Croeso

Lefter leaning Nederlands

It was nice to see recently the Dutch following the fine example set by the South American electorates and voting lefter in the Council elections than the previous time. I think our ex colleague Wouter Bos will be the next Minister President here (fingers crossed anyway)

Good News in South America

The marvelous news that is coming from the South American Democracies is very encouraging.

Left wing parties are winning in the elections and Chile under Michelle Bachelet

And Bolvia under Evo Morales are exciting developments,

and hopefully with America engaged in the war against terror, they will not interfere (as they tend to do) and let these people serve the people of their countries well.

Salvador Allende and those lessons we must not forget, especially in 2005.

My wife and I have just watched a Chilean documentary on Salvador Allende.

My wife knew the history but I only knew the Bolivia, Argentina and Cuba revolution stories, sadly they main narratives reads the same.

Salvador Allende was the leader of the socialist revolution in Chile. In it the Americans role in his downfall was publicly admitted by the the US ambassador and the economic sanctions ánd opposition funding, that were applied were justified by limiting soviet influence in the region and on the grounds of regional stability. I am inspired by such a brave, principled and pacifist man, who wanted to introduce a socialist revolution without violence. A brave experiment and the external powers that pervaded at the time did not allow him to succeed. I was further disheartening to hear the US actions were supported also by the catholic church and various governments and institutions of Europe.

I am proud to live in a free, and mainly socialist Europe, but again recent events have rocked my beliefs and values, when forward thinking countries like Sweden can sanction American lead torture it rocks your very belief in the great successful societies that are Scandinavia and the Netherlands (the NL Royal family also supported the anti Allende action, by the way). There are indeed dark forces at work and we must all guard against them.

Look what happened in Chile post Allende, Pinochet - with literally hundreds of thousands detained and killed, thankfully there are some brave souls in Chile now who are holding Pinochet accountable.

Again this pacifist goes to bed with  heavy heart, how can we change the world to be just and fair if these dark forces operate outside of our democratic processes, yet claim to be in support of democracy. Democracy for whom always seems to be the pertinent question.