U.S. EvilDoings in Bolivia

There needs to be some castration going on. Democracy Now ran a story tonight about u.s. officials, acting on either official or unofficial policy of the United States government, asking Fulbright Scholars and Peace Corp Volunteers in Bolivia to spy on Cubans and Venezuelans present in Bolivia. The story was broke when 2007 Fulbright Scholar, Alexander Von Schaick, contacted independent journalist, Jean Friedman Rudovsky, and expressed his concern that a u.s. official at the u.s. embassy in Bolivia asked Schaick and other Fulbright Scholars during a security briefing to "report to the embassy the names and locations of Cubans and Venezeualans that they encountered in Bolivia." After some investigating, it was uncovered that the same thing had been asked of Peace Corp recruits, at which Peace Corp officials lodged a complaint with the State Department about this violation of international law and breach of the goals and aims of the Peace Corp program. So far, it has not been reported that the Fulbright Program has done the same.

The u.s. government has declared that these two separate incidents were "abberations" but journalist Bengamin Dangl says that it is a part of a larger effort on the part of the Bush adminstration to destabilize the government of President Evo Morales in Bolivia. The u.s. government, through the USAID program has channeled millions of dollars to right-wing groups in Bolivia in the effort of decentralizing the Bolivian government, giving greater autonomy to right-wing forces within the country with the intended results of toppling Evo Morales as president of Bolivia. USAID and the National Endowment for Democracy have both been used as tools by the Bush administration in these efforts. Please read the interview that Amy does with Schaick, Rudovsky, and Dangl above. This is a serious affront to the integrity of people all across the globe to define their own destiny and choose the ways in which they intend to live.