Over the past weekend I watched with great interest, and as you’d expect knowing me, great pleasure, as the masses took to the streets in Buenos Aires and danced a Tango of protest against the US president. It pretty much set the tone for the entire weekend, as the mass media offerred speech after speech with the silver-spoon president fumbling and bumbling speech after speech about how latin america loves his destructive foreign policy. Then he tried to escape to Brazil, but even there, o povo Brasileiro gave him hell everytime he stepped into the light of day. I bet he has nightmares of protestors and asks Laura everynight why the world hates him. I hope he cries himself to sleep for all the people his policies have killed, its the minimum punishment, in my opinion.
But this isn’t about attacking the easy target. This is about the wonderful landmass known as South America and how, in the past 5 years, it has awoken and stood up – time after time – against the forces that have opressed, manipulated, and murdered its people. The myths of free trade, the terror of so-called democracies, and the empty promises of a bright future as the economic, political, and social laboratory of North America.
Diego Maradona and Hugo Chavez, two men who definitely act and look as if they have circus experience on their CV’s, may not be the ideal posterchildren for a movement, but their message rings true for the marginalized majority across the continent and worldwide.
I too should have brought a shovel to my blog today, to bury that horrendous and illegitimate pact – the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas.