Blogging the democratic revolution
I got a call from Beijing, Red China earlier this week from a friend who lives there. He told me he saw a growing willingness of the people from the outer cities to challenge the authorities. He also saw a growing willingness in the authorities to repress such people. The cops, he said, had it…
That’s the analysis of Academic Elephant in this well-thought out essay on how we should think about the growing power of the Fidel Castro regime. Should the U.S. lift a trade embargo on an increasingly aggressive regime, fortified by Venezuelan oil, like Cuba? Read the whole thought provoking thing here. And don’t miss Elephant’s special…
This past week, the biggest and most economically critical city of all South America was beseiged by drug thugs from Brazil’s abysmal favelas. The ghetto barbarians, acting on orders from their leader, who’s somehow has a cellphone in jail, killed over 200 people, mostly cops. Imagine if New York City lost 200 cops in a…
Two big elections in the troubled Andean states in the next two weeks – Colombia and Peru. Will the voters go Chavista or seek something more economically viable? Will it be a lunge for the messiah-savior of leftwingery or a vote for reality? See what Boz has on the latest polls, as well as doings…
Glenn has found an important source on the doings in Syria, the benighted sub-Axis-Of-Evil tyranny. Intellectuals of all stripes are being rounded up by Syrian goons in the heaviest crackdown on dissidents in years. First in line for government oppression are those who have criticized the Syrian involvement in Lebanon. One by one, name by…
Via Real Clear Politics, I have found an exceptional essay by the excellent Fareed Zakaria on the problems Americans have perceiving the world’s vast move toward democratic revolution. Zakaria writes that Americans are pretty convinced that their country is the beacon of freedom. And with its visa lines and 12-million-strong illegal alien count, who is…
Looking out the window on an air flight to Miami, Ziva at Blog For Cuba can’t help but look over and across the vast blue Florida Strait for traces of all those thousands from Cuba who desperately tried to make their way to freedom, and died trying. Her haunting post is here.
In London, site of the cold-blooded Islamofascist train and bus bombings in 2005, terrorism is a serious subject. We already know that the London cops, having shot an innocent Brazilian in string of police errors, aren’t really up to the frightening task of countering such major-league terrorism, and the city is full of hundreds of…
As part of a new, despot-pleasing goodie package, the European Union wants the United States to sell Iran new airplanes so that it can modernize its decades old fleet. They already fell for this once — back in 2005, the Bush administration signed an order allowing the U.S. to sell aircraft spare parts to the…
By Pedro Camargo Special to Publius Pundit De facto, Hugo Chavez is adding Ecuador to his growing roster of Bolivarian nations. He is close now with the final steps in place. Ecuador is following the Chavez nation-destroying playbook by ending its international trade and its own democracy. How did Chavez do this? Easy. He followed…
The discussion began here at Publius when A.M. Mora y Leon linked to a piece at the new Foreign Policy blog, commenting that whenever there are searches for sex material, the vast majority of them come from domain extensions that pertain to highly Islamist countries like Saudi Arabia and Egypt. Just going through the top…
Like a world-class military, Egypt’s judges are highly professional and technocratic — ardent defenders of the law. That’s why, over the past year, thousands of them have taken to defying the Mubarak regime which has, in turn, sought to corrupt and strangle the institution of the judiciary. They were prevented from overseeing the counting of…
With the new advent of new “revolutionary tourists” tramping through the shantytowns of Caracas on guided dog-and-pony “reality tours,” Venezuelans, the latest zoo animals for these gringos, are aghast. Here these unkempt, arrogant, Che t-shirt-wearing Sandalistas are, well-fed and staying in Caracas’ five-star hotels, getting out to get down and dirty among the ‘real people’…
I guess many of you knew Nickie Goomba. He was an Italian-American blogger who had helped create the logos of my blog as well as the blog of other well-known bloggers, such as Big Pharaoh and Sandmonkey. I was shocked today for learning that he has passed away just 3 days ago. It seems he…
Well folks it seems that since Hugo Chavez’s officials can’t get to me, given that I live in a full fledged democracy where freedom of expression truly exists, Ken Livingstone, his ‘social democrat’ comrade in London, has taken issue directly with me stating “Aleksander Boyd is a supporter of terrorism against Venezuelan democracy” (sic) Äremarks…
In a war, the first casualty is truth. So, show trials for ideological deviation have begun in Venezuela. This is characteristic of all communist regimes as they consolidate power. Eventually, the truth is the target. Now in the seventh year of Chavez’s regime, there are new orthodoxies Chavez wants people to accept, ones that ring…
The New York Times is reporting that the Bush administration is considering holding negotiations for a peace treaty with North Korea. To many, this will be a shock. After years of six-way talks to try to convince them to abandon their nukes, it comes to this. However, if you read Publius, this may not be…
The Financial Times describes the gang riots that have taken Sao Paolo by storm: Life in S????o Paulo returned to something like normal by the middle of this week after prison riots and attacks on police and property orchestrated by organised crime left 132 people dead and 53 injured between Friday night and Tuesday morning….
We are getting a lot of keywords today looking for news of Ecuador. I will have a roundup ahead, I do think the conditions are there for democratic revolution because that government has just jumped the shark. Here is one news editorial to start and after I get back, I’ll have a proper roundup. Big…
I have previously remarked on Algeria????????s growing ties to the Islamic Republic of Iran, and President Bouteflika????????s fiery rhetoric towards France on the issue of colonial apologetics. Both of these issues is contrary to Algeria????????s national interest, though on different scales. The first is an issue of independence in foreign policy, which has been a…
…that Hugo Chavez says he wants to sell to Iran. Miguel has the funniest take ever on this topic, with ‘ewwww, gross!’ photos! You got to see it here.
As you might have heard, the United States resumed diplomatic relations with Libya, one of the most totalitarian countries in the world. To even begin trying to account for how this matches up to the stated “Bush Doctrine” of promoting democracy, and how it will benefit the people of Libya, boggles the mind. It does…
The Peruvians, in the midst of their heated presidential campaign, are having a grand old time lampooning Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez, who has continuously meddled in their election – promising $3 billion in sewer upgrades for instance if Peruvians elect his promised candidate, Ollanta Humala. As you might imagine, it’s sunk Humala’s candidacy beyond repair….
He’s done it! Hugo Chavez has finally joined the club! He’s a made man! He has status. A leader of a pariah state! It’s an elite club but considerably cooler than that Hated Country Club of Caracas that he’s trying to turn into a shantytown, and dammit, he finally made it. Chavez got the U.S….
For many of us, we are just bloggers. We blog, taking alter-egos, saying all the things we’d like to say in the regular world but don’t, and then return to our normal lives, happily anonymous. For some bloggers, it can get to be quite a contrast indeed. Proto-blogger Matt Drudge, a humdrum Hollywood gift shop…