Reypescado: Good Fascism, The Unintentional Dictator, and Sunny American Days

When lying, cheating, and corruption is all that you have ever known, there is a fighting chance that your world will implode. This is certainly what has happened to what’s left of the reactionary elements in Venezuela. Unfortunately, it hasn’t reached that point here in the U.S.

Since the overthrow of Venezuelan dictator, Gen. Marcos Pérez Jiménez, in 1958, Venezuela settled into a pathetic democratic shit hole dominated by two political parties known as “COPEI” and “Acción Democrática”. They were the basic equivalent of the current Republican and Democratic Parties in the U.S. During their forty-year stewardship, Venezuela became one of the poorest nations in South America. In spite of the country’s vast wealth of oil, 70% of all Venezuelans lived in dire poverty while such vices as starvation, illiteracy, and unemployment reached catastrophic levels. It got to the point where the majority of Venezuelans no longer had the luxury of believing that the two major parties were different from each other.

So, when a real, independent, populist movement blitzkrieged its way into the corridors of power in Venezuela in 1999, the charade that these two parties were upholding collapsed on top of itself like a house of cards. Their leaders were forced to show their true colors by joining ranks and tag-teaming the raging Bolivarian juggernaut. There was little organization or long-term planning involved in their process. They had no discernible platform or alternative agenda to offer Venezuelans. They were only united in their hatred of the movement’s leader, Hugo Chávez, and were prepared to get rid of him by any means necessary — a failed coup, 24/7 corporate media propaganda, white-collar strikes, oil industry sabotage, temper tantrums, you name it. This is why Chávez and his supporters have repeatedly slammed them in elections and have gained enormous influence in Venezuela and elsewhere. Some people might argue that there is too much democracy in Venezuela. Certainly, the power that Chávez has amassed — all constitutionally, I might add — has become somewhat alarming.

Many progressives in America today wonder when a similar change will happen in the U.S. Such well-intentioned, sell out, liberal lowbrows as Global Exchange diva, Medea Benjamin, and Dick Cheney look-alike, David Cobb, still think that they can work with the Republocrats in order to set their people free. Unfortunately, people like Benjamin and Cobb are intellectually incapable of grasping the fact that their flirtations with cooperation only serve to diffuse, water-down, and eventually render impotent any truly independent movement.

Regardless of such pitfalls, there is some hope that a real change in the political landscape is materializing. In spite of it’s post-election fizzling, Matt Gonzalez’s run for mayor was a microcosm of this process. Though it is in a state of crises, the Green Party also shows some promise. Only time will tell if a real reformation of the same ilk as the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela will birth itself in the U.S. Until (if) that glorious day comes, angry and misguided progressive democrats, demogreens, and other ideological undesirables will just have to continue deluding themselves while eating copious amounts of shit.