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Evo Morales on Ecoonomic and Environmental Policy

Submitted by Newton on Tue, 09/06/2011 - 06:40.
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Last year Evo Morales Ayma, president of Bolivia since 2006 and the first indigenous Amerindian elected president of any country in South America, published a volume containing his messages on economic and environmental policies. It contains highly challenging ideas, often deliberately confronting those of the United States. Some of what he says is political hype and some of it seems out of touch with scientific thinking. But the same can be said for most of what US politicians have to say about those matters, and some of what he says invokes deep moral principles. The shame is that Evo Morales has been ignored by the US media, although his ideas deserve thoughtful discussion. I have made some notes from his book, which are attached. Although I have occasionally paraphrased in my own words [in square brackets], most of the notes are direct quotations.
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Rustin at Swarthmore

Submitted by Newton on Thu, 07/14/2011 - 07:27.
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This little vignette is what I remember rather than documented history.  Even if others remember it differently, it is a good story. I have given New YorkYearly Meeting permission to publish it, but I do not know when or in what venue that might happen. Next year is the centennial of Bayard’s birth, and the following year the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington, so there are plenty of coming occasions to hear about him.
 
 
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Bolivia Timeline

Submitted by Newton on Tue, 04/12/2011 - 17:14.
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                                BOLIVIA TIME-LINE
1825     August 6 - - Bolivia becomes and independent nation
1825-1950 - - Five wars: Bolivia loses half its territory, including access to the Pacific.
1952 - - Reform government of Victor Paz Estenssoro, start of 12 years of decent civilian government under Victor Paz and Hernán Siles. First suffrage and public education for Indians; first land reform law
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Letter to the Buffalo News 4/12/11

Submitted by Newton on Tue, 04/12/2011 - 17:09.
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The recent budget negotiations were shameful on both sides. Both sides violated a fundamental necessity of democracy, namely that the public be kept informed. But it is the Speaker’s big persistent lie that is most annoying.
 
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THE BUDGET DEBATE – MEDITATIONS ON ROUND ONE

Submitted by Newton on Mon, 04/11/2011 - 17:20.
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     Our country left democracy behind in two ways this week.  On one hand the manner of the "debate" was clandestine and its participants' claims were dishonest, violating the principle that democracy requires debates to be open and honest, so as to give people a real chance to decide.  On the other hand the substance of the decisions revealed our system to be of the wealthy, by the wealthy, and for the wealthy, rather than of the people, by the pople and for the people. That is, plutocratic rather than democratic.    --  Full thoughts are attached.

    

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Bolivia and Egypt: Parallels and Discontinuities

Submitted by Newton on Tue, 02/15/2011 - 20:19.
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BOLIVIA / EGYPT

Parallels and Discontinuities

During the six-year period from 2003 to 2009 Bolivia went through an astonishing revolution. It began on a Sunday night in October with outrage over three dozen deaths when President Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada ordered the army to escort tanker trucks through a blockade in order to replenish fuel supplies in the capital. The next five days were a good deal like the eighteen days beginning January 28 in Tahrir Square in Egypt.

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Niebuhr and Quakers

Submitted by Newton on Tue, 11/09/2010 - 21:39.
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Reinhold Niebuhr was not a pacifist. ;Niebuhr was interested in exercising political power and dominance, whereas a Quaker leader needs to refrain from exercising such power. Christianity has been political since at least the 4th century, with the conversion of Constantine and the suppression of the texts known as the Gnostic Gospels. That is to say, a concern for power and dominance has been present, often primary, and has led Christian churches to work hand in glove with civil authorities. Niebuhr stands in this tradition, as does the “Just War” doctrine. Quakers stand outside it.

See attachments for full text

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EASTER ELECTIONS IN BOLIVIA

Submitted by Newton on Tue, 03/30/2010 - 19:26.
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COMMENT
     The background information by Jim Shultz (see attachment) on the Bolivian elections set for April 4 contains much useful information about local conditions. It needs to be supplemented, however, with a wider political frame and some comment about economics.
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