From CrossLeft
By Jim Ramelis

Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa wants the U. S. out of its airbase in Manta in Ecuador. The U.S. had a ten year lease with the Ecuadorian government and it ends in 2009. Monitoring and intercepting the cocaine trade was to be the base’s purpose but it is suspected operations are conducted out of the base to support our Columbian ally in its fight against leftist rebels. It is also suspected that Latin American communications are monitored from the base. Depending on the source, there 300 to 475 American troops on the base. Officially there can be up to 500 troops per the contract.

President Correa is part of the Latin American “pink tide”. They are Latin America leaders elected in the last decade or so whose primary allegiance is to their own countrymen and its problems, putting their own interests above those of the mostly American based multi-national corporations. These new leaders are often sympathetic to Hugo Chavez . For the most part it is a very democratic movement and includes indigenous peoples too. They are resisting our attempts at economic colonization and our decided favoritism to white dictators that keep their own people beaten down, hungry, and in servitude in feudal like conditions to large landowners and multi-national corporations. These new Latin American leaders are wise to organizations like the World Trade Organization (WTO), The International Monetary Fund (IMF), and USAID. They understand that their loans mean bondage, servitude, and economic colonization.

President Correa told the U.S. that they could keep their base if he would be allowed to open up an Ecuadorian army base in Miami . Touché. Needless to say, he was not taken up on this offer. His suggestion does bring home our worldwide position though. We have 700 sites with American military personnel stationed on them worldwide. We are more than Babylon, Rome, and the British Empire and other European powers ever were. We are the global cops for the multi-national corporation. We are in every corner of the globe, poised for action , ready to defend the profit margins of the multi-nationals against the interests and welfare of people everywhere. We can have bases in other people’s countries because we are Americans and they are not. They need to do as we say or we will kill them, literally, or with trade embargoes and other capital linked punishments.

As Christians, we need to support an end to our occupation of the world and our role as the Great Babylon of our age. We have evolved into a greedy, warlike empire, as all empires eventually do. We need not only to get out of Ecuador but many other countries. Did God die and leave us in charge? How can those of us who worship the Prince of Peace support our global war machine ?

There is another matter going on in Ecuador, that also illustrates our world position and what is wrong with America. In the 1960’s, Texaco dumped at least 17 million gallons of crude oil in the soils and waterways of the Ecuadorian Amazon. They also dumped 20 million gallons of drilling wastewater into these same waterways. In contrast, the Exxon Valdez accident dumped 10 million gallons of oil on the Alaska coast and we were informed of the environmental impact of that. Today the 30,000 residents of the region are sick with various ailments due to the trashing of their home by Texaco. Texaco has been bought by Chevron, who doesn’t deny that the destruction and environmental disaster occurred from 1960s to the 1990s. Chevron says that when Texaco turned their Ecuadorian operations over to Petroecuador in 1992, that it all became Petroecuador’s problem and responsibility. With their purchase of Texaco, even though Chevron assumed all responsibility for Texaco’s operations. They Chevron, have no fiscal responsibility for what happened in Ecuador. The people of Ecuador , and it is mostly indigenous tribes that inhabit the region are suing Chevron. Chevron’s has hired former Senators John Breaux and Trent Lott as lobbyists, as well as Mac McLarty a former White House chief of staff in the Clinton Administration. Who are they lobbying? They are lobbying the U.S. trade representative, as well as members of Congress and Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte. The goal is to pressure the Ecuadorian government to force the people bringing the suit to back down. The hammer is cancelling trade preference agreements that could severely damage Ecuador’s economy.

So we have former U.S. Senators, acting now as lobbyists for the rich and powerful Chevron oil, against the poor and sick people of a Latin American country, who have been poisoned by big business interests. And our government, supposedly elected by we the people, is considering punishing Ecuador with these trade preference agreements for daring to let its citizens sue the almighty multi-national.

Are these examples of what is going on in one small country a good example of what our country is all about in the new millennium? We call ourselves a Christian country yet act like this? Is it any wonder the rest of the world is turning against us?

It is up to concerned politically active aware Christians such as ourselves to turn the tide. Most American are ill informed and still think of America as being all about truth justice, and freedom. The face that the rest of the world sees is all about greed, power, and defending the interests of the wealthy against the working people of the world.

Let us pray for a change in the heart and soul of America.