Not only are FARC rebels just operating in Venezuela, but they have Al Quaeda style training camps set up along the border.

Chavez is a screwed up character. The current land redistribution he is engaging is stupid at best, communist at worse. His close relations with Castro are also flaring to a blaze, with recent Venezuelan legislation allowing Cuban police to operate and arrest people in Venezuela.

Uribe is the arguably the best leader in Latin America. A president american-style, a man that tackles the problems, something pretty uncommon there.

Certainly the paramilitaries and "death squads" would agree that Uribe is "arguably the best leader in Latin America."
Chicago Tribune Editorial

Some quotes"His tentative strategy already has come under fire from members of Colombia's Senate and international human rights groups. It would give too easy a pass to paramilitary leaders charged with narco-trafficking, human rights atrocities and assorted banditry, in exchange for their putting down their weapons." and "Human Rights Watch has strongly criticized Uribe's proposal for failing to investigate paramilitary leaders' involvement in massacres and kidnappings and failing to demand that they admit to crimes and identify collaborators. The proposal also does not require paramilitary leaders to disclose and turn over all ill-gotten funds and properties.
"
I guess as long as the death squads kill in the name of "freedom" and "democracy", all right-thinkers must support them.

I gotta agree with Tom Volckhausen. Uribe has been willing to let off the AUC with little more than slaps on the wrists and it is only through international pressure has he been willing to modify the stance somewhat, but his plan provides for no real training of demobilized paramilitaries in addition to the aspects of the plan that reek of impunity.

I will acknowledge that Uribe has an extremely tough job. I also don't have a problem with him going a little easier on the AUC if they are willing to acknowledge their crimes, do some time (obviously not as much as if they didn't demobolize) and give up the riches they have obtained from their crimes. That's essentially what the donors told him in Cartagena.

As for the best leader in Latin America, I'll put my money on Ricardo Lagos.

So would I. But I think we must acknowledge that most of the hard work the chilean economy needed, such as social security privatization, was done by Pinochet, the dictator that sent to kill around 3,000 person. It is unfair to decouple one thing from the other.

Latin American politics are pretty special indeed, they cannot be easily compared to anything in the developed world, but at least Uribe is trying to change things in a country that is in civil war for half a century. That's much more than it is being done in neighbouring countries. I think he deserves our support.

But I think we must acknowledge that most of the hard work the chilean economy needed, such as social security privatization, was done by Pinochet, the dictator that sent to kill around 3,000 person. It is unfair to decouple one thing from the other

I don't agree with that. To begin with the success of Chile's privatized social security certainly seems to be a mirage at best. Chile's greatest success came long after Pinochet was voted out.

In addition allegations of corruption are now dogging Pinochet with the Riggs Bank scandal. In my mind he doesn't deserve an ounce of credit.

Uribe deserves our support only when he comes up with a sincere plan to resolve the violence coming form both left and right in Colombia and takes into account the victims of the AUC's violence, drug dealing and land theft.

To Robert Mayer: Who was the Oracle of the American Revolution? Did he ever advocate land reform? Why do you call America's Oracle a Communist?

To Joe_A: Uribe was the Mayor of Medillin. He has long time links to drug traffickers and killers. I don't think you really know Uribe Perhaps you just like that he was the only South American leader to support Bush's War on Iraq.

The rest of the commenters seem OK to me :)

Great post and summary!
I thought it was well balanced

I see Chavez doing the same thing that caused the coup by Pinochet, he is bringing in Castros stalinst thugs, and people are beginning to disappear in the night, and there is the Mugabe/Maoist Communist "Land Reform"

We see a stalinist hellhole in the making.

Pinnochet killed leftist killers, probably saving the lives of 100,000 innocents from the leftist mass grave. and left a liberal democracy in his wake. the leftist religion of mass death lost in Chile, thats the beef they have with Pinochet.

After all, Castro and his ilk can murder with inpunity, even Sadamns mass graves might be begrudgingly admitted by a leftist, but you wont see them mentionaing them on their own, not even mass graves of children.

Where are the mass graves of Chile ?

Exactly, death there was, but we wont find mass graves of kids there, still clutching thir toys.

Castro has gulags, and the lobodomy drill is often used to deal with those that become too annoying.
but that dont stop leftist praise and love and glorification of his infamous "health care" and the doctors he sends abroad (while holding familly hostage under threat of death at home, to ensure obedience.

And no leftist concern for EU leete sex vacations to bed Castros goverment owned underage child whores.

No all outrage is reserved for those lacking proper socialist credentials, or "worse" anyone that effects a setback to the march of communism, like Pinnochet.

I dont expect Chaves to allow himself to be voted out, all points to his self instalation as a new socialist dictator and maximum leader, the cuban enforcers are marching into country, just like they did in Chile, where is a Pinnochet for Venezuela ? because its getting very clear they will be needing one.

You're attempting to rewrite history and ese perro no cazará.

The disappearances and murders in Chile happened under Pinochet and yes there were people secretly buried in Santiago's General Cemetery, two to a grave. Pinochet's sick and depraved response was to praise the economy of burying two to a grave. Venezuela doesn't need another Pinochet (no place in the world needs another Pinochet). Venezuela needs an opposition that can effectively articulate a response to Chávez and provide a viable alternative to his demagogic rule while taking into account the corrupt history of Venezuela's elite and the needs of the poor.

As for your other comments, I consider myself of the left and have vigorously criticized Fidel Castro and Chávez on my blog. So does Marc Cooper I also protested Saddam's rule when the Reagan administration was sucking up to him so I find your sweeping generalizations to be less than persuasive.

That's the beauty of dealing with sweeping generalizations; they're so easily disproven.

You disprove nothing

For one i reject your leftist history, your leftist news, and your fake equality

Two to a grave ? compared to leftist mass graves ?

That choice is easy

Even Pinnocet is perferable to any communist.

And "disapearances" ? Sorry, but Pinnocet did his killing right in the open, if you was blood stained leftist mass murdering scum, you was labeled for death when you was admitted to the damn camps, some 3000 is said to have been killed in them, the rest set free "without explanation" the leftist news said.

Nope, sorry, Pinnocet killed commies, mass murdering, 174 Million Murdered, cuban thug inviting commies, and left behind a liberal democracy in his wake after losing a democratic vote that took place on his orders.

And what was the content exactly, of Reagans "sucking up"

Was it anything like Carter and Clintons gifts of lightwater reactors and fuel to North Korea !

Another land of leftist mass death, complete with family death camps, under the rule of the man the Leftist media whitwashed as a Teddy Bear.

During the recent inter-Korean summit, North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il was lionized by the establishment Western press as "a teddy bear" who has "changed his image" via a "giant makeover."

Nothing could be further from the truth. Yet patriotic Americans, especially U.S. Korean War veterans should have seen this coming after Roger Clinton -- the president's brother -- recently traveled to North Korea to play with his band in a special concert -- a presidential sibling event not seen since the days of Billy Carter, Billy Beer and his infamous trip to Libya in the 1970s.

Is that "sucking up" of the kind your talking about !

No, I reject your fake leftist history and your fake leftist controled news, and the leftist evaluation of just who, is guilty of "sucking up" to evil men.

Chile's own official government report (aka known as the Rettig Report) contradicts your account of events supporting Pinochet.

Your method of argument is mere contradiction, and frankly owes more to John Cleese than it does facts and history. I wasn't drawing a comparison to to make the deaths committed by leftists and rightist dictatorships equal. I deplore them both. More's the pity that you don't.

As for your praise for Pinochet, why do you praise a man whose government was responsible for an act of terrorism in Washington, DC?

Hysteria and hyperbole don't make history. Facts do. I'll stick to the facts.

I have no respect for fake leftist "facts".

Pinochet killed commies the way we need to be killing terrorists.

Now, Chavez is doing the same thing that gave Pinnochet cause, where is a Pinnochet for Venezuela ? because its getting very clear they will be needing one, and it had better be soon.

Because we need some commie killing going on down there, the extermination of another 3000 commies will probably save the lives of 100s of thousands of "enemies of the people".

I've always believed that when one screams and distorts all your intended audience realizes is that you're screaming and distorting.

Thanks for proving my point.

Typical leftist misdirection.

The point is that Communist mass murder, and we have a communist thug inviting in Cuban thugs, its stalinist mass murdering death camp operators comming to power, leftism the most evil of all evils, measured in their mountain of 174 Million skulls that has ever troubled planet earth.

We need no further schooling to know the nature of these creatures, and YES, even Pinnocet, and the liberal democracy he left behind, was such a more positive outcome compared to the rule of any communist thug, that only the worshipers of the leftist religion of mass death themselves dare say any different.

Damn right, a repeat of the Chile example, would deliver a far better outcome, with far less innocent death, than allowing another Commie mass-murderocracy to establish itself there.

If you're going to defend a criminal against humanity whose secret police commited acts of terrorism on three continents, then I really have nothing to say to you.

You oppose killing criminals against humanity, and call the liberator of Chile, who killed the killers, a criminal against humanity.

How quaint.

"Soft Power" lefties always advocate the inaction that leads always to the opression of the leftist iron boot, mass graves and gulags.

You have nothing to say, because there is nothing to say, Chile is better off because of Pinnochet, he saved lives, he killed commie thugs, saving lives, he exterminated commie vermin, delivering freedom.

Every free man in Chile alive today owes his freedom to Pinnochet

And thats what sticks in your craw.

Even the name "velvet revolution" for what happened after the fall of the USSR in the eastern bloc is a lie, it ignores the 62 million lives exterminated, untill the killers lost the desire for killing, that was the price paid in blood for the freedom many enjoy today.

Thanks to Pinochet, the people did not have to suffer mass death and the iron boot of a Castro of Chile.

Pinnocet was a good thing to happen to chile, despite his excesses and crimes, it remains a fact, that Chile is free today, due to Pinochet.

Leftists are the enemy of humanity, as their mountain of 174 Million skulls attest

And Pinochet's extermination of them, and the free liberal democracy he gave Chile, is a far better outcome than the rule of any leftist thug.

Hugo is inviting in Cuban killers, its deja vu all over again. so where is a Pinnochet for Venezuela?

They could sure use one to save them right now.

Mr. Moyers:

I've thought long and hard about your tone and this is what I would like you to consider:

1.) I'm entirely comfortable engaging people who disagree with me.

2.) I will not accept abusive comments directed at me or anyone because they do not share someone else's political beliefs. There is a way to discuss matters even with those with whom you disagree without resorting to name-calling or accusing someone of being a liar because they don't view history the same way you do.

3.) I have the authority to delete comments within my posts that I find violate the comments policy of this site. I suggest that you go to the front page of the site to read the comments policy.

Reasonable people can disagree on issues and discuss them without resorting to name-calling and without poisoning the discourse. The manager of this site and I certainly don't see eye-to-eye on many issues, yet we have found a way to communicate with each other without insulting each other. I also have nothing but the highest respect for Joe Katzman and others with whom I disagree, but who manage to maintain a civil tone.

If you find that you are unable to maintain a civil tone and feel a need to insult me and others with whom you disagree, I would suggest that you don't comment at any of my posts.

Govern yourself accordingly.

Mr. Moyers:

I've thought long and hard about your tone and this is what I would like you to consider:

1.) I'm entirely comfortable engaging people who disagree with me.

And then go on to decribe great disconfort.

2.) I will not accept abusive comments directed at me or anyone because they do not share someone else's political beliefs. There is a way to discuss matters even with those with whom you disagree without resorting to name-calling or accusing someone of being a liar because they don't view history the same way you do.

Abusive ? where ?
Name calling ? where ?
Liar ? where ?
History is an objective truth, the humans that describe it are imperfect, and perspective and opinion are mallable and eternally variant, but the actual events are not, those are facts, truth is a discovery, not an invention.

The way to debate your differences in history, is to point out and debate your difference in history.

Here you are avcusing me of .. what, because you state no particulars.

This is a diservice to be sir, its the very unfairness you intend to slime me with,

3.) I have the authority to delete comments within my posts that I find violate the comments policy of this site. I suggest that you go to the front page of the site to read the comments policy.

Ive told Both Jow and Marc to do just that, ive got finite live energy allocated to my mortal coil, and can easilly expend my time an attention elsewhere if i find the enviroment suffocating.

Reasonable people can disagree on issues and discuss them without resorting to name-calling and without poisoning the discourse.

And the way to do that is to disagree with reason, its called a debate.

The manager of this site and I certainly don't see eye-to-eye on many issues, yet we have found a way to communicate with each other without insulting each other. I also have nothing but the highest respect for Joe Katzman and others with whom I disagree, but who manage to maintain a civil tone.

Insulting who ? uncivil to who ?

There you go accusing me without any particulars, is that not a bit uncivil ?

If you find that you are unable to maintain a civil tone and feel a need to insult me and others

There you go accusing me again.

with whom you disagree, I would suggest that you don't comment at any of my posts.
Govern yourself accordingly.

That sounds like a threat of some kind, based on what ? due to what, just what, in particular do you protest ?

You have not noted one insult or inaccuracy.

I must say, what you said to me here is far more harsh and insulting than anything ive said.

A assert my facts are provable, that it clings to objective truth, and a reasonable interpetation of the facts.

And I reject the idea that i am personaly insulting anyone, nor am i exibiting any lack of reason in my opinion.

Raymond, as a member of the WoC team I agree with Randy.

We welcome diverse viewpoints, including those that are strongly held.

However, your comments are sucking the oxygen out of discussion on several threads here recently. We very seldom ban commenters or delete comments, but if you persist in dominating threads this way the administrators will have no choice but to do so in order to make room for other voices.

Thanks, Robin.

Mr. Moyers:

1.) Leftists are the enemy of humanity, as their mountain of 174 Million skulls attest

2.) Every free man in Chile alive today owes his freedom to Pinnochet And thats what sticks in your craw.

3.) I have no respect for fake leftist "facts".

4.) No, I reject your fake leftist history and your fake leftist controled news, and the leftist evaluation of just who, is guilty of "sucking up" to evil men.

You've called me the "enemy of humanity," a "fake" and sought to stereotype me based on what you perceive to be my thoughts. Reread your comments and consider your tone.

I don't mind debating and engaging people, but that's not what you are doing.

Sucking the oxygen ? Dominating ?

Just that is that, exactly

Thats a good email address in my comment header, of all the things that should not belong here, its this public flogging, based on ... what exactly ? that does not belong in the comments.

Ive had two posts nuked, one by Joe, one by Marc, I invited them to do just that, they told my why, in the particualar, and i used their objections to guide my further participation.

What is being done here however, accusation based on .. something, indictment of wrongdoing citing ... you will not say.

This in unfair.

I suspect its the opinion, and not the packaging, that is the irritant.

Ok then, no problem, I will remove myself from your orbit.

Thats a good email address in my comment header,

Yes - and I both respect and value that.

I want to be very clear: it is not Raymond's opinions that Randy and I object to. It's the vehemence and repetition with which they are posted.

Raymone: I value your presence here, if you can take a deep breath and sometimes let the conversation go on without a point by point rebuttal in length.

1.) Leftists are the enemy of humanity, as their mountain of 174 Million skulls attest

This is a fact, you are disputing this ?

You can start with R.J. Rummel,Professor Emeritus of Political Science. University of Hawaii.

He has published twenty-four nonfiction books (one that received an award for being among the most referenced), four novels, and about 100 peer-reviewed professional articles; has received the Susan Strange Award of the International Studies Association for having intellectually most challenged the field in 1999; and was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award 2003 from the Conflict Processes Section, American Political Science Association. He was a 1996 Nobel Peace Prize finalist.

He has a blog here and has his democide research here

2.) Every free man in Chile alive today owes his freedom to Pinnochet And thats what sticks in your craw.

Thats a fair deduction, its a true assertion, and just how does a moral man square with the fact that the fredom of so many is owed to a man considered by many to be so vile ? I think i can prove that this conjuction is the pivot at the center of the revolving angst.

The problem is that those who love their freedom but hate the man, let the hate of the man ruin their ability to celebrate their liberty

Others not only hate the man, but are leftist who have no love of liberty, but love an all powerfull state imposing their egalitarian schemes at gunpoint.

To the first, you do not need to love the man to enjoy the liberty he gave them, to the second, well we are ina basic struggle of good and evil with those.

Too bad both march together, because in this case, the former are sleeping with evil, sharing the venue with evil. Bagdad mcDermit standing on mass graves of kids (figurativly) to support an evil regime, M Moores "Potemkin Village" defense of the PolPot of babylon.

I also reject the glorification of killers, the excuse of mass killers. a mountain of 174 Million skulls and still the socialist religion has a frightening army of followers.

Leftist evil is an imposing invading force, its the imposition of power, its the invading Veitmin, the Red Kihmers or perhaps a misguided social engineer back with govt goons with guns to impose his policy opon you.

In America, the consitution and bill of rights, almost entotal, is restrictions on government. limits on authorty, and limits of what a majority can demand of even the single person.

3.) I have no respect for fake leftist "facts"

You deny the leftist media ? from Walter Durranty, who helped Stalin murder 10 Million in the Ukraine, to the media that depicted every American victory in southeast asia as a defeat, even covering up the Treason of a certian John Kerry, who colaborated with the Regime of the 5% death quota, to help the south become enslaved and introduced to mass death, gulags and 100s opon 100s of thousands lost in the south China sea ?

All the way to the leftist fraud by Beselles, part of the leftist attack on our gun rights, and the leftist redefinition of the 2nd amendment to deny that its the single citizen that has a right to Own and Carry a gun.

The examples are legion and they are examples of the rule, not the exception.

No i do not accept leftist propaganda offered as fact, or leftist news offered as information.

Truth is a discovery, not an invention, perception may be imperfect, emotion can cloud thinking, and humans can often have difficulty adjusting their worldview based on new discovery.

But difficult is not the same as impossible, all of our progress so far can attest to that.

And the day the religion of the MOST mass death wears the badge of infamy it deserves, communism, and all it variant flavors. that will be great progress indeed.

I agree with everything Robin said, including and especially the last paragraph.

The problem here is that you paint with a broad brush.

I consider myself to be on the left, but I also criticize and detest Castro, I don't defend Hugo Chávez and routinely criticize him. I have absolutely no use for nor patience with anyone who praises literacy and medical care in Cuba while ignoring the repressive government there.

Of course Walter Duranty and what he did was detestable. I also found it equally detestable that Jeane Kirkpatrick when visitng Chile as US Ambassador to the UN met with Pinochet and refused to meet with Jaime Castillo, a Christian Democrat and head of the Chilean Human Rights Commission. I find it detestable that Reagan said that Efraín Rios Montt was "getting a bad rap" on his human rights record when all available evidence indicated that Rios Montt's rule was without question the most brutal in Guatemala during the military dictatorship years. I find it detestable that the Reagan administration tried to claim that the El Mozote Massacre didn't take place.

One of the people who Pinochet tried to have assassinated who opposed him was Bernardo Leighton a co-founder of the Christian Democrat party in Chile. Another who Pinochet may be indicted for killing was his predeccor as Commander of the Chilean Army, General Prats who was killed with his wife by a car bomb in Buenos Aires. Pinochet's secret police also killed Orlando Letelier and Ronni Moffitt via car bomb on Embassy Row in Washington, DC.

I consistently criticize human rights abuses by both left and right. I just find it puzzling that you feel comfortable defending a man whose government used helicopters to fly people drugged and tortured out over the ocean where their bodies were tossed overboard and who helped form an organization that among other things, planned to assassinate a US Congressman.

If you're comfortable making that moral equation, so be it. I certainly wouldn't be comfortable defending anyone - regardless of their political leanings - who was involved in such activities.

I consider myself to be on the left, but I also criticize and detest Castro

That alone will make you persona non grata to the majority of leftists, in fact, one wonders just that it is that has you claiming to be a leftist, and to have problems with castro.

Me thinks you have mislabeled yourself.

The Jenen Massacre, didnt happen, it was a leftist news fraud, France2 seems to be caught in another leftist fraud

We also see that our media is doing in Iraq, the Eason Jordan affair, where if it wasnt for the blogs, a fake history of our troops deliberatly murdering Journalists would have become the next leftist "fact".

What we are finding out is that we are drowning in fake history and fraudulent events.

Leftism and disinfomation are as inseperable as your chromosome pairs. all totaliatrian idologies depend on it.

Thats why leftist states have no free press.

Untill the rise of talk radio and the internet, information was under leftist control, and i no longer accept leftist news as truth, and when they report on something factual, I know there is so much leftist spin on it the truth might be close to the opposite of what they reported

There is one thing that is beyond dispute however, if Pinnochet was the evil villan .. whats the deal with giving Chile a liberal democracy ?

Evil men dont do that kind of thing

Its enough to call all the rest said about him into question, especially since it comes from the left, the religion of the totalitarian regime, the potemkin village, and the largest mountian of skulls ever created by any evil of any kind.

No truly evil men, willing to kill to remain in power, have no problem staying in power, Castro, Saddam Kim Jong, Lenin Stalin Mao PolPot onlt death deposes the evil tyrants with the will to murder.

Well except for an invasion by the US armed forces !

And as for the human rights organisations, most seem to say that the only real evil in the world is the USA, they are usually leftist front groups, even in the United Nations, look who is in charge of "Human Rights" there.

Nope I have no faith in the so called "Human Rights" activists.

Seems to me, the most major organization that has ever delivered "Human Rights" to peoples is the US Military.

Well, with exception of Pinnochet, he gave freedom to the whole of the country of Chile, perhaps some credit is due there too.

Pinochet the commie-killer gave freedom to Chile like Hitler the commie-killer gave freedom to Germany, only smaller. But I notice, Raymond, that you've never acknowledged even Hitler's anti-Communism as having gone too far. Perhaps the Holocaust is another fake leftist fact. (After all, since the Jenin Massacre was a fake, then the El Mozote Massacre must be a fake, then by extension the Warsaw Ghetto Massacre must be a fake.)

Pinochet the commie-killer gave freedom to Chile like Hitler the commie-killer gave freedom to Germany , only smaller.

So Chile's liberal democracy is like National Socalist Germany under the Socialist Dictator Hitler ?

Heh, not one of your better moments Andrew.

But I notice, Raymond, that you've never acknowledged even Hitler's anti-Communism as having gone too far.

Further than the communists at the time had gone ?

The German Workers' Party name was changed by Hitler to include the term National Socialist. Thus the full name was the National Socialist German Workers' Party Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP) called for short, Nazi. By the end of 1920 it had about three thousand members.

The USSR had some 20 Million in mass graves by the time Hitler had chosen his parties new name, but never you mind, he was going to enter a murder-athon race to catch up to the communist mass grave size, well, or would have done better had they not used ovens, something hard for me to reconcile with the german energy shortage.

Overall, by genocide, the killing of hostages, reprisal raids, forced labor, 'euthanasia,' starvation, exposure, medical experiments, terror bombing, and in the concentration and death camps, the Nazis murdered from about 15,000,000 to over 31,600,000 people, most likely closer to 21 million men, women, handicapped, aged, sick, prisoners of war, forced laborers, camp inmates, critics, homosexuals, Jews, Slavs, Serbs, Czechs, Italians, Poles, Frenchmen, Ukrainians, and so on. Among them were 1 million children under eighteen years of age."
-R.J. Rummel, Death by Government

Hitler is closely tied to Stalin in magatude of mass murder, but the USSR is an 70+ year marathon of mass death, body count 61,911,000

Perhaps the Holocaust is another fake leftist fact. (After all, since the Jenin Massacre was a fake, then the El Mozote Massacre must be a fake, then by extension the Warsaw Ghetto Massacre must be a fake.)

Hitler was a leftist, a typical "Capitalist roader" Socialist, like Tony Blare and Bill Clintons "Third Way"

Sweden has this model of socialism, not as far left as Hitler or Benito however.

Nope, Sorry Andrew, before Hitler had harmed a soul, the communists had already exterminated a larger mountain of helpless innocents by outright summary execution than Hitler would later try to equal.

Communism = Mass murder, that was an objective truth in the 1930s already, if killing commies was all that Hitler did, He would have gones down as a Heroic figure, and a savor of humanity, But, Hitler you see, was a socialist, and like all Socialist dictators, mass murder define these evil creatures.