One gringo more or less (reply to Nestor)

["Tom O'Lincoln" <suarsos@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Nestor, you wrote:

>>Current events in Latin  America tend to have that effect on those who
look on them with, let me tell you, Tom -and please be not offended if I
sound harsh because this is not "for the par" on Marxmail, simply I am not
such an able writer in English- unrealistic "socialist" hopes?. Let it be
clear from the beginning: there was _no_ chance whatsoever,   at _any
moment_, that the current Bolivian rebellion would lead to a socialist
outcome.<<

No offence taken, especially as your English is a lot better than my
Spanish. But having re-read my post, I don't see where I said anything
about a socialist outcome. I take it as read that this is effectively
excluded, though perhaps on different grounds. I think it takes a socialist
revolutionary leadership to achieve that, and this clearly does not exist
in Bolivia. 

[Quick digression: By leadership I mean a _mass_ revolutionary organisation
with deep roots among all the exploited and oppressed, not small cadre
groups or even somewhat bigger organisations such as the POR.]

>> Some in Argentina, already, have begun to explain that Bolivia has  been
another "lost" opportunity.<<

Well I have no connection to them, but what I'm talking about is not a
missed opportunity for socialism, but the danger of a missed opportunity to
seriously shake up the system. I read the COB document which seemed quite
advanced, and thought we were seeing something radical. I still think we
are. But saying "we don't want a gringo president" is not radical at all -
you can hear that sort of thing from the Australian Labor Party any day of
the week.

The centre of my concerns was this:

>>as the article says, the country is  not really any less colonised
because the "gringo" has gone: after all he governed with general bourgeois
support: "[El] gobernó con el apoyo de casi todos los partidos políticos
del  sistema y recibió el respaldo de connotados intelectuales,
historiadores, periodistas, politólogos y artistas... (he governed with the
support of almost all the political parties of the system, and received the
 backing of prominent intellectuals, historians, journalists, political
scientists and artists")<<

In other words, getting rid of one "gringo" does not even seriously
challenge neo-colonialism, and if the movement fails to do that, it seems
to me that would indeed be a missed opportunity.

I read the rest of your post with great interest.

regards
Tom


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