O'Grady on Bolivia

OPINION: "The End of Bolivian Democracy," by Mary Anastasia O'Grady, Wall Street Journal, 23 November 2009.

An accurate depiction:

A dictatorship that fosters the production and distribution of cocaine is not apt to enjoy a positive international image. But when that same government cloaks itself in the language of social justice, with a special emphasis on the enfranchisement of indigenous people, it wins world-wide acclaim.

This is Bolivia, which in two weeks will hold elections for president and both houses of congress. The government of President Evo Morales will spin the event as a great moment in South American democracy. In fact, it will mark the official end of what's left of Bolivian liberty after four years of Morales rule.

The rest of the column is the best short history of the Morales phenom I've yet seen in print.

The gist: in 2003 Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada elected president and proposes a big LNG deal with Chile. The rad left says he's giving away the national treasure and launches strikes and protests. This coincides with coca growers' movement led by Morales, which joins in. President threatens mil crackdown and gets State Dept on his back (sound familiar?), promising to cut all aid. Lozada resigns under pressure and Morales wins in special election. Once in, Morales starts going after previous officials and makes sweeping changes to legislature and judiciary. Any opposition met the sharp end of a stick wielded by street gangs (very Chavez and very fascist, if you know your German history, but fascism was a big draw in South America in that time frame--to FDR's great worry). Morales' party tries to rewrite constitution but fails on seat-packing of legislature needed to pull it off. Then Morales calls special assembly to military garrison, locks out opposition with military, and makes some new rules happen, later using mobs to scare the Senate into ratifying them (they surrounded the parliament building and threatened violence). The new rules create a special class of citizen (pure Indian blood) and give them special seats in the legislature. With this next election, Morales is expected to push even harder for the new constitution, which should make him invulnerable--according to the classic Chavez script.

The end:

Mr. Morales is South America's latest dictator, but he is not the ideological communist that many fear. He's more akin to a mob boss, having risen to power by promising to protect the cocoa business. Now he has the capacity to do it.

Under his rule, coca cultivation is legal and he collects a licensing fee from all farmers, whose harvests are sole through a centralized market. MAS [Morales' party] official also regular cocaine production and trafficking which now reaches down to the household level.

The booming business has made Mr. Morales popular. He may hate the U.S. and freedom but one thing is for sure: He understands markets.

The longer we hold off on decriminalizing (where O'Grady and I would surely part ways), the more we'll see populist governments (so called) in South American reformulate themselves as de facto narco-states to take advantage of the illegal premium. Decriminalize cocaine and Morales has bupkes, but until then, we are creating our own monsters in the region.