[Marxism] Bachelet Openly Supports Venezuela, denounces Pinochet’s economic model

[Walter Lippmann]

(More progress registered in the process of Latin American integration.
Note in particular Bachelet's meeting with Joan Jara, which is reported
in the MERCOSUR news service, not a left-or revolutionary resource.)
==============================================

Bachelet Openly Supports Venezuela

Santiago de Chile, Oct 5 (Prensa Latina) President Michelle Bachelet
clearly supported Venezuela for joining the UN Security Council
during a dinner with Christian democratic parliamentarians Tuesday,
noted local media Thursday.

Some of the participants expressed "not everyone will be happy" with
the decision.

The Christian Democracy, representing the most conservative and
pro-American sector in the ruling coalition, has developed a strong
campaign against President Hugo Chavez and his hope to hold a seat at
the UN entity.

The fact that the first item chosen by the dignitary to start the
meeting with her guests was also a sign within a large range of
disagreements with her most prominent political partner s supporters
inside the government parties.

The president highlighted some aspects she used to back up her
decision in favour of Venezuela like regional support and how
complicated it will be for Chile not to join the consensus in an
arena where only Colombia and Peru will not join.

The president also added that to vote in favor of Guatemala, the
other candidate, would be a sign of poor independence regarding the
US.

An additional aggravating factor is that the Central American country
did not back Chile during Jose Manuel Insulza proposal to OAS.

ef abo apr mf

PL-162

Mercosur 
Monday, 02 October

http://www.mercopress.com/Detalle.asp?NUM=8876

Bachelet denounces Pinochet’s economic model

Chilean President Michelle Bachelet condemned General Pinochet’s
military regime and the lack of social welfare consciousness in
rightwing politics.

In a seminar entitled “Social Protection in an Uncertain World,”
Bachelet delivered an academic argument against the economic model of
the Pinochet regime and defended the reconstruction process carried
out by the ruling Concertación coalition.

She explained that, in contrast to European countries that maintained
a capitalist, laissez faire economic system alongside the creation of
the welfare state “we in Chile implemented a similar model from the
standpoint of the right, a neo-liberal model, imposed and
subsidized.”

“But in the nineties we started setting right the most urgent issues”
such as “ensuring basic liberties, maintaining a macroeconomic
balance so that the new democracy could survive, and fight the
enormous amount of poverty that was passed down from the military
regime”, said the Chilean president.

Bachelet announced she was determined to leave her mark on Chile’s
social system and that her legacy would be to redirect the role of
the state towards greater social responsibility. The president
declared her government would aim for “even economic growth, and have
a preoccupation with increasing personal liberties and the well-being
of its population.”

Since 1990, poverty in Chile has fallen by 40 percent. Spending on
health has tripled while spending on education has doubled. Three of
every four Chileans live in their own house. “The main focus is the
idea of an integrated system,” said Socialist Party Sen. Carlos
Ominami. “It is based not only the rights of groups, but on the
rights of individuals that are guaranteed by the state. This will be
our legacy.”

Later on, Bachelet met with Joan Turner, widow of the
singer-songwriter Víctor Jarra, who was killed following the military
coup. Together they inaugurated a tribute dedicated to Jara on
display in the Plaza de la Cultura, opposite the La Moneda
Presidential Palace. The exhibition is installed where one of the
symbols of the military regime, the “flame to liberty” (Llama de la
Libertad), once stood.

That same day, Bachelet, along with her mother, Angela Jeria,
celebrated the publication of a book of letters by her father, “The
Letters of General Bachelet” (Las cartas del general Bachelet).

The book contains letters from her father smuggled out from jail
during his imprisonment after the coup. A clearly emotional President
Bachelet recalled how difficult it was for her family to receive the
letters and said that her father “symbolized democratic Chile.”

By Beatrice Karol Burks The Santiago Times