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The Other Side of Paradise
June 21, 2012
Talking about the structural ineffectiveness of charities and NGO’s is difficult because criticism of charity creates the problematic misconception that an individual is against easing the suffering of others, or the good intention to make the world a better place. This is not true. The problem is the wider framework within which charity occurs.
June 19, 2012
There are many problems with public-opinion polls—like their failure to illuminate the real forces and phenomena behind popular beliefs. They have generally been pretty good, however, at predicting how (as opposed to why) citizens are going to vote in an election a few days away. With Mexico’s presidential election just a week and a half away, a variety of voter surveys continue to show the PRI’s Enrique Peña Nieto as the frontrunner.
Manufacturing Contempt
June 18, 2012
In response to Venezuela opposition candidate Henrique Capriles’s campaign rally on June 10, news outlets contrasted Capriles’s vigor with Hugo Chávez’s frailty, while conveying Venezuelans’ disgruntlement. So it came as no surprise that just one day later, the U.S. press reported that Chávez’s own rally to officially inaugurate his presidential campaign attracted a crowd an entire order of magnitude smaller than that of Capriles.
The Other Side of Paradise
June 18, 2012
With billions of dollars promised to “build Haiti back better,” why hasn’t it happened? The sad reality is that while the earthquake may have destroyed a significant part of Haiti, it did not destroy the predatory and exploitative imperialist system which has historically impoverished Haiti—it unfortunately intensified it.
Border Wars
June 16, 2012
After years of inaction and mounting pressure, President Barack Obama has finally issued an order to end deportation proceedings against undocumented youth who might have qualified for relief under the presently-defunct DREAM Act. Yet while many are celebrating this move, there is reason to remain skeptical about the administration’s commitment to follow through on this promise.
June 15, 2012
In the violent agrarian conflict in the Bajo Aguan region of Honduras, a new financial deal and continued eviction threats are catching the attention of the international community.
Border Wars
June 13, 2012
While the Obama administration made promises last year to focus its “removal” efforts on those who pose dangers to national security and public safety, the overall number of deportations remains very high. The outcome is illustrative of how the deportation machine functions: if it can’t find “bad” migrants to send into exile, it simply produces them.
June 13, 2012
It is not so much that the television networks, and the people who control them, have chosen Enrique Peña Nieto to do their bidding as the next president of Mexico. It is that Peña Nieto, and the people who control him, have purchased his way into power by buying favorable coverage.
Cuadernos Colombianos
June 11, 2012
Land restitution in Colombia is moving toward failure because the Santos government is committed to the neo liberal orthodoxy of agrarian development based on large scale agriculture. A law passed last year granting compensation to victims who lost their land in the conflict has given rise to opposition between activists and paramilitary groups.
Manufacturing Contempt
June 11, 2012
Guest post by Peter Beattie: In her recent attack against Chilean student protest leader Camila Vallejo, Wall Street Journal columnist Mary Anastasia O’Grady proved herself once again completely unmoored to reality, yet arrogantly self-assured. The combination is just precious.