"If God gives me life and help, I will be at the head of the government until 2050."
That's Hugo Chavez talking, in English translation as quoted by the BBC. Having given him the credit he was due for not attempting to suppress opposition rallies during the Venezuelan referendum campaign, I offer this as an important reason why he should lose this weekend. The headline explains my position. Call it a U.S. cultural prejudice, but I believe that no man, no matter how talented, should consider himself so indispensable that he would aspire to remain in power when Chavez would be 95 years old. The egoism of someone who presumes that he alone can save his country, the arrogance underlying the assumption that no one can be trusted to carry on his work, is simply staggering. This is the same sort of talk one hears from Robert Mugabe, a man generally believed to have gone mad in his desperation to keep power while impoverishing the masses of Zimbabwe. Let me concede that they think their rulership necessary for purposes larger than their own ambition; still, inevitably the imperative to stay in power takes priority over the original purposes, and inevitably, someone who thinks as Chavez apparently does will put opponents in prison.
Americans think differently. Our model is George Washington, who could have been and was encouraged to be an American king after the Revolution. Instead, he retired to his farm like his Roman role model Cincinnatus. He could have been President for life, but called it a day after two terms, setting a precedent that held up for almost 150 years. After Franklin Roosevelt broke the third-term taboo Washington had set up, Congress and the states made sure through a Constitutional amendment that no future President would serve more than two terms. Say what you will about George W. Bush, but after January 2009 he will be gone from power, and anyone who still suspects differently must at least acknowledge that it is far less likely now than it might have been earlier in his administration that he'll try to break the rule. He hasn't ever even signaled that he might want to do such a thing. Chavez, on the other hand, openly admits that he wants no limit on how long he can rule, and if that's how he feels, how likely is it -- how much less likely will it be later -- that he would let the people's will stop him?
I don't want to rule out absolutely the possibility of the necessity of revolutionary dictatorship for the sake of planetary well-being if circumstances require it, but revolutionary dictatorship need not be the same thing as one-man rule. Apologists for Chavez can talk about all the wonderful bottom-up organizing going on in the communes he's called into being, but they should ask themselves whether the package of enhanced presidential powers their man is pushing is consistent with grass-roots government. They may want to claim that his personal power is necessary to make the truly desirable long-term changes happen, but I insist that the necessary power doesn't have to be and shouldn't be personal in nature. If Chavez doesn't expect another competent person to emerge and pick up the slack over the next forty years, and has no other interest in his own life except to govern, that tells us that the "Bolivarian" agenda is less about what's best for the Venezuelan people and more about what Hugo Chavez thinks everyone should do.
Who knows? Maybe I distrust dictators and caudillos because I'm an atheist and reject the notion that there is a single absolute ruler, in this world or the next, who is absolutely entitled to the people's unconditional obedience. But this is only to segue into a preview of my next comment, in which I turn my scope on Joseph Ratzinger and his latest encyclical against atheism. Don't miss this one: it should be like shooting a dead horse in a barrel.
6 comments:
I still say Bush has left himself (and all future presidents) an out to rule for more than 2 terms. By granting the President the executive power to take control of all state militias and to be able to declare martial law under very blurry circumstances, all it will take is for another 911 "terrorist" attack on American soil for Mr. Bush to declare martial law and suspend the elections. Congress could kick and scream all it wants, but it has no actual troops to back them up. It really depends on whether the military would allow the "coup" to take place.
Keep in mind - according to the letter of the law, what martial law entails is that civilians obey any and all orders given by the military, under threat of instant execution. If a soldiers says "jump" and you don't, he is entitled to shoot you on the spot. That is what Mr. Bush's idea of martial law entails.
The scary thing for me isn't that this is possible, but how so many people believe it is impossible. The scary thing is not that history has a nasty habit of repeating itself, but that so many people believe "it couldn't happen to us."
This is an old issue between Chrymethinc and me, and I'm not going to blame people for an excess of vigilance in these times. I'll limit myself to saying that the peak time for Bush to pull any such stunt is well past. I doubt whether he'd have the military or the Republican party or even many right-wing media talkers behind him if he tried for unlimited power now. Nor do I think Blackwater or similar entities capable of pulling off a coup in his interest. Presuming that George W. Bush even has a desire to rule beyond his term limit, he would act without any intellectual or ideological apparatus to support him. There is no one out there advocating dictatorship or a state of emergency or amending the constitution for Bush's benefit, and if you'll recall, there was none of that in October 2001 either. If he wanted to do this, he'd have done it, or tried it, already.
1. Most of the military is out of the country right now. In Iraq, in Afghanistan, in S. Korea, etc.
2. Military personnel are trained to the point of near brainwashing to follow orders without question. Especially during a time of war when refusal to follow orders can get you shot on the spot.
3. A lot of the top brass are Bush loyalists. After all, they have him to thank that they get to justify their salaries. And they get to play soldier in a real war.
4. It doesn't have to be Mr. Bush specifically. Theoretically speaking, if Mr. Bush were to die, Mr. Cheney would take over and probably get his war against Iran as well. Or it could be some future president. The point being, Mr. Bush's push for executive powers not detailed in the Constitution would make it much easier for a popular president, under the right circumstances, to make him/herself a dictator. Rome is a perfect example of how this sort of thing happens in a Republic. And lets not forget that history repeats itself...
There are a few holes in Crhymethinc's latest comment. First, if the Bush-appointed top brass are playing soldier in a real war, wouldn't that mean they're probably also out of the country, and therefore out of position to carry out any presidential coup plan? Meanwhile, for better or worse, if military people are brainwashed into obedience, it's probably obedience to higher ranking military. I suspect that when the crisis came, and a man in a suit shambled over to them and drawled out the coup order, they might laugh in his face. Finally, however, Crhymethinc is right to emphasize the structural rather than the personal threat. If Bush's best chance is past, that doesn't mean that someone worse (Giuliani comes to mind) might not take advantage of the opportunity left him if nothing is done to change the law or revise the powers of the executive. Doing this may be even more important than electing a president next year.
Actually, the Joint Chiefs are all at the Pentagon. And though they may not be Bush loyalists, they do represent the "official" arm of the military/industrial complex (which accounts for billions of dollars in government spending).
Battlefield commanders - like Gen. Petreus are mainly in the field, but only a few hours flight from DC, whereas the logistics of moving any large number of troops that quickly would pose a problem.
Insofar as whether soldiers would obey a direct order from Bush (or any other president), the answer is "yes". The Commander-in-Chief is the highest ranking officer in the military. But the president would probably never be in a position to give a direct order to common soldiers. He gives orders to the command officers, like generals and admirals. The orders then flow down the chain of command.
Of course, you could just ask any soldier you happen to see if they would obey a direct order from the president, no matter how ridiculous it seemed.
I'll restrict myself to Crhymethinc's last point. I think the answer depends on circumstances. If you asked soldiers ten years ago if they would have obeyed a direct presidential order, the president then being Bill Clinton, quite a few might readily have said no if they could keep it off the record. Even today, if you asked soldiers if they'd obey a direct presidential order to in effect perpetrate a coup d'etat, the answers might happily surprise you, even if you presume they'd behave differently if the pressure was really on. But since Crhymethinc is right to suggest that coup orders would probably be implemented indirectly through the chain of command, it's an open question whether the grunts would even realize what they were doing.
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