Anita Arnon

So what happens in effect is that you get the Creole class, of which Bolivar's family was very much a part of,

they start making decisions on their own.

They get a taste of autonomy, a taste of what it is to run the show themselves.

When finally it is sorted out, what's going on in Spain and Ferdinand VII returns to power in 1814, he comes back going, hang on a minute, what are these colonies doing?

They're not listening.

They've just been doing things on their own and he tries to restore absolutist rule.

Now, by this time, the Creoles, even the moderate Creoles, had a taste of doing things themselves, probably running things a lot more effectively because they know the country, they know their people.

Even the moderates start saying, which Spanish king?

Who the hell are you?

We've been doing this ourselves for a few years now.

Why are you here?

They start talking about self-governance.

Some, the less moderate ones, start talking about independence.

You were asking before, was Bolivar thinking along the lines of independence?

Can't go into his head about this, but the theme at the time was,

independence started being talked about for the first time after Ferdinand tries to sort of become the heavy on the Creoles who've been running things in the absence of any clear direction.

It's a pattern as a template, isn't it?

Yeah, exactly right.

And in Venezuela itself, or what we now know as Venezuela, the Creoles are now meeting in secret to discuss how outrageous it is that the king far away, who has been absent and involved in a ridiculous squabble with the family and inviting the French into Spain, is trying to now act the heavy.

So they start