In the series on left-leaning governments in South America (see previous post), NPR presented a piece on Chile which was problematic to say the least. At one point Julie McCarthy states that, "now age 90, Pinochet has faded from the public scene, but the memory of his rule has not." She notes that over 28,000 were victims of torture during his dictatorship, but fails to mention that one of the proud parents of the dictatorship was the CIA which maintained a close working relationship with its murderous offspring.
Also disturbing is when McCarthy asserts, "the dictatorship ended in 1990; it was brutal; it also laid the foundation for Chile’s remarkable growth today." I think not! Greg Palast has an excellent critique of this canard. His analysis is born out by the reporting on NPR which mentions that much of Chile's economic growth can be attributed to the high price that Chile's copper fetches on world markets. Even a writer for the Miami Herald in 1998, concluded that much of the Pinochet economic moves were disastrous for Chile.
After spending much of the 1980s studying the Chile tragedy, it is really heartbreaking to listen to NPR's silent coverup of the US' prominent role in creating and sustaining the torture state of Pinochet's Chile, and perhaps even worse to hear the dictatorship (and its eager economists from the University of Chicago) lauded for whatever economic successes Chile may be having.
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They did a better job with saturday morning's segment on Mexico. It was still somewhat slanted and (typically) lightweight, but at least they talked to Mark Weisbrot who gave a solid straightforward summary of the region's growth (lack of) since adopting the Washington Consensus economic policies(and, in the case of Mexico, NAFTA).
Yes, I would agree with you on the Mexico piece.
oh, another thing that occurred on saturday morning... the odious (as Salon has called him) phony sad-sack Scott Simon interviewed former NSA director Ret. Army General William Odom on Iraq. One rarely hears from Odom outside of obscure policy journals or Democracy Now!, so that was a refreshing breath of fresh and honest air. [This was later balanced out by Simon's unctuous interview with Chris Smithers]
... you know, plenty of people like Thomas Powers and Odom talked about what a disaster this Iraq war was going to be on NPR prior to the invasion, and their predictions have neatly matched the outcome. It would be nice if NPR would replay their interviews from 2002-2003. (yah right...)
It funny leftists are alway telling us that they have laid the pre conditions for growth. In Chile Allende's economic reforms are what led to Chile's current economic position. In India it was Nehru, in China was it Mao?. In Ireland it is the education policy of the leftists. But the strange thing is that there is not one single socialist/nationalization scheme that has made a country rich. All countries that have followed socialism have been unbelievably poor and as soon as they switch to capitalism they magically become rich.
Maybe the simpler explanation is that socialism just doesn't work and capitalism does. If Allende's policies are so great why didn't Chile achieve its miracle during his time?
Can anonymous below provide some citations about leftists claiming credit for economic growths in China, India, etc?
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