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Sources? Evidence? Rhetoric != cash by ChePibe · 2008-02-24 05:37 · Score: 4, Interesting · on Military Grounds Stealth Bomber Fleet

I'll get modded down for this one, as it is Slashdot, but here goes:

Many of America's client states are rebelling against the economic burdens placed upon them. A clear example of this is seen in South America, where several countries (Venezuela included) are acting in contravention to America's economic wishes.

Which explains why the U.S. and Peru just struck a free trade agreement and why the U.S. already has a free trade agreement with, pound for pound, what is arguably the most powerful and stable economy in South America - Chile.

Oh, but Chavez. He makes a lot of angry speeches against the U.S.! He MUST hate us! He must just be screwing us and cutting us out!

Try again. Venezuela's main export partner - still by massive, massive margins (46% in 2006, according to the CIA world factbook) is the U.S. He still sends vast majorities of his oil to the U.S. Economically speaking, he's lining up just fine. Security wise, he's causing a few issues with neighboring countries that we would like him to stop, but as far as his massive oil industry - which is the only real engine his economy has - massive amounts of it are coming here, and there's little reason for him to change that.

Also of note, according to CIA World Factbook figures from 2006: Brazil imports almost twice as much from the U.S. as it does Argentina and exports twice as much to the U.S. as well.

Furthermore, the American economy is in deep trouble, largely because it has borrowed hundreds of billions of dollars to build expensive weapon systems (and also to build too many unproductive but expensive toys such as big screen TV's).

Oh please. The American economy has stalled a bit, but we're not even at the point of a classic recession (failure to increase GDP).

The economic system you are discussing is referred to generally as "neo-Marxism", with its focus on large states ruining the outlying countries for their wealth in an evil capitalistic world. What neo-Marxists never came to realize is that the world is not a zero sum game - and that rhetoric rarely translates into cold hard cash.

Now, what the U.S. likely is experiencing is more akin to hegemonic diffusion. The U.S. is, pretty much, an undisputed world Hegemon at this time. However, to maintain this hegemony, it must maintain trade (using its own resources) and trade a great deal with other countries, slowly diffusing its wealth to others. The great examples of this at the moment would be China and perhaps India. China is building a massive military based on income largely from U.S. trade, for example. China improves quickly, and the U.S. finds it increasingly difficult to maintain its relative position. The big question is whether this will switch to a bi-polar world (U.S./China), remain a uni-polar world (U.S., possibly China) or become multi-polar in the end.

Re:If you want to see the real Cuba, go now... by Solandri · 2008-02-19 08:10 · Score: 1 · on Fidel Castro Resigns

Freeing the country will do wonders to bring the truth to light, especially with the renewed faith in this system amongst the poor of Latin America.

Yes, they can look up to Haiti, Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, El Salvidor, Honduras, Guatemala, etc as a testament to the triumph and prosperity of capitalism and democracy.

Out of curiosity, I looked up the per capita GDP of all the independent nations I could find surrounding Cuba. Most seemed to be some form of democracy, although I'll leave it up to the reader to determine exactly which ones (just scroll up to the government section of the linked pages). Also, not all economic data is from the same year, but this should at least give you a ballpark estimate of where the countries stand. All figures from the CIA World Factbook, which despite the source seems to be generally regarded as a high quality compilation of facts. Here they are:

United States - $46,000
The Bahamas - $22,700
Aruba - $21,800
Trinidad and Tobango- $21,700
Barbados - $19,700
Netherlands Antilles - $16,000
Costa Rica - $13,500
Venezuela - $12,800
Mexico - $12,500
Antigua and Barbuda - $10,900
Dominican Republic - $9200
Panama - $9000
Belize - $7800
Colombia - $7200
Guatemala - $5400
El Salvador - $5200
Jamaica - $4800
Cuba - $4500
Grenada - $3900
Honduras - $3300
Nicaragua - $3200
Haiti - $1900