Sunday way off topic trivia

As some of you might remember I also hold a French passport. Thus I was drawn to this New York Times piece: Historians Reassess Battle of Agincourt. Apparently the mythic feat so eloquently put in verse by The Bard , and splashed on a great movie by Kevin Branagh, was not so mythic. True, Henry V forces were outnumbered but by not such a wide gap. It seems that diligent post victory propaganda made sure that the feat was grander for the numbers gap than the French incoherence.

Interestingly in my French school days that huge number gap was kept, which I suppose is a consequence of being in the losing side where you have other more pressing business to attend than figuring whether the French outnumbered 1 to 2 or 1 to 5. Besides, even if Azincourt (the French spelling) is looked at badly as a humiliating day, it is always put into the context of the civil war starting then between "Armagnacs et Bourguignons". That civil war dynastic consequences would drag all the way until Louis XIV. Also in the French psyche of the 100 Years War that I was taught, the battles of Crecy won by Edward III and Poitiers won by the Black Prince 50 years earlier are considered more fateful and more humiliating than Azincourt. This because in each one of the them the king was involved while Agincourt is looked more upon as a mad dash of unruly aristocrats as king Charles VI was sinking into folly and thus absent from command. A true disaster for sure, but an additional one to Civil War and the Mad King.

The power of myth is indeed powerful and crosses cultural barriers, influencing even the defeated. Fidel Castro understands this very well, and it is certainly part of the reason why chavismo is so busy rewriting history: after a while people will think that chavista manuals are indeed historical.... Venezuelans will start beleiving crap like "dia de la resistencia indigena" and black Bolivar just as the French bought the propaganda so nicely put up by Shakespeare. Hey, I am French but the Henry V harangue is stirring no matter what!

This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember'd;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day

-The end-

Uruguay votes

I have kept a semi regular correspondence with a reader from Uruguay who kept me informed of what was going on there. So, who better to ask for a guest post on Uruguay?
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Letter from Montevideo: What’s at stake this Sunday…

Montevideo – 23/10/09 - It’s Friday night and meteorology announces a red alert. As I write this, it rains hard and the wind blows heavily; I see thunder and lighting in the horizon. Somehow, it’s a perfect setting or symbolism for what we have been living these past months: a red alert, blackness and thunder, lots of thunder; lots of fireworks too, and no substance.

This Sunday Uruguay will vote for President, Vice-President, the General Assembly (30 senators and 99 National Representatives) and members of the 19 Electoral Juntas (one for each department) composed of 5 members each. Two plebiscites will also be voted: one to allow Uruguayan citizens abroad to vote by mail and another to annul the Amnesty Law to the Human Rights violators – the Armed Forces that perpetuated the Dictatorship in Uruguay from 1972 to 1985. Voting in Uruguay is compulsory.

There are five Presidential candidates and two favorites: José “Pepe” Mujica, the 74-year-old Senator from the Broad Front and fielded by the party in power, a Tupamaro guerilla in the 60’s. The second favorite is Luis Alberto Lacalle of the Nationalistic White Party who was President of Uruguay from 1990-1995. Both candidates emerged from the internal elections carried out in June, when the people elected their favorite within each political party. In both cases, the extremes won. The moderate candidates, Danilo Astori, Minister of Economy of the present government and Jorge Larrañaga lost their chance in that election. Both are the vice-presidential candidates of Mujica and Lacalle respectively.

“Everyone thought then, that the clash between those two strong personalities, with sharp political profiles, experienced, and with a clear vision of the country they wanted was going to be a tough and controversial process”, writes Tomas Linn in this week’s Búsqueda, a prestigious Uruguayan weekly newspaper. “However, it was not so”, he goes on. “The two candidates committed errors, had setbacks and deliberately blurred those visions. Mujica’s errors were bigger and more important. But Lacalle paid a higher price. And that can be explained: Mujica’s electorate tried to excuse his stumbles, while Lacalle’s could not conceal their distaste. This shows how different both electorates are”.

Those that do not belong to the undivided division that the Broad Front represents, don’t quite understand how the latest opinion polls do not reflect a downslide of Mujica’s numbers. A month ago the country was shocked with two “pieces” by this candidate. An interview with the Argentinean newspaper La Nación in which he declares “to be against government intervention in the economy, argues that ‘justice is vengeance’ and what matters are the human rights of the living, praises Brazil’s Lula da Silva negotiating skills, admits not understanding the political ideology of the Kirchner couple, loathes bureaucracy and apologizes for having condemned Uruguay to live under a military dictatorship” (a summary of sorts here).

The irony is that among the Uruguayan youth, the Tupamaros have created the myth that they fought against a dictatorship, not a government elected democratically. He says in Argentina that he is against government intervention in the economy, but here he says that he wants the workers to manage the factories, but not to become Capitalists”. He also says that the State should own all land, but denies having said it the next time. And last but not least, he wants a Constitutional Assembly for has never explained why and what for.

The second gaffe was a book called “Pepe Colloquies” published by Alfredo Garcia, Editor of a weekly newspaper called “Voices” (used to be called Voices of the Front, but shortened about a year ago). Garcia describes how for four months, every Monday morning for two hours, they chatted – seated on upside-down yellow buckets, in the candidates farm in the outskirts of Montevideo, about the future of Uruguay and his utopian dreams. “It was so difficult to systematize the turmoil of ideas and thoughts that poured from Mujica”, wrote Garcia, “that I gave up and decided to publish the conversations we had literally”. Among other things, he states that “The Kirchners are lefties, but what a left, mamma mia, what a gang!” and Argentina is a country “of hysteric, mad, paranoiac reactions”. In this book he criticizes God, the devil and President Vázquez himself, which brought an immediate reaction: “He talks pontifically and says a lot of stupidities”.

[Three parties together in the same Montevideo 'rambla costanera',
amiably campaigning for their man. Such a scene,
familiar in Venezuela until the 90ies,
is absolutely unthinkable today! ]

It took more than a month for Vázquez to accept taking a picture with the candidate of his party and says he will vote for him for disciplinary reasons. Mujica’s campaign team has ordered him to literally shut up, and he canceled several interviews with local political shows that he had previously agreed to. The undecided have grown, according to pollsters, and are a record number. Mujica called them “morons” and that if they were afraid of voting for him, they should throw their votes to the sea or issue a blank vote. With all that, polls still say he will be the probable next president of Uruguay. I don’t believe the polls, but that may be wishful thinking.

The country is divided in two halves. Which side will win on Sunday is still a mystery. There are several open options. 1) Mujica wins 50% + 1 of the votes with a Congress majority tomorrow; 2) the Broad Front wins the majority in Congress but there’s a run-off or ballotage with Lacalle and he wins the presidency in November; 3) neither party has a majority in Congress and Lacalle wins in a ballotage.

The Colorado Party, who had 9% of the votes in the past election, a “punishment” vote to Jorge Battle of this party who governed from 2000-2005, is the third runner up and is now presenting according to polls a 13-15% vote intent. Pedro Bordaberry, son of the man responsible for the Uruguayan coup d’état, has made a 2.0 modern-looking campaign and is still dreaming of having a surprise win over Lacalle, thus being the rival of Mujica in the ballotage. No way will this happen, but it may be one of the reasons for the #3 above to take place.

The fourth party is the social democratic Independent Party led by lawyer and sociologist Pablo Mieres. The party has only one Representative in Congress, vice presidential candidate Iván Posada. Their aim is to elect Mieres to the Senate and increase their number in the House of Representatives to 4 or 5. In the last polls they have a steady and increasing number of supporters that went from 2 to 4% and may also surprise tomorrow. [On the right Mieres, who I suppose is the choice of our guest blogger]

The fifth candidate is Raul Rodriguez of the newly created Popular Assembly, a scission of the Broad Front, who believes the later have betrayed the leftist ideals. They want to impose Cuba’s and Venezuela’s socialism in Uruguay. They may elect one member of Congress.

As to the Plebiscites, pollsters say that neither will obtain the necessary votes (50%) but this is also a mystery and another long story.

The dish is served. The dice have been thrown. In this election there are many things in play: the rule of law, democratic values and styles of coexistence in a society that has changed, and not for the better. Previously called the “Switzerland of the America”, the destiny of this small South American country is in the hands of a bunch of fanatics and a silent minority that hopes and prays for better days.

I’ll be supervising elections tomorrow, and the one reason I still hope, is that Uruguay has one of the most trustworthy electoral systems in the world. At least we are sure that whatever the results, it was what people really voted.

M.C.McC.

Editor's note: I understand that the author will be quite busy tomorrow during the election, due to her own political involvement. So she might not be able to reply to any question you might have until late in the day. But that should not stop you from asking anything you wish to know about that election that seems to have been financed by Venezuela. Imagine that! Chavez financing a Tupamaro!

-The end-

Electric peace nobel?

This recent cartoon of Weil escaped me. But it is perfect to illustrate why we are having so many power outages: there seems to be always money to give around to client states, but never the cash and the will to fix pressing problems at home. Chavez plane should get the peace prize because it keeps flying to La Paz, The Peace, all the time. Except that La Paz is of course Bolivia where petro dollars finance the political activities of Evo Morales, the bought president of Bolivia. Great pun!

By the way, Teodoro has another killer editorial on electric outage today! Maybe if I have time later...


-The end-

Maques del Toro is degraded to Conde

The risks of blogging.

The new history manual distributed around Venezuelan schools are apparently, according to an article in El Nacional today (subscription only), plagued with errors. However one of the list made me wonder: The Marques del Toro, close friend of Bolivar who in those years was less bolivarian than what Chavez would have us believe, is not reported as Conde, count, which I believe in Spanish heraldry is a demotion (I think in England Earl beats Marquess, but what do I know).

Whatever, I am sure that a very famous opposition blog has been the cause of such title change, since its editor is a distant relative of said aristocrat.

-The end-

The Chavez equation

The Petkoff editorial of Tal Cual today was simply irresistible and I had to translate it. It was also accompanied with an image that illustrates more than anything else the administrative failure of the worst government in Venezuelan history. The only question for us, for amusement, you know, is to hear the excuses of the PSF, more and more silent these days as they shift to Honduras their attention, a more palatable cause in their book I suppose.

THE THREE PLAGUES
Teodoro Petkoff

Over the country three major crises are converging simultaneously. The public security crisis, the crisis of the electrical system and the crisis of public health system. They are not the plagues of Egypt, they are the plagues of Chavez.

Not that Venezuela was a wonderland before Chacumbele [Chavez] , but what we had in those three areas then could withstand the worst eleven years of public administration this country has ever experienced. The oil boom, of course, disguised incompetence. But now the service structure that the government manages can no longer stand. Of course, these three crises are not unique.

Public education also is severely damaged and on the horizon rears the ugly head of the water crisis. Not to mention the economy. But, is the crisis of insecurity, health and electricity which at present fall with greater weight on the back of everyone in the country, particularly on the poor.

The poor cannot close up their streets, as do the inhabitants of the residential areas of middle class or the rich, nor can they afford private security; and police patrols do not circulate along the routes in the townships. The poor then are absolutely defenseless and unprotected and the public security crisis hits them with a particular harshness. For the poor there is no police and most of the crimes that overwhelm them go unpunished . 99% of homicides occur in the townships and a similar percentage of them are not even investigated. There are no courts of justice for the poor but what they have is prisons, the worst and most violent in the continent.

The poor can not go to private clinics and for them there is no HMC. Hospitals and clinics are overwhelmed and the relief that Barrio Adentro meant was short-lived. The Social Security system already has eleven years of delay. The Great Charlatan, without the slightest sense of the ridiculous, is "inviting" the gringo president "se venga pa’l socialismo" [slang: come over socialism]but Obama, in just nine months, is about to get Congress to approve his universal Social Security, while for the "revolutionary" and "socialist" Chacumbele almost eleven years have not been enough to settle this debt with the people.

In terms of electricity we have started to plunge into the "mar de la felicidad" ["sea of happiness" in which supposedly according to Chavez Cuba and Venezuela float]. Who would believe that this country, energy rich by definition, would know long hours of electricity rationing. Who could believe that Venezuela was going to live "alumbrón" in alumbrón "- as the Cubans say, to mark the end of the blackouts - [apagón=outage and the pun is that alumbrón would be the occasional non outage]. Of course, the poor are most affected by power failure, but this calamity indeed does not make for class distinctions.

Rich and poor alike suffer the consequences of these destructive plagues that has fallen over the country. [untranslatable expression closes the text: ¿Será verdad que todavía la sarna con gusto no pica?]



-The end-

A good day for Honduras? Nicaragua makes its own coup!

The provisional government of Honduras received a big boost yesterday, courtesy of nothing else than Nicaragua. Daniel Ortega, the thug, accused of rape and all sorts of other dubious moral acts, has managed to have a portion of the High Court to gather in a very questionable legality to suppress a constitutional article banning immediate reelection. That is, he goes one further than Zelaya, he uses an opaque ruling, not bothering with parliamentarian debate, or referendum, no nothing.

While we wait how this "legal" constitutional coup plays (I mean, a sudden convocation at 1 PM to decide in a rush the reelection of a president? gimme a break!) we can turn toward Honduras who feels cornered today but who must feel quite an ego boost, quite a validation after the cavalier way into which Ortega, its local nemesis, managed his right to reelection.

At this point Honduras would be well justified in breaking relationships with Brazil, turn off the embassy electricity (in solidarity with the Venezuelan people?), send the OAS packing and release a note stating that when the OAS worries at least half as much about Nicaragua than Honduras then they will be more than willing to reopen talks. I, for one, would support such a stand. After all, there is barely a month left for the vote and even if creeps like dictator loving foreign minister Moratinos of Spain announces that Spain will not recognize the result I can assure Micheletti that drop wise countries will come around after November 29.

The farce is reaching new heights of ridicule. The OAS is now totally discredited. After having bombastically condemned the Micheletti legal regime it had to accept to come to Tegucigalpa to negotiate to try to stop the blood shed that irresponsibly the OAS promoted with its knee jerk reaction to Chavez interests in the name of a moral that Chavez is the first one of the lot to ignore. I mean, the disregard of Chavez for the OAS is such that he had no qualms in promoting a judicial coup in Managua just as the OAS is negotiating another coup not even an hour away by plane. You will observe that the way the coup was conducted in Nicaragua is an imitation of the few judicial coups already experienced in Venezuela under Chavez.

Note: the coup was held courtesy of the lousy Latino American custom of having "substitutes" that can act whenever the main holder of the office is absent. In civilized country there is no such a figure, only too prone to abuses. When a US Supreme Court is sick or dies, his seat is vacant until a new Justice is named. When a Congress member becomes secretary or dies, the seat is vacant, period. And the Vice President, the only substitute contemplated in the constitution, has no power except presiding the Senate. Even in France where representatives are elected with a substitute, this last one has no duties until the seat if officially vacated for good because the holder has become a minister, resigned or croaked. Once the substitute enters the Palais Bourbon, he becomes the holder for good.

But in our culture where political rewards are the norm, they invented the substitute practice that allows constant interchangeability. That way more people could get if not a fully paid job (they get in general compensation when they replace the main holder even for only a day) they get at least a "honor". This is what happened in Nicaragua where the Liberal holders of the Court seats were convoked too late, or were away, and the substitutes, Sandinistas (?!?!?!?!), stepped in a jiffy to vote a major constitutional interpretation.

That pernicious custom, as well as reelections, are to be banned from our political system if we want to have some day serious governments. And that goes for you too, Alvaro Uribe, NO REELECTION and if we must have it, two consecutive SHORT terms, period.

-The end-

Chavismo is shorting big time over lack of juice

Still immersed in electoral calculations I need to comment on that fascinating episode of chavismo history, the month when the electric crisis came back to zap them in the ass. The press is all full of technical reports about how that problem arose and whose guilt is. There is much less consensus about finding a solution since any will be, well, painful. Or we can look at the whole episode as yet another morality tale.

The cold naked facts first

Chavez has been in office for soon 11 years. That is, he has been already in office for more than TWICE the rule of any of his democratically elected predecessors. No one remembers his predecessors for constant power outages and damages TV, refrigerators, and other appliances....

Part of the distribution grid and of the production system where privately owned, though the state was the main player. Chavez decided to nationalize it all, flush of his 2006 victory.

With ups and downs, the Venezuelan economy did not grow that much in production, even retreating in many items, but it clearly grew a lot in import, distribution and expensive A.C. malls for shopping.

Experts seem to agree that electrical consumption grew by about 25% over the last decade while production only grew by about 10%. Give or take a couple of points it does not matter, there is a big deficit, period. And nothing was ever done to solve it.

The government has known for at least 5 years that massive investments in electricity distribution were necessary, that oil/gas burning had to increase significantly, and that we were too much at the mercy of an El Niño cycle to dry out the Guri system water reserve of which maybe 70% of our juice depends.

What has the government done? It finished the Caruachi dam, which was started BEFORE Chavez came to power. Chavez himself promised 29 generating plants a few years ago. Work has started on 5, only two of them producing so far, but at a partial rate.

That is all. Only today we learned that in a rush the IBD had approved a credit for a new dam, that should work in a couple of years. Yeah, right.....

Why the fiasco?

The reason for the looming disaster upon us is, I am afraid, more than ever, that those who rule over us, starting with economy minister Giordani in office for about 9 years already, have no fucking idea how a modern economy is run. They have their head simply filled with ideological nonsense and think that with power in hand they will force things to work the way they think they should work. It is that simple. Reality for them is a distraction.

If you prefer a more pragmatical explanation I could advance the overreach of populism, where the need to promise new things all the time, to give free stuff all the time simply eliminates investments in all that is not visible, immediate, quick fixes. Fixing electrical system is not glamorous, people do not see it and in chavismo sick mind the hoi polloi will not be thankful for a good electrical service anyway.

Though of course these explanations, far from being exclusive, work well together.

Electrical shorts not only at home but in the brains of chavismo

The consequences are becoming dramatic. At work we lose now at least a day of work a month, and Yaracuy is one of the less hit areas, so far. But elsewhere reports of daily outages lasting up to 12 hours are now routine. You can decide for yourself how the quality of life is affected, in particular for the poor without AC, and a small cheap refrigerator that cannot hold the cold for that long.

What is much more interesting is to listen to the reactions of chavismo, showing that they are very annoyed by this trivial matter for them. In their words there is really no much concern for the people, just a wish to talk about something else, the revolution, the hated US and whatever. That people want to have cold drinks and TV to watch their soaps does not seem to enter in their minds. A few examples below.

Giordani, the economy minister, the guy who has presided over two major devaluations of the Venezuelan currency, who has never been fired due to some mystical hold he must have on Chavez had no other explanation but to blame the "preceding administration". This is simply stunning since himself represents a length of time in office almost equal to two of these preceding administrations. HE IS his own preceding administration! What has he been doing all of these years? No, in his attitude what you read is the second rate academic, trained in Italian universities at the time where communism was seen as the answer to all, a guy of such arrogance that he thinks his longevity in office is actually his ultimate validation and that he has no accounting to give to anyone. Read his recent interview where he clearly has no idea as to why the Venezuelan economy is slowing down, anyone's fault but his policies.

Henrique Maestre, the governor of Sucre. This individual is one of the scummiest characters offered by chavismo. He comes across as the barrio thug, and has been acting like that all of his so called political life. He is an animal and in his excuses for the electricity outages he comes across as such, totally ignorant of economics, even of its simplest elements. See, he justified the electric outages because Chavez had to chose between financing Barrio Adentro or electricity for the country. First, he is comparing apples and oranges. But much, much worse, he confesses that the social programs of chavismo were established WITHOUT ANY CONSIDERATION AS TO THEIR LONG TERM SUSTAINABILITY. I am not even discussing if the people and the means existed, I am here observing coldly that chavismo set up Barrio Adentro as an electoral propaganda ploy never worrying about its long time chances or effectiveness. No wonder more than 2000 of the Barrio Adentro modules have closed! And note: they closed before the electrical situation became catastrophic so in a way the excuse of Maestre is not even a good tall tale of Chavez generosity!!! By the way, what good is a Barrio Adentro module if it is out of juice?

There are other examples but let's finish this post with El Supremo himself. Clearly the man never believed that the electric crisis would come. He sounds totally surprised and is bereft of any idea how to face it. He has had at least 4 years to start doing stuff to prevent it or at least attenuate the effect. But he has not done so because he had to win elections, he had to give away food and aspirin, he had to give away refrigerators and washing machines in barrios lacking running water or stable electricity, he had to build the ALBA against the US of A, he had to finance Cuba with more money than even the Soviets gave in their heyday. A man of his stature could not be bothered with such mundaneness. But he never had the wisdom to name someone to fix the problem and let him or her work at it, even on a budget.

So, as is expected in such situation where bureaucrats are trapped by their own inefficacy and lack of prevision, he comes up with silly measures that make little sense ad that are not going to solve the problem whatsoever.

First he ordered a campaign to educate people in saving energy. If we judge on the results of previous campaigns launched by Chavez we know the fate of this new one. Can any one name for me a successful educational campaign involving health or social services launched by Chavez? Must I remind you of the street kids fiasco? Must I remind you that he NEVER launched a campaign or judicial measures against fathers abandoning wife and kids? None of his initiatives to make sure people do not throw trash in the street has worked, not even a single fucking day! The only one that I can think of with a very limited success is to limit road alcohol consumption on certain holidays. And he pretends now to educate us as how to save electricity? Even his light bulb changing campaign has gone nowhere because when the energy efficient bulbs eventually burn down people go back to the old incandescent bulbs, much cheaper than the ones that were originally given by the government for free.

Then he decides that the rich should pay more for their electric bill, because they have all those A.C at home and two refrigerators and wide screen TV and whatever nonsense crosses his neurones at such moments. First, he can double my electric bill and it will not affect me because electricity is dirt cheap in Venezuela. I have an electric kitchen! And a water heater! And yet I rarely pay more than 50Bs. for a month service! Less than what I paid years ago in the US in Spring where I used neither AC nor heat! Trust me on that one, he can double electric fare for the rich, the savings will be minimum. Amen of the fact that the people that are heavy consumers at home are no more than a very few percentage points (maybe 5?).

But Chavez will never take the measures that are really needed because they would go against all the cheap populism he has established in 11 years. For example, by minister Ramirez own admission, he can start by forcing the government to pay the huge electrical bill it owes!!!! Yes, that is right, the utilities biggest dead beats in Venezuela is the government because no electric company can cut service if they do not pay! The less now that they all belong to the state... Of course that would mean that ministries and other offices would have to cut down on such things as campaign support, red t-shirt distributions and other such things to pay for their juice!

Another area where true saving could happen is to force the immense barrios of Venezuela to stop stealing electricity. They should be forced to pay at least a cheap flat rate. Why? Because if you travel anywhere in Venezuela you will be astounded at the intricacy of the electrical cables floating above your heads. That is, it is estimated that anywhere between 20 to 40% of electricity in Venezuela is simply stolen. And that robbery is highly inefficient of course. By simply offering a cheap but monitored service Chavez could reduce more the waste than increasing the electricity bill of the rich. However forcing people to pay for electricity would have the same political cost for the government as doubling the ridiculous price of gas which has not changed in 11 years in spite of an accumulated inflation that floats around 600%.

On the other hand the measures Chavez might take will eventually be a rationing of electricity, on a "provisional" excuse due to El Niño failing to water adequately this year the Caroni water head. This would become permanent sooner than later, at a tremendous cost for the development of the country. I mean, how can you build an economy, socialist or not, if you have electrical rationing and the lousy service wrecks regularly your electrical motors? Amen of increasing the electric bill of companies already burdened with the highest working costs of Latin America.

In other words, prepare for next year electricity induced recession. And if Chavez indeed opens a dozen electrical plants next year (one can always dream) he will be exporting less oil, adding to the recession. Go and buy a home generator if you can afford it. The electrical problem is going to last as long as Chavez is president. He is unable to solve it.

By the way, what good it is for the defense of Venezuela to buy all those second rate Russian weaponry if we have no electricity? Has any of the fat and corrupt generals surrounding Chavez pointed out to him that a couple of cruise missiles at a couple of electric distribution centers are enough to stop Venezuela? Remember, 70% of our electricity comes from a single area... Stopping buying weapons and instead buy 30 generating plants would increase Venezuela security way more than a half dozen semi obsolete Sukhois.

-The end-