Bolivian elections for the executive office are a funny thing. If no candidate wins a majority the congress elects the president. Saying "Bolivia" elected someone isn't always what it seems.
Certainly it would be financial support for the Bolivian opposition. They don't seem to be the type of movement that would have the money and resources to reach those it needs to reach power. Certainly providing the new Bolivian government with support (ie. Finanical, Military etc.) isn't a long shot either.
Are you serious? Are you gonna tell me that Mexico or Colombia or Argentina or Chile or Costa Rica aren't better off today than they were 10 years ago? Do you have alot of contact with Central and South America? Because everything I hear from their media as well as from family leads me to believe that these nations are on the up and up while sadly some other nations in the area have not come on board and are not doing so well.
This will be a nuisance for the US at worst, while for Bolivia (and Venezuela) it will be the nightmare. They will learn, the hard way, that no matter how bad things are, they can get worse, and a good way to make them worse is to try to implement socialism. This is easier to predict than a belch of gas from Teddy Kennedy in the Alito hearings. Of course, those who believe that Cuba is a workers paradise with free healthcare will disagree.
Boo to Bolivia for electing someone with close ties to Fidel Castro. If you don't want to be seen as the United States' or someone else's lapdog then fine, but cozying up to Fidel ain't the solution either.
??? It's possible that political campaigns in Bolivia involve people power and not massive commercial buys, as we have here.
I am not that familiar with Chilean and Colombian politics, but I have no reservations saying that things are not better off today in Costa Rica, Argentina and Mexico. I haven't worked much with South and Central America in the last year, but prior to that I was working for an immigrant outreach project of the Catholic Social Services and worked/studied in Costa Rica for several months. Also, I think that some of the development there has made things appear better temporarily, but that the money has not gone to the people generally and has come at a catastrophic ecological cost--the maquiladoras in Mexico I think are the perfect example. I am not completely against free trade agreements and such--I just think that they need to be paired with the social and environmental agreements that the rest of the region has subscribed to. Without those, the way for Northern empirialism is paved, and the cost is paid by the poor worker. Sh!t, I'm running late--I'll be back this afternoon.
To paraphase Jon Stewart.... "What do the people of America think of Chevez, Bolivia, and other left wing governments of South America?" (silent pause....) "We don't" Sorry for this interuption... The "blame America first" crowd may continue on their rants, unabated!
Whoa! Argentina had a massive financial meltdown that devastated the economy. Surely that was typo on your part. I don't track the Mexican economy too closely, but didn't they need a massive US bailout about a decade ago? Are things going very well there today? I know that US-Mex relations are frosty. Costa Rica? They've always been a free nation. For many years, the Ticos didn't even have a military. I'm not sure what my point is, but I'll think of something. And Chile's economy seems to have done particularly well. However, I thought that the ballyhooed private investment accounts tanked in a spectacular way. (Note to self: Next time verify these things.)
Wishful thinking,HK? Update 5: Leftist Gets Half of Bolivian Vote So Far Evo Morales is at 50.1% and his percentage has been rising as the votes continue to be counted.
Are you speaking for the American people now? Wow. With regard to the topic, good luck to all Bolivians in their endeavours, their democracy, their clear relationship to a historic culture that values the spaces and places, and their peaceful way of being in the world.
Well, as Chenny totally dictate US foreign policy now, Caspen sea is where his focus is -- as a formor energy CEO, not poor places like South Americas. But by our normal ignorance and arrogrance, our foreign policymakers are able to piss friends away and made enemies out of them. For example, after 9-11, by using anti-terror war as banner, we were able to secure military bases in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. But due to not fully happy with those governments and want to put some more "pro-US" guys there, CIA are behinds the riots and chaos in those two countries. So very quickly, we are got kicked out of Uzbekistan, and only after many big efforts (money), we are able to stay at Kyrgyzstan. But damage is already done. Due to the trust issue on us, Kyrgyzstan also asks Russia and China to sent troops in there to maintain military base to "balance" out US base there. Also when our embassies were bombed in Africa by AQ, our embassy guys were so concern only about Americans, and not the locals, so some of African Americans of our own people not get "better" treatment because they were mistaken as Africans. That will work wonder for the locals. I sametimes doubt those so called experts know damn about those foreign affairs. Here are some stupid examples: 1) Gave Turkey BIG money by asking them send troops in Iraqi to help out (at crying of Iraqis). 2) Make big consessions to India (due to India became undeclared nuclear power) in case asking them to be US anti-China ally. 3) Spend big $ trying to persue Vietman to be US anti-China ally (that is last thing Vietmanese want to do beside death). 4) Spend big $ in Mongolia (forget whole Monglian economy depends on trading with Inner-Monglia of China). Those are dumb moves.
Really, you sure about that? I believe we have an Electoral College. Furthermore, as recently demonstrated, it is possible for an American to be elected president without a majority of the popular vote. In 2000 George W. Bush received 47.9% of the popular vote whereas Al Gore received 48.4%. In Bolivia neither of these men would be the president. (I voted for Nader so don't accuse me of rehashing old ********... I don't really care). Also, in Bolivia, I would hazard a guess that the idea of an electoral college would seem rather silly to most folk.
I'm not sure what you're getting at.... or maybe you're just not getting what I'm saying. I'm all about a socialist coca farmer getting elected if that is indeed the case for a variety of reasons. Not the least of which is that I'm hoping the shock will finally finish off Dick Cheney. Seriously though, new blood in Latin America is a good. Ask me about Lula and I'll have a lot of nice things to say about him as well as a few negative things. ********, I even just made my annual contribution to MST in Brazil. I guess what I'm getting that is if you're accusing me of being umsympathetic to leftist movements in Latin America then you've got me all wrong.
In the US, only 535 people vote for president. If no one wins a majority, congress votes. When the people vote, they are voting for electors.
Is it really that different from a parlimentary system? Couldn't Tony Blair have become UK Prime Minister without his party winning the popular vote. Granted, it's rather unlikely, but then again so is the scenario that happened in 2000.
Exactly... popular votes versus electoral votes. Bolivia uses the former, we use the latter. Thus, different systems of electing a president.
I'm gonna say "yes" but I see the similarities. The notable difference would be that we don't vote for parties here... well, not really anyways.
It can happen. A party in the parlamintary system can win an election even without the most votes. It depends on how the votes are distributed.
Blame Clinton. No, really. Blame him. There was a huge outreach to central and south america as 'equal' or 'fair' trading partners, not just the big conglomerate interests. Basically, america was promising central and south america prosperity, and lo and behold, it was a dirtpoor boy done good doing the promising. Now of course, america doesn't send its kids to Wharton and Harvard Business School to let some Pedros get the better of us on a business deal. And some countries made some bad deals. And the poor there got no better, and are mad and upset and want to do something about it. And if it wasn't for some poor boy showing them that they might be able to make a difference, they'd just suck up the poverty and let the elite run their lives. Its hardly a foreign criticism of Bush (though he's a good target to work up people's ire) - as it is a response to some perhaps unrealistic expectations of affluence these people got in the past 15 years. So yeah, I think we can blame Clinton here. I'm really surprised nobody ahs yet.