It's Just a Government

It happened again yesterday. A group of young documentary filmmakers from abroad came into our office seeking help as they set out to make a film about the Bolivian political revolution. They are coming in droves to Bolivia these days – filmmakers, journalists, academics, dreamers of thesis topics, freelancers, seekers.

They are coming because they have heard that in Bolivia something truly original is underway – indigenous rule, a political revolution from the ground up, the "new socialism."

And I said to the young filmmakers yesterday as I say to all those who visit these days: Sorry to disappoint you folks, but really it is just a government.

To be sure, it is a government that is different than most, both in symbolism and substance. Much is made of the Minister of Justice, Cassimira Rodriguez, who used to be a maid (leaving out the less colorful fact that she has also been an effective union leader for a decade). What visiting journalist has not taken note of a President who doesn't own a tie? And yes, the new government is filled with many indigenous people among its ranks; it is seeking to reverse twenty years of foreign-imposed economic policy; and it has convened a constituent assembly to re-write the nation's constitution.

But, again, it is just a government, behaving the way that governments do.

Take the famed constituent assembly, for example. The vision for that gathering that drove the demand for it for decades was that it would sidestep the discredited instruments of political parties and build its members from bases like indigenous communities, labor unions, and the like. But MAS cut a deal with PODEMOS and the other parties to effectively exclude anyone but parties from the election for the Assembly. It reminded me greatly of the way lawmakers in California used to redraw election district boundaries – swapping Democrats in one district for Republicans in another until both parties walked away with "safe seats" in which, really, there weren't elections anymore.

Yes, my idealistic friends, political parties look out first for how to maintain and expand their own power and MAS is no different.

Take the even more famed May 1 Morales decree "nationalizing" Bolivia's gas and oil. Yup, looking at the decree through the lens of media coverage, both in Bolivia and abroad, it looked like the new government was really playing tough with foreign energy companies. Morales even sent troops into the oil fields! But in fact, when it came down to the policy itself "Morales 2006" looked pretty much like a mixture of "Goni 1992" and "Mesa 2005" – negotiate a deal to end up 51% owner of companies co-owned by the multinationals and impose higher taxes. "Nationalization" it clearly was not.

Yes readers, politicians often try to make things look different than they really are, for political reasons, and Morales and MAS are no different.

And now we have the evolving story of the new head of the state gas company (YFPB), Jorge Alvarado, embroiled in a scandal that smacks of both corruption and incompetence. I am not especially surprised. Alvarado was an engineer with no political profile when he was tapped to take over the Cochabamba water company after residents of the city took it back from Bechtel in April 2000. His performance in that position was unremarkable at best, but in 2002 Evo went searching for someone tied to the Water Revolt to join the MAS ticket and, when Oscar Olivera said no, Alvarado went into politics and became a Congressman.

I worked with politicians in California for many years and once contemplated becoming one myself, so I recognize the professional affliction they suffer sometimes – becoming utterly phony.

Not long after Alvarado entered Congress I approached him to see if I could get his help to get the Bolivian government to step up efforts to help get orphaned children adopted. "Sure!" he said when I asked him to come with me to visit one of the orphanages in town. "Maybe my wife and I will adopt one." I thought to myself, "Wow, this guy has it bad. He really will say anything to anyone."

But up the ranks Alvarado went, being MAS' candidate for governor of the state of Cochabamba last year and after losing, being named to one of the most important posts in the new government. It would appear that he took his weaknesses as manager and took them into political prime time.

Yes friends, in the mix of officials that all new governments must put in positions of power, some of them are going to be incompetent or corrupt or both, and the new Bolivian government is no different.

Now, lest the Evo-haters take this as too much red meat to swallow in one bite, let's put this in perspective. It would be pretty hard to find anything that this government has done (or most others) that rivals the Bush administration taking the US to war on a lie and having no plan for what to do about a mistake that cost more than 3,000 Iraqi lives just in July, has sent thousands of flag-draped coffins home to the US, and is costing US taxpayers about $3,000 per man woman and child per year.

But just because the current government in Washington is in the middle of "the mother of all political screw ups" doesn't mean the government in La Paz doesn't need to clean up its act. The Alvarado case is a test for a Morales government that ran for office pledging to clean up the government of corruption and incompetence.

Yes, all governments are faced with decisions that place loyalty to friends up against the broader principles for which those governments supposedly stand.

How Morales deals with the Alvarado/YFPB scandal will be a clear measure of whether Bolivia's new government is just talking the talk of being different, or also walking the walk.