Boycotts threaten to turn Biden’s Summit of the Americas into a political disaster

US neighbors say the president’s reported “democracy vs. autocracy” invite list is a no-go and are willing to forgo the whole thing.

MAY 18, 2022

Written by
Aileen Teague

https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2022/05/18/why-biden-should-invite-cuba-venezuela-and-nicaragua-to-the-summit-of-the-americas/

Last week, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador declared that he will boycott this year’s Summit of the Americas, scheduled to take place June 6-10 in Los Angeles, if the Biden administration fails to invite the leaders of Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua.

While no final decision has yet been announced, several U.S. officials have indicated recently that the questionable human rights records and authoritarian governance of each of these countries disqualify them from attendance, a position that has raised hackles throughout the hemisphere.

Indeed, Lopez Obrador is not the only leader in the hemisphere who may not show up unless Washington extends invitations to all three countries. Last week, Bolivia’s president, Luis Arce, tweeted a similar intention, while several Caribbean leaders have suggested that at least some if not all members of CARICOM, which consists of 15 English-speaking Caribbean member-countries and five associate members, may decide to stay home. The newly elected president of Honduras, Xiomara Castro, has also suggested she won’t go if the three nations’ leaders are not invited.

These threats suggest that the first Summit to be hosted by the United States since its inaugural session in Miami in 1994 is not only setting up the Biden administration for a serious diplomatic embarrassment, but also for a major missed opportunity to focus attention on the growing strategic importance of its hemispheric neighbors. Washington needs the support of its regional partners to tackle critical issues, notably illegal migration, the drug trade, climate change, and growing Chinese influence in the Americas. The Summit itself is not solely to promote U.S. interests but to promote the interests of all the countries in the Americas.

In a region where the United States is quickly losing influence and partner nations perceive U.S. disinterest, the Biden administration will lose political capital if it allows its growing tendency to divide the world into “democratic” friends and “authoritarian” states to dictate the invitation list for a forum that is much larger than Washington’s professed policy objectives, however laudable they may be. A summit with critical partners missing would also deliver a huge blow to Biden’s attempts to find solutions to U.S. domestic problems that range from border security to immigration flows to the rise in oil and gas prices.

Moreover, Washington’s position on the Summit is hypocritical, inconsistent, and ultimately undermines an already-faltering U.S. position in the Americas.

The United States has championed human rights and democracy promotion around the world, but those efforts have been uneven in the Americas, to say the least. From Mexico through Argentina, the United States practiced a policy of backing – sometimes even installing – politically violent, even genocidal dictators and local elites who supported Washington’s anti-communist policies, both before and during the Cold War. In Latin America, the United States has a far longer track record of supporting human rights violators than of advocating for the masses whose rights were violated. The special irony of excluding Cuba and Nicaragua from this year’s Summit is that Washington went to great lengths during the Cold War, including providing critical support to armed insurgencies and imposing severe economic sanctions, to destabilize and eventually overthrow leftist governments in both countries, thus infusing their successor leaders with understandable skepticism about Washington’s insistence that their exclusion reflects Washington’s dedication to democracy and human rights throughout the hemisphere.

On top of this, the case of Venezuela presents the United States with a dilemma. If the United States invites Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido, whom it recognizes as the legitimate president of the country, the Caribbean states, who have never recognized Guaido as Venezuela’s president, are more likely to boycott. Indeed, Washington is increasingly isolated by its continued loyalty to Guaido whose years-long efforts to unite the opposition against President Nicolas Maduro have come to naught. Even the European Union, which initially recognized Guaido as president after his election as president of the National Assembly, has reduced his status to one of privileged interlocutor” in an implicit acknowledgment of the abject failure of Washington’s de facto “regime change” policy.      

Though White House press secretary Jen Psaki, who just stepped down this week, and State Department spokesman Ned Price indicated that the discussion of attendance remains hypothetical, even at this very late stage — no invitations have yet been issued — the growing hemispheric contretemps over who gets an invitation seems unlikely to end well. Christopher Sabatini, senior fellow for Latin America at Chatham House, a London-based think tank, wrote in Foreign Policy magazine that without a significant change in U.S. posturing, this year’s summit could be seen as “a gravestone on U.S. influence in the region.”

The Summit, which was initiated by former U.S. President Bill Clinton, is held every three years in a different country and was initially intended to help foster closer hemispheric cooperation around issues including democracy and shared economic and related problems. It was also intended to boost U.S. public and business interest in the country’s southern neighbors. But levels of U.S. interest in the forum have been inconsistent, especially in recent years. 

In an unprecedented move, President Donald Trump skipped the eighth summit held in Lima, Peru in 2018, sending Vice President Mike Pence in his place. Both Maduro and Daniel Ortega, Nicaragua’s increasingly authoritarian president, attended the 2018 Summit. After U.S. President Barack Obama normalized relations with Havana in 2014, Cuba was invited and participated in both the 2015 and 2018 Summits. Trump’s absence in 2018 merely served to highlight the increasing irrelevance and decreasing influence of the United States in the region and the faltering inter-American system.      

Things have not much improved under Biden, in major part due to domestic political considerations and partisan politics. The confirmation of key ambassadorships in the Americas has been delayed in Congress for months due to holds put on confirmations by Republican Sen. Ted Cruz for unrelated reasons having to do with his opposition to the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. It was only just announced that Frank Mora, Biden’s nominee as U.S. ambassador to the Organization of American States, would be confirmed later this week, less than three weeks before the summit.

Domestic political bickering has also shaped the position the White House finds itself in with Cuba. Senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey, a Cuban-American Democrat who also chairs the Foreign Relations Committee, has long opposed the normalization of U.S.-Cuba relations. In an evenly split Senate, Menendez’s support is viewed by the White House as critical to a wide range of foreign policy issues, which gives him enormous leverage on the policies he cares most about. Although the administration this week moved more decisively to ease Trump-era sanctions against Havana despite strong objections by Menendez, whether it can bring itself to invite Cuba to the Summit remains up in the air.      

Until the 2015 Summit where Obama met with then-President Raul Castro, an encounter that helped lay the groundwork for Obama’s historic trip to Havana a year later, the question of Cuba’s participation in the Summit, as well as other hemispheric venues, served as a perennial source of friction between the United States and most of the rest of the hemisphere. But Trump’s reversal of Obama’s opening to the Caribbean island – and Biden’s delays in fully restoring relations – have effectively thrust the issue back onto the hemispheric agenda in ways that are likely to negatively affect Washington’s relationships, particularly if, as polls currently predict, Luis Inacio Lula de Silva, is returned to the Brazilian presidency in elections later this year. 

With incoming president Biden declaring “America is back,” one might have expected swift policy changes in the Americas, but the president’s initiatives have so far proved to be more rhetoric than reality.

Biden condemned Trump’s inhumane policies toward migrants on the campaign trail, promising major changes if elected. Ultimately, President Biden has inherited the regional migration problem in his own right, with Vice President Kamala Harris, the point person in the administration’s Central America “root causes” strategy, famously telling Guatemalans, “do not come” during her June 2021 visit to Central America. Despite increased attention on migration from Central America, Cuba, and elsewhere, the issue – and the perception in the region that Washington, even under Democrats, remains hostile to desperate migrants – continues to rankle relations between the U.S. and Latin America.               

Indeed, with U.S. attention hyper-focused on its own priorities – namely migration, drug trafficking, and China – its regional partners are less inclined to work with a northern giant they see as selfish, arrogant, and hubristic. The question is, can the United States momentarily put aside its domestic fixations and great power concerns for the greater good of the hemisphere?

U.S. re-engagement with its partners in the region is long overdue. It is not that the United States should not hold countries accountable for their human rights records. It’s that making clean human rights records and democratic governance preconditions for being invited to a summit designed to tackle the hemisphere’s immense challenges is bad practice, not to say historically inconsistent and hypocritical.           

The absence of Presidents López Obrador, Castro, and Arce, and the leaders of other regional partners would be keenly felt and damaging to the forum in future years. It would present China with new opportunities to assert its own growing influence. There is still time for the United States to create a relevant summit and promote successful partnerships in all of the Americas, but it is running out.  

 ‘Brave’ SWAT Squad Races to School, Then Waits 40 Minutes as Parents Scream for Action

MAY 27, 2022

BY DAVE LINDORFF

https://www.counterpunch.org/2022/05/27/brave-swat-squad-races-to-school-then-waits-40-minutes-as-parents-scream-for-action/

In the Uvalde Elementary School mass shooting of 19 children we had on display the true nature of SWAT units,  those  Special Weapons and Tactics cops trained to take on the most dangerous of criminals and terrorists, but who are always thinking first of their own safety.

The SWAT squad got to the school in force quite promptly, but then, to the consternation and fury of neighbors and parents — who were screaming at them to “Stop it! and “What are you doing — get inside the building!” — they stayed safely back. (In fact, if they did anything at all it was fight off and tackle frantic  parents trying to get to the school!)

An unarmed Amadou Diallo was slaughtered 47 years ago while standing on his front stoop, hit by 40 bullets fired by four frightened police undercover officers.

A few days ago, an 18-year-old whacked-out kid armed with two assault rifles shot was given 40 uninterrupted minutes in a locked classroom to kill 19 fourth grade kids and two teachers while the SWAT officers who were suited up in their body armor waited patiently for someone to get them a key to open the door to the room.  They didn’t run and get one of those battering rams they so routinely use to break in the front door of houses to serve a warrant for a missed court or to conduct a surprise drug search. They didn’t just kick the door in or shoot out the lock.

They waited.  For a key.

By the time they finally went in to shoot and killed the gunman inside, his killing spree was over. He’d had all the time he needed to do what his sick mind intended.

Why do communities and cities waste all that money creating terminator squads in their communities that, when the moment when they are really needed arrives, they just stand around waiting for the ammo to run out, or for the killer to commit suicide?

There is really only one answer:  The people who choose to be on SWAT units are not brave. They are not like the firefighters who, arriving at the scene of a burning house, apartment building, shopping mall, or factory, as soon as they hear there may be people inside, just run into the inferno without hesitation to try and save those lives.  Not SWAT crews. They wait, just as they did as the killings went on and on at Columbine High School 23 years ago.

Oh, the SWAT cops are pretty brave when the job is a warrant to serve, or a search for drugs. Then they might toss a flash-bang grenade or two through a window, fire some shots through the door, and charge in, terrorizing everyone in the home, maybe killing innocents in the process.

But when it is a barricaded killer — even a killer of small children — and is someone carrying an automatic weapon, they aren’t so courageous.

That’s when we see that cop mentality at work. Like those cops outside of Diallo’s apartment building who saw him fumbling for his wallet and thought “He might be going for a gun! I fear for my life!  Better shoot him!”  and so all four of the assembled cops empty their revolvers into him. Their expressed fear was all they needed to avoid punishment for killing an unarmed man just trying to get into his apartment after a day of work.

If SWAT units cannot rescue a classroom filled with 10-year-olds being murdered mercilessly one by one then why do we even have them?

Ordinary police can stand around waiting just as well as SWAT officers, and they don’t cost as much.  And without the SWAT units raiding people’s homes at 4 in the morning, we’d have a lot fewer unarmed citizens being shot and killed by police.

I’d say Uvalde or whatever Texas police departments dispatched those useless SWAT-trained officers should fire every one of them for dereliction of duty.

A couple of regular cops who responded to the scene first did exchange fire with the attacker in the school and were shot. They are heroes for trying to stop him. So is the School Safety officer who allegedly confronted him.

But the SWAT units at the scene are simply a disgrace. They only serve to demonstrate why the entire concept, developed in Los Angeles by the LAPD in the ’70s and metastasized across the US since then,  encouraged by absurd Hollywood depictions of heroic men (and women) dressed like Terminators and sporting assault rifles, taking on heavily armed drug armies and terrorists without a thought given to their own safety.

The truth is much sadder and more maddening.

Just as American troops get called heroes for calling in their First World weapons of mass destruction, from drone-fired Hellfire missiles to cluster bombs and thermobaric bombs to slaughter Third World peasants and urban fighters defending their own lands with AKs and home-made explosives,  SWAT cops get lionized for beating on and killing people — sometimes even raiding the wrong address. Meanwhile, now, when it really is the time for a SWAT response, they can be counted on only to diddle around waiting for the shooting to stop before going in.

Too late guys. The kids are all dead. Their teachers too.

Dave Lindorff is a founding member of ThisCantBeHappening!, an online newspaper collective, and is a contributor to Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion (AK Press).

The Danger of Worsening Relations With Both Russia and China

MAY 27, 2022

BY MELVIN GOODMAN

https://www.counterpunch.org/2022/05/27/the-danger-of-worsening-relations-with-both-russia-and-china/

Q: “Are you willing to get involved militarily to defend Taiwan if it comes to that?”  (CBS News)

A: “Yes.” (President Joe Biden, May 23, 2022)

Q: “ You are?” (CBS)

A: “That’s the commitment we made.” (President Biden)

Once again, an unplanned and impromptu remark from President Biden has generated controversy, although this represents his third (incorrect) reference to a commitment to defend Taiwan.  Each time, Biden’s national security team has tried to walk back the president’s remarks, but the fact of the matter is that the United States is pursuing a policy of confrontation and containment with China.  There has been no attempt to pursue a diplomatic solution to our differences with China or to give Chinese leader Xi Jinping reason to believe that Sino-American relations could be improved through the pursuit of a serious diplomatic dialogue.

It wasn’t difficult to assess China in the past because Beijing has had to deal with a hostile Soviet presence along a long international border since WWII, which required extensive military deployments and resources.  This is no longer the case.  While Biden was in Japan last week, Russia and China conducted a major exercise in the Pacific, flying strategic bombers over the Sea of Japan and the East China Sea.  The joint exercise demonstrates the success that Beijing and Moscow are having in coordinating military policy against the interests of the United States.

The United States was particularly fortunate that, despite its full-scale warfare against North Vietnam in the 1960s, the Sino-Soviet dispute provided the Johnson and Nixon administration with a free hand in Southeast Asia. The dispute led to a bloody confrontation along the Amur and Ussuri rivers in 1969.  The Johnson administration was slow to understand the nature and intensity of the Sino-Soviet dispute, but the Nixon administration moved adroitly to ensure that Washington would have better relations with both Beijing and Moscow than the two leading communist powers had with each other.

The triangular diplomacy of President Richard Nixon and national security adviser Henry Kissinger paid major dividends, including the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty and the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty with the Soviet Union as well as improved bilateral relations with China that led to full-scale diplomatic recognition in the administration of Jimmy Carter.  The Watergate crisis, the Nixon resignation, the inexperience of Gerald Ford, and the hubris of Carter’s national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski kept the United States from exploiting the initial successes of the strategic triangle between the United States, the Soviet Union, and China.

The United States was similarly fortunate regarding its bilateral relations with both the Soviet Union and China as a result of leadership changes in Moscow and Beijing.  In 1979, China radically changed course under Deng Xiaoping, who pursued economic reform and a non-ideological foreign policy.  Deng wanted China to “hide its strength, and bide its time.”  In 1985, Mikhail Gorbachev emerged as the Soviet leader, and he was determined to pursue economic reform (perestroika) and greater scrutiny of previous Kremlin policy (glasnost).  He wanted an improved relationship with the United States and used arms control and disarmament to ensure a durable detente.  The Chernobyl crisis in 1986 afforded an opportunity to purge the military, and to create a national security team oriented toward improved relations with the West.  Now, the United States must deal with the extreme nationalism and anti-Americanism of Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping.

We are eighteen months into the Biden administration, and the flawed policy of Donald Trump toward China is still in place.  The policy of confrontation and containment risks the ratcheting up of military and economic pressure on China.  Editorial columns in the Washington Post and the New York Times favor this hard-line policy, calling for greater defense spending to enable a “faster modernization and rearmament of the U.S. military.”  Presumably, Pentagon strategists are already preparing budget requests that are oriented to a “two-front war,” which drove U.S. spending to record levels in the 1980s right up to the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.  The notion that the United States could succeed in battling both Russia and China at the same time is particularly ludicrous.

Last week, an op-ed in the Post argued that “should China decide to wage war with the United States today, it would do so with modern weaponry purchased with U.S. money and often built with U.S.-designed technology.”  The idea that China would “decide to wage war with the United States” is particularly obtuse.  The belief that the policy of containment that worked against the weak Soviet Union will have favorable results with a strengthened China is an illusion.

Biden’s declaration to defend Taiwan if China attacked may have gone too far, but the formation of an Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, a thirteen-nation pact that excluded China, didn’t go far enough.  The Framework is no substitute for the Trans-Pacific Partnership that was negotiated by the Obama administration and abandoned by the Trump administration.  Unlike the Framework, the Partnership involved economic engagement with East Asia, India, and Australia.  The Framework is not a trade deal; it doesn’t open new markets.

Biden’s decision to maintain tariffs on Chinese imports has divided his national security team, with Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen and Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo arguing that removing some of the tariffs would offset rising prices.  Daleep Singh, a deputy national security adviser, has argued that the Biden administration inherited the tariffs from the Trump administration and that the tariffs “serve no strategic purpose.”  Thus far, the hardliners on China, particularly National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and U.S. trade representative Katherine Tai, have convinced Biden that the tariffs provide leverage for the United States vis-a-vis China.  According to Harvard Professor Jason Furman, “tariff reduction is the single biggest tool the administration has” in fighting inflation.

Unfortunately, no one in the Biden administration seems to be making the case that the policy of decoupling the United States from ties to China and trying to take on both Russia and China will be hugely expensive in terms of resources and appropriations.  Biden’s approach will require huge expenditures for both air and naval platforms, leaving inadequate resources for domestic requirements, particularly for infrastructure and the climate challenge.  In his first months, Biden emphasized there would be a review of our global military presence.  But he gave this task to the Pentagon, which recommended no withdrawal or reductions.  Indeed, the most substantial change was to improve airfields in the Asia-Pacific regions; increase personnel in Germany, and bolster French counter-terrorism efforts in Africa.

It is unfortunate that Biden has put together a national security team that has nothing new to alter the stalemated situations that Donald Trump left behind regarding policy toward China, Iran, and North Korea.  Defense spending continues to climb; new initiatives regarding arms control and disarmament are nowhere to be found, and military deployments continue to rise.  Defense analysts are already arguing for an expanded military presence in the Baltic States and key East European states such as Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria.  Their call is for the permanent basing of U.S. units in order to institutionalize a front-line force posture.

Melvin A. Goodman is a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy and a professor of government at Johns Hopkins University.  A former CIA analyst, Goodman is the author of Failure of Intelligence: The Decline and Fall of the CIA and National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism. and A Whistleblower at the CIA. His most recent books are “American Carnage: The Wars of Donald Trump” (Opus Publishing, 2019) and “Containing the National Security State” (Opus Publishing, 2021). Goodman is the national security columnist for counterpunch.org.

 EU no convocó a los gobiernos de Venezuela y Nicaragua

Reuters, AFP y ARN

 https://www.jornada.com.mx/2022/05/27/politica/003n3pol

 

Periódico La Jornada
viernes 27 de mayo de 2022, p. 3

Washington. Estados Unidos no invitó a nadie del gobierno del presidente venezolano Nicolás Maduro ni del ejecutivo nicaragüense a la Cumbre de las Américas del próximo mes, dijo ayer el coordinador de ese encuentro, Kevin O’Reilly, en medio de la amenaza de boicot de algunos líderes regionales, quienes rechazan un encuentro que excluya a naciones del hemisferio.

En una declaración ante el Subcomité para el Hemisferio Occidental del Senado, O’Reilly fue menos tajante al responder sobre la posible participación de representantes del gobierno cubano, y dijo que dependerá de la Casa Blanca la decisión de invitar a Cuba a la reunión de Los Ángeles, pero afirmó que sí se pidió a los activistas civiles cubanos que asistieran; no precisó si ellos procederían de la isla o de Miami.

En Buenos Aires, el presidente argentino, Alberto Fernández, dejó en duda su presencia en la reunión tras una reunión con el enviado de Washington, el ex senador demócrata Christopher Dodd, al afirmar que su país está dispuesto a trabajar si se toma en cuenta a todos.

Reprochó que la política del presidente Joe Biden no haya cambiado su postura hacia América Latina, respecto de su antecesor Donald Trump. Es una vergüenza que Estados Unidos mantenga el bloqueo sobre Cuba y Venezuela, aseveró, y manifestó: Si es con todos, Argentina trabajará para el éxito de esa cumbre.

El presidente de Cuba, Miguel Díaz-Canel, anunció antier que en ningún caso asistirá a la cumbre a celebrase del 6 al 11 de junio.

El presidente nicaragüense Daniel Ortega se excluyó la semana pasada del encuentro al afirmar que no le interesaba.

Los mandatarios de México, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, y de Bolivia, Luis Alberto Arce, advirtieron que no asistirán si hay exclusiones. La presidenta de Honduras, Xiomara Castro, y el gobierno de Chile se han manifestado en favor de incluir a todos los mandatarios.

Sobre las relaciones con México, O’Reilly dijo que la administración está constantemente en diálogo con el vecino país y agregó que ciertamente tenemos conversaciones con el gobierno de México y todos los gobiernos de la región sobre la estructuración y organización.

Acerca de si Estados Unidos invitará a alguien del gobierno cubano, O’Reilly dijo: Esa será una decisión de la Casa Blanca.

Presionado sobre si se invitará a algún representante del gobierno de Maduro, O’Reilly respondió: Absolutamente no. No lo reconocemos como gobierno soberano.

O’Reilly agregó que sería decisión de la Casa Blanca invitar al opositor venezolano Juan Guaidó al que Estados Unidos y decenas de países han reconocido como presidente legítimo de Venezuela.

El presidente chileno, Gabriel Boric, sostendrá una reunión con Biden, al margen de la cumbre de las Américas, informó la canciller chilena, Antonia Urrejola, quien reiteró que el evento se debilita al excluir a Cuba, Venezuela y Nicaragua.

El gobierno brasileño confirmó ayer que el presidente Jair Bolsonaro asistirá a la cumbre y también se encontrará con Biden.

El presidente de Guatemala, Alejandro Giammattei, aún podría asistir a la cita, anunció el canciller Mario Búcaro. A mediados de mayo, el mandatario descartó su participación, luego de que Estados Unidos criticó a su gobierno por relegir María Consuelo Porras como fiscal general, a quien Washington acusa de corrupción.

 ¿Se atreverá Marcelo?

Para Marcelo es el todo por el todo, abandonar el juego del “gran segundo” que apoya toda ocurrencia, o por fin, liberarse del yugo de AMLO e impulsar su propio proyecto de nación.

mayo 26, 2022

Leonardo Kourchenko

https://www.elfinanciero.com.mx/opinion/leonardo-kourchenko-la-aldea/2022/05/26/se-atrevera-marcelo/

La adelantada competencia por la sucesión al interior de Morena, un juego político de corcholatas y destapes que el presidente provocó con demasiada antelación, está traduciéndose en la conformación de bloques, las relaciones ríspidas y la inevitable batalla intestina.

Con ondeante bandera verde, hemos visto a la favorita Sheinbaum acudir a estados y mítines, para aparecer en estrados donde los candidatos morenistas hacen campaña en 6 entidades de la República.

Lo mismo ha sucedido ya con Marcelo, a quien pareciera no le habían dado el visto bueno presidencial para hacer abierto proselitismo.

El más rezagado, con aquello de que “no juega en la contienda, sólo me ayuda”, es el secretario de Gobernación, Adán Augusto López.

El “apestado” de Palacio, Ricardo Monreal, con su habilidad política y operativa, sin la venia del caudillo ni grupo abierto de respaldo, se ha dado el lujo de aparecer también en un par de actos estatales, para hacer su llamado al proceso transparente y equitativo.

Nadie le hizo caso, más allá de la mal encarada jefa Claudia, quien lo descartó en segundos al señalar que los estatutos de Morena no contemplaban un proceso interno organizado por el INE, como el senador Monreal proponía.

Se mueven las aguas y las fichas, algunas desesperadas, como la capitalina, que a toda costa pretende activar construcción de vivienda, desarrollos urbanos, áreas verdes, que durante tres años abandonó. La señora Sheinbaum se cuenta a sí misma la historia de que todo va muy bien, hasta la seguridad, cuando la encuesta de El Financiero reprueba la gestión del gobierno capitalino en todas sus áreas. Cada quien sus cuentos y su autocomplacencia.

Circulan historias perversas con tintes electorales: de los poco más de 26 millones de dólares que la CDMX tendría que invertir en el Gran Premio de México, los funcionarios capitalinos solicitan “ayudas” y “donaciones” a empresarios de la construcción a depositar en un fideicomiso para la realización de la carrera de Fórmula Uno. Se sabe que solicitan desde un millón de dólares, o más, todo a cambio de la buena voluntad gubernamental para liberar permisos, licencias y todo trámite detenido para activar desarrollos.

Si AMLO insiste en favorecer a Claudia a pesar de que los números no ofrezcan un panorama alentador en torno a su eventual candidatura y probable victoria en 2024, quedan sobre la mesa una serie de interrogantes.

Adán Augusto, amigo, paisano y muy probable integrante –por encargo del caudillo– de una hipotética futura administración morenista, acatará a pie juntillas las instrucciones de su jefe. Si no le dan luz verde, no contenderá, ni presentará desafío ninguno a la candidata.

Pero Marcelo es otra cosa. No sólo porque sus números de aprobación, respaldo y reconocimiento de nombre a nivel nacional, aparecen con frecuencia superiores a los de Claudia. Sino porque ésta es la suya, no habrá otra oportunidad tan bien posicionada para contender por la Presidencia en el futuro. Ni siquiera, si una eventual Claudia presidenta lo sentara en Bucareli.

El canciller Ebrard sabe bien que ya cedió una candidatura presidencial en el pasado (2012) con base en unas encuestas que, dijeron, favorecían a AMLO.

Si Marcelo decidiera separarse de Morena una vez que Claudia sea designada candidata, y todas las posibilidades al interior de ese movimiento se vean cerradas para él, varios partidos lo verían con enorme interés y potencial electoral.

El Verde (PVEM), un profesional en la lectura de los favoritos, acomodaticio por excelencia, lo vería con buenos ojos. Y qué decir del creciente Movimiento Ciudadano, que ha barajado sus cartas con cautela y serenidad.

Ante la ausencia total de un candidato fuerte de oposición, desierto electoral evidente, el señor Ebrard podría –una vez abanderado por MC, PVEM o algún otro– recibir incluso el respaldo de la alianza opositora Va por México (PRI, PAN, PRD).

Para muchos analistas hay premisas evidentes: candidatura de unidad en la oposición, para hacer frente a Morena, o varias que garanticen la victoria al presidente y su sucesor o sucesora.

Sé bien que a estas alturas, lo que escribo suena a blasfemia, a traición griega o romana, con puñaladas y todo. Pero en 6 u 8 meses, este escenario pragmático podría ser una alternativa ante un triunfo avasallador de Morena en caso de que la oposición sea incapaz de construir –va con retraso– una candidatura sólida, fuerte, con presencia, mensaje y, por encima de todo, proyecto.

Para Marcelo es el todo por el todo, abandonar el juego del “gran segundo” que apoya toda ocurrencia, o por fin, liberarse del yugo caudillista de AMLO e impulsar su propio proyecto de nación.

Este capítulo ya lo vimos en la Ciudad de México en 2006, cuando Ebrard gobernó por cuenta propia, impulsó sus iniciativas, realizó –hay que decirlo– la más grande inversión en infraestructura vial en la historia capitalina, aunque cuidó a López Obrador, cobijó a algunos de los suyos y financió campañas, giras, plantones y demás dislates.

En esencia, invirtió con inteligencia en el futuro político de una izquierda progresista, que para frustración de muchos, se convirtió en la peor expresión de un movimiento social retardatario, conservador, represor y para colmo, corrupto.

¿Se atreverá Marcelo a balancear los cálculos?

Por ahora, esperará hasta el último momento en que la unción del caudillo recaiga sobre... ¿? y después activar el plan B y C, cuidadosamente enarbolado desde ya.

 ESTADOS UNIDOS, MATANZAS Y CULTURA DE LA MUERTE

Una nueva matanza se registró hoy en los Estados Unidos, cuando un asesino terminó con la vida de 19 niños y dos maestros en una escuela primaria en la localidad de Uvalde, en el estado de Texas.

Masacre tras masacre, año tras año, en el país más poderoso del mundo, ya sea en escuelas (van 27 este año), cines, centros comerciales e incluso dentro de instalaciones militares, ya no es la excepción, sino la norma (212 en lo que va de 2022).

Los políticos, los burócratas, los policías, sociólogos, psicólogos, comunicadores, sacerdotes, etc. se devanan los sesos una y otra vez después de cada masacre, tratando de explicar a la ciudadanía, al mundo y a sí mismos, cuáles son las razones que están detrás de esta epidemia de matanzas, desde por lo menos unos 25 años, en los Estados Unidos.

La más común, que proviene del campo progresista y liberal, es que es demasiado fácil conseguir, comprar o hacerse de armas de cualquier calibre, ya sea para tenerlas en casa, negocios o para portarlas, con la justificación de que es para defensa personal.

Ningún otro país del mundo tiene la cantidad de armas que poseen los estadounidenses; 120 armas por cada 100 habitantes, mientras que en la Unión Europea son 15 armas por cada 100 habitantes[1].

Como sabemos, los republicanos y los fabricantes de armas son los principales promotores de esta política que favorece la tenencia de armas, basada en la Segunda Enmienda de la Constitución de los Estados Unidos, que da ese derecho a los habitantes del país.

Ello explica en parte el aumento en el número de homicidios con arma de fuego reportado por los Centros de Control de Enfermedades y Prevención (último dato disponible), pues durante 2020 hubo un incremento del 35%; la cifra más alta desde 1994[2], llegando a más de 45 mil muertes relacionadas con armas de fuego durante la pandemia (19 mil de las cuales fueron homicidios; el resto suicidios, accidentes, etc.).

Pero esto no es la única razón, también se ha comentado insistentemente que los problemas mentales son causa de muchos de estos eventos mortales, ya que individuos mentalmente inestables han sido los responsables de varias matanzas.

Si bien la cantidad de armas y de individuos con enfermedades mentales explican en parte la recurrencia de masacres en Estados Unidos, no pueden ser las únicas vertientes.

Una parte relevante de la explicación tiene que ver con la “cultura de la muerte” que continuamente se glorifica y se mitifica en los medios de comunicación, la literatura y especialmente el cine y la industria del entretenimiento de Estados Unidos.

Película tras película; serie tras serie de televisión, las armas, los enfrentamientos a tiros, las drogas, la exaltación de los “mafiosos”, son constantes en las tramas y guiones de las empresas productoras de cine y televisión; e incluso de libros y revistas.

Ya sea que se exalte el poderío militar de Estados Unidos y de sus “héroes” tipo Rambo, que matan a cientos de “amarillos” (normalmente vietnamitas o chinos), “morenos” (como siempre, latinoamericanos dedicados al narcotráfico), “negros”, rusos, alemanes (como siempre, considerados nazis), musulmanes (como siempre considerados terroristas), etc.; o los detectives y policías que asesinan sin rubor (al estilo Clint Eastwood) a los criminales; la cultura de las armas, la muerte, la destrucción del “otro”, es permanente en ese país. Y está convalidada y promovida por las propias élites económicas y políticas de Estados Unidos.

Estados Unidos es un país “guerrero”; se mantiene en permanente estado de guerra, contra todo aquel país o grupo social o económico, que no reconozca su hegemonía (ellos lo llaman “liderazgo”), y que no acate sus órdenes.

Precisamente por ello el establecimiento político-económico-militar, necesita tener a una población en permanente estado de guerra, listo para cuando se le necesite, y con la mentalidad acondicionada para matar, destruir, cuando y en donde se le ordene.

Las élites estadounidenses requieren una población que no se cuestione en ningún momento porqué bombardean ciudades (Dresde); aniquilan poblaciones enteras (Hiroshima, Nagasaki), cometen atrocidades contra la población civil (Vietnam); torturan (Abu Ghraib), etc.

Necesitan hombres y mujeres deshumanizados, que a su vez vean a los “otros”, a los que las élites estadounidenses necesitan avasallar, como subhumanos, a los que pueden destruir sin consecuencias (no por nada Estados Unidos no acepta la jurisdicción de la Corte Penal Internacional; quiere manos libres para cometer sus atrocidades en todo el mundo).

Pero ello tiene su costo interno. Esos asesinos que envía a todo el mundo Estados Unidos, eventualmente regresan a casa (came home to roost)[3], con problemas mentales que los llevan al suicidio[4] o a cometer las atroces matanzas que hemos visto en las últimas décadas.

Otra variable que explica esas masacres es el aumento del racismo en Estados Unidos, instigado por las élites derechistas y conservadoras, que consideran que los blancos están siendo desplazados y hasta sustituidos por miembros de otras razas y países; por lo que desde hace años han lanzado toda una campaña racista contra negros, latinos, musulmanes, asiáticos, etc. Todos aquéllos no blancos y no europeos.

Ello obviamente ha tenido su influencia en personas con poca educación, fácilmente manipulables, que acaban formando parte de grupos supremacistas blancos o por sí solos, se convierten en “lobos solitarios” que intentan “resolver” ese problema, llevando a cabo masacres contra los miembros de minorías raciales o étnicas.

Así que, como podemos ver, no es sólo un factor o dos los que explican las continuas matanzas en los Estados Unidos, sino principalmente toda una política que viene del propio establecimiento político-económico-militar estadounidense y de las élites, que ha creado una verdadera “cultura de la muerte”, que se ha extendido a lo largo y ancho del país y de los distintos estratos sociales, y que no va a cambiar en tanto dichas élites mantengan sus objetivos de dominio mundial y subyugación del resto del mundo.

---

[1] https://www.heraldo.es/noticias/internacional/2019/08/06/el-numero-de-armas-por-habitantes-en-ee-uu-es-ocho-veces-mayor-que-en-la-ue-1328815.html

 

[2] (https://publichealth.jhu.edu/2022/new-report-highlights-us-2020-gun-related-deaths-highest-number-ever-recorded-by-cdc-gun-homicides-increase-by-more-than-one-third).

 

[3] Las malas acciones pasadas, regresan en el presente con consecuencias para quienes las realizaron.

[4] Hay alrededor de 30 mil suicidios al año en ese país.

 What’s Biden’s End Game in Ukraine?

by Ron Paul Posted on May 24, 2022

https://original.antiwar.com/paul/2022/05/23/whats-bidens-end-game-in-ukraine/

Last week, President Biden signed a massive $40 billion military aid bill for Ukraine. Who cares that inflation is killing the American economy and mothers can’t even get baby formula. For Washington, spending on war and empire always seems to trump America’s interests.

To put this giveaway to Ukraine in perspective: just since late February, the US has provided nearly $60 billion in "assistance" to Ukraine. That is almost half that country’s entire 2020 GDP! Washington has literally adopted Ukraine in our name and on our dime.

The Biden Administration claims that Ukraine is winning the war with Russia and that such an item of expenditure to protect Ukraine’s borders is critical to our national interests and worth risking a nuclear war over.

But protecting Ukraine’s democracy is no longer the stated goal of the Administration. Defense Secretary Austin outlined the Administration’s new intention not long ago when he said that the real goal is to weaken Russia.

Biden’s neocons are fighting a war with Russia, but once again Congress has no interest in voting on a war declaration or even in debating whether war with Russia 30 years after the end of the Cold War is a good idea.

There are a reason our Constitution grants war powers to the legislative branch. Forcing members of the House and Senate to declare the US to be in a state of war also enables them – through the powers of the purse string – to define the goals of the war and particularly what a victory looks like. That prevents the kind of mission-creep and shifting objectives that have characterized our endless wars in the 21st century – including this current proxy war with Russia.

Even the US mainstream media is beginning to notice. Last week the New York Times’ Editorial Board published an editorial originally titled, “What is America’s Strategy in Ukraine?” complaining that the Biden Administration has yet to answer any questions to the American people regarding its involvement in Ukraine.

While, as could be expected, the paper attacked the “isolationists” in the US Congress who opposed the $40 billion giveaway, the NY Times editorial board nevertheless registered what can only be seen as the first major sign of dissent among the usual media war cheerleaders.

They wrote:

…it is still not in America’s best interest to plunge into an all-out war with Russia, even if a negotiated peace may require Ukraine to make some hard decisions. And the US aims and strategy in this war have become harder to discern, as the parameters of the mission appear to have changed.

While warning that Americans’ interest in Ukraine will begin to wane without more clarity from Washington as to its goals, the paper went on to directly contradict the Biden Administration’s predictions of a Ukraine victory:

A decisive military victory for Ukraine over Russia, in which Ukraine regains all the territory Russia has seized since 2014, is not a realistic goal.

Congress – with very few exceptions – has opened a financial spigot to the government in Kiev without asking a single question about how and why the money is to be spent. When Senator Paul simply asked for someone to keep track of the $60 billion we shipped over there he was met with near-unanimous opposition.

An endless supply of US taxpayer money to Ukraine with zero stated goals and zero oversight. Isn’t it time to stand up and demand that both parties in Congress start asking some hard questions?

Reprinted from The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity.

New York Times Repudiates Drive for ‘Decisive Military Victory’ in Ukraine, Calls for Peace Negotiations

Ukraine must negotiate based on a "realistic assessment" and "limits" to U.S./NATO commitment, says NYT

by John V. Walsh Posted on May 23, 2022

https://original.antiwar.com/john-v-walsh/2022/05/22/new-york-times-repudiates-drive-for-decisive-military-victory-in-ukraine-calls-for-peace-negotiations/

A week ago we noted that a May 11 New York Times news article, documented that all was not going well for the US in Ukraine and that a companion opinion piece hinted that a shift in direction might be in order.

Now on May 19, "THE EDITORIAL BOARD," the full Magisterium of the Times, has moved from hints to a clarion call for a change in direction in an editorial uninformatively titled, "The War Is Getting Complicated, and America Isn’t Ready." From atop the Opinion page, the Editorial Board has declared that "total victory" over Russia is not possible and that Ukraine will have to negotiate a peace in a way that reflects a "realistic assessment" and the "limits" of US commitment. The Times serves as one of the main shapers of public opinion for the Elite, so its pronouncements are not to be overlooked lightly.

Ukrainians will have to adjust to US "limits" and make sacrifices for newfound US realism

The Times May editorial dictum contains the following key passages:

"In March, this board argued that the message from the United States and its allies to Ukrainians and Russians alike must be: No matter how long it takes, Ukraine will be free. …"

"That goal cannot shift, but in the end, it is still not in America’s best interest to plunge into an all-out war with Russia, even if a negotiated peace may require Ukraine to make some hard decisions (emphasis, JW)."

To ensure that there is no ambiguity, the editorial declares that:

"A decisive military victory for Ukraine over Russia, in which Ukraine regains all the territory Russia has seized since 2014, is not a realistic goal. … Russia remains too strong…"

To make certain that President Biden and the Ukrainians understand what they should do, the EDITORIAL BOARD goes on to say:

"… Mr. Biden should also make clear to President Volodymyr Zelensky and his people that there is a limit to how far the United States and NATO will go to confront Russia, and limits to the arms, money, and political support they can muster. It is imperative that the Ukrainian government’s decisions be based on a realistic assessment of its means and how much more destruction Ukraine can sustain (emphasis, JW)."

As Volodymyr Zelensky reads those words, he must surely begin to sweat. The voice of his masters is telling him that he and Ukraine will have to make some sacrifices for the US to save face. As he contemplates his options, his thoughts must surely run back to February 2014, and the US-backed Maidan coup that culminated in the hasty exit of President Yanukovych from his office, his country, and almost from this earth.

Ukraine is a proxy war that is all too dangerous

In the eyes of the Times editorial writers, the war has become a US proxy war against Russia using Ukrainians as cannon fodder – and it is careening out of control:

"The current moment is a messy one in this conflict, which may explain President Biden and his cabinet’s reluctance to put down clear goalposts."

"The United States and NATO are already deeply involved, militarily and economically. Unrealistic expectations could draw them ever deeper into a costly, drawn-out war.."

"Recent bellicose statements from Washington – President Biden’s assertion that Mr. Putin ‘cannot remain in power,’ Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s comment that Russia must be ‘weakened’ and the pledge by the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, that the United States would support Ukraine ‘until victory is won’ – may be rousing proclamations of support, but they do not bring negotiations any closer."

While the Times dismisses these statements as "rousing proclamations," it is all too clear that for the neocons in charge of US foreign policy, the goal has always been a proxy war to bring down Russia. This has not become a proxy war; it has always been a proxy war. The neocons operate by the Wolfowitz Doctrine, enunciated in 1992, soon after the end of Cold War 1.0, by the neoconservative Paul Wolfowitz, then Under Secretary of Defense:

"We endeavor to prevent any hostile power from dominating a region whose resources would, under consolidated control, be sufficient to generate global power."

"We must maintain the mechanism for deterring potential competitors from aspiring to a larger regional or global power."

Clearly, if Russia is "too strong" to be defeated in Ukraine, it is too strong to be brought down as a superpower.

The Times has shifted Its opinion from March to May. What Has Changed?

First of all, Russia has handled the situation unexpectedly well compared to dire predictions from the West.

President Putin’s support exceeds 80%.

165 of 195 nations, including India and China with 35% of the world’s population, have refused to join the sanctions against Russia, leaving the US, not Russia, relatively isolated in the world.

The ruble, which Biden said would be "rubble" has not only returned to its pre-February levels but is valued at a 2-year high, today at 59 rubles to the dollar compared to 150 in March.

Russia is expecting a bumper harvest and the world is eager for its wheat and fertilizer, oil, and gas all of which provide substantial revenue.

The EU has succumbed mainly to Russia’s demand to be paid for gas in rubles. Treasury Secretary Yellin is warning the suicidal Europeans that an embargo on Russian oil will further damage the economies of the West.

Russian forces are making slow but steady progress across southern and eastern Ukraine after winning in Mariupol, the biggest battle of the war so far, and a demoralizing defeat for Ukraine.

In the US inflation, which was already high before the Ukraine crisis, has been driven even higher and reached over 8% with the Fed scrambling to control it with higher interest rates. Partly as a result of this, the stock market has come close to bear territory. As the war progresses, many have joined Ben Bernanke, former Fed Chair, in predicting a period of high unemployment, high inflation, and low growth – the dread stagflation.

Domestically, there are signs of deterioration in support of the war. Most strikingly, 57 House Republicans and 11 Senate Republicans voted against the latest package of weaponry to Ukraine, bundled with considerable pork and hidden bonanzas for the war profiteers. (Strikingly no Democrat, not a single one, not even the most "progressive" voted against pouring fuel on the fire of war raging in Ukraine. But that is another story.)

And while US public opinion remains in favor of US involvement in Ukraine there are signs of slippage. For example, Pew reports that those feeling the US is not doing enough declined from March to May. As more stagflation takes hold with gas and food prices growing and voices like those of Tucker Carlson and Rand Paul pointing out the connection between inflation and the war, discontent is certain to grow.

The NYT editorial signals alarm over the insane goal of the neoconservatives.

There is a note of panic in this appeal to Biden to find a negotiated solution now. The U.S. and Russia are the world’s major nuclear powers with thousands of nuclear missiles on Launch On Warning, aka Hair-Trigger Alert. At moments of high tension, the possibilities of Accidental Nuclear Armageddon are all too real.

The alarm is warranted and panic is understandable.

But will the neocons in charge give up and move in a reasonable and peaceful direction as the Times editorial demands? This is a fantasy of the first order. As one commenter observed, the Warhawks like Nuland, Blinken, and Sullivan has no reverse gear. They always double down. And they are now in control of the foreign policy of the Biden administration, the Democratic Party, and most of the Republican Party. They do not serve the interests of humanity nor do they serve the interests of the American people. They are in reality traitors to this country. They must be exposed, discredited, and pushed aside. Our survival depends on it.

John V. Walsh, until recently a professor of physiology and neuroscience at the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School, has written on issues of peace and health care for Asia Times, San Francisco Chronicle, EastBayTimes/San Jose Mercury News, LA Progressive, Antiwar.com, CounterPunch, and others.