Still no baby. So little Javi will now (most likely) be born in ’08, not the tail end of ’07. We won’t get the nice tax break (sorry, my dad’s an accountant, I can’t help it), but that’s OK.

A number of Bolivian poll numbers in La Razón today:

No baby news yet. We’re still waiting. K8’s parents are coming up today, since they’re getting anxious (and there’s not much else to do). Hopefully soon?

I’ll be taking a break over the holidays. The most obvious reason is that it’s Christmas. But also because I’m expecting my first son any moment now. I’ll be back soon. And then we’ll have lots of baby pictures. Oh, and Bolivia news & updates (which I’m keeping up on, of course). ¡Feliz navidad, y’all!

Today’s La Razón has an interesting article on the Bolivian government’s proposed new budget. The figures include about Bs.10.1 million (about US$1.2 million) for “social movements” (which primarily seems to mean organized unions & sindicatos). The figure, of course, is merely a fraction of the budget (about 0.1% of total projected spending)—so it’s probably not as big a deal as the news report suggests. But it’s still a little troubling.

As expected, Bolivia has entered a holiday truce (a cuarto intermedio). No doubt things will heat up again after the New Year. But for now things are simmering down. Let’s hope it stays that way.

For some time now, Peru’s government has been demanding that Bolivia extradite Walter Chávez, a Peruvian citizen wanted for his alleged connection to MRTA (Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement, an urban Maoist terrorist organization). Walter Chávez is a fairly well known journalist w/ leftist sympathies who served as advisor to Evo Morales’s presidential campaigns in 2002 & 2005. The Bolivian government has declined to extradite him to Peru & has offered political asylum. The (relatively minor) issue has been on the back burner for some time now. Walter Chávez, of course, denies the allegations; he stepped down as a presidential advisor in February 2007.

We mocked the local panic & frequent emails about winter “weather emergencies”—and now we’re on our first full 24 hours w/o electricity in the house. Lovely.

A recent poll by Equipos Mori shows the pro-autonomy position gaining ground from July 2006 to today. The poll suggests that “Yes” would win in a new referendum on autonomy in 6 of 9 departments (in a 50/42 split).

This could be unrelated to the political news, of course, but ERBOL (and other sources) report a bomb explosion just past noon in Santa Cruz. The explosion (reportly large enough to destroy a car) went off in the 6th floor of the Palacio de Justicia. No injuries are reported.

Today will be an interesting day in Bolivia. In La Paz, the government & its supporters are celebrating the new constitution (CPE), w/ a march through the city. Meanwhile, many in Santa Cruz will celebrate the region’s self-declared autonomy. So will Beni, Pando, and Tarija. And Chuquisaca is moving in that direction, too. All five departments have either finished “autonomic statutes” or are working on them. Santa Cruz is preparing to hold its own referendum election.

Finally saw Helvetica last night on DVD. My friend Jake saw it a few months ago when it was shown in Philadelphia. I have an amateur’s interest in design, so the idea of a documentary on the typeface Helvetica intrigued me. Plus, I value Jake’s opinion on these matters (he has a professional’s interest in design).

Problems continue w/ Bolivia’s new constitution. According to a La Razón report, a small committee is modifying the text outside of committee & after it was approved by the assembly. This is the latest in a series of “irregularities” in the procedure by which the constitution was approved. It doesn’t help, of course, that an “official” version of the final document hasn’t yet been made publicly available. There’s a version on the assembly’s website, but it’s dated November 24 and labeled a “draft” (proyecto de ley).

Today’s La Razón has another special supplement on the new constitution. It offers some more detail on some of the text’s provisions. Meanwhile, Carlos Hugo Molina reminds us that there is no official document yet. Even w/o an opposition present (whether through boycott or intimidation), assembly delegates couldn’t agree on 8 articles (out of 408), which are still on the table. Thus, it’s still unclear what the final draft will look like.

As expected, the new Bolivian constitution has been approved (w/ some minor changes) yesterday evening. La Razón has a special supplement on the new constitution. Meanwhile, civic leaders in Santa Cruz, Beni, Pando, Tarija, and Cochabamba are calling for autonomy by December 15 (though “autonomy” is not the same as “independence”). Of course, the new constitution includes 30 articles detailing departmental autonomy (including formation of regional assemblies), so this may be unnecessary.

The draft Bolivian constitution will likely be ratified by the end of today. The document is being read quickly & voted w/ little debate. Less than 24 hours after the assembly voted to meet in Oruro, newspapers report that 147 of the articles were ratified. The document is 100 pages long, has 408 articles in total. As of a few weeks ago & about 15 months after its installation, not a single article had been agreed upon by the body, which nearly fell apart. The rushed vote is conducted, as in Sucre, w/ thousands of cocaleros and pro-MAS miners guarding the meeting site. The opposition PODEMOS is no longer participating in the process & five regional civic committees have already rejected the new document.

This has been a hectic week, and things are starting to move incredibly quickly, following the rushed passage of a draft constitution, making it difficult to keep up. But here are some quick updates on the Bolivian situation.

Following the last two weeks’ events, Evo proposes a recall referendum for himself & the country’s nine prefects. In the announcement, he asked voters to decide whether they are “in favor of change” or “continuing the neoliberal model.” No date is scheduled yet. But this is an interesting turn of events.

But there is a recall law already on the table (submitted on January 19, 2007). It stipulates that presidents, prefects, or mayors elected by an absolute majority (50%+1) can be recalled only if they are opposed by one additional percentage point in the recall referendum. This means that a vote to recall Evo must win 54.7% of the national vote. But for those who won w/ simply pluralities, a simple majority will do to remove them from office. No prefect won election w/ an absolute majority.

Ironically, few (if any) prefects have lost significant support over the past months. The one key exception is the David Sánchez (MAS), the Chuquisaca prefect. But if he’s voted out of office, a new election would likely appoint an opposition figure. This would leave MAS w/ only two prefectures: Oruro & Potosí. It’s possible, of course, that MAS could wrest the La Paz prefecture away from Pepelucho (José Luis Paredes, PODEMOS).

The greatest danger of this kind of plebiscitary democracy, of course, is that it leaves little incentive for compromise or dialogue. If the government & its opponents go into campaign mode on a single, polarizing question, political divisions are only going to worsen. And what if the vote to reject Evo is close nationally but lopsided regionally? Imagine if Evo is approved by 52% (his current standing in the polls) but rejected by two thirds (or more) of media luna voters. What then?

Angus Reid’s Global Monitor just released the latest poll for Bolivia. Evo is down 10 points from last month (from 62 to 52 percent approval). I don’t know how this breaks down across the country (the pollsters interviewed residents of La Paz, El Alto, Cochabamba, and Santa Cruz, the four major cities). But the figures are consistent w/ what one would expect after the tumultuous past weeks.

It’s finally snowing in Carlisle. And I’m loving it. I’m sure the panic will soon set in (why don’t people outside the Midwest understand that snow is a perfectly natural form of precipitation?) & area schools will shut down for 3-4 days. But in the meantime I get to watch snow drift across campus from my second story window.

By now most people have commented on the defeat of Chávez’s constitutional reform proposal in yesterday’s referendum vote. The fact that Chávez came out quickly to accept the defeat is a positive signal. It means that Venezuela is not as “authoritarian” as some of its harshest critics would suggest. Hopefully, this will push Chávez to reconsider some of his ambitions (i.e. his desire for indefinite reelections)—especially since he made the constitutional referendum a personal issue (a vote for or against himself).

Today’s our first wedding anniversary. It’s almost surreal to think that it’s gone so quickly. A year ago today we were in Chicago in the middle of a snowstorm (I barely made it in for the nuptials). It was six weeks after I defended my dissertation & barely four months after coming to Dickinson. A year later, it’s six weeks after K8 defended her dissertation & three weeks from the birth of our first child. It’s been a whirlwind.