Reply #21: I wont vote for a radical!!! [View All]

putting the bill of rights through the shredder was radical
free trade is radical i think
that our jobs going away to slaves is radical
The rape of land is radical
the stealing land from indigenous populations is radical
the gross violation of human and workers rights is radical
freet trade is so radical it drove the population it oppressed to havea revolution in bolivia
Bolivia's Poor Proclaim Abiding Distrust of Globalization By LARRY ROHTER

Published: October 17, 2003 (NY TIMES)

A PAZ, Bolivia, Oct. 15 — The many Indian protesters who choked the streets and highways of this Andean nation again on Thursday may be poor and speak broken or accented Spanish, but they have a powerful message.
It is this: no to the export of gas and other natural resources; no to free trade with the United States; no to globalization in any form other than solidarity among the downtrodden peoples of the developing world.

The force of that message may yet topple President Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, who tried to quell the unrest by offering a package of concessions late Wednesday night that the protesters rejected.
Instead they vowed to continue with demonstrations meant to force his government to abandon a plan to export natural gas to the United States through a port in Chile. The protests have already left more than 80 people dead over the past month.

Sensing that public support for the president, weak to begin with, has all but vanished, opponents of the gas export plan have now moved to press their advantage.
"The blood that has been spilled is something sacred," Felipe Quispe, leader of the indigenous group that initiated the protests, said in response to Mr. Sánchez de Lozada's offer, made in a televised speech. "So we can't negotiate and we're not even going to talk."
Several thousand workers, mostly miners from the south and coca growers from the north, were reported to be marching on the capital Thursday. The armed forces demanded that they disperse, saying that the military would erect barricades to prevent them from entering La Paz, but the warning appeared to have gone unheeded.
More than merely threatening the longevity of Bolivia's government, the protesters have lent new energy to the discontent already percolating throughout the region.

Across South America, labor unions, student and civic groups and a new wave of leaders — Hugo Chávez in Venezuela, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in Brazil, and Néstor Kirchner in Argentina — are expressing similar doubts about who actually benefits from a free flow of international trade and investment.



http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/17/international/americas/17GLOB.html?8...