The Autocrat

Chávez, amid the shouting and the chaos and the violence and the pots banging and the oil tankers sitting idle. Chávez, the first brown-skinned president of brown-skinned Venezuela.

He's a populist. Not a socialist. Not a communist. Yet perhaps not the kind of democrat many might hope for. He promises land reform. He insists on a strong government hand in the country's oil industry. He blocks privatization of water. He expects the oil giants to pay royalties from the cash in their bulging corporate coffers in exchange for the oil they take.

And for this he has earned the visceral hatred of his country's established white elite. And that's why he's called an autocrat. This cannot go on. He must be stopped. The autocrat must be neutralized.

And when it happens, we will be told that the assassination was the fault of the rioting masses, and we'll imagine terrorists with bandanas concealing their brown-skinned faces. And when it happens, we'll be relieved that the mob was stopped. Stopped dead in their tracks.

That's what we'll think, because so little of the story is being told.

Resources:

• [Brazil sends gas to Venezuela]
• [BBC/Palast]
• [Greg Palast]
• [Venezuela bibliography]
• [Unabashed reporting]

Much credit to Greg Palast who spoke live on KPFT-Houston this afternoon.

8:16:15 PM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []