bricmont

The impact of the Rwandan tragedy or of Hiroshima on public consciousness is no doubt due to the fact that each of these slaughters took place within a short period of time. But if a system of domination regularly produces so much death and suffering, is the horror any less just because it stretches over a longer period of time? Shouldn't it be surprising in the post-1945 world, where racism was officially discredited and abolished, people who consider themselves civilised have killed so many people they consider not civilised enough?

In Cuba, life expectancy is 6 years longer than the rest of the continent. Under-five mortality is 4 times below the average. If Latin America could show the same results as Cuba, 250,000 children's lives could be saved every year. There are 5.7 million working children in Latin America. For the whole continent, there are 50 million street children. None of these situations are to be found in Cuba, where all children go to school.

European construction boils down to transferring State power to a super-privileged bureaucracy which preaches to others the purest economic liberalism. Elections can go on being held, but they are of no importance, because no serious political alternative can be proposed, no "New Deal", no "structural reform", no "common programme of the left", no "Italian way to socialism". Competition and the free market are the only prospects on the horizon now and forever. And, as in the United States, people vote more and more with their feet by avoiding the ballot box, or else vote for whoever seems to be most hated by those in power (Le Pen for instance).