Bolivian Rhapsody

It’s Bolivia’s
turn for a day or two in the stark, twisted spotlight of world media
attention. Maybe once a decade that merciless eye will sweep this benighted
morass of human suffering and then move on, nothing solved or even exposed
to anything more than momentary indifference.

Bolivia is the poorest and most backward nation in this hemisphere,
probably in the world outside of sub-Sahara Africa. When I was there
a few years ago, things in the capital, La Paz (the highest world capital
not counting Tibet, and lets not have that discussion now), were like
the US in the 50’s; ancient cars, no franchises or neon signs, sorry,
worn cobblestone streets rising at impossible angles, and dirt-poor Indians
everywhere. The only ostensible signs of wealth were the shadowy black
Mercedes ferrying aging Aryan aristocrats in greatcoats and boots to
bars and bistros with names like "Der Racket" and "Mein Rache" to rue
the
fall of the Reich.

Outside of the capital things were much worse. It was like traveling
backwards in a time machine at least 100 years, before electricity and
running water, to a land mired in malnutrition and human suffering. A
landlocked nation with little to export anyway, no institutions to speak
of, and consisting of inhospitable populated zones controlled by heavily
armed local generals and warlords, similar to the situation in lawless
lands
elsewhere.
A stagnant, forgotten land ripe for revolution.

For the major media take on things, here is the New
York Times article.
For the Radical Left side of the story, see Narco
News.

Are there any bloggers in Bolivia?