Its been a rough year for Latin American dictators...

Having taken just one of Professor Borzutzky's classes would have exposed me to General Pinochet's authoritarian rule in Chile... I took five. His death has sparked new discussions over what his real affect on Chile was - while many people abhor the murder and torture of Chileans and non-Chilean opponents, many others are still advocating that he saved Chile from communism and created an economy that today is the strongest in Latin America. To me, the overthrow of a democratically elected government is never justified, and the world doesn't know what would have become of Allende's democratic-socialist administration because the democratic-capitalists of the world decided that he was too dangerous. Apparently a capitalist general with no respect for democracy - who was willing to do anything to stay in power, including killing and torturing his own people while stealing millions of US dollars from them - was a better option. Margaret Thatcher to this day continues her support of Pinochet, and Reagan was one of his strongest allies during his rule. America and Britain even now say they support democracy above all, and we all know that they support capitalism... Allende's overthrow by Pinochet just remains one of the best examples of what happens when democracy and capitalism don't come in the same leader.

On the other side of the political spectrum, but along the same "Latin American dictators get older and sicker" story line, Cuba's leader has been noticably absent from, well, everything in the last 8 months or so. Sources say he's not quite dead yet, but for all practical purposes, his younger (72 year old) brother Raul has taken over. Now is the time for every Latin American specialist in Washington to read After Fidel by CSIS associate Brian Latell. I posted about this book the first time I read it last year, but apparently the second edition is coming out in February. Fidel may have really hated the United States, but Raul was always the more devoted brother when it came to studying Communist ideology. However, being that the Cold War is over, Raul seems much more open to dialogue and *gasp* negotiation with the U.S. The real test, of course, will be what happens when the not-so-young younger brother dies as well, and even the best Cuban specialists don't dare make public speculations about that just yet.

I love having the time to really read and think about the news.