as labeled as being the largest threat to them since the Soviet Union, and as we can read as reported the Venezuelanalysis.Com news service in their article titled "Top U.S. Defense Officials Increase Hostility Towards Venezuela", and which says:

"Over the past few years, the Bush Administration has funneled millions upon millions of dollars into building up an opposition movement to the Chávez administration in Venezuela, utilizing U.S. tax payer dollars filtered through the National Endowment for Democracy and the U.S. Agency for International Development, and has backed a failed coup d’état against President Chávez and oil industry sabotage that caused billions of dollars in damages to the nation yet failed to oust the government from power.

For the year 2006, the U.S. Congress has allocated more than $9 million dollars to opposition groups in Venezuela (again, U.S. taxpayer dollars) and has launched a psychological operations campaign coordinated from the Pentagon’s Special Operations Command in Tampa, Florida. In a document published by the U.S. Army in October 2005 entitled “Doctrine for Asymmetric War Against Venezuela,” President Chávez and the Bolivarian Revolution were labeled as the “largest threat since the Soviet Union and communism.”

The propaganda rhetoric by the American President against Venezuela has also increased, and as we can read as reported by the Bloomberg News Service in their article titled "Bush Warns of `Erosion of Democracy' in Venezuela, Bolivia", and which says:

"President George W. Bush said he's concerned about an ``erosion of democracy'' in Venezuela, one of the four largest suppliers of oil to the U.S., and Bolivia. ``Let me just put it bluntly - I'm concerned about the erosion of democracy in the countries you mentioned,'' Bush said today in response to a question about Venezuela and Bolivia while addressing the National Restaurant Association in Chicago. ``I am going to continue to remind our hemisphere that respect for property rights and human rights is essential for all countries in order for there to be prosperity and peace."

The world once again is stunned into horror over these latest American pronouncements, especially in light of the United States current ‘democracy’ experiment in Iraq and where that new government has ordered all homosexuals to be put to death by torture and joined the Arab World boycott of Israel.

The United States ‘democracy’ experiment in Egypt has gone equally bad with that nations continued beating and jailing of dissident protesters, though not to effect the American government from their continuing to pay Egyptian President For Life Mubarak, and as we can read as reported by the Financial Times News Service in their article titled "Egypt ‘not under US pressure’ over political freedom", and which says:

"Egypt’s prime minister on Sunday said he had been reassured by the US that American financial aid would not be affected by the latest spat over political freedom, insisting that Cairo and Washington “see eye to eye” on the importance of their relationship. Egyptian security forces have arrested hundreds of protesters in recent weeks and the appeal of Ayman Nour, a leading secular opposition figure condemned to five years on what is seen as trumped up charges, was denied. A judge also was reprimanded for exposing fraud in last year’s parliamentary elections."

The American ‘democracy’ experiment in Afghanistan is also failing due to the United States returning that nation to one of the major drug centers of world and fueling the anger of its Muslim peoples, and as we can read as reported by the Reuters News Service in their article titled "Afghan drugs, poverty and anger fuel Taliban war", and which says:

"Drugs, poverty and frustration with the Afghan government are fuelling an insurgency by Taliban militants, who appear to be growing stronger just as more foreign forces are arriving to try to improve security. Violence in the past week has been some of the worst since U.S.-led forces drove the Taliban from power.

Many impoverished, deeply conservative Afghans are also receptive to the insurgents' rallying cry of jihad, or holy war, said Waheed Mozhdah, a writer and political analyst who served as a government official during Taliban rule. “Every war needs a cause more so than weapons. The Taliban have a cause and that is Islam," Mozhdah said.

The recent release of a Christian covert who many thought should have been punished for abandoning Islam had raised questions over the legitimacy of the government from an Islamic point of view, he said. At the same time, there was resentment of heavy-handed tactics by foreign forces searching for militants and many Afghans saw no improvement in their lives nearly five years after the Taliban were driven out. "There was hope among people after the Taliban's ouster that things would improve economically, Afghanistan would be reconstructed. But it seems those hopes did not come true," Mozhdah said.

The Western-backed government's efforts to eradicate opium-growing were also playing into the hands of the Taliban. "Instead of arresting officials involved in trafficking the government has resorted to punishing poor farmers. That has caused anger," he said.”

If it was not so tragic, this America lie of ‘democracy’ and fighting drugs, it would be laughable, that is except for the consequences to the nations affected, such as Colombia, and as we can see evidenced of these American efforts as reported by the Boston Globe News Service in their article titled "$4b later, drugs still flow in Colombia", and which says:

"Six years and $4 billion into the US-backed campaign to wipe out cocaine at its source, Colombia appears to be producing more coca than when the campaign started, according to US government estimates. As Congress opens debate this month on another $640 million for next year for Washington's most ambitious overseas counternarcotics effort, a growing number of critics say the costly program has neither dented the cocaine trade nor driven down the number of American addicts. Two of the program's major missions -- to dramatically reduce coca growing in Colombia and provide alternative livelihoods for drug farmers -- have fallen far short of hoped-for goals."

But to the shame of the American people themselves in their governments ‘democracy’ experiments should be the Palestinian people who were told by the United States they were ‘free’ to elect a government, but when choosing a party not liked by the Americans have been plunged into an humanitarian crisis of the likes not seen since the collective punishments of people by the Nazi Germans, and as we can read as reported by China’s Xinhua News Service in their article titled "U.S. group warns of humanitarian disaster in Gaza", and which says:

"A U.S. humanitarian group warned on Tuesday of a looming humanitarian disaster in the Gaza Strip due to Israel's siege and the West's cutoff of crucial aid. Mercy Corps warned at a news conference in Gaza City that the humanitarian and health situation in the Gaza Strip would further deteriorate if the political and economic blockades on the Palestinians continued.

The group blamed the aid cutoff and border closings by Israel for the deepening crisis in the desert coastal strip, saying that the Israeli sealing of Gaza "significantly curtailed critical export revenues and imports of food and other goods." The group also stressed the necessity to take appropriate measures to confront what it described as a tragedy in the Gaza Strip and appealed to the international community to improve the situation."

To the threat of Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador reclaiming the vast wealth of their nations oil for the betterment of their citizens instead of the United States oil giants is the truest American hypocrisy of all, especially in the light of the Western Nations recent actions against the dictators of the African nation of Chad, and which likewise reclaimed its oil wealth, and as we can read as reported by Britain’s Guardian Unlimited News Service in their article titled "When two poor countries reclaimed oilfields, why did just one spark uproar?", and which says:

"Civilisation has a new enemy. He is a former coca grower called Evo Morales, who is currently the president of Bolivia. Yesterday he stood before the European parliament to explain why he had sent troops to regain control of his country's gas and oil fields. Bolivia's resources, he says, have been "looted by foreign companies", and he is reclaiming them for the benefit of his people. Last week, he told the summit of Latin American and European leaders in Vienna that the corporations which have been extracting the country's fossil fuels would not be compensated for these seizures.

You can probably guess how this has gone down. Tony Blair urged him to use his power responsibly, which is like Mark Oaten lecturing the Pope on sexual continence. Condoleezza Rice accused him of "demagoguery". The Economist announced that Bolivia was "moving backwards". The Times, in a marvellously haughty leader, called Morales "petulant", "xenophobic" and "capricious", and labelled his seizure of the gas fields "a gesture as childish as it is eye-catching".

Never mind that the privatisation of Bolivia's gas and oil in the 1990s was almost certainly illegal, as it took place without the consent of congress. Never mind that - until now - its natural wealth has only impoverished its people. Never mind that Morales had promised to regain national control of Bolivia's natural resources before he became president, and that the policy has massive support among Bolivians. It can't be long before Donald Rumsfeld calls him the new Hitler and Bush makes another speech about freedom and democracy being threatened by freedom and democracy.

This huffing and puffing is dressed up as concern for the people of Bolivia. The Financial Times fretted about the potential for "mismanagement and corruption". The Economist warned that while the government "may get richer, its people are likely to grow even poorer". The Times lamented that Morales had "set back Bolivia's development by 10 years or so ... the most vulnerable groups will find that an economic lifeline is soon removed from their reach". All this is humbug.

Four days before Morales seized the gas fields - on May 1 - an even bigger expropriation took place in an even poorer country: the African republic of Chad. When the Chadian government reasserted control over its oil revenues, not only did it ensure that an intended lifeline for the poor really was removed from their reach, but it also brought the World Bank's claims to be using oil as a social welfare programme crashing down in flames. So how did all those bold critics of Morales respond? They didn't. The whole hypocritical horde of them looked the other way.

The World Bank decided to fund Chad's massive oil scheme in 2000, after extracting a promise from the government of Idriss Deby - which has a terrible human rights record - that the profits would be used for the benefit of the country's people. Deby's administration passed a law allocating 85% of the government's oil revenues to education, health and development, and placing 10% "in trust for future generations". This, the bank said, amounted to "an unprecedented system of safeguards to ensure that these revenues would be used to finance development in Chad".

Without the World Bank, the project could not have gone ahead. It was asked to participate by Exxon, the leading partner in the project, to provide insurance against political risk. The bank's different lending arms stumped up a total of $333m, and the European Investment Bank threw in another $120m. The oil companies (Exxon, Petronas and Chevron) started drilling 300 wells in the south of the country, and building a pipeline to a port in Cameroon, which opened in 2003.

Environmentalists predicted that the pipeline would damage the rainforests of Cameroon and displace the indigenous people who lived there; that the oil companies would consume much of Chad's scarce water and that an influx of oil workers would be accompanied by an influx of Aids. They also argued that subsidising oil companies in the name of social welfare was a radical reinterpretation of the bank's mandate. As long ago as 1997, the Environmental Defence Fund warned that the government of Chad would not keep its promises to use the money for alleviating poverty. In 1999, researchers from Harvard Law School examined the law the government had passed, and predicted that the authorities "have little intention of allowing it to affect local practice".

In 2000, the oil companies gave the government of Chad a "signing bonus" of $4.5m, which it immediately spent on arms. Then, at the beginning of 2006, it simply tore up the law it had passed in 1998. It redefined the development budget to include security, seized the fund set aside for future generations, and diverted 30% of the total revenues into "general spending", which, in Chad, is another term for guns. The World Bank, embarrassed by the fulfilment of all the predictions its critics had made, froze the revenues the government had deposited in London and suspended the remainder of its loans. The Chadian government responded by warning that it would simply shut down the oil wells. The corporations ran to daddy (the US government) and, on April 27, the bank caved in. Its new agreement with Chad entitles Deby to pretty well everything he has already taken.

The World Bank's attempts to save face are almost funny. Last year, it said that the scheme was "a pioneering and collaborative effort ... to demonstrate that large-scale crude oil projects can significantly improve prospects for sustainable long-term development". In other words, it was a model for oil-producing countries to follow. Now it tells us that the project in Chad was "less a model for all oil-producing countries than a unique solution to a unique challenge". But, however much it wriggles, it cannot disguise the fact that the government's reassertion of control is a disaster both for the bank and for the impoverished people it claimed to be helping. Since the project began, Chad has fallen from 167th to 173rd on the UN's human development index, and life expectancy there has dropped from 44.7 to 43.6 years. If, by contrast, Morales does as he has promised and uses the extra revenues from Bolivia's gas fields in the same way as Hugo Chávez has used the money from Venezuela's oil, the result is likely to be a major improvement in his people's welfare.

So, on the one hand, you have a man who has kept his promises by regaining control over the money from the hydrocarbon industry, in order to use it to help the poor. On the other, you have a man who has broken his promises by regaining control over the money from the hydrocarbon industry, in order to buy guns. The first man is vilified as irresponsible, childish and capricious. The second man is left to get on with it. Why? Well, Deby's actions don't hurt the oil companies. Morales's do. When Blair and Rice and the Times and all the other apologists for undemocratic power say "the people", they mean the corporations. The reason they hate Morales is that when he says "the people", he means the people."

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