A Bíblia dos Idiotas

Excerto de "The Idiot’s Bible", artigo de Alvaro Vargas Llosa no The Independent Institute:

Hugo Chavez’s gift to President Obama at the recent Summit of the Americas—a copy of Eduardo Galeano’s “Open Veins of Latin America” — has many people wondering what the fuss is about. A decade ago, I and the other two co-authors of the “Guide to the Perfect Latin American Idiot” devoted a chapter to refuting the historical and ideological fallacies contained in Galeano’s tract, which we called the “idiot’s bible.” Everything that has happened in the Western Hemisphere since the book appeared in 1971 has belied Galeano’s arguments and predictions. But I guess Chavez has given it the kiss of life and, since people are asking, here I go again.

The book rails against the international division of labor, in which “some countries specialize in winning and others in losing.” That division of labor in the Western Hemisphere has not changed — Latin American countries still export commodities — and yet in the last six years, poverty in the region has been reduced to about one-third of the population, from just under half. This means that 40 million were lifted out of that hideous condition. Not to mention the 400 million pulled out of poverty in other “losing” nations worldwide in the last couple of decades.