![](\"http:\/\/cyber.law.harvard.edu\/blogs\/static\/dowbrigade\/chavezz.jpg\")
At least since the first nomadic humans figured
\n out that by placing certain seeds in the ground at certain times a
\n year, and then sticking around to wait for the results, they didn’t
\n have to move around constantly following animal herds, and shortly
\n thereafter that if they were staying in one place they could build
\n walls and fortifications to keep other nomadic humans from taking the
\n fruits of their labor, the history of human civilization has basically
\n been the efforts of a small minority to get the majority to do things
\n they wouldn’t otherwise do, like pay taxes and fight against
\n strangers.<\/p>\n
There is nothing intrinsically evil or oppressive
\n in this tendency. In order to perform all of the complicated and diversified
\n tasks involved in building a civilization, the efforts of large groups
\n of people need to be coordinated and directed. It’s just that it seems
\n inevitable that the group of people giving the orders soon come to
\n see themselves as inherently superior, deserving of special treatment,
\n and feel an almost
\n genetic
\n drive to accumulate wealth and power to insure the reproductive success
\n of their offspring. Power corrupts.<\/p>\n
Mankind (and the far majority of the emergent elites
\n who felt they should be directing the groups efforts were male) developed
\n a wide variety of techniques to convince the majority to accept the
\n direction of a powerful elite. Fear of pain and physical punishment. Religious
\n Awe and imposition of the elite as the representatives of the divine,
\n or as divine themselves. Fear and hatred of culturally distinct groups
\n of humans. Black magic. Absolutist beaurocracies which adhere to and
\n enforce fanatical fascist leader-worship. Cults of personality. Invasive
\n and
\n ubiquitous
\n police power. Systematic brainwashing by television. The list goes
\n on, and includes most of what we euphemistically call "culture".<\/p>\n
And then we have democracy. According to its proponents,
\n although flawed, the closest to perfect form of government yet devised.
\n Representative Democracy, the variety practiced in the United States,
\n consists of convincing the majority to follow orders on the theory
\n that they play an essential role in selecting the individuals who issue
\n the orders. In order to be selected as order-issuers, the elite must
\n convince the majority that it is in their own best interest to hand
\n over decision-making to one particular group of the elite.<\/p>\n
The problems start to multiply when we combine this
\n system with the other cornerstone of modern civilization, market capitalism.
\n The results of this overlay are quite different in the countries at
\n the high end of the socioeconomic spectrum than in the rest of the
\n world.<\/p>\n
Imagine the population of the United States as a
\n spectrum arranged by yearly income. Take the middle 51% of the electorate,
\n the required majority to support a democratic ruling class, and what
\n you have is roughly equal to the American middle class. Getting elected
\n in America, therefore, largely consists of convincing the Middle Class
\n that your party offers the best chance for them to climb out of the
\n middle and join the favored Upper Class. No one likes to think about
\n the possibility of slipping out the other end of the Middle and becoming
\n part of the Poor, so that goes largely unmentioned in national campaigns. If
\n the Poor are mentioned at all, it is to court their votes by offering
\n to convey them instantly to the Middle Class, although this can be
\n a dangerous strategy since the Poor are notoriously unpredictable and
\n ungrateful to boot.<\/p>\n
This system has been working reasonably well in
\n the United States for over 200 years, and in fact is largely responsible
\n for the emergence of the American Empire, the most powerful military,
\n economic and cultural tsunami the planet has ever seen. We believe
\n it is reinforced, at least on a subconscious level, by
\n the realization that every American is consuming roughly 8 times his
\n or her fair share of the planets resources under the current dispensation,
\n which causes instinctual fear of anything which might upset the apple
\n cart.<\/p>\n
The panorama is quite different in the majority
\n of other countries, however. In your average nation outside of
\n the "Group of 9", the mixture of Democracy and Capitalism is as volatile
\n as nitro and glycerine. In a country where 60% of the population live
\n in poverty, the aforementioned 51 % of the electorate ARE ALL POOR.
\n This makes it much more difficult for the political elite to convince
\n voters that they, the elite, who are always among the richest few percent
\n of the population, have the best interests of the poor majority at
\n heart. <\/p>\n
Furthermore, on the rare occasions when the poor
\n majority do manage to elect leaders who try to improve their lot, which
\n in addition to being the "right" thing to do may seem to be the best
\n way to get reelected, the do-gooders are in immediate conflict with
\n the
\n economic
\n elite, who are threatened by any attempts to disrupt or divert the
\n economic flow currently filling their personal coffers.<\/p>\n
A prime example of this phenomena is unfolding right
\n now in Venezuela. Although previously among the richest nations
\n in Latin America, with a standard of living approaching post-war Europe,
\n Venezuela how has 60% of its population in poverty and 30% in abject
\n poverty, placing the sweet spot of the electorate somewhere between
\n those two stations. President Hugo Chavez, a military man from relatively
\n humble origins, seems to be attempting to provide the poor with the
\n health , education and human services most experts agree are the essentials
\n of human development. Meanwhile, the economic elite complain that he
\n is diverting resources (primarily oil income) which are essential to
\n business development.<\/p>\n
We are going to be seeing more and more of this. In
\n a country with more than 50% poverty, when truly free and open elections
\n are held, people will keep getting elected who threaten the economic
\n status quo and the privileges of the economic elite. This is the
\n reason that our great country, champion of democracy, is deathly afraid
\n of establishing it in Iraq, or Afghanistan, or Saudi Arabia. The nature
\n of the electorate in these countries is such that they would probably
\n elect governments which do not see eye-to-eye with the US on a gamut of issues,
\n and could even upset the fragile global economic distribution system
\n we have spent the past 50 years so carefully constructing.<\/p>\n
The fact that
\n Venezuela is the world’s 5th largest oil exporter offers a scary insight
\n to how one relatively small third-world economy can throw a monkey wrench
\n into the global system, causing an acute rise in oil prices at a time
\n when the health of the entire emerging world economic order hangs in
\n the balance.<\/p>\n
This is also producing illogical political-economic
\n alignments, as the world oil markets seem to be pulling for a Chavez
\n victory in current recall election. One would think that the world
\n energy elite would favor the Venezuelan opposition, which includes almost
\n all of the rich, the business class, and the international investors
\n pulling for globalization and free trade. However, the feeling seems
\n to be that if defeated, Chavez would refuse to leave, prompting renewed
\n violence and possible interruption of the oil flow. Although Chavez is
\n perhaps the world’s most dangerous anti-Globalization leader in office
\n at present, his continued reign offers the best chance of avoiding a
\n disastrous shutdown of one of our closest sources to feed our growing
\n oil addiction. Given
\n the dubious durability of our other dealers in the Middle East and Russia,
\n the Chavez administration, the natural enemy of the international energy
\n elite, has become an essential ally. Real Politik in the energy age can
\n result in strange bedfellows.<\/p>\n
Here’s the latest on the recall election from the Reuters, CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) – Venezuelan leftist President According to National Electoral Council President Francisco Carrasquero, At least since the first nomadic humans figured out that by placing certain seeds in the ground at certain times a year, and then sticking around to wait for the results, they didn’t have to move around constantly following animal … Continue reading
\n via the New York Times<\/a>:<\/p>\n
\n Hugo Chavez on Monday declared victory in a referendum on his rule but
\n the opposition called the results “a gigantic fraud.”<\/p>\n
\n Chavez won backing from 58 percent of voters with 94 percent of electoral
\n rolls counted in the referendum on whether to recall him before his term
\n ends.<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"