A Perfectly Cromulent Blog

"Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead"

But former Chilean president Augusto Pinochet is still alive. What's more, today is his 88th birthday. Conveniently, this year also marks the 30th anniversary of the CIA-backed coup that removed Salvador Allende from power and installed Pinochet as dictator of Chile.

How about a little career retrospective?

+ 180,000 tortured during his first year in power
+ Numerous assassinations performed abroad by Pinochet's secret police (DINA), including that of former Chilean diplomat Orlando Letelier in Washington, DC
+ "Operation Condor" - before it was a Jackie Chan movie, it was a joint effort by the governments of Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, and Uruguay to monitor, abduct, and torture political enemies regardless of where they were living at the time[1]
+ Routine torture of "dissidents" using electrical shock, beatings, and sexual assault throughout his presidential tenure

And let's not forget our own government's compliance, which is depressingly unsurprising, given the popularity of supporting "friendly dictators" during the Cold War. Present day spin artists like to present Pinochet as a hero in the struggle against Communism, based on how instrumental he was in preventing the Red Menace from achieving a strategic toehold in the Andes and seizing the precious alpaca herds.

Courts have ruled Pinochet is mentally unfit to stand trial for human rights abuses. He suffers from diabetes, has a pacemaker, and was recently hospitalized for bronchitis and a broken wrist. He is unrepentant about crimes committed during his time in office, and insists he always acted "in a democratic way."

Congratulations on lurching to another birthday, you murdering scumbag. I hope it's your last.

[1] Pinochet's suspected involvement in the abduction and "disappearing" of 79 Spanish nationals/Chileans of Spanish descent from Argentina formed the basis for his arrest in London in 1998.