What he doesn't use his power for, what he hasn't once, to my knowledge, set his sights on and then focused all his will and all the influence and power of his office to bear upon, was changing something in this world for the better, intentionally. The immediate better — not insane blathering promises about a happy day on the horizon when all countries will be democratic and everyone will have purple ink on their fingers all over the world and all the bad guys will be dead or captured, doesn't matter which, and all the good guys will live forever until Jesus comes back to take them up to heaven while the rest of the bad people who maybe didn't know they were bad people are left on the earth to suffer a thousand years' war with the devil and then, presumably, go to hell and suffer an eternity of war with the devil...

George W. Bush is not the first American President to leave the world a worse place than it was when he took office —but, once again the king of dubious achievements, he is arguably the most accomplished in that regard.

He is a dishonourable man, his entire Administration is replete with dishonourable men, and he has diminished the United States in the eyes of the world —and especially Latin America —to a greater degree than any other President has before him.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, knowing our history with Latin America, is quite saying something.

UPDATE: In his comment in the discussion below, rustydude expands on his second reason, and now it makes a LOT more sense -- to me, at least:

"You're... right that this isn't about a "Republican" President. Democratic and Republican Presidents have been screwing over Colombia with horrible foreign policy for 50 years. But understand, the Colombian government has been ramping up military presence within the cities and towns of the country for months now, specifically in preparation for the Visit. People there not only resent the heightened authoritarian environment just for this one man; they also resent the disruptions it causes in their daily lives.

And they're not dummies. They know that all this extra police and military on the street costs money and they know who foots the bill. Perhaps I didn't make this clear. While in the U.S. we became aware of Bush's impending Latin America trip a couple of weeks ago, in Colombia and the rest of Latin America, they've been aware of Bush's visit for several months. And they did not have to read the newspapers to discover the fact. They only needed to bump into newly deployed military soldiers on the streets as they try to walk to work.

There's a solidarity movement growing in Latin America. I suspect that many of these protests across the different countries are to show the world a new emerging unity in Latin America that is becoming more and more anti-USA. I think there's an amplification of resentment that has built upon itself. I saw the same type of amplification occur here in Seattle during the WTO conference riots."

Now, THAT is something with which I can get down; of COURSE they hate him for that. I suspect that the Clinton visits didn't inspire the need for QUITE so much security and military presence; American Presidents who aren't universally loathed, despised, reviled and hated (you can never have too many synonyms for that word when referring to GWB) tend not to need entire countries put on lockdown...

Maryscott O'Connor, a guest columnist at Cyrano, founded and helms Myleftwing.com, a citizens' blog with headquarters in Sherman Oaks, California.