Democrats are severely damaging relations with America’s faithful South American ally Colombia.
The corrupt media refuses to report this threat to national security.
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (C) greets the crowd during a visit to Explora Park in Medellin, January 25, 2008. The United States would break faith with a strong Latin American ally that has rescued itself from failure if the U.S. Congress refuses to approve a free-trade agreement with Colombia, Rice said on Thursday. (REUTERS/Jose Miguel Gomez)
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice urged the Democratic Congress to support America’s great ally in South America and pass legislation that would open up trade between the two nations. Democrats have been pandering to international Leftist organizations and trade unions and refuse to pass legislation to help the Colombian people.
Last fall Speaker Pelosi snubbed Colombian President Uribe when he came to Washington- even though she met with Syrian dictator Assad earlier in the year.
Bloomberg reported:
“Colombia is an inspirational story,” Rice told reporters after meeting Uribe and his cabinet today in Medellin, northwest of Bogota. “Not only for countries in this region, but also for countries of the world that are trying to overcome years of civil conflict.”
Rice and the group of lawmakers, including Eliot Engel of New York, met today with trade union leaders, both for and against the trade agreement, and with representatives from the private sector.
The visit to Medellin — once considered the world’s most dangerous city when drug lord Pablo Escobar ran his cartel from there — builds on a series of similar trips last year by U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez and lawmakers aimed at getting Congress to approve the agreement with Colombia this year. The accord would increase trade between the nations by about $1.6 billion a year, according to the U.S. International Trade Commission.
Approval of a trade pact faces difficulty. Labor unions and Democratic lawmakers, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, say Colombia must show more progress in cracking down on violence against trade unionists before they will consider the legislation.
“Free trade is an important step that will bring increased investment to Colombia and employment with social security,” Uribe said. “The more Colombia is brought into the international community the more respect there will be for workers rights.”
Rice’s visit also is an effort to show support for the U.S.’s closest ally in the region as Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez mounts a diplomatic battle with Uribe over relations with the nation’s biggest rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia.
Over one million people attended a protest against terrorism, violence and kidnappings, in Colombia on July 5, 2007. (REUTERS/Albeiro Lopera)
Here is the story behind the Democrats shameful and damaging international policy:
In late April 2007, the American Spectator wrote this about the destructive actions by Speaker Pelosi:
She has third parties (Far Left groups) who have encouraged her not to take the meeting,” says a leadership aide, who said a coalition of labor organizations and MoveOn.org had been pressuring her to not meet with Uribe. “We’ve never seen anything like it. It’s not like we’re talking about some family from San Francisco who stopped by her office unannounced. This is the president of a country.”
In Colombia, Uribe has been struggling against communist terrorist groups financed by Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez, as well as leftist political pressure internally. All while attempting to work with the U.S. against narco-trafficking. “He’s a friend and an ally,” says a State Department source, who was unaware of Pelosi’s snub. “I’d be surprised that one of our national leaders would not meet with a strategic partner of the United States of America.”
Sen. Patrick Leahy (D) of Vermont, chairman of the subcommittee overseeing foreign funds, then froze $55 million in military aid to Colombia.
Democrats say they are withholding funds because 8 pro-Uribe lawmakers were put in jail on charges ranging from mere collusion with the paramilitaries to conspiracy to kidnap and murder. This gave democrats an excuse not to fund the Pro-US, Pro-Capitalist neighbor of Hugo’s Venezuela.
What the democrats won’t tell you is that it was “precisely because of the Uribe government’s successful negotiation with the paramilitaries – which lead to the demobilization of 31,000 fighters – that the truth of their influence is being revealed.” The Uribe government supports the paramilitary investigations that discovered the rotten politicians. the Uribe government even continues to fund the investigations!
The Pro-US Colombians were devastated by the denial of funds.
(At last report- these funds were still being denied to the Uribe government. I will update if I find out otherwise.)
Then… Democrats drove another nail through the heart of Pro-US Colombia.
Later, democrats sided with the terrorists. Democrats refused to give preferred status to the crucial US ally.
From the US House Ways and Means Committee:
“With regard to the Colombia FTA, the House of Representatives recently passed the 2008 State and Foreign Operations Appropriations bill, which redirects U.S. foreign assistance in Colombia. All of us regard Colombia as a crucial ally in a region that deserves our active engagement, and the bill represents an effort to have U.S. funds help address the root of numerous problems there. There is widespread concern in Congress about the level of violence in Colombia, the impunity, the lack of investigations and prosecutions, and the role of the paramilitary. Issues of this nature cannot solely be resolved through language in a trade agreement.
“We believe there must first be concrete evidence of sustained results on the ground in Colombia, and Members of Congress will continue working with all interested parties to help achieve this end before consideration of any FTA. Consequently, we cannot support the Colombia FTA at this time.
Did
you get that?
Democrats were upset about the violence in Colombia, a country that has been fighting Leftist terrorists for over 40 years!
And… Democrats totally denied the truth:
** Colombia has knocked down deaths by unionists by 90%.
** Murders are at ten/twenty year lows. So are kidnappings. Just this past year in Medellin murders are down 40%.
(This was despite Hugo Chavez’s funding of the FARC terrorists.)
DEMOCRATS ARE NOT BEING HONEST!
What is the real reason they refuse to deal with Pro-US Colombia?
And, just who are they listening to?
And, who are democrats helping here by not assisting the Pro-US Uribe government?
A.M. Mora y Leon was irate over the latest Congressional slap on Colombia:
I also see signs of weakness, in that Congress keeps falsely saying it wants to help Colombia, signalling that it fears those of us who state that the act is unfriendly and helps only Hugo Chavez. Therefore, there is room for fightback. Congress wants to screw Colombia but they don’t want to be called its enemy by bloggers like me.
Congress, I got one message for you – you are Colombia’s enemy and you are screwing Colombia. You are on the side of narcotraffickers. You are helping Hugo Chavez – and not doing one thing for Colombia.
Colombia has risen from the monstrous ashes of a terrifying war to become a nation that has grown into free trade and needs free trade to grow into a first world country. It’s been the U.S.’s most faithful ally in the entire hemisphere, it’s been a friend to Democratic and Republican administrations without fear or favor. But the Democrats can’t stand this country because it’s ruled by a rightwinger, a man who won office with 70% of the popular vote, and who now holds an 80% approval rating …. for Congress, this noble nation must get screwed. It’s a slap in the face of an ally unlike any other in history. This nation did anything for us, anything, and look how our Congress is treating it!
I am so angry I could throw things. I burn with hatred, I want to break something. How could Congress be so unethical? How could they throw away something so precious?
…Colombia is going to be traumatized by this. The charges against it are exaggerated, but cutting off free trade is only likely to increase the violence as the economy tanks. Screwing 46 million people is no way to make them want to be your ally. Betraying a nation like this will have consequences for us and I shudder to think what they are.
Read it all HERE.
Previously:
FARC You! Democrats Choose Terrorists Over Pro-US Colombia!
Pelosi Snubs Pro-US Uribe- Makes Plans to Visit Hugo Chavez!!!
Over One Million March Against Terrorism in Colombia
State Dept. Blasts Dems for Denying Aid to Colombia
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