Ogmin/central america

Short slideshow of street scenes from Guatemala City where two groups of protesters took to the streets on Sunday, one, primarily poor and Indian marching in support of leftist President Colom, the other, largely middle and upper class, demanding he step down. Colom has been accused of corruption and conspiring to murder a lawyer but knowing the history of Guatemala, I would not be surprised if this whole affair is not a disinfo campaign by the oligarchy, a right-wing attempt at a coup. Colom has started food banks for the urban poor and is the first president who has made it possible for Mayan Indian children to get an education. 50% of Guatemala's population is pure Mayan

Social technology interrupts corruption and murder as usual in Guatemala. Web 2.0 emerging as the new, omniscient global conscience.

"Thousands of protesters have demonstrated daily in front of the presidential palace, calling for Colom's resignation. And politicians have said Colom should step aside during the investigation into Rosenberg's death. "This is the most serious political crisis the country has faced since the signing of the peace accords" in 1996, said Anita Isaacs, a Haverford College political science professor who studies democratization in Guatemala. "The country is hanging on by a thread.""

"Current developments in South America are of historic significance for the continent and its people. It is well understood in Washington that these developments threaten not only its domination of the hemisphere, but also its global dominance. Control of Latin America was the earliest goal of US foreign policy, tracing back to the earliest days of the Republic. The United States is, I suppose, the only country that was founded as a "nascent empire," in George Washington's words. The most libertarian of the Founding Fathers, Thomas Jefferson, predicted that the newly liberated colonies would drive the indigenous population "with the beasts of the forests into the Stony Mountains," and the country will ultimately be "free of blot or mixture," red or black (with the return of slaves to Africa after eventual ending of slavery). And furthermore, it "will be the nest, from which all America, North and South, is to be peopled," displacing not only the red men but the Latin population of the South."

From the page: "The Mayan hot pepper and chili flavors are distinctively 'New World' while the Spanish added the flavors of cinnamon and cane sugar, to make the drink more approachable to European pallets. This recipe was handed down to a member of the Caputo family by a Yucatec Mayan Shaman in the jungles of Central America. It is a traditional recipe most likely created around 1550 and demonstrates the fusing of 'New World' and 'Old World' flavors."

"The Art of Political Murder: Who Killed the Bishop?
by Francisco Goldman
Grove, 416 pp., $25.00

Goldman returned to his grandmother's country (Guatemala) from his home in New York to doggedly tease out the nuances of a case that reveals the challenges faced by a country long run by war criminals.

"Most top killers avoid the smell of burning flesh. They are calm bureaucrats, ideologues, politicians, academics. They kill with whispers, papers, and keyboard strokes.

And on the earthly -- implementation -- level, where sharp knives enter chests, the human adjustment is sometimes difficult for those who must do the actual killings."

Interview with Guatemalan-American author Francisco Goldman, whose In The Art of Political Murder, chronicles the 1998 murder of progressive bishop Juan Gerardi and the subsequent trial.