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Read Why It Happened! Dime's Worth of Difference: Beyond the Lesser of Two Evils Order Here! Today's Stories November 12, 2004 Forrest Hylton / Sinclair Thomson Insurgent Bolivia: the Roots of Rebellion November 11, 2004 Peggy Thomson Encounters with Arafat Joe Bageant Hung Over in the End Times: Heaven's Foot Soldiers Escape the Dog Patch Ben Tripp The Squeaky Wheel Gets the Grief Edwin Krales Cuba's Response to AIDS: a Model for the Developing World Jordan Green How They Tried to Suppress the Black Vote in South Carolina Gary Leupp Guzman's Fist Mike Whitney Meet Your New AG: Alberto Torquemada Sam Bahour Palestine is Bigger Than Arafat Sylvia Shihadeh and Robert Jensen The Irony of Arafat Russ Wellen Why Do They Laugh at Us? Mark Scaramella Kerry's Enablers: the Clinton Cult Factor   November 10, 2004 Joshua Frank The Bright Side of Bush's Reelection Mickey Z. The Worst President Ever?: Bush + Clinton = Bubya Stan Goff Debating a Neo-Con Mike Whitney Exit Ashcroft Dave Lindorff Taking a Leak on the Bush Bulge Ghada Karmi After Arafat Fr. Gerard Jean-Juste Letter from a Haitian Jail Rev. Bob Jones, III A Letter to President Bush: "God Has Granted America a Reprieve" Bernestine Singley Tampa Vote: Dispatches from the Ground Website of the Day Free Camilo Mejia   November 9, 2004 Meredeth Kolodner Rebuilding the Anti-War Movement Saul Landau The Appeal of George W. Bush: a Mystery for the World to Solve Brian Cloughley Diego Garcia and Freedom, Bush-Style Charles Glass US is Failing the Test of History in Iraq Robert Fisk Arafat Died Years Ago Paul Craig Roberts The American Century is Over Adam Federman Witch Hunt at Columbia: Middle East Profs Smeared as Anti-Semites M. Junaid Alam The Discredited Logic of ABB Tony Kevin Fallujah and the Making of a War Crime Pierre Tristam Zealots on the Mount: Get Voltaire on Speed Dial! Patrick Cockburn Crushing Fallujah Will Not End the Iraq War Website of the Day Don't Blame the Voters!   November 8, 2004 Roger Burbach Out of the Ashes: Bush Win is a Defeat for Democrats, Not the Left Dave Lindorff Lessons from a Quagmire: Fallujah, the Hue of Iraq Greg Moses After the Morning After: On the Homefront of the Civil War Greg Bates Nader's Election Legacy: Something to Stand On Michael Donnelly The Hit-and-Run Left: From ABB to CYA Nick Schwellenbach Gutting FOIA: the Harm of Too Much Secrecy Adam Jones Men vs. Civilians in Fallujah Amelia Peltz Note from Palestine: This Is Not the Time for Despair David Swanson The Media Black Out on Vote Fraud Brian Rainey The Devil Made Them Do It? Elections, Religion and the American People Poets' Basement Albert, Landau, Hamod Website of the Day A Report on the US Supply of Toxic Weapons to Iraq   November 6 / 7, 2004 Alexander Cockburn Don't Say We Didn't Warn You Jeffrey St. Clair Green Out Carl G. Estabrook Who Killed Cock Robin? Saul Landau Che: the Man and the Movie Gary Leupp Let There Be Conflict! Ben Tripp You Call This a Party? Paul Craig Roberts The October Numbers: Continuing Stress on the Jobs Front Jordan Green Heroin, Cocaine and Espanola, NM Fred Gardner Haul of Justice J.A. Miller Cults of the Jealous God: the Balfour Decision Reconsidered Ramzy Baroud Life Without Arafat Dave Zirin Out at the Ballgame: Pro Sports and the Gay Athelete Ron Jacobs The Arrow on the Doorpost Robert Oscar Lopez How White Liberals Became a New Racial Minority Niranjan Ramakrishnan The November Surprise Dave Lindorff Silver Linings Richard Oxman Invitation to the Bodily Snatched John Whitlow Value Wars: the View from Lexington, Kentucky Rahul Mahajan Fallujah and the Reality of War Leila Matsui Political "Ju-On": Carrying a Grudge November 5, 2004 David Vest The Not-Bush Brothers: a Fond Farewell Elizabeth Boylan The Dems and Faith-Based Politics Conn Hallinan War Crimes and Iraq David Zonsheine Poetry and the Courage to Refuse Cynthia McKinney It's a New Day! Elaine Cassel Running from the Religious Right Chris Geovanis First Protect Your Vote: Lessons for Democrats on Fixing Elections from Chicago Rob Ritchie Election 2004 by the Numbers Jo Guldi The Beast of History is In     November 4, 2004 Sharon Smith The Self-Fulfilling Prophesy of Lesser-Evilism CounterPunch Wire Bush Voters: 2000 v. 2004 Ben Tripp My Fellow Americans...Get Stuffed! Michael Donnelly Why Not Blame Rosie? Vijay Prashad An Election of Homophobia and Misogyny Jules Rabin De Profundis: the Morning After Robert Jensen Politics and Professions of Faith: "Your Rich Men are Full of Violence" Zoltan Grossman Blue State Secession: the Only Solution? Jonah Birch 1968 and Today Dave Lindorff What Went Wrong? Jack McCarthy I Knew It Was Over When Michael Moore Showed Up: He Was For Nader...Before He Was Against Him Donna J. Volatile Ahoy Kerrycrats! Welcome to Our Nightmare Paul Craig Roberts The Bright Side of Black Tuesday     November 3, 2004 James Hodge / Linda Cooper The CIA and Abu Ghraib: 50 Years of Training Torturers Ann Harrison The Ghost Votes in the Machine: Voting Snafus Across the Nation Greg Moses Blues for Fallujah Anis Memon The Moral (Values) of This Election Mickey Z. Post Mortem Josh Frank The Dems Should be Ashamed Chris Floyd No Ways Tired: Defeat, Dissent and the Bush Machine spArk Smoke Signals from Portland: Karmic Blowback and the Democrats Friedrich von Schiller Folly, Thou Conquerest Cockburn / St. Clair Democrats in End Time: Who to Blame Now?   November 2, 2004 Gary Leupp Democratic Elections in Historical Perspective: The Wrong Side Wins Lance Selfa Selling the War on Terror Laura Carlsen The US Elections and Latin America: Can the US Ever be a Good Neighbor? James Davis To Control the Event: Attention Bicyclists Richard Oxman Getting Up with Osama Dr. Ira Kay A Mental Map of the Bush Presidency Jesse Walker Frankenstein v. Chucky: the Halloween Election Thomas C. Mountain Election '24, Deja Vu?: LaFollette, Nader, & the "Most Important Election of Our Lifetimes"   November 1, 2004 Cockburn / St. Clair How Bush Was Offered Bin Laden and Blew It Dave Lindorff Bulgegate Confirmed; Press Yawns Greg Bates Nader Voter Survey Results Roger Morris Novel Politics: Only Fiction Can Do This Election Justice Diane Christian Death Tolls Lenni Brenner Secularists Be Warned: Christlike Kerry Roams Spiritual Universe Christopher C. Conway Can the Left Sink Any Lower? Francis Boyle Legal Elites and the Iraq War: the Nazis Had Their Law Professors, Too Jason Leopold Rummy's Failed War Plan Website of the Day Dylan Resurrects "Masters of War"     October 30 / 31, 2004 JoAnn Wypijewski The Long March and the Million Worker March Winslow T. Wheeler Spartacus Tells All Bruce Anderson Notes from the Big Empty: When the Hippies Invaded NoCal Vicente Navarro They Worked for Franco: How Sec. of State Cordell Hull and Nobel Laureate Camilo Jose Cela Collaborated with the Fascist Regime Robin Blackburn How Monica Lewinsky Saved Social Security Greg Bates A Question of Character: What Makes Nader Tick? Nancy Welch The American Health Care Crisis: an Interview with Dr. David Himmelstein William Lind Election Day: Which Menendez Brother Will You Vote For? Brian Cloughley Uzbekistan and Bush Hypocrisies Suzan Mazur Oops They Did It Again: the NYTs the Paper of Record and Rip-Offs Greg Moses Standing at the Graves of Iraq John Chuckman Osama's Endorsement Richard Oxman Why Not Accept Osama's Offer? Ken Avidor Landscape of Fear: When Ugly is Suspicious Niranjan Ramakrishnan Bush, Ba'ath and Beyond Hope Bastian Strangling Cuba's Economy P. Sainath Tower of Gabble: Toward a Sustainable Rhetoric Dave Zirin Bush League: Why MLB Owners Support the Prez Jon Swift The Dry Drunk Thang: Put a Cork in It Ron Jacobs The Joke's on Me: a Review of Bob Dylan's Chronicles Vol. 1 Alexander Billet Taking Theatre Back: Are the States Ready for "Stuff Happens"? Poets' Basement Jones, Laymon, Norris, Ford and Albert Website of the Weekend The Origins of Halloween   October 29, 2004 Harry Browne No Justice for Peace Activist in County Clare October 28, 2004 Forrest Hylton "The Gas is Ours:" Bolivia's Ghosts of October Col. Dan Smith Rebellion in the Ranks Alan Maass Jon Stewart v. the Pundits Ron Jacobs Ecstasy in Red Sox Nation Alexander Cockburn Kerrycrats and the War     October 27, 2004 Jules Rabin Crammed with Distressful Politics Dave Lindorff Bulgegate: the Lies Continue Katherine Van Tassel On the Home Front: Both Parties Ignore Working Parents Jeffrey St. Clair The Bi-Partisan Politics of Oil   October 26, 2004 Brian Cloughley Three Weddings and Lots of Funerals: Atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan William Blum Fear Factors Lenni Brenner The 1964 Berkeley Free Speech Movement: Lessons for 2004 Ben Tripp The Chicken Salad Election Fidel Castro After the Fall Greg Bates The Nation's Flawed Calculus Walter Brasch Gag the Public: the War on Dissent Niranjan Ramakrishnan An Open Letter to Pat Buchanan Mickey Z. Rumble in the Jungle at 30: Ali, Foreman and the Congo Amir Taheri The Boom in Conspiracy Theories Alexander Billet Say It Ain't So, Bruce!: the Boss Endorses Kerry Doug Giebel The Religion of G.W. Bush Kathleen Christison Why I Liked Thomas Friedman's Latest Column Before I Didn't   October 25, 2004 Ralph Nader Letter from a Minnesota Highway Werther West Texas Wahabbism Dave Zirin Boston's Killer Cops: Death of a Fan Fred Gardner Pot Shots: Oregon Revokes Dr. Leveque's License Omar Barghouti Executing Another Child in Rafah William J. Nottingham Lori Berenson's Story John Chuckman A Foolish Consistency Uri Avnery On the Road to Civil War   October 22 / 24, 2004 Alexander Cockburn You Can't Blame Nader for This Rev. William Alberts On Bended Knee: Faith-Based Deceptions Willliam A. Cook Killing for Christ Saul Landau George W. Bush: a Man of His Words? Bill Quigley I Held the Bullet in My Palm: Masked Haitian Police Shoot Children While Arresting Priest Christopher Brauchli Seal It With a Frown: What Compassionate Conservativism Really Means William S. Lind Fallujah and the Moral Level of War Sharon Smith Guilt Trippers for Kerry Greg Bates Kerrynomics: "Hurt the Ones Who Vote for Us" Justin E.H. Smith Is Lesser Evilism a Compromise with Evil? Rebecca Evans Tarnished Legacy: Pinochet and the Chilean Military Mike Whitney Al Hurra TV: the Second Invasion M. Junaid Alam Purchasing Individuality in America David Krieger Nuclear Non-Proliferation: Examining the Policies of Bush and Kerry David J. Ledermann The Emperor's New Crumbs Lawrence Reichard Same Old FBI Story Website of the Weekend Lie Girls: the Real Coalition of the Willling     October 21, 2004 Ben Tripp The Undecided Voter Examined Joshua Frank Kerry and the Environment: It's Not Easy Pretending to be Green Stan Cox What the Left Doesn't Get About Small Businesses Bill Martinez State Depart and Cuban Visas: Only Anti-Castro Agitators Need Apply Mark Engler The War and Globalization Lina Britto and Lucia Suarez Bolivia: a Year After the October Insurrection Website of the Day Two Pampered Children of Wealth     October 20, 2004 Yitzhak Laor "Did You Two Squabble?": a Bullet Fired for Every Palestinian Child Jason Leopold Sinclair Broadcasting's Air War: a Long History of Journalistic Deception Jesse Sharkey A Teacher's Account of How Military Recruiters Prey on High School Students Col. Dan Smith Choking Free Speech About the Draft Dr. Teresa Whitehurst Using My Religion David Vest If Bush Wins, Blame Me Jack Random The Jackson 17: Reflections on a Mutiny Ron Jacobs Time to Kick It Up a Notch James Brittain Plan Patriota and the FARC: a Change in the Countryside? Christopher Dols Bombing Madison: Michael Moore's Fright Fest Dave Lindorff First They Came for the Nurses... Website of the Day Banana Republican Catalogue     October 19, 2004 Jeffrey St. Clair Party Favors: the Political Business of Terry McAuliffe Jeff Taylor Confessions of a Swing State Voter Matt Vidal American Myopia: "More Money in Your Pocket" Victor Kattan "It's Not Who You're Against; It's Who You're For": Palestine Takes Center Stage At Euro Social Forum William Loren Katz What Goes Around Comes Around Sean Carter O'Reilly Should Shut Up About Extortion Claiims CounterPunch Wire Who's Really in Bed with Republican Funders: Kerry or Nader?       October 18, 2004 Saul Landau Facts and Lies; Slogans and Truth Dave Lindorff Bulletin on the Bush Bulge Diane Christian Sheep and Goats: On the Language of Goodness Greg Bates / Dave Lindorff Betting on War: a Wager on the Fallout of a Kerry Presidency Uri Avnery Ariel Sharon's Philosophy Peter LaVenia Leaving the Greens So Soon? a Response to Josh Frank Mike Whitney O'Reilly at the Whipping Post Elaine Cassel The Other War: Civil Liberties Three Years After 9/11   October 16 / 17, 2004 Alexander Cockburn The Free Speech Movement and Howard Stern Leslie Brill Unmerciful Judge, Merry Executioners: the Death Penalty as the True Measure of Bush's Character Jules Rabin Reckoning Deaths in an Agitated World Dave Lindorff About the Bush Bulge: Was There a Pucker in That Jacket or Was the President Just Glad to be There? Peter Linebaugh Judging Judges: a Few Pages from The Mirror of Justices Gary Leupp Iran and Syria: How to Effect Regime Change and Expand the Empire M. Shahid Alam America, Imagine This! Ron Jacobs Trying to Cross Lake Champlain Fred Gardner The Flu Vaccine Question: How Bush Blew It Jenna Orkin The Toxic Legacy of 9/11 Dave Zirin Name the DC Baseball Team: Contest Results David Hamilton Alone and Exposed: Bush as a Strong Leader? Ralph Nader Criticizing Israel is Not Anti-Semitism Doug Giebel Thinking the Unthinkable Mark Engler Crimes in Freedom's Name: Dick Cheney's El Salvador Derek Tyner Blacks Didn't Get the Vote by Voting: an Interview With Clarence Thomas on the Million Worker March Evan Jones Gimme That Ole Time Religion: Cash and "The Mind of the South" Poets' Basement LaMorticella, Klipschutz and Albert Website of the Weekend No More Bush Girls   October 15, 2004 Paul Craig Roberts Where Did These "Conservatives" Come From?: The Brownshirting of America Laura Carlsen Wal-Mart vs. the Pyramids of the Sun and Moon Greg Bates Empire of Insanity: Kerry's Iraq Troop Numbers Michael Donnelly News from a Swing State: Does Anyone Here Have a Spine? Katherine Lahey The Venezuelan "Threat": Why Do Kerry and Bush Fear Hugo Chavez? Robert Jensen / Pat Youngblood Election Day Fears Leah Caldwell From Supermax to Abu Ghraib: the Masterminds of Torture and Abuse Website of the Day An Anti-Billionaire Policy? Why That Would Be Economic Racism     October 14, 2004 Darcy Richardson The Other Progressive Candidate: the Lonely Crusade of Walt Brown Willliam A. Cook Turning Myths into Truth Laura Santina Water, Women and War Evelyn Pringle Free Speech Banned by Big Pharma: What You Can't Say About Drug Importation Alan Farago Lessons from Nature Rep. Maxine Waters A Letter to Colin Powell on Haiti Nicole Colson Maimed for Oil and Empire       October 13, 2004 Bishop Thomas Gumbleton and Bill Quigley Aftermath of a Coup: The Other Disaster in Haiti Sharon Smith Barak O-Bomb-a?: Democrats Target Iran Christopher Brauchli God and the Bush Administration Mike Whitney The Real Meaning of the Hamdi Case Paul de Rooij Amnesty International: a False Beacon? Website of the Day Operation Truth     October 12, 2004 Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz "Indian Country" Greg Bates The Year of Voting Dangerously: a Survey Request of Nader Voters in Swing States Steven Conn Progressives as Pawns: Kerry's War on Nader Jason Leopold Under Cheney, Halliburton Helped Saddam Siphon Billions from UN Oil-for-Food Program Security Scholars for a Sensible Foreign Policy Time for a Change of Course Timothy J. Freeman Dying for a Mistake Pierre Tristam Deconstructing Bush Niranjan Ramakrishnan The 2nd Debate: the Blurring of Act and Audience Bill and Kathleen Christison Israel as Sideshow Website of the Day John Kerry's Personal Off-Shore Tax Shelters   October 11, 2004 Robert Fisk Iraq: Unforgivable Betrayals and Broken Promises Kevin Pina The Untold Story of Aristide's Departure from Haiti Patrick Gavin Rethinking Columbus Day Chris Floyd Tribes with Flags in the New Afghanistan Daniel Wolff Radioactive Money: Entergy, Political Cash and America's Most Dangerous Nuclear Plant Walter Brasch The Only Ones Who Believe Saddam Had WMDs are Bush, Cheney...and 40% of All Americans Mike Whitney The Phony Afghan Elections: Ballot of the Disappearing Ink Ari Shavit "He Talks to Condi Rice Every Day": an Interview with Sharon's Lawyer Paul Craig Roberts The Debates and the Big Lie Website of the Day Dylan's Greatest Recording?     October 9 / 10, 2004 Alexander Cockburn "There Are No Innocents" Paul de Rooij Northern Ireland is Still the Issue: a Conversation with Gerry Adams M. Shahid Alam Making Sense of Our Times Laura Carlsen Protest and Populism in Latin America Fred Gardner Pot Shots: ASA Goes to Court Col. Dan Smith Bush's Credibility Gap Paul Craig Roberts Faith-Based Economics Greg Bates What If Nader Critics Get What They Demand? Joshua Frank Cobb, the Greens and the Collapse of the Left Felice Pace Wilderness, Politics and the Oligarchy: How the Pew Charitable Trust is Smothering the Grassroots Environmental Movement Walter A. Davis Of Pynchon, Thanatos and Depleted Uranium William A. Cook The Agony of Colin Powell Phyllis Pollack Twas No Crank Call Love Affair: London Calling, 25 Years Later Poets' Basement Klipschutz, Albert, Ford Website of the Weekend Abu Ghraib: the Taguba Annexes   October 8, 2004 Jennifer Loewenstein The Israeli Invasion of Gaza Moshe Adler Edwards' Gambit: He Hoped No One Would Notice the Similarities David Swanson Media Blackout: Press Continues to Ignore Labor's Opposition to Iraq War Dave Zirin CounterPunch Contest: Let's Name the New DC Baseball Team! Rep. Ron Paul The Draft is a Form of Slavery William S. Lind Keeping Our SA Up Samar Assad Kerry v. Bush: No Difference When It Comes to Israel / Palestine Jim Ingalls and Sonali Kolhatkar The Elections in Afghanistan     October 7, 2004 Dave Lindorff All Out of Volunteers: A Draft is in the Air Masha Hamilton Fear in Kandahar Christopher Brauchli Master of Corruption: the Ripening Scandals of Tom Delay Jason Leopold Is There Still Time to Impeach Bush? Bruce K. Gagnon Bombing the Panhandle: Fighting the Pentagon in Rural Florida Meredith Kolodner Where is the Urgency?: The Anti-War Movement's Election Year Challenge     October 6, 2004 Jeffrey St. Clair "Please, Dude, Can I Take Them Out?": Targeting Civilians in Fallujah Ron Jacobs Going Nuclear: the Ghost of Edward Teller Lives Michael Colby The National Flip-Flop: Suddenly Bush is Unfit to Lead? Tarif Abboushi More of the Same: Israel Wins the Debates Matthew Behrens Canadian Firms Profit from Iraqi Blood Mike Whitney Rethinking WMDs John Pilger Stealing Diego Garcia Ben Tripp Kerry's "Triumph" Kevin McKiernan Cheney's Poison Lab: Wrong Time, Wrong Target Patrick Cockburn Elections Will Not End the Fighting in Iraq Website of the Day Is There an Islamic Problem?   October 5, 2004 Anthony Loewenstein Rupert Murdoch and the Marginals: "Personally Creating Outcomes" Mark Clinton and Tony Udell The Suicide of an Iraq War Veteran Greg Bates Trading Idiots: an Open Letter to Eric Alterman Dave Lindorff What's the Frequency, Karl? Norm Dixon Why Washington Won't Save Darfur Villagers Larry Kearney God Talk and Burning Children Bill Linville Dirty Politics in the Land of "Clean" Government Gary Leupp What Edwards Should Ask Cheney Website of the Day A Guide to Halliburton for Tonight's Debate   October 4, 2004 Diane Christian The Gates of Hell Joshua Frank An Interview with David Cobb Doug Giebel Incurious George: What If Bush Didn't Lie? John Chuckman Strange Victory: Sen. Obvious and the Pathetic Lump Ramzy Baroud Reverse the Picture: Anatomy of a Palestinian Outrage Julia Stein Remembering Mario Savio and the FSM Sean Donahue Outsourcing Terror: Kerry and Special Forces Website of the Day Mapping Mt. St. Helens as She Rocks   October 2 / 3. 2004 Paul Wright John Kerry on Criminal Justice Kathleen and Bill Christison An Exchange with Israeli Historian Bennie Morris Kathie Helmkamp My Son Trent: a Marine Who Doesn't Want to Kill Phillip Cryan Indigenous Mobilization in Colombia Lenni Brenner The First Ex-Catholic Saint: Memories of Mario Savio Fred Gardner Pot Shots: In Case You Missed "Montel" Ron Jacobs It Did Happen Here: When Neo-Nazis Terrorized Olympia Ben Tripp Sticker Shock William S. Lind The Grand Illusion: Iraqi Security Forces Dave Zirin The Swindle of the Century: Baseball Comes to DC Dave Lindorff Lies from the Great Debate Luscon Pierre-Charles Haiti's Elections: a High-Tech Sham is Underway Zoe Moskovitz & Sasha Kramer Separating Lies from Truth About Haiti Nelson P. Valdes Habana Night vs. Latin American Scholars in Vegas: 61 Banned Cuban Academics Alan Farago The "Ownership Society" and the End of the Everglades Nancy Haley What is the Historical Jesus Trying to Tell Us? Alex Billet Long Live The Clash: London Still Calling After 25 Years Steve Fesenmaier Save and Burn: The War on Libraries Poets' Basement Smith, Holt, Albert   October 1, 2004 Steve Breyman Kerry's Missed Opportunities Rose Gentle My Son Died for a Lie Lee Sustar Iran in the Crosshairs Ralph Nader What We Didn't Hear at the Debate: Where's the Exit Strategy? Walter Andrews We Are Less Secure Now Than Ever Mike Whitney Pandora's Government Mickey Z. Debate This Saul Landau The Iraq Invasion: Lessons from the Pinochet Cases                   Hot Stories Alexander Cockburn Behold, the Head of a Neo-Con! Subcomandante Marcos The Death Train of the WTO Norman Finkelstein Hitchens as Model Apostate Steve Niva Israel's Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings? Dardagan, Slobodo and Williams CounterPunch Exclusive: 20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians Steve J.B. Prison Bitch Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber True Lies: the Use of Propaganda in the Iraq War Wendell Berry Small Destructions Add Up CounterPunch Wire WMD: Who Said What When Cindy Corrie A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter I Can't Hear From Gore Vidal The Erosion of the American Dream Francis Boyle Impeach Bush: A Draft Resolution Click Here for More Stories.     Subscribe Online

November 12, 2004 The Roots of Rebellion Insurgent Bolivia By FORREST HYLTON and SINCLAIR THOMSON The great anti-colonial indigenous insurrection of 1781 has haunted republican Bolivia since its founding in 1825. From their military encampment in El Alto overlooking the colonial city of La Paz, Aymara leaders Túpaj Katari and Bartolina Sisa laid siege to the ruling Spanish elite from March to October 1781. Lacking urban allies, they were ultimately unable to seize the city, yet the aspirations of that uprising have taken on new life at the beginning of the 21st century. In October 2003, popular classes of Aymara descent living in El Alto spearheaded what became a broad-based movement to overthrow the increasingly repressive and illegitimate regime of then-President Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada. They too laid siege to the capital and brought it to a virtual standstill. Unlike Katari and Sisa, the latest insurgents successfully overtook the urban center, occupying all but a few blocks around Plaza Murillo where the Presidential Palace is located. Waving the Aymara flag (the wiphala) and the Bolivian flag side by side, the crowds swelled to as many as 500,000 on October 17, the day a heavily guarded Sánchez de Lozada fled to Miami. The stunning turn of events-dubbed by journalists the "gas war"-brought to an end the era of neoliberal domination in the country. It also confirmed that Bolivia has entered a new revolutionary moment in which indigenous actors have acquired the leading role. It is a time of great promise, but one whose outcome remains unforeseeable. A powerful tradition of popular urban mobilization has been evident in earlier historical moments, as when "national-popular" forces overthrew the dictatorship of Col. Alberto Natusch Busch in 1979 or brought the Democratic Popular Unity (UDP) government to power in 1982. Yet the profile and organization of these previous mobilizations were different. In the 1970s and 1980s, workers, students and members of the progressive middle classes organized themselves through left parties and the national Bolivian Workers' Confederation (COB). The politically emergent indigenous peasantry mobilized as well during this period, but almost entirely at the behest of the COB and as a junior partner in the national-popular bloc. However, in October 2003 the progressive middle classes stirred only belatedly and the COB was a relatively minor player. More importantly, these groups were essentially backing demands previously launched by Aymara insurgents, organized mainly through their community, union and neighborhood organizations. Ultimately, though, all sectors converged around the same demands: the resignation of Sánchez de Lozada and his ministers, a trial to punish those responsible for state violence against the unarmed civilian population, a national referendum on how to develop the country's natural gas reserves, the formulation of a new Hydrocarbons Law and the convening of a Constitutional Assembly. In contrast to the proletarian character of the national-popular struggles that ended the phase of military and narco-dictatorships in the early 1980s, the powerful movement in 2003 displayed an indigenous centrality in synch with the current demographic, sociocultural and political realities of Bolivia, where 62% of the population claims indigenous identity, according to the 2001 census. If we are to understand the October insurrection, however, it is not enough to point out Aymaras' currently assertive historical agency. We must first note that the keen sense of Aymara identity is itself a product of recent political struggle, and that the entire context for the revolutionary cycle that opened in 2000 has been shaped by forceful and fluid processes of ethnic formation. The galvanization of indigenous identity is especially striking among the subaltern actors of October's events. Members of mobilized rural communities on the altiplano (highland plateau) have gradually adopted a self-conscious cultural and political identity as "Aymaras" since the late 1970s. The rise of militant peasant unionism and the emergence of radical indigenous leaders criticizing ongoing forms of colonial hierarchy and racism within the country are largely responsible for this ethnic affirmation.[1] The trajectory of Aymara leader Felipe Quispe-known as "El Mallku," an Aymara term meaning both condor and traditional authority-reflects this process. One of the most arresting features of the 2003 uprising was the expression of Aymara ethnic identity and solidarity among the urban residents-especially young protestors-of El Alto, an impoverished yet dynamic city of 900,000 outside La Paz. According to the 2001 census, 82% of alteños, as the city's residents are known, identify as indigenous. In La Paz, laborers from the hillside neighborhoods of Munaypata and Villa Victoria, a proletarian stronghold during the Revolution of 1952, actively supported the insurgent alteños. Although not all these neighborhood residents would overtly identify themselves as Aymaras, they share with alteños a history of multi-generational migration from the Aymara countryside and insertion into the ethnically segmented urban social hierarchy. Bolivian miners have traditionally identified and organized themselves on a class basis. When mineworkers traveled from the mining center of Huanuni to join the protests in El Alto, they revived the memory and symbolic power of earlier proletarian struggle in the national-popular tradition. However, on this occasion they also surprisingly affirmed their own indigenous roots. Cocaleros (coca growers), another important sector in the contemporary popular movement, and agrarian colonizers from the Yungas recognize their own Aymara origins, although their collective identity is more closely tied to grassroots union organizations than to the traditional Andean community, or ayllu. In the Chapare, the country's principal coca-growing region, the majority of residents are from the Quechua-speaking regions of the Cochabamba valleys. Others, like cocalero leader Evo Morales, are Aymara migrants from the highlands or Quechua-speaking former miners. The regantes (small-scale coordinators of regional water distribution) who are best known for their role in the 2000 "water war" in Cochabamba also played their part in the "gas war." They have their roots in the region's Quechua-speaking mestizo peasant culture. Other actors in the uprising, like the peasant communities from Potosí and Chuquisaca, are organized through ayllus and are of mixed Quechua-Aymara background. All of these groups contributed to the insurgent movement that expressed itself so boldly, and with such a strongly indigenous accent, in 2003. The point to emphasize, however, is that the insurrectionary energy of the 2003 uprising stemmed initially from the Aymara heartland of Omasuyos, on the altiplano around Lake Titicaca, and later from the Aymara city of El Alto. Likewise, indigenous communities and neighborhoods were the first to put forth the basic demands around which so many others eventually converged in October. Historically, indigenous movements have sought to build ties with other popular and middle class opposition forces in cities and mining districts. Such tentative efforts took place during the indigenous mobilizations against Spanish rule in 1780-1781, the insurgent federalist movement led by Pablo Zárate Villca in 1899, the regional revolutionary movement led by Manuel Michel in 1927, the uprisings that began in Ayopaya in 1946 and the general strike of 1979. But relations between indigenous movements and their potential national-popular allies have generally been marred by mutual suspicion, misunderstanding or plain racism. Political theorist René Zavaleta Mercado pioneered the idea of "national-popular" forces in Bolivian history. Zavaleta posited that the insurrectionary "multitude" opposing oligarchic elites and their foreign, imperialist allies was formed through the political unification of normally divided subaltern subjects.[2] National-popular struggles of this sort can conceivably be traced back to the wars of independence against Spain. The active consolidation of this mode of struggle on the national political stage, however, began during the Chaco War (1932-1935) and culminated in the Revolution of 1952. National-popular struggles were behind the nationalization of Gulf Oil under Gen. Alfredo Ovando Candia in 1969, the Popular Assembly government of Gen. Juan José Torres in 1971, as well as the overthrow of the Col. Alberto Natusch Busch and Gen. Luis García Meza dictatorships and the rise to power of the center-left UDP between 1979 and 1982. Throughout this period the left and the union movement held, at best, a condescending view of indigenous participation in national political organization. These groups privileged a schematic vision of class consciousness over cultural identity as the basis for political action. They also shared with elites a "whitening" ideology of national progress through mestizaje. More recently, however, this began to change. The political fortunes of the left and the COB went into decline with the onset of neoliberalism in 1985, but indigenous political and cultural organization gained increasing momentum in the 1980s and 1990s. During this same period, coca producers acquired a strategically crucial political importance through their opposition to U.S. militarized drug intervention. Then in 2000, a new revolutionary cycle was ushered in with indigenous protests on the altiplano and the water war in the Cochabamba valley. Finally, the events of October 2003 revived the tradition of Aymara community insurrection in one of Latin America's largest indigenous cities. The latest insurgency constitutes a major challenge to Bolivian society's internal colonialism and may lead to the formation of a new national-popular bloc representing the social majority. The national revolutionary tradition, symbolized by the overthrow of oligarchic rule in 1952, seemed definitively vanquished by neoliberal ideology as structural adjustment reached its apogee during Sánchez de Lozada's first term (1993-1997). The regime set out to privatize state tin mines and to "relocate" mining families to the outskirts of Oruro, Cochabamba, El Alto and the lowland frontiers of the Chapare. The union movement, which the government deemed an outmoded corporatist institution, came under relentless attack. Technocrats, ideologues and mainstream party functionaries-former middle class dissidents prominent among them-recited neoliberal mantras: competitivity, governability, efficiency, deregulation, decentralization, direct foreign investment. Globalization, they argued, afforded unprecedented opportunities for indigenous peoples to reap the benefits of modern capitalist democracy. Though economic growth was sluggish and state revenues plummeted as a result of privatization, the discourse of neoliberalism appeared hegemonic. During Sánchez de Lozada's first administration, international financial institutions signaled Bolivia as a model of "reform" and democratization for other developing countries. Harvard economist Jeffrey Sachs, an architect of Bolivia's free market "shock treatment" in 1985, hailed Sánchez de Lozada as one of the most creative politicians of the era. The southern Andean nation became a shining star in the neoliberal firmament, and its militant popular movements appeared to have suffered a historic defeat. As part of the wave of privatizations, Sánchez de Lozada drafted a Hydrocarbons Law in 1996 that dismantled YPFB, the state energy firm, setting the stage for the transnational takeover of Bolivia's rich oil and natural gas resources. A year later, just two days before the end of his first term, he signed another decree effectively forfeiting constitutional sovereignty over the reserves. An official report released by the Bolivian government in December 2003 revealed that the Bolivia-based operations of British-owned BP Amoco and Spain's Repsol YPF enjoy the lowest operating costs for oil and gas production and exploration in the world. The sweetheart arrangement for these oil corporations was an eerie-and not unnoticed-repetition of the oligarchy's sell-off of Bolivia's mineral reserves to Anglo-Chilean capital following the War of the Pacific in the late 1800s. Bolivians have had a long and bitter experience with the expropriation of their mineral wealth for the benefit of oligarchs connected to foreign capital. The monetary system in early modern Europe thrived on the export of Bolivian silver from Potosí, now one of the country's poorest, most desolate regions. In the 19th and 20th centuries, tin extracted from the area near Oruro was smelted in the U.S. and Britain. Today, the working conditions and technology in most of Potosí's mines recall those of the colonial era, while Oruro is a landscape of post-industrial devastation where residents make superhuman efforts to survive. The protestors in the gas war were unwilling to see the old pattern repeated with natural gas since, according to many, only sovereign control over Bolivia's gas reserves-the second-largest in Latin America-could underpin a viable political and economic future for later generations. A deal to export gas through a Chilean port to California was negotiated between San Diego-based Sempra Energy and the Spanish-British-U.S. energy consortium Pacific LNG under the watch of one-time dictator and then-President Hugo Bánzer. During his administration (1997-2001), Bolivia ranked as one of the most corrupt countries in the world. With state violence and social protest on the rise, and the legitimacy of neoliberal political parties eroded, Sánchez de Lozada narrowly won the 2002 elections. His attempt to close the gas deal in 2003 sparked massive opposition to which he responded with blunt force. On September 20, the day after some 500,000 people marched throughout the country to defend national economic sovereignty, security forces killed three civilians in Warisata and one in Ilayata as part of an effort to "liberate" a group of tourists stranded by a road blockade. The center of conflict spread to El Alto on October 8 when the Federation of Neighborhood Associations (FEJUVE) and the Regional Workers' Federation (COR-El Alto) declared a general strike. Members of the insurgent communities of Warisata and Achacachi, like their kinfolk in the alteño neighborhood of Villa Ingenio, conceived of themselves as patriots and their rulers as traitors to the Bolivian nation. Once the massacres began, first in the countryside and then in the city, the relatives and friends of the deceased dubbed their dead "martyrs fallen in the defense of gas." The repression intensified and 31 died on October 12, the anniversary of Columbus' incursion into the Caribbean. Simultaneously, urban Aymara insurgents and their allies in the neighborhood of relocated miners known as Santiago II began to develop autonomous institutions for self-government similar to those developed in Warisata after September 20. More than 150,000 people marched from El Alto to downtown La Paz on October 13. After several days of mourning, and once the insurgent communities from Omasuyos arrived, rebels set out to overrun the capital. Prominent middle class personalities and politicians organized hunger strikes on October 15 that spread with remarkable speed to every major city in the republic. But by that point what had once seemed impossible had already become likely: Sánchez de Lozada-also known as "El gringo" because of his heavily accented Spanish (he was raised in the United States)-would have to go. In retrospect, the ideological hegemony of the Washington Consensus, embodied in Bolivia by Sánchez de Lozada, appears to have been a mirage. Contrary to neoliberal common sense, Bolivia's revolutionary past was not obliterated after 1985, but rather reconfigured. Contemporary indigenous radicalism grows out of a long, largely underground history, yet its irradiating effects since 2000 have reanimated aspirations for social and political change, harkening back to earlier moments of interethnic, interregional and cross-class alliance.[3] The October insurrection thus represents an exceptionally deep and powerful, though not unprecedented, convergence between two traditions of struggle-indigenous and national-popular. Earlier mobilizations, and some of their gains-notably the nationalization of mines in 1952 or petroleum in 1969-left a more enduring legacy than had been supposed. Self-consciously building on earlier revolutionary cycles, especially those of 1780-1781, 1899 and 1952, the current cycle of 2000-2003 will leave its own legacy. The upcoming Constitutional Assembly, demanded by indigenous peoples since 2000 and secured by the revolutionary intervention of popular forces, offers the most immediate possibility for social reform, or even national transformation. The Assembly could help redraw state-society relations to reflect Bolivia's new historical conditions. It could recognize the enduring non-liberal forms of collective political, economic and territorial association by which most rural and urban Bolivians organize their lives. It could democratize the political relations that throughout the republican era have limited the participation of indigenous peoples in national political life, forcing them to resort to costly insurrectionary struggles. It could also redirect the future exploitation of the country's coveted resources in a way that benefits most Bolivians. Political and economic elites will undoubtedly attempt to divert the current process. However, as long as they have no alternative agenda to offer, their attempts to stonewall the process are likely to only further radicalize the opposition. These elites may try to construct a more visionary new hegemonic project but there are no signs of this as yet. Meanwhile, popular sectors are engaged in effervescent debate and are formulating their own visions of the future. What would Bolivia look like with sovereign control over its territory and natural resources, with forms of regional and ethnic self-determination, with meaningful national political representation for popular movements or with true majority rule? Whatever the future brings, there will be no going backwards. The current conjuncture in Bolivia is marked by seasoned political skepticism, yet also measured hope, and it may well carry implications for other struggles in the Andes and Latin America more broadly. As indigenous insurgents of previous centuries proclaimed in moments of anti-colonial and autonomist insurrection: "Ya es otro tiempo el presente" ("The present is a new time"). Forrest Hylton is conducting doctoral research in history in Bolivia. He can be reached at forresthylton@hotmail.com. Sinclair Thomson teaches Latin American history at NYU and is author of We Alone Will Rule: Native Andean Politics in the Age of Insurgency (University of Wisconsin, 2003). They are coeditors of Ya es otro tiempo el presente: Cuatro momentos de insurgencia indígena (La Paz, 2003). NOTES 1. See Silvia Rivera Cusicanqui, "Aymara Past, Aymara Future," NACLA Report on the Americas, Vol. 25, No. 3, December 1991, pp. 18-23; and Rivera's article in this issue. 2. See René Zavaleta Mercado, Las masas en noviembre (La Paz: Juventud, 1983, Lo nacional-popular en Bolivia (Mexico: Siglo XXI, 1986); and Luis Tapia's, La producción del conocimiento local: historia y política en la obra de René Zavaleta (La Paz: Muela del Diablo, 2002). 3. See Rivera, this volume; Forrest Hylton, Felix Patzi, Sergio Serulnikov, and Sinclair Thomson, Ya es otro tiempo el presente. Cuatro momentos de insurgencia indígena (La Paz: Muela del Diablo, 2003). This article was originally published by the North American Congress on Latin America. Weekend Edition Features for October 30 / 31, 2004 November 6 / 7, 2004 Alexander Cockburn Don't Say We Didn't Warn You Jeffrey St. Clair Green Out Carl G. Estabrook Who Killed Cock Robin? Saul Landau Che: the Man and the Movie Gary Leupp Let There Be Conflict! Ben Tripp You Call This a Party? 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