First I must thank the Daily for running Darren Bernard’s Sept. 15 piece titled “A continent and a house of cards” on President Hugo Chavez, Venezuela and the hemispheric threats posed to our great yet humble republic.
How is Chavez allowed to rule in “our” backyard? The Bush administration is failing this country by allowing Chavez and mighty Venezuela to hold us hostage for one more day.
Chavez took control of his country’s oil supply from the few, and he gave the ensuing profits to the many. That’s dangerously close to something called communism, in my opinion. Worse, he’s using the oil profits for hunger and literacy programs for the poor!
That is a direct affront to our own economic system. And now the poor in Venezuela will be well fed and literate? By the time we overthrow Chavez again (our pathetic coup in 2001 lasted only a couple of days – shame on you, President Bush), Venezuelans will feel entitled to democracy, decent nutrition and education.
Oh, and health care. Chavez is trading oil for doctors with (gasp) Cuba. Cuba couldn’t even handle getting hit by a real hurricane last year – they evacuated a couple of million people and lost zero lives before a Category 5 storm could test their mettle – and yet we think the same Cuba can provide health care for Venezuelans? And I can’t wait for some stinky leftist out there to cite some made-up stat about Cubans having universal health care, as if competition and profit motives weren’t the best means for providing adequate health care and education. Please.
And thank Jesus that Bernard pointed out Chavez’s media suppression. The very people who used to horde the country’s oil wealth, well, they somehow owned all of the television stations – if you believe the leftist conspirators – and kept running false stories to discredit Chavez and inflame his opposition. So, crybaby Chavez goes and shuts them down. How dare he?
What if our own media didn’t stand up for those in power against the needs of the many? What if we weren’t inundated with horse race political coverage, fake objectivity (like feeling the need to run columns from zero-substance, ideology-apologists and instigators, just to appease extremists and appear “balanced”) and celebrity hype? What if images of people dehydrating on flood-surrounded rooftops and starving outside of convention centers weren’t balanced with “stories of hope” and “profiles of heroes” or some nonsense?
I mean, people might get angry or even clear-headed – the huddled masses might even try to make real and positive social change. What would happen to our system then? How would we continue to bring the American dream to our inner cities and democracy to the rest of the world? How would we even rebuild Trent Lott’s beach house? This is serious stuff, people. Come on.
Again, thank you Daily for helping to keep America (The America, baby – “South?,” “Central?,” “Latin?” whatever) vigilant against threats to our way of life. With people like Darren Bernard still able to find an outlet for their revolutionary thoughts, to frame and inform the debate, there is hope yet for our great experiment called, um, uh, democracy, yes, democracy. Popularly elected leaders of fellow, sovereign democracies be damned, of course.
Tom Moore is a University Senior Data Entry Operator. Please send comments to [email protected].
