High Aims, High Expectations, High Disappointments

If these aims are ever to be made reality, the number of poor people living within the FTAA will be decreased by one half (fifty per cent) by the year 2015.

It would be really interesting to see this become reality. Yet, even the form-givers to this free trade area see this aim far too optimistic to achieve.

Hugo Chavez, the president of Venezuela, made it quite clear after this high aim was set that the number of poor people in Latin America alone has been in a constant rise since the first meeting of American states that were developing the idea of forming the FTAA in 1994.

Another word of doubt was thrown in by Fernando Henrique Cardoso, the president of Brazil, who said that he understood the fear towards globalisation. According to him, FTAA would work in a proper way only if it manages to guarantee the products of poorer countries the access to the markets of richer, more industrialised countries. It doesn't seem too likely, though, and between the lines of these two non-conforming comments one can read the message clearly - the aim to reduce poverty is merely an aim that is set to distract the public eye from seeing the worst-case scenarios.

Well, we shall see about that. It is strange for a capitalistic, short-term-profit-seeking-creation of this kind (of the worst kind) to set that kind of an aim. Ultra-capitalistic systems are definately not known for their solidarity, nor for their socially healthy, or environmentally sound properties.

This leads us to another strange declaration, for FTAA also aims to root out corruption. Good luck! We have just seen, how corruption almost made George W. Bush the president of the United States of America! Fortunately, he isn't, even though he thinks he is.

Strangely, I don't recall anything said on environmental issues. Perhaps they did deal with these issues, but most likely they didn't. Perhaps this lie would have been far too apparent, far too unbelieveable to believe. Perhaps people would have remembered that the main polluter of the world has just made a decision to pollute the world more intensively.

Whatever are the high aims that were set, they will set high expectations on achieving these pre-defined goals. When the expecters will realise that their high expectations were highly unlikely to ever come true, they will be utmostly disappointed.

On the other hand, it is bloody stupid to believe in anything they say to public, especially when they're high on coca�ne.

- Per Kekle

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