Si Camina Como Pata

As I read this article I realized that I have never expressed the full depth of my contempt for Hugo Chavez.

He is an enemy of democracy. He is a socialist. He is a friend to Fidel and Ahmedinejad. Like all dictators he has based his rule on cronyism and the weakening of opposing forces and institutions.

Now it appears that there is evidence linking him directly to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). FARC is a terrorist organization. They kidnap, extort, and murder for gain. Computers seized from a FARC camp were examined by Interpol and found the following:

Venezuelan officials set up contacts with Australian arms dealers and arranged for missile training in the Middle East, according to the documents, which were on computer hard drives seized by Colombia.
Venezuela's ties to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, came under further scrutiny Thursday when Interpol said it had concluded that the Colombian government hadn't tampered with the seized computers.
Interpol's report bolsters Colombia's claims that the computers contain evidence of meddling by Venezuela in its neighbor's war with FARC. Venezuela has asserted the files on the computer are bogus, and on Thursday, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez denounced the Interpol report as "ridiculous."

Read the article for more. I'm disgusted.

La Vida Cubana

I don't have any time, but I wanted to link to this interesting post about life in Cuba. Seeing how many apologists for the Castros have sprung up since Fidel's "retirement" I think it is important that we remember what it is really like. That post has some beautiful photos of Varadero Beach, where my mother used to go as a child.

Instapundit also has some commentary on whether Fidel has left his people better off. You know how I feel.

¿El Fín?

Not really.

Fidel Castro's decision not to face "reelection" after 49 years in power will likely mean nothing for the people of Cuba, at least for the time being.

It has never been likely that Cuba would reform from the top down. Despite the decades-old embargo there is little incentive for Cuba's leaders to liberalize economically or politically in the dramatic way that many Cuban exiles hope for. This has left little room for citizen reformers in Cuba's tightly controlled society.

So what does this mean? Most people thing Fidel's brother Raul will assume control. but as this article explains, Raul may prefer to rule from behind the scenes. There are various potential candidates that would also promote a false idea of change, which could ease internal pressures on the transitional government.

This article from Pajamas Media agrees that little will change as a result of Fidel's resignation.

Fidel goes out a winner. Regardless of the state of the Cuban people, he is leaving on his own terms, thumbing his nose at America, and leaving his regime in place. U.S. policy towards Cuba has been a failure, and this can be traced quite clearly to the Kennedy Administration's failure to support the invasion force at the Bay of Pigs. Now that would have been a nice act of imperialism.

Now the Cubans will wait, as they have for so many years.

No hay respeto (There's no respect)

Hugo is at it again. He continues to deal with widespread food shortages in Venezuela socialistically, suggesting that the National Guard should seize "unproductive" lands.

Good luck with that one amigo.

Peligro en Venezuela (Danger in Venezuela)

I had a conversation with someone last week where we discussed the reasons for Latin America's failure to develop as rapidly as the emerging Asian economies. Among other things, the penchant of Latin Americans to elect demagogues like Hugo Chavez dooms many nations to perpetual mediocrity.

Recently Hugo Chavez recognized the FARC, or Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia as a legitimate political actor, deserving the same recognition as a state. In the Wall Street Journal, Mary Anastasia O'Grady compares Chavez to the former Argentine dictator Galtieri. Galteiri orchestrated some sketchy foreign policy to cover the extremely poor state of the Argentine economy, among his moves the seizure of the Falklands from Great Britain. Chavez' recognition of the terrorist FARC seemed calculated to provoke a conflict with Colombia, timed to cover Venezuela's deteriorating economy.

As O'Grady explains, Colombia did not take the bait and instead made some smart diplomatic moves, including reaffirming the support of France, Spain, and E.U. officials. Fortunately for freedom-lovers (and unfortunately for Chavez) his political misfire has not gone unnoticed.

Gateway Pundit has an excellent round-up of photos and articles about anti-FARC protests that took place in Colombia yesterday. Hundreds of thousands of Colombians marched in solidarity with their government and to protest the actions of the FARC (including kidnapping, drug trafficking, and extortion).

I have no doubt that FARC is a terrorist organization. The last two Colombian presidents have made consistent efforts to fight terrorism in their country. The current president, Uribe has been particularly impactful. We have an opportunity to stand in solidarity with their efforts in support of freedom and the rule of law by supporting trade agreements with Colombia. I hope you will urge your legislators to support that initiative.

Reasons I'm Glad to be American II

This one comes to us from China. It seems that over 200,000(!!!) Chinese are stuck in a train station in Guangzhou, capitol of Guangdong province. Over the next week that number may swell to 600,000(!!!!!!!). The culprit? Bad weather.

On our worst weather day how many people have been stranded in Atlanta? Or Chicago? Or New York? Not that many. The influx of travelers is due to the coming Chinese New Year. Many may be stranded far from family due to inclement weather.

I feel for those people, and feel gratitude for my life here.

Cuba and Poland UNITE!

I majored in International Politics at BYU. One of my favorite classes was Latin American politics, examining various political systems in the Latin American world. For my final paper I elected to explore the way that Catholicism influenced communism in Poland and in Cuba, in order to examine why it was such a powerful liberalizing force in the former and so impotent in the latter.

Religion was not the only component of Poland's liberation from communism. Brave individuals like Lech Walesa also contributed. He is now among the individuals initiating a petition imploring the Castro government to free political prisoners. The petition:

We are appealing to the Cuban government to free all political prisoners and prisoners of conscience in Cuba. Their continued imprisonment violates the fundamental humans rights. During her own enslavement, Poland experienced a great deal of solidarity from the free nations of the world. It is our moral duty to support the pro-freedom aspirations in Cuba.

It is heartening to see people like Walesa take an interest in Cuba's plight. You can sign it here. Don't worry, the form is also in English (thanks to DumSpiroSpero for the information).

No se puede

When I was living in Southern California as a missionary I witnessed much excitement on the frontera over the presidential election. I used to see "¡Fox! ¡Si se puede!" written on the windows of cars.

As I looked at this video of the run-up to Venezuela's constitutional referendum, I thought to myself "¡Hugo! ¡No se puede!"



Thousands of Venezuelans have been protesting, demonstrating their rejection of some of Chavez' undemocratic measures, including the abolition of term limits. I hope Chavez has overplayed his hand, but I also fear for the fairness of the election.

Esperando La Leche (Waiting for Milk)

Instapundit linked to this post from the blog Caracas Chronicles. It shows a line outside of a supermarket in Maracaibo where people are waiting to buy milk.

I don't care how poor you are- you can go to any city, town, or village in this nation and buy milk, eggs, whatever you want. The time will come when Chavez' Venezuela will be seen as one of the saddest stories in the history of Latin America.

Another victory for the Chavista revolution!

Tell it straight

As Venezuela descends into dictatorial rule, most of the western media ignores the situation. The King of Spain, Juan Carlos, allowed his frustration to show. From Barcepundit:

I'M NOT PRO-MONARCHY in the sense that I don't believe that any office should be hereditary, including the head of state. But I can't help but cheer on king Juan Carlos today:

‘Why don’t you shut up!’

The words of King Juan Carlos 1 of Spain to the Venezuelan President, Hugo Chávez, in the closing session of the Latin American summit today.

The Spanish monarch lost his cool when Chávez called the ex Spanish Prime Minister, José María Aznar, a fascist on several occasions. King Juan Carlos then got up and walked out of the session in a gesture without precedent, and just in time to hear the Nicaraguan President, Daniel Ortega, criticising Spanish businesses and the role of Union Fenosa in Nicaragua in particular. The King was to return later, but was not present for the singing of the Chilean hymn which closed the debates.

This article from The Economist provides more insights into Chavez' efforts to subvert democracy.

I Love Capitalism

This is a fantastic article from Wednesday's Wall Street Journal. The purpose is to relay some of the lesson of Atlas Shrugged, a novel by Ayn Rand. It is one of the most important books in my opinion, and one that I credit with "making me a capitalist." I think the link only works for subscribers, but I wanted to excerpt a portion:

This is the lesson that most people in business have yet to learn from "Atlas," no matter how much they may love its portrayal of the passion and the glory possible in business enterprise. At a crucial point in the novel, the industrialist Hank Rearden is on trial for violating an arbitrary economic regulation. Instead of apologizing for his pursuit of profit or seeking mercy on the basis of philanthropy, he says, "I work for nothing but my own profit -- which I make by selling a product they need to men who are willing and able to buy it. I do not produce it for their benefit at the expense of mine, and they do not buy it for my benefit at the expense of theirs; I do not sacrifice my interests to them nor do they sacrifice theirs to me; we deal as equals by mutual consent to mutual advantage -- and I am proud of every penny that I have earned in this manner…"

We will know the lesson of "Atlas Shrugged" has been learned when business people, facing accusers in Congress or the media, stand up like Rearden for their right to produce and trade freely, when they take pride in their profits and stop apologizing for creating wealth.

In light of my focus in the past week on those who would take from the labors of others by force and according to their own warped and naive motives, I thought this was a timely piece. Let me know if you'd like the whole thing. I can e-mail it to you.

The Legacy of Che

It disgusts me when I see a college student or teenager wearing a t-shirt with a picture of Che Guevara.
This post from the Reason blog offers a nice remembrance of the dead totalitarian.
The shirt below is more to my liking.

Whither the Mormon Anarchist?

I wrote a post for my friends at In Rare Form on a new publication, The Mormon Worker. It advocates something called Mormon Anarchism. Want to guess how I felt about it?

Go read the post here.

Priorities

In an e-mail dialogue with a close friend this week, I explained that my position on Global Warming does not mean that I don't care about the planet. It means that I don't know that climate change is man-induced and that I seriously doubt that we can do very much to affect it. That assumes that recent changes are not a part of normal climate patterns, which they may well be.

Pete DuPont writes in today's Opinion Journal about where we should focus our time and resources. He begins by looking at climate change during human history:

The National Center for Policy Analysis's new Global Warming Primer (www.ncpa.org/globalwarming/) shows that over the past 400,000 years, "the Earth's temperature has consistently risen and fallen hundreds of years prior to increases and declines in CO2 levels" (emphasis added). For example, about half of the global warming increases since the mid-1800s occurred before greenhouse gas emissions began their significant increases after the 1950s, and then temperatures declined well into the 1970s when CO2 levels were increasing.
During the 20th Century the earth warmed by one degree Fahrenheit, and today the world is about 0.05 degree warmer than it was in 2001. These small increases have led the global-warming establishment to demand that we adopt the international Kyoto policy of stopping the growth of CO2 emissions so that global warming does not destroy us all. Or in Al Gore's words, "At stake is nothing less than the survival of human civilization and the habitability of the earth for our species."

Gore's statement is emblematic of all that is wrong with the environmental movement. His singleminded hyperbole is also an example of misplaced priorities. DuPont cites Bjorn Lomborg, noted critic of Gore and his followers:

Mr. Lomborg believes that while we must develop low-carbon technologies, "many other issues are much more important than global warming." Malaria kills more than one million people each year, and some four million die from malnutrition, three million from HIV/AIDS, 2.5 million from various air pollutants, and nearly two million from lack of clean drinking water. Solving these problems would save more lives and do more to improve the human condition than spending money on global CO2 reduction.
The final table in the book dramatically makes the case. Fully implementing Kyoto would cost $180 billion per year, but for $52 billion per year we could do much better by tackling the challenges Mr. Lomborg mentions. The world would avoid 28 billion malaria infections (and 85 million deaths) over a century, instead of Kyoto's avoidance of 70 million infections (and 140,000 deaths). There would be one billion fewer people in poverty instead of Kyoto's one million fewer, and 229 million fewer people would suffer from starvation rather than Kyoto's two million.

Hmmmm. I know where I want to put my time AND money. You may want to give Al Gore $25,000 so that he can exaggerate to you in person. Not me.

The Real "Sicko"

Michael Moore is an effective filmmaker and propagandist. His work is often as engaging as it is misleading, and his most recent film is no exception. Sicko claims to show the serious deficiencies in the U.S. health care system by looking at how we compare to nations like Canada, the U.K., and Cuba.

David Gratzer, a practicing physician licensed in the U.S. and Canada, debunks many of Moore's assertions about the superiority of state-provided healthcare:

Consider, for instance, Mr. Moore's claim that ERs don't overcrowd in Canada. A Canadian government study recently found that only about half of patients are treated in a timely manner, as defined by local medical and hospital associations. "The research merely confirms anecdotal reports of interminable waits," reported a national newspaper. While people in rural areas seem to fare better, Toronto patients receive care in four hours on average; one in 10 patients waits more than a dozen hours.
This problem hit close to home last year: A relative, living in Winnipeg, nearly died of a strangulated bowel while lying on a stretcher for five hours, writhing in pain. To get the needed ultrasound, he was sent by ambulance to another hospital.
In Britain, the Department of Health recently acknowledged that one in eight patients wait more than a year for surgery. Around the time Mr. Moore was putting the finishing touches on his documentary, a hospital in Sutton Coldfield announced its new money-saving linen policy: Housekeeping will no longer change the bed sheets between patients, just turn them over. France's system failed so spectacularly in the summer heat of 2003 that 13,000 people died, largely of dehydration. Hospitals stopped answering the phones and ambulance attendants told people to fend for themselves.
With such problems, it's not surprising that people are looking for alternatives. Private clinics--some operating in a "gray zone" of the law--are now opening in Canada at a rate of about one per week.

His use of Castro's Cuba to demonstrate a better system is the icing on the cake. Many people are not aware that for certain procedures Cuban citizens are required to provide many of their own materials. The system works very well for medical tourists but is atrocious for the average Cuban:

Dr. Julio Cesar Alfonso, 39, who practiced medicine in Cuba for four years before coming to Miami in 1999, describes the Cuban healthcare system as ''a disaster,'' from doctors reusing needles to draw blood from patients (and keeping a sharpening stone for the needles ) to the X-ray machine at Cardenas Regional Hospital, which hasn't been replaced since 1959.
''The treatment Moore and the rescue workers receive in the film was done specifically for them, because they knew it would make great propaganda,'' says Alfonso, a general practitioner in Little Havana. ``The medical centers in Cuba that treat tourists and government officials and VIPs are very different than the ones that treat the general population. If you're a Cuban citizen and need a prescription drug, most doctors either tell you to ask your relatives in the U.S. to ship it to you or recommend alternative herbal remedies. That's the degree of scarcity on the island.''

Michael Moore lives in a dream world. His ambition is to make it a reality. He has admitted that he would like to see the government handle all health care. Forget his dream- for us it would be a nightmare.

Chavez' Accomplices

It's pleasing when the friends of tyrants make themselves known. The Belmont Club has some information on some notables who are siding with the repressive actions of Hugo Chavez.

I don't recognize the people that are cited, but the title MP means Member of Parliament. Very nice of them to stand up and be counted.

El Viente de Mayo

Although not as well known as Cinco de Mayo, Viente de Mayo is an important date- it is the anniversary of Cuba's independence from Spain. As you can see on my sidebar, I have a Cuban flag. My heritage on my mother's side is Cuban, and I have included the inscription, "Esperando la libertad," which means "Waiting for freedom."

El Diario de las Américas (a Spanish-language newspaper based in Miami) commemorated this day in an editorial. You can read it here (in Spanish) and I wanted to relay an excerpt:

Qué doloroso es para los cubanos llegar a otro 20 de mayo con su patria esclavizada, cuando normalmente debería celebrarse el ciento cinco aniversario de la proclamación de su independencia ejerciendo la libertad republicana. El primero de enero de 1959, se diera cuenta mucha gente o no de que se había hundido la libertad de Cuba en el mar de la tiranía comunista, esa patria dejó de ser república. En la actualidad, pues, ese pueblo que Martí soñó para la libertad, por cuya causa murió en el combate de Dos Ríos, recién iniciada la guerra, lleva ya casi cuarenta y ocho años de no tener libertad ni independencia. Lleva ya casi cuarenta y ocho años de no ser república, ni cosa por el estilo.

A quick synopsis for English-speakers: It is sorrowful for Cubans to come to another May 20th with their homeland enslaved. It should be celebrated as the 105th anniversary of her independence but in 1959 it stopped being a republic and fell under communist tyranny. Almost 48 years have passed with liberty or independence.

That is far too long, and the continued sorry state of the Cuban people is due in no small measure to the deference leftists have shown to Castro's communism. Hailed early on as a hero, to this day you find intellectuals that defend his sorry government, despite incontrovertible evidence that Cuba is not free.

Now we find ourselves facing a similar danger in the form of Venezuelan despot Hugo Chavez. Again, leftists defend him, even treat him with respect. I received a comment on my blog the other day from someone named Julia_1984. She wrote:

I was impressed when I read the list about things cubans cannot do and find that some of them, are starting to happen (in a lower way, still) here in my country. And there's still some left intellectuals saying that the US media over reacts...

She has a blog where she talks about what is going on in her country today. I encourage you to visit it. We have been given a gift in this country. We are free. I have always believed it is our duty to bring that freedom to other people. This reminder is my small effort in that struggle. Don't allow the blessing of your birth to cause you to forget those who were not as fortunate.

Gun Rights Evolve

There has long been criticism from the right about judicial activism. Wikipedia defines it as:

Judicial Activism is a term used by political scholars to describe a tendency by judges to consider outcomes, attitudinal preferences, and other public policy issues in interpreting applicable existing law. Formally, judicial activism is considered the opposite of judicial restraint, but it is also used pejoratively to denote judges who are perceived to endorse a particular agenda.

There is a change in the way that some legal scholars, and as a result, some judges see gun rights. Some say that this change in viewpoint is evidence of judicial activism, as it is evidence of change in legal precedent established over decades. I disagree with that interpretation (legal scholar that I am) on the grounds that the precedent was wrongly conceived to begin with. Overturning existing precedent based on what is deemed the intent of the Constitution's framers is an originalist viewpoint, and that is the camp that I often side with.

The point of this post is to examine an article in the New York Times that discussed the role of liberal law experts in recent gun cases:

In March, for the first time in the nation’s history, a federal appeals court struck down a gun control law on Second Amendment grounds. Only a few decades ago, the decision would have been unimaginable.
There used to be an almost complete scholarly and judicial consensus that the Second Amendment protects only a collective right of the states to maintain militias. That consensus no longer exists — thanks largely to the work over the last 20 years of several leading liberal law professors, who have come to embrace the view that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to own guns.

Follow the link for more.

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Finally, a note on the French Presidential elections: I'm glad to see that conservative candidate Nicolas Sarkozy won the election, defeating the socialist candidate Segolene Royal. Despite Sarkozy's adherence to the European obsession with climate change, this can only improve U.S.-Franco relations, and that is a good thing as we continue the difficult War on Terror.

Muchas Cosas (Many Things)

Having been busy with my new lady (have you seen her?) I haven't had time to do some standard blogging, so here goes:

• Some friends of mine started a blog, In Rare Form. I mentioned it in SPOTD #122, but wanted to recommend it again. I think it is very funny and it is also quite eclectic. I especially enjoy the Miller Monday feature, which has covered everything from hybrid cars to Lifetime Original movies to David Hasselhoff v. William Shatner.
• The topic of hybrid cars provided renewed info on the Global Warming kerfuffle, and this helpful link from the U.K. Times (thanks to T. Russell Jacobson). It seems that Mars is experiencing a climate change similar to that of the earth. This may indicate that climate change is a natural phenomena (really?) and at the very least is the kind of information that you instill healthy skepticism for Goremania.
• Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has ordered the nationalization of several massive crude projects in his country. This is bad news for the companies operating the projects, but even worse for average venezolanos. This is because countries that respect and protect property rights tend to be more free and provide greater opportunity for their citizens. It's analogous to the woman who has an affair with a married man. She assumes he will be faithful to HER. The Venezuelan people do not realize that Chavez is not being faithful to THEM, as altruistic as he claims to be. Just look at Cuba.
• This website is hard to describe, but I really think it's worth a visit. They have pictures of cats and other animals, and there are captions, but the way they write them is amusing. I like it (Courtesy of Eric Snider)
• Possible Republican presidential aspirant, former senator, and current actor Fred Thompson provides commentary on occasion for ABC Radio. I like this one quite a bit. He looks at the unpopularity of the U.S. vis-a-vis the rest of the world, and why we shouldn't feel too bad about a lot of that criticism.

Finally, a few weird videos to make you laugh. The first is from a Starburst ad for Berries & Cream:

Fortunately, the little weirdo in the video has some background on his fascination for the B&C, which you can watch here. Just bizarre.

No Cuba Libre

I haven't posted anything about Cuba in a long time, so I am glad to have this list, which I received from Maret Mitchell. It comes from the Cuba Transition Project, a program of the University of Miami. Enjoy:

What Cubans Can Not Do:

Cubans can not:
 Travel abroad without government permission.
 Change jobs without government permission.
 Change residence without government permission.
 Access the Internet without government permission (the Internet is closely monitored and controlled by the government. Only 1.67% of the population has access to the Internet).
 Send their children to a private or religious school (all schools are government run, there are no religious schools in Cuba).
 Watch independent or private radio or TV stations (all TV and radio stations are owned and run by the government). Cubans illegally watch/listen to foreign broadcasts.
 Read books, magazines or newspapers, unless approved/published by the government (all books, magazines and newspapers are published by the government).
 Receive publications from abroad or from visitors (punishable by jail terms under Law 88).
 Visit or stay in tourist hotels, restaurants, and resorts (these are off-limits to Cubans).
 Seek employment with foreign companies on the island, unless approved by the government.
 Run for public office unless approved by Cuba's Communist Party.
 Own businesses, unless they are very small and approved by the government and pay onerous taxes.
 Join an independent labor union (there is only one, government controlled labor union and no individual or collective bargaining is allowed; neither are strikes or protests).
 Retain a lawyer, unless approved by the government.
 Choose a physician or hospital. Both are assigned by the government.
 Refuse to participate in mass rallies and demonstrations organized by the Cuban Communist Party.
 Criticize the Castro regime or the Cuban Communist Party, the only party allowed in Cuba.

It is disconcerting to see such repression just 90 miles off U.S. shores.