For those commenting on Chavez, please read this document:

[prolesunited]

http://www.globalexchange.org/countries/americas/venezuela/USVZrelations.pdf

Then we can talk.

[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[prolesunited]

5. I didn't even comment on Bush

but whatever.

The only ones who haven't benefitted from his policies are the elite ruling class. Is that who you are concerned with protecting? BTW, you might want to fact check yourself a bit as you have highly overstated your case.

And the eyes roll? Who's telling who to grow up? I posted an alternative resource that perhaps some people may be interested in reading and all you can offer is insults?

[MADem]

6. Your link did.

If you really wanted to talk about this, there's better places to do it. Like here. http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x989406

I strongly suggest you actually read the whole thread before you come back with a smartass comment saying I'm "mean" to the "freedom loving" fucker. There's some eye opening information in it that will disabuse you of your red-shirted Utopian fantasy. A thug is a thug.

Hey, if you think Hugo's
--suspending the rule of law,

--declaring himself Presidente Indefinitely,

--halting elections,

--tossing the Parliament,

--shutting down all opposition media, TV, radio and newspapers,

--enacting laws to strip dual citizens of their other-nation rights to force them to stay in VZ,

--stuffing the Army, Police and Judiciary with cronies,

--funding those agencies, and lining his pockets and those of his cronies with oil money, and

--making it a CRIME to say anything bad about "the authorities"

is a GOOD thing, well, you feel free to move there. In fact, I URGE you to--then you can report back to us...if you can get internet access out of the country, which is the next fucking thing to go.

You have no fucking clue what that guy is doing to the country.

But do cheer him on.

Sure, many of the people there are poor. And that's not a good thing. But I don't happen to think the only way to ameliorate that is to fuck the working class, the middle class, and even those bastards in the upper class, by turning VZ into mini-Cuba.

If you rob Peter to pay Paul, Peter quite sensibly gets the fuck out of there. And those Peters, they're lined up at the embassies, pleading for visas.

[BushOut06]

10. Then why is Chavez allowing all these demonstrations?

Seems kind of ironic, that those out there protesting his "crackdown" on freedom of speech are being allowed to speak against him.

Would you consider it okay if NBC or CNN had been advocating a coup attempt against Bush?

[MADem]

29. Oh, yeah...he "allowed" them all right--did you see the violence, are are you being deliberately

obtuse?

That's your measure of what? His 'benevolence?'

How was he going to stop thousands and thousands and thousands of people pouring into the streets? High school and college kids, the young AND the very old. He couldn't stop them, but what he could do is hurt them, and he did. He beat the living SHIT out of those protesters. He used rubber bullets and teargas. It was a fucking RIOT.

Christ, how dull of comprehension can you be?

Faux Snooze started up in 96, and spent four years calling for the ouster of Clinton. So your stupid comparison doesn't fly. Further, you're reading what the Chavistas SAY the TV station did, but if you actually CHECK what they did, you'll find out that the Chavistas aren't telling the truth. But hey, the victors write the history, and if no one stands up to Chavez, that lie becomes a truth in no time and all.

And furthermore, if you would peruse the links I provided, you would see that Chavez has given the reason that the station was closed down not anything to do with that coup (which happened FIVE long years ago, FWIW) but as a MORAL reason--they were purveying "pornography" (Spanish language telenovelas) and they showed someone drinking a beer at a soccer match. You'd also see that he's going after one more TV station, will try to block CNN, wants to be Dictator indefinitely, and has neutered the judiciary and the parliament.

Wow, how would you like to live in THAT society? Makes Bush AND Falwell look like fucking liberals.

Know what you're talking about before you defend this guy. He's off the goddamned page in genuine, believe-your-own-press, megalomaniacal fashion. He's a dictator, Fidel of SA.

The real irony is that you're so eager to tout this assclown, from your comfortable vantage in the USA, while people just like you are desperately calling around to embassies, trying to find a visa to get the fuck out of VZ....

[malaise]

35. Nothing terribly violent about those

demonstrations. Funny how the catholic church always shows up when the 'right wing' show begins.

[MADem]

48. You're just refusing to see the obvious. I can't help you if your

definition of "nonviolent" means "only" rubber bullets are fired. And the gratuitous insult to the majority religion in that nation, yeah, that was elucidating, too--of your prejudice. Would you make the same snarkish remarks about Muslims if a fucking mullah turned up at an Iraqi demonstration?

Christ, what commentary...

[rinsd]

33. This attitude slays me.

Chavez ALLOWS demostrations.

Chavez COULD have had the coup leader shot.

"Seems kind of ironic, that those out there protesting his "crackdown" on freedom of speech are being allowed to speak against him. "

No, the irony is a "progressive" subtly hinting those in opposition shouldn't have that right or only have that they have that right because of the benvolence of Chanvez.

[cherokeeprogressive]

56. Allowing?

Gosh, how absolutely royal of Him. Allowing his subjects to demonstrate, until he tires of it and fires tear gas and rubber bullets that is.

Mighty ironic. That's what I'd look for in the index of THIS history book.

[yurbud]

2. there is a lot of intentional misinformation on Chavez here-- frankly sinc Bush criticizes him

that by itself should make you wonder if the criticism is BS.

Good post.

[EFerrari]

3. Latin Pulse had a great panel on this issue today.

One of my old teachers at Berkeley said, "To frame this as a free speech issue is ridiculous."

And of course there was one Bushbot that tried to defend the RW teevee stations in Venezuela who sought to subvert the lawfully elected government.

Chavez must be one lousy dictator if it takes him five years of court proceedings to take out media outlets that collaborated with the US backed coup.



/oops

[MADem]

7. Oh please. What a load of horseshit.

Chavez SUSPENDED ELECTIONS.

What part of "dictatorship" don't you understand?

[EFerrari]

9. We will see shortly, won't we?

[MADem]

18. What part of SUSPENDING ELECTIONS don't you understand?

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/ben_whitford/2007/05/the_revolution_will_not_be_tel.html

The revolution will not be televised
The demise of Radio Caracas Television is a disturbing sign of the decay of Venezuelan democracy.
Ben Whitford

May 28, 2007 3:00 PM | Printable version
At midnight on Sunday, a Venezuelan institution came to an end. After 53 years of broadcasting, the country's oldest television network, Radio Caracas Television, lost its license and went off the air, shut down at last by Hugo Chávez in retaliation for its virulent opposition to his administration.

Fans of Chávez's brand of populist socialism - like Tariq Ali speaking to Rory Carroll last week, or Labour MP Colin Burgon writing in Friday's paper - believe RCTV simply got what was coming to it. They point to the station's flawed and partisan coverage of the botched coup that briefly unseated Chávez in 2002, during which it failed to mention the crowds of Chávez supporters who took to the streets in protest. We wouldn't allow Fox News or Channel 4 to support the overthrow of the government without consequence, they argue; why should RCTV be treated any differently?

But just as we hold our media organizations accountable for their actions, so we expect our media regulators to deliberate carefully and transparently in meting out punishment. In Venezuela, there has been no such deliberation; instead, Chávez and his officials unilaterally branded the network coup-mongers and pornographers - the latter apparently a reference to the trashy but popular telenovelas that are standard fare on all the region's networks. No investigations, meetings or hearings were held to assess the station's failings; no evidence was presented, and the network was given no right of reply.

It wasn't until this March, three months after announcing its decision to revoke the station's license, that the government deigned to release a "White Book" giving an official account of the station's transgressions. More polemic than policy paper, the book only serves to underscore the arbitrary and politicized nature of the government's decision; RCTV is accused of a raft of minor sins, from sensationalizing its coverage of a recent murder to showing alcohol consumption during its coverage of a baseball game. RCTV had never previously received more than a warning for these violations; other stations guilty of the same or worse errors have been allowed to retain their licenses. ....It's hard to see RCTV's closure - which was opposed by 70% of the Venezuelan people - as anything more than an act of political retaliation for the network's continuing, and increasingly isolated, resistance to the Chávez administration. While it's true that the country's media remains largely in private hands, most of the other opposition channels have allowed themselves to be cowed by Chávez's threats...

"Freedom loving" Chavez my ass. He's now taking down Globovision, too. This is the end of his coup:


Hours after President Hugo Chavez shut down Venezuela's main opposition broadcaster, his government has demanded an investigation of news network Globovision for allegedly inciting an assassination attempt on the leftist leader. ....Chavez's reforms, since he assumed the presidency in 1999, have given him greater control over the country's judiciary, the military and the oil sector.

Critics had said an independent media was the only safeguard against Chavez forging a Cuban-style regime. The closure of RCTV leaves Globovision as the main media voice opposed to Chavez, but it does not broadcast nationwide.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/4077032a12.html

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601086&sid=aEhslU4CJsO8&refer=latin_america
Opposed by more than two-thirds of Venezuelans in a poll last month, the decision not to renew RCTV's license is both unpopular at home and has earned Chavez condemnation abroad from groups such as the European Parliament as he consolidates his power and silences critics in Venezuela.

``Chavez controls the judiciary, the congress, the electoral body, and gradually the TV networks,'' said Alvaro Vargas Llosa, senior fellow at the Oakland, California-based Independent Institute and the author of books on Ernesto ``Che'' Guevara and Latin America. ``This is one more step toward total control.''

The National Assembly in February gave Chavez the power to make law by decree for 18 months, and the former army lieutenant colonel is seeking to change the constitution this year to allow for his indefinite rule. ....Organizations critical of the shutdown include London-based Amnesty International, New York-based Human Rights Watch and New York-based journalist advocacy group Committee to Protect Journalists.

....Most Venezuelans oppose the shutdown, according to a poll by research company Datanalisis. About 69 percent of those surveyed were against the closure, with 16 percent supporting it, said pollster Luis Vicente Leon. The April 9-16 survey of 2,000 Venezuelans has a margin of error of 2.2 percentage points. ...

And even though we KNOW the reason he got rid of the station because they dared to criticize him, he's playing the PAT ROBERTSON "moral majority" card as an excuse for taking them off the air. Real "democratic" that:

CARACAS, Venezuela -- Venezuelan folk music, a Cuban documentary and heavy doses of government propaganda glorifying "21st Century Socialism" highlighted the first day of a new television channel that on Monday took over airspace of this nation's oldest and most popular station, a frequent critic of leftist President Hugo Chavez.....Said Virginia Vera, host of a morning call-in show that has a 60 percent viewer share: "Everyone is afraid."

Government officials said the license was denied for alleged violations of laws governing violence and sex programming....The closing brought censures from the U.S. Senate, the European Union, the Inter-American Press Association and the governments of Chile and El Salvador.

Most Venezuelans oppose -- by a 5-1 ratio -- the yanking of RCTV's license as well, according to a recent opinion poll by Datanalysis firm in Caracas.

"This could be a mistake for Chavez because it breaks the appearance of democracy that Chavez has succeeded in having, especially with the Europeans," said Datanalysis President Luis Vicente Leon.


http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-venezuela_tuesmay29,1,2617301.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed



Yep, Indefinite Rule. Little Fidel. The coup will NOT be televised....

Funny how when BushCo tries this shit, there's outrage all over this place. But when Fidel er, CHAVEZ does far worse, unthinking HugoBots cheer.

Makes no damned sense. Guess we GEESE somehow think that we deserve better than those Venezuelan GANDERS....

[EFerrari]

19. And let's look away from Mexico and Chile where journalists

are being killed. Because shutting down operations that try to subvert elections is so much more important than the slaughter of journalists. Woohoo!

Let's focus on Hugo, that's the ticket. (What part of RW propaganda do YOU not understand?)

We disagree. And, time will prove one of us right or wrong. You don't have to shout at me, MADem. I'm listening.

[MonkeyFunk]

25. but what does this have to do with Chile or Mexico?

Seriously... I'm trying to learn more about this situation, and all I see are two sides yelling right past each other.

Why does neither side address the arguments of the other?

[EFerrari]

26. Thanks for the reality check. Journalists is Mexico and Chile

are being disappeared and assasinated -- a much more urgent situation than what is happening in Venezuela, where the process has gone up through the courts. The free press in those countries is in much more dire straits than in Venezuela but, since BushCo is cool with them, we don't hear about it.

[MonkeyFunk]

28. So Venezuela

just isn't important enough in the big scheme to discuss? I disagree.

I am seriously trying to learn more here, specifically about Venezuela. Do we need to have a heirarchy of importance, and start at the top and then work our way down?

[EFerrari]

30. No, I didn't say that. I said people are disappearing and getting dead

in Mexico and in Chile. And that seems to me to be more urgent.

[MonkeyFunk]

31. Well can we table urgency

and just discuss Venezuela? Cuz Darfur is more important than journalists in Chile, and global warming is probably more important than Darfur... and, well, it never ends.

[EFerrari]

32. No. If we're talking freedom of the press in Latin America it doesn't dissolve

into everything else.

[MonkeyFunk]

36. ok

then I'll put you down as as "no, you won't discuss Venezuela with me". Got it.


Anybody else care to step up?

[EFerrari]

38. Nice try. I was putting perspective in and you choose to ignore it.

Your choice. And, come to think of it, no, I won't try to discuss Venezuela with you.

[MonkeyFunk]

39. I asked you 4 different ways

and you kept deflecting.

It's a shame. I don't have a firm position either way on Chavez. I have some questions and concerns. You seem to be pretty adamant about the situation - too bad you can't discuss it. You just deflect, deflect, deflect.

[MADem]

49. There you go again. Stay the fuck on TOPIC. We aren't talking about MEXICO, or CHILE

You ALWAYS do that. You can't argue the point, so you wave your arms like a three year old and bellow "LOOK OVER THERE!!!!! That's WORSE!!! Mexico, Chile....oh, and BUSH is bad TOOO!!!"

The topic is CHAVEZ and VENEZUELA. So yes, LET's FOCUS ON HUGO, because that is what this fucking thread is about.

You wanna talk about Mexico and Chile, go ahead--hit the little button with the pencil that says POST and knock yourself out.

We don't "disagree." You won't respond to the POINTS I and others are making, because you're having a little trouble defending a red shirted Mussolini wanna-be who thinks he is the heir to Fidel.

That's what is really going on here--you might at least be honest with yourself.

And I'm not shouting. I am urging you, in no uncertain terms though, to just cut the egregious and transparent utter bullshit. Stop changing the subject to other "wrongs." Two wrongs, as I keep telling you, do not make a right.

Answer some of the questions I've posed in these and other threads.

Do you agree with Chavez's stance on shutting down all opposition media?

No problems with taking over the legislature and assembly?

Ruling by decree works for you?

Making presidental terms indefinite--do you like that idea as well?

Would you put up with that shit here, "for the good of the country?"

Are all of the Venezuelans fleeing the country just a bunch of whiners?

Would you want your kids to grow up in that environment?

I'm just fucking AMAZED at the number of people who call themselves DEMOCRATS who think it's OK for an entire nation to lose their democracy, just because their head asshole in charge hates our stupid GOP president. It says something, and it's not flattering, about their adherence to democratic principles, to say nothing of their ability to process political issues and world affairs.

It's frankly, stunning--and not in a good way, either.

[EFerrari]

53. I am telling you what a panel of experts said today

when asked about Chavez and Venezuela and this so called "freedom of the press" issue. I am not inventing it; I am relaying it.

If you can't process that, that's your problem, not mine.

[MADem]

61. The thread topic is not Mexico, nor Chile, it is VZ. You are getting a reputation and it isn't a

good one, frankly.

When you can't answer the debate points, you pull a "yeah but" out of your ass and toss unrelated (and it IS unrelated) horseshit into the mix--it's not working. You're not answering point blank qustions, and it is obvious.

I don't CARE about Mexico or Chile, in the context of this discussion. Capisce? They haven't anything to DO with the topic of press freedom and oppression by a guy who's quickly forming a dictatorship in VZ--unless he attacks them and takes them over.

The reason you aren't answering is because you know damned well what the guy is doing is dead wrong. That's the real deal, here.

[prolesunited]

66. You're getting a reputation as well

just sayin'

[MADem]

68. All I am doing is posting facts. I actually back up my assertions with links.

I'm not 'broad brushing' or changing the subject, either.

If the answers to my questions--legitimate ones--about the situation in Venezuela are "Well, so-and-so over THERE is bad, too!!" that's just not acceptable. And I will point that out.

Go on, reread what I've said. I'm actually trying to discuss the issues. All I'm getting back is the "Two Wrongs" argument.

And a lot of bullshit, too. There's absolutely no response to a single major issue I've raised. The old, already debunked lies keep getting repeated, the "look over THERE" whines, and the take, apparently, is that simply because this redshirted asshole hates another asshole named Bush, he's a hero.

That's quite frankly STUPID logic. It's a third grade argument, and I think we all deserve better. I am simply amazed at the eagerness to embrace Friendly Fascism over there...while being so angry about Fascism Lite, by comparison, over here.

[ellisonz]

86. Bingo.

But Pol Pot loves the people...:sarcasm:

:yourock:

[eridani]

83. Answers

"Do you agree with Chavez's stance on shutting down all opposition media?"
Failing to renew one license (for airwaves only) is not

"No problems with taking over the legislature and assembly?"
Nope. I'm glad the Dems took over the Senate and the House. Supporters of Chavez took over in the same way--they had an election.

"Ruling by decree works for you? "
If its scope is specifically limited by the legislature, as it is in Venezuela, those decrees have way more oversight than executive orders in the US. Did you have a problem with Clinton ordering the restoration of funding for international family planning agencies in 1993? I didn't.

"Making presidental terms indefinite--do you like that idea as well?"
It worked fine for all of US history up until the last 50 years or so. Chavez still has to run for the office.

"Would you put up with that shit here, "for the good of the country?""
What shit? Universal literacy and health care for people who haven't had it in years?

"Are all of the Venezuelans fleeing the country just a bunch of whiners? "
That's what I'd call the top 20% in income who don't want it distributed downward. The ones who stayed, though are benefitting along with everybody else from Venezuela's 11% growth rate (which, BTW, is almost entirely in the private sector).

"Would you want your kids to grow up in that environment?"
I'm way too old to start over, especially those parts of my brain that do new languages. If I were 40 years younger I'd consider it.

[Judi Lynn]

24. Du'ers have known about Datanalysis, one of your sources, for a long time.

~snip~
Those plotting a coup against him currently are trying to thwart the majority. Chavez's 70% approval rating comes from Datanalysis, a notoriously anti-Chavez polling firm. One of it's partners once told the LA Times that Chavez needed to be assassinated. You can trust the figure if it's coming from them.

http://www.alternet.org/blogs/themix/30456/?comments=view&cID=72667&pID=71832

All the prominent polling firms in Venezuela are completely hard right, pro-oligarchy. That's simply pathetic.

Don't have time to read your post longer, although I'm sure the rest of it was as bent as the parts I saw, have to be somewhere else immediately, but I saw you claimed Chavez has suspended elections. That's a hot one.

I'm sure you will provide the evidence to back that one up.

[MADem]

50. Oh for chrissake. Four days of protests, tens of thousands of people in the street,

and you gripe about the polling source. Yeah, everyone that doesn't tout Chavez is "notoriously anti-Chavez" because HE fucking says so. Why don't you google that bozo who wrote your cite--he's the idiot who says that RULING BY DECREE is no different from FAST-TRACK AUTHORITY. Yeah, right.

Fuck the polls. Count the people in the streets, why doncha?

And of COURSE you don't have time to read my post longer. And of course it's way simpler to toss a halfassed, childish insult like calling me "bent" rather than actually respond to the valid points I made.

Yep, don't READ, you might learn something, like what an undemocratic despot that red-shirted asshole you revere actually is. Can't upset the "Democrats-lite," I guess, with pesky things like ugly facts.

I really do wish you have an opportunity to go live in VZ, and enjoy the "full experience."

[dave_p]

15. He's been elected three times in 8 years

... and survived an intervening recall vote with 59% support.

What part of "democracy" don't you understand?

[MADem]

51. So why is he RULING BY DECREE now, if he's so fucking popular?

Why has he stuffed the judiciary full of cronies, if he's so beloved and his ideas are so legal?

Why has he put forth legislation to allow himself to rule INDEFINITELY?

Since the opposition parties boycotted, the entire legislature is HIS PARTY, doncha know.

What part of RULING BY DECREE is democratic?

If anyone needs a definition of democracy, it ain't me!!!!

:rofl:

[Chemical Bill]

101. Ruling by decree...

is rather like executive orders in the US, something Presidents have used for a long time.

You must have a fit over *'s signing statements.

Bill

[ellisonz]

91. What don't you understand about democracy don't you understand?

http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/display.article?id=4358

CHAVEZ'S RULES

Consider these restrictions placed on the observer teams:

• Nobody but the government's Electoral Council will be allowed to do a quick count of the vote.

• The Electoral Council has asked international monitoring teams to limit their observers to 40 people nationwide. The OAS and the Carter Center each deployed more than 60 election monitors in recent Venezuelan elections and want to keep at least that figure.

• While the Electoral Council says international observers will have freedom of movement, its regulations will restrict their movement: Observers are being asked to participate in a ''program'' of guided tours on election day.

• The Electoral Council has prohibited the OAS, the Carter Center and other international election-monitoring teams from expressing their opinions during the electoral ''process,'' which presumably includes election day.

[yodermon]

17. He suspended elections?

I did not know this.
link?

[MADem]

47. He is ruling BY DECREE. There is a measure before the legislature to

make him PRESIDENT INDEFINITELY. Oh, and the legislature is packed with his cronies. You do the math.

I provide links out the ass, and no one fucking reads them:

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/02/02/1533248
AMY GOODMAN: To discuss the situation in Venezuela, we turn to two guests: James Petras is Professor Emeritus of sociology and Latin America studies at SUNY Binghamton, author of the book Social Movements and State Power; Francisco Rodriguez is assistant professor of economics and Latin American studies at Wesleyan University and the former chief economist of the Venezuelan National Assembly. We welcome you both to Democracy Now!

Let's begin in the studio in Hartford with Francisco Rodriguez. Your concerns right now about the move, the National Assembly granting Chavez the power to rule by decree?

FRANCISCO RODRIGUEZ: Well, I think that what's happening in Venezuela is that President Chavez has increased his scope of power and has increased the concentration of power in his person, and it’s a gradual process that we've seen happening over the past few years, where the Supreme Court is under the control of his followers, the Assembly is 100% -- all of the members of the Assembly are backers of President Chavez. The Electoral Council is very clearly stacked with his followers. The former president of the Electoral Council, who supervised the 2004 vote count, is now his vice president. And this is just one more step, in which the president is concentrating power. He doesn't really even trust his assembly, even though it’s filled with his backers, and he wants to be able to legislate directly.

Now, this figure of enabling law, the law that enables the president to rule by decree, has been used previously in Venezuela, but in the past it used to be very well circumscribed to specific areas of legislation, such as during the debt crisis. The president was granted authority to legislate on particular economic issues. But now what we're seeing is an enabling law that will allow President Chavez to rule by decree in just about every area of the Venezuelan economy and society. It's couched in very vague terms, such as social and economic rights transforming state institutions. For the first time in history, the president will have the right to rewrite organic laws, which are laws of constitutional rank, which generally would take a two-thirds majority in the Assembly to change them, but now he will be allowed to do that by decree. So we are seeing a lot of power put in the hands of the president, and we’re seeing something very close to the end of any type of separation of power in Venezuela.

Now, this shit isn't NEWS--but no one bothered to pay attention when it happened several months ago. They just toodle along, cheering on this fucking thug like he's a hero, just because he called the Monkey "Satan." Well, the truth is, they're two peas in a pod, only CHAVEZ is doing a better job of consolidating power than Bush is:

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-ed-venezuela10feb10,1,5005232.story?coll=la-news-comment

Venezuela's theoretical democracy
President Hugo Chavez edges a bit closer to becoming a full-fledged dictator now that he can make laws without legislative approval.
February 10, 2007


VENEZUELA, AS ITS president, Hugo Chavez, never tires of pointing out, is still a democracy. It's just a place where democracy is a little more nonbinding than elsewhere.

To illustrate just how democratic the country is, the 167 members of the National Assembly — all of whom support the president because the opposition boycotted the last parliamentary election — convened outdoors in Caracas last month, to be better seen by the throngs of red-shirted Chavistas gathered in the square, and unanimously voted themselves into irrelevance....The vote gave Chavez the power to make laws by decree for 18 months, with no need to even use his Assembly's rubber stamp. Seeing as how Chavez already had total control over the judicial branch, how he is taking steps to quell opposition media and how he could have rammed any law he chose through the Assembly with barely a semblance of debate or a whisper of protest, his new powers seem gratuitous. But even symbolic oversight can be messy, bureaucratic and slow. Kind of like democracy.

Venezuela's constitution allows the legislature to cede decree powers to the president, which it has done several times to other presidents and once before to Chavez, in 2000. But normally this occurs in times of fiscal upheaval, not while the nation is swimming in oil revenues. Chavez is expected to use his powers to, among other frightening things, do away with presidential term limits so he can remain in office indefinitely.

That's the first step...the second step is to use your decree powers to change the way the President is chosen. Or change the number of voters needed to bring forward a referendum. Failing that, he owns all the voting machines...but the first step, really, is to CONTROL THE MESSAGE. He's going after another station, even as protests against him continue:



CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on Tuesday called opposition news channel Globovision an enemy of the state and said he would do what was needed to stop it from inciting violence, only days after he shut another opposition broadcaster.


Tens of thousands of Venezuelans marched in Caracas in a fourth consecutive day of protests over Chavez's closure of the RCTV network - a move which has sparked international criticism that the leftist leader's reforms are undermining democracy.


State television showed hundreds of government supporters marching in downtown Caracas celebrating Chavez's decision........his critics say his moves to centralize power, politicize key institutions like the military, judiciary and oil industry threaten democracy. He is forging a single governing party, ruling by decree and considering abolishing limits on how many terms a president can serve.

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/reuters/070529/world/international_venezuela_television_dc

Enemy of the state, eh? With us, or agin' us. One party rule. Kinda like Iraq. I will remind everyone that the last time Saddam's name was on the ballot, he got 99.9 percent of the vote.

I'll bet you any amount of money that once he has this one party rule shit down, controlling the media, the borders, the whole nine yards, he'll go to the Cuban system, where the National Assembly does the pesky Presidential electing...after all, he's ruling BY DECREE now, he can easily make that happen.

Or is the crush at the embassies for exit visas just the result of overactive imaginations on the part of overwrought citizens? If things are so great, why does Chavez have to play the bully? And why are all the brains AND the middle and working class trying desperately to get the fuck out of there? I'd wager they know something some people here just aren't seeing:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article1851682.ece

Amid protests and fear, thousands prepare to flee the slow revolution

......For the past eight years, rich Venezuelans have been trickling out of the country, spooked by the socialist bluster of their populist President, Hugo Chávez. But since being inaugurated for his third term in January, Mr Chávez’s talk has begun turning into substance, with an evermore radical series of moves to transform Venezuela into the world’s first “21st-century socialist state”. Now the super-rich are being joined by middle-class professionals and, increasingly, families.

At the US Embassy, citizenship claims and visa enquiries have doubled since January. A Canadian job fair, with a capacity of 500, was swamped by a crowd of 1,500. Every morning snaking queues form outside the embassies of Australia, Spain and Portugal to inquire about emigration there....Maria Conquita Rodriguez, an agrochemical engineer, could cope with the nationalisation of electricity, telecommunications — even oil. Not active in the opposition, she felt little fear of being purged from a government job. But the President’s snowballing rhetoric since his vow of “socialism or death” has her spooked enough to join the queue at the Spanish Embassy to investigate her rights of residency there. “He is becoming more and more extreme and everything that he says becomes a law,” she said. “We are looking at a dictatorship. You realise you have to have your papers in order in case you have to leave.”

In Caracas, billboards and murals of Mr Chávez are everywhere, showing the smiling President clasping a child or surrounded by adoring crowds. Just as ubiquitous now are the huge red posters, each illustrating one of the five “engines of the revolution” unveiled by Mr Chávez in January.

The first of these, already in place, is the law handing Mr Chávez the power to rule by decree for the next 18 months, circumventing such unrevolutionary nuisances as Parliament. The second is the constitutional reform, which translates as the removal of presidential-term limits, allowing Mr Chávez to govern indefinitely. The remaining three, sceptics say, might as well just say “anything Mr Chávez fancies” because the first two enable him to do exactly that. “I can’t see anyone stopping him,” Mrs Rodriguez said. “We are becoming the next Cuba.”

[yodermon]

57. Thanks for the links.

I like the phrase "nonbinding democracy", that does seem to be his MO.

I do find all these totalitarian-style activities troubling, even if I (mostly) agree with his politics.

I get the sense that he is trying to undo the effects of the oligarchy and various CIA-backed interlopers in a very short time frame, while guarding against his own assassination. Not that his justifies his declaring himself president-for-life.

If he does in fact dub himself "President {read dictator} For Life" I'd be very disappointed. Judging from the powers he's claimed for himself I'm sure he would have the "power" to cancel/"Indefinitely postpone" elections...
..although, It's not clear from your links where he's actually done that. The next pres. election is in 2012, and there's a parliamentary election this year sometime.

So, is there proof that he has actually suspended elections yet? If he hasn't, I certainly hope he doesn't.

[Laughing Mirror]

71. What elections did he suspend again?

Your links do not support your claim.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

75. What election did he suspend? -nt

[MADem]

67. Your teacher is an uninformed IDIOT. That coup try happened FIVE YEARS AGO.

Chavez took the station, HE SAID, because it showed "pornagraphic" telenovelas (soap operas) and beer drinking--that's what HE SAID, mind you. So if that's not a "free speech" issue, what is?

The courts ruled on THAT issue, not the coup shit. And the court is packed with his PALS.

And the reason they waited was to prevent the station from going to the OAS or other agencies for redress ahead of the taking of the station.

If the station license had gone up for bid, like it should have, Chavez could have outbid them. But no, he wanted not just the station, to control the MESSAGE (first thing you do when you take over a country, FWIW) he also wanted the equipment, for free.

But go ahead--make up facts to suit your painfully twisted defense of a dictator.

Would you have a problem if your seventeen year old kid went off to a demonstration four days ago, and hasn't come back yet? His friends tell you that the cops dragged him off. You call the Ministry of Justice and they won't tell you anything...is that "OK" with you?

That's what is happening in Venezuela. And the protests CONTINUE.

But hey, it's HUGO, and he hates Bush, so what the hell...

Don't bother telling me how awful the US is, or Mexico, or Chile, or anywhere else. Two wrongs, or three, four, even five, after all....

Ooops, indeed. Get your facts straight.

[MonkeyFunk]

4. Regardless

of US involvement, do you really have no qualms over the TV station takeover? Why must it be made into yet another government mouthpiece? Why couldn't they have sold it to other interests?

How many goverment TV stations does he need? Is the answer "all of them"?

[MADem]

11. Well, that's what all of his Latin American neighbors are saying.

And they sure have a better vantage point than pipedreamers up north. And I'm not the only one to note that five years ago is when that coup nonsense happened--if there was any "punishing" to do, why didn't it happen then? Maybe because punishment wasn't actually in order, perhaps?

Of course, what is happening right NOW in VZ is a coup--when you suspend elections and declare yourself President Indefinitely, that's a coup to me...

http://english.eluniversal.com/2007/05/29/en_pol_art_venezuela-took-a-st_29A877079.shtml

Latin America's leading newspapers devoted their Monday editorials to the discontinuation of 53-year old private TV channel Radio Caracas Televisión (RCTV). They all claimed that the arbitrary measure taken against an enterprise that pioneered TV broadcasting in Venezuela was "a step backwards" in the freedoms of the country and the whole region.

Editor of Venezuelan evening newspaper Tal Cual Teodoro Petkoff pointed out in the Argentinean Clarín daily that Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez is pressing ahead with "his plans to set up a mass media hegemonic position." In this regard, he said that if the excuse not to renew a broadcasting license for RCTV was "its involvement in a coup", then Venezuelan TV channel Venevisión "should have been taken off the air a long time ago."

Brazilian Jornal do Brasil asserted that the Venezuelan ruler's decision on RCTV was "a slap on Latin America's face" ....In an editorial headlined "Another stair", Uruguayan newspaper El País said that "neo-totalitarianism" is a form of government that is beginning to spread "dangerously" to all Latin America. For this daily, President Chávez did refuse to renew a license for Radio Caracas Televisión because it "was not submissive."

Paraguay's ABC Color daily front page, headlined "Chávez kills freedom in Venezuela", claimed that the discontinuation of RCTV entails "a turn towards totalitarianism."

La Prensa newspaper from Panama said that President Chávez "is about to become an autocrat" and that the two remaining powers in the Venezuelan state, that is, the Legislature and the Judiciary, bowed silently down to the move...Another Panamanian daily, El Siglo, asserted that, with the failure to renew a broadcasting license for RCTV, an inalienable right was mortally wounded in the hands of the Venezuelan ruler, whom they call "the Americas' new dictator."

[Jim Warren]

8. Thanks for that

In the interest of open inquiry although something tells me those with their minds made up aren't interested in becomimg better informed.

[Cleita]

12. Kudos for posting this,

As a person who was born in South America, I'm sick of the propaganda slings any leader in South America has to take when they don't back our American hegemony in that continent. It's time to get the truth out about what is really going on.

[MonkeyFunk]

13. OK, I read it

thanks for that.

My question is this: Is authoritarianism a legitimate response to external threats? For all nations or only Venezuela? What about the US?

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

14. Ok, Done. Fuck Chavez.

[UTUSN]

16. You said it for me. Just saw somebody from this Global Exchange group

vomiting the same Kool Aid that we hear here constantly in support of Hugo. And the implication in the o.p. continues the same old crap: That those of us who detest a loudmouth stuffed in a military costume are non-SELF-thinkers who are REGURGITATING somebody else's talking points (Darth Rums or whoever).

ALL of those things that the other posters have listed are clear SIGNS of authoritarianism. By the bye, unlike Shrub violating sovereignty, I am ALL FOR a nation's self determination. If the Venezuelans WANT that p.o.s. stuffed in a military costume---------they can HAVE AT IT!!1 But don't tell me what I am permitted to think of him!!1

Quacks!!1 Waddles!!1 It's a fucking DUCK!!1

[MonkeyFunk]

20. I would love to have a grown-up discussion on this topic

but neither side seems capable of having one.

It's all either "FUCK Chavez!" or "Chavez is a hero!"

I have questions that I'd love to discuss, but I despair of ever having a real discussion here.

[ellisonz]

87. Chin up!

"The most radical revolutionary will become a conservative the day after the revolution."

New Yorker (Sept. 12, 1970) (1970).

"When we were told that by freedom we understood free enterprise, we did very little to dispel this monstrous falsehood.... Wealth and economic well-being, we have asserted, are the fruits of freedom, while we should have been the first to know that this kind of “happiness” ... has been an unmixed blessing only in this country, and it is a minor blessing compared with the truly political freedoms, such as freedom of speech and thought, of assembly and association, even under the best conditions."

On Revolution, ch. 6 (1963).

"There is all the difference in the world between the criminal’s avoiding the public eye and the civil disobedient’s taking the law into his own hands in open defiance. This distinction between an open violation of the law, performed in public, and a clandestine one is so glaringly obvious that it can be neglected only by prejudice or ill will."

“Civil Disobedience,” Crises of the Republic (1972).

"It was characteristic of the rise of the Nazi movement in Germany and of the Communist movements in Europe after 1930 that they recruited their members from this mass of apparently indifferent people whom all other parties had given up as too apathetic or too stupid for their attention. The result was that the majority of their membership consisted of people who never before had appeared on the political scene. This permitted the introduction of entirely new methods into political propaganda, and indifference to the arguments of political opponents; these movements not only placed themselves outside and against the party system as a whole, they found a membership that had never been reached, never been “spoiled” by the party system. Therefore they did not need to refute opposing arguments and consistently preferred methods which ended in death rather than persuasion, which spelled terror rather than conviction."

The Origins of Totalitarianism, ch. 10, Harcourt (1951).

"Historically speaking, the most obvious and most decisive distinction between the American and the French Revolutions was that the historical inheritance of the American Revolution was “limited monarchy” and that of the French Revolution an absolutism which apparently reached far back into the first centuries of our era and the last centuries of the Roman Empire. Nothing, indeed, seems more natural than that a revolution should be predetermined by the type of government it overthrows; nothing, therefore, appears more plausible than to explain the new absolute, the absolute revolution, by the absolute monarchy which preceded it, and to conclude that the more absolute the ruler, the more absolute the revolution will be which replaces him."

“Foundation 1: Constitutio Libertatis,” On Revolution, Macmillan (1963).

"No cause is left but the most ancient of all, the one, in fact, that from the beginning of our history has determined the very existence of politics, the cause of freedom versus tyranny."

On Revolution, introduction (1963).

"The fearsome, word-and-thought-defying banality of evil."

Eichmann in Jerusalem, ch. 15 (1963).


:yourock:

[Critters2]

97. I've given up.

I have parishioners from Venezuela, here on student visas (university students). They are both politically progressive. It's hard to feel comfortable in my church otherwise. They are not wealthy, a part of the oligarchy. One is upper middle-class, the son of a doctor in Ciudad Bolivar. His wife a real "pulled herself up by the bootstraps" story from the slums of Valencia. Her family still lives there and she worries constantly about the situation. They are both upset by this closing of the TV station, and fear for the direction of their homeland. Indeed, they are trying to find ways to get their siblings and nieces and nephews out legally. They have nothing good to say about Chavez, ever.

Yet, whenever I've tried to enter into conversation, and say I know Venezuelans who don't love Chavez, I'm told they MUST be members of the oligarchy, MUST have some vested interest in bringing down his regime. It simply isn't possible to enter into conversation with people who know, from hundreds of miles away, more than the citizens of a nation do--about that nation.

I've learned to watch what I say about what I've learned of Chavez from my Venezuelan friends around progressives, on DU or in rl. But I fear that we should be more skeptical and critical of him than most progressives want. If closing down a media outlet isn't proof that a place is headed toward a dictatorship, I don't know what is.

But what do I know? I only know what I know because I hear it from Venezuelans.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

21. You sure are saying "fuck so-and-so" a lot today.

Almost as if you think it's the substitute for an argument.

[Name removed]

22. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

23. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

84. Please DO continue insulting people here. I want you to. Honest. -nt

[Taverner]

27. If Fox news were ever taken off the air by the government, as strange as it sounds...

This is fascism and censorship - The line has been crossed.

But everything Chavez did before this? All good...

[Selatius]

34. Chavez doesn't need to be defended. And RCTV deserves no support whatsoever.

RCTV is not a free speech martyr either. They should've had their concession license yanked the day after. I would wager my very own soul on the notion that if RCTV had done all the things it has done in 2002 and since in any industrialized nation like France or Germany or Japan that that nation, too, would revoke its broadcast license simply because the public airwaves belong to the people, not RCTV, and that the public airwaves should not be dominated by a select few at the expense of the truth everybody else deserves.

With that said, there should've been a public trial or a hearing about renewing or revoking RCTV's license. Both under the old and new constitutions, there is no provision for an open trial or proceeding deliberating the issue of revoking a broadcast license beyond leaving the issue up to the executive branch to decide. This is flawed, and it should be changed, but this is the way the law has been written since 1987, well before Chavez was a notable name. Unfortunately, as a result, the law, flawed as it may be, provides the only framework by which the decision is made.

Ultimately, the true power in Venezuela is vested in the people. Most people don't watch RCTV. They're too poor to afford TVs. They remember what happened in 2002. If they don't like what is happening to RCTV, then let them march in the 500,000s and 1,000,000s that they marched in when Pedro Carmona liquidated the legislature and the judicial branch. Let them speak.

[MonkeyFunk]

37. Here's my question

Why is it always framed as a dual choice? Either allow a coup-supporting station owned by the oligarchs to continue, OR turn it into a government-run propaganda outlet.

Why is there no other option?

Let's say they WERE guilty of supporting the coup (but I'd love to get some answers on that topic, too). Let's just stipulate it.

Why did the government have to seize the property and turn it into a government-owned station? They already have at least one government-owned station. Is there no other entity in the nation that could run an independent television station?

How many television stations does Chavez need to control? Is the answer "all of them"?

[Selatius]

41. You shouldn't allow a coup-supporting station to run, and you shouldn't turn it into a...

propaganda organ.

If a strong review process or some mechanism that makes the decision-making process to renew or revoke a license a public matter with public proceedings or trials had been in place, then if the station's broadcast license is revoked, then you give the license to the station's workers organized into a news co-op enterprise where the station's workers are the shareholders or you give the license to a new corporation in an open bidding process or you make it into a public access channel where anybody who can produces programs can play.

Unfortunately, as I said, there was no mechanism mandating public proceedings or trials, and that's a problem. By putting the decision-making process under the scrutiny of the people by making the proceedings open and public to all, the people then could weigh in directly and tell Chavez what should or should not be done. A trial by jury would've satisfied that, as the corporate officers would be judged by their peers.

[MonkeyFunk]

42. so

because there was no "mechanism" in place, this was the only possible outcome? I find that answer a little unsatisfying.

on edit: Thanks for responding. I've asked this 4 or 5 times and nobody has even attempted to answer.

[Selatius]

43. No, it's not the only possible outcome.

If I were Chavez, I would've mandated a public trial. Let the evidence speak for itself as to whether RCTV did or did not aid and abet a violent military overthrow of an elected government. Then let the people decide.

In fact, I would've mandated a public proceedings/trials mechanism be put in place before all these licenses came up for renewal, and I would've asked the legislature to put that into law for me. Hell, I'd support it as a constitutional amendment. This way, the executive branch gives the power of revoking or renewing essentially to the people to decide, not investing it in the president.

[MonkeyFunk]

44. Yeah

that makes more sense to me.

Does this outcome change anybody's feelings about Chavez? His supporters here seem to be entirely unfazed by this.

[Selatius]

45. I have grown more weary about consolidation of power in Venezuela.

On economic policies, I support Chavez all the way. His social program that invests in and expands worker cooperatives, that fights poverty and illiteracy, that fights disease, that provides job training and economic opportunities to the poor are things I support as a vehicle towards a more democratically run economy, but Chavez deserves fair criticism where it's due, especially here.

Yes, I am somebody who favors "democratizing the workplace," a free market socialist if you will, but I generally wish to accomplish that goal by decentralizing power to the people as opposed to consolidating it into the hands of the state. If that means I am more anarchistic than a lot of socialists, then fine, call me an anarchist.

[MonkeyFunk]

46. Thank you Selatius

I think we're in large agreement.

Congratulations on being the first person I've seen in these threads who actually sees some shades of gray.

[LynnTheDem]

59. Some links;

Guardian Op-Ed: UK Should Back Chavez in RCTV Controversy
Neoconservative forces, via compliant media outlets and Christian right groupings within the European parliament, are preparing their latest attack on Hugo Chávez and the government of Venezuela. The latest focus of the campaign is the decision of Venezuela's broadcasting authorities not to renew the licence of the private television channel RCTV. The anti-Chávez apparatus once again presents a test for Foreign Office ministers.

Washington's outriders characterise the decision as an affront to freedom of speech, yet the facts speak in louder tones. Over 80% of Venezuelan television and radio outlets are privately owned; this excludes a number of cable and satellite television networks that are widely available. Of this 80%, significant sections are owned by corporate groups. According to a recent New York Times editorial, this has led to a situation in which "even the best news outlets tend to be openly ideological...so the owners' views can permeate reporting".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/venezuela/story/0,,2087738,00.html

Chavez Remains Far from a Dictator
Take, for example, Chavez’s decision not to renew the license of RCTV television network when it expires in May. At first blush, this would certainly seem to be reason for alarm — a government shutting down a television station because it doesn’t like its editorial bent.

But RCTV is not exactly your average television station. In April 2002, it promoted and participated in a coup against Chavez in which a democratically elected president was overthrown by military rebels and disappeared for two days until large street protests and a counter-coup returned him to power. For two days before the coup, RCTV suspended all regular programming and commercials and ran blanket coverage of a general strike aimed at ousting Chavez. Then it ran non-stop ads encouraging people to attend a massive anti-Chavez march on April 11, 2002, and provided wall-to-wall coverage of the event itself with nary a pro-Chavez voice in sight.

When the protest ended in violence and military rebels overthrew the president, RCTV along with other networks imposed a news blackout banning all coverage of pro-Chavez demonstrators in the streets demanding his return. Andres Izarra, a news director at RCTV, was given the order by superiors: no Chavistas on the screen. He quit in disgust and later joined the Chavez government.

On April 13, 2002, after the coup-installed president Pedro Carmona eliminated the Supreme Court and the National Assembly and nullified the constitution, media barons, including RCTV’s main owner, Marcel Granier, met with Carmona in the presidential palace and, according to reports, pledged their support to his regime. While the streets of Caracas literally burned with rage over Chavez’s ouster, the television networks ran Hollywood movies like Pretty Woman.

Venezuela’s media, owned largely by the country’s wealthy elites, is arguably the most rabidly anti-government media in the world.

http://www.commondreams.org/views07/0215-27.htm

Leading voices in Britain call for respect for Venezuelan government's RCTV decision
Prominent figures including Members of Parliament, Nobel Prize for literature winner Harold Pinter, film-maker John Pilger and Tony Benn have called for support for the Venezuelan government’s decision not to renew the licence of the RCTV television station. Academics, trade unionists and student leaders also backed the call.

In a letter they say that the decision of the “Venezuelan government not to renew the broadcasting licence of RCTV when it expires on May 27 is legitimate given that RCTV has used its access to the public airwaves to repeatedly call for the overthrow of the democratically elected government of President Hugo Chávez” and point out that ‘’RCTV gave vital practical support’’ to the military coup against Hugo Chavez in April 2002.

They explain that ‘RCTV, far from being silenced, is being allowed to continue broadcasting by satellite and cable’ and ask people to “Imagine the consequences if the BBC or ITV were found to be part of a coup against the government,” and urges Venezuela to be given “the same consideration.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/letters/story/0,,2088662,00.html

Distorting the Venezuelan media story
http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=3107

CONFUSED ABOUT VENEZUELA?
http://reclaimthemedia.org/bolivarianmediaexchange/eva_golinger_on_chavez_nationalization_moves

Is Free Speech Really at Stake? Venezuela and RCTV

Actually, in other democratic countries, broadcast companies sometimes do not get their licenses renewed. For example, in Britain in 1992, in a process based in part on a subjective assessment of “quality of service,” Thames Television lost its license after 24 years of service. Several British commentators speculated that the Thatcher government had influenced the result.

So democracies do occasionally find reasons not to renew a license. So what about this case in particular: Would RCTV have had its license renewed in the United States or Europe?
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/05/23/1405/

[toddaa]

54. You're not alone

Anarchist groups in Venezuela have been warning leftist groups outside the region that the so called Bolivarian Revolution that Chavez is leading, isn't all it's cracked up to be. Have you read this? It's pretty balanced, provided you lean anarcho socialist. Even if you don't, it paints a more balanced view of what Chavez is doing.

[prolesunited]

60. I had other things to do today so I lost track of this thread

My whole point in posting this and trying to discuss it today was to show that the situation is NOT as black and white as so many paint it as being. There are many shades of gray that can be found in the events that have transpired and the historical context of what has happened in Latin America since Reagan and the more recent events in Venezuela.

I was not looking for such comments as "Yeah, Chavez." or "Fuck Chavez" that don't merit comment or to be told to move to Venezuela if I think it's so great there.

My husband and I were discussing this situation today and it's very complicated. I've learned some things I didn't know in trying to research it beyond what is found in the MSM.

Still, I don't pretend to have all the answers or understand the situation completely. Perhaps that is why I am trying to have a discussion on a discussion board.

What the station did would not have flown by the FCC here and I don't know what the appropriate response would be if another foreign power was actively trying to overthrow our government, even as much as I dislike Bush. Some of Chavez's actions do seem paranoid and worrisome, but then I think that perhaps he is doing what he thinks is necessary to retain the country's sovereignty.

Bottom line is that while I have misgivings about Chavez, I distrust our own government even more.

[MADem]

72. Jeez, when even the reds and anarchists are having trouble, that's somethin'!

That is a cracking good read, even if you aren't on that anarcho-socialist team, actually--that is a very interesting perspective, there!! Good POV piece from that end of the political spectrum...the article certainly does a concise job of pointing out some of the rather craven hypocrisy going on down that way. It's quite eye opening, and not in a nice way, certainly:

...What possible use is it to go on and on about how unjust the war in Iraq is, for instance, when Halliburton remains the chief services contractor for PDVSA? How enormously distracting is it for Chávez to play verbal war games with Condoleezza Rice while welcoming Chevron - the murderous company she once directed - into the country with open arms, even calling them "great friends of the revolutionary process"? ....For Chávez, anything that brings in money from the country's energy reserves (combined, the largest in the world) is positive. His single driving goal is to convert Venezuela into the number one energy producing country on earth - and for this to happen he relies not only on the transnationals, but the continuity of the capitalist system that consumes that energy. Despite scattered references to "the environment", he has absolutely no intention of developing or providing the alternative energy solutions necessary to reduce economic dependency on the oil market. In fact, the only type of energy Chávez seems to be interested in that doesn't come from gas, petrol, or coal... is nuclear.

...This is the reality of a "left-wing" government that was drawn directly out of, and remains dependent on, the armed forces: of an "anti-imperialist" government that rhetorically positions itself "against" Christopher Columbus, but in full cooperation with the Spanish banks that control the nation's finances - and of course, who do you think ultimately owns those banks?

Foreign influence over Venezuela's economy does not only extend through the energy sector, though that is clearly its most important manifestation. Electricity in Caracas, traditionally owned by a powerful local family, is now set to be internationalized by H Corp. The finance sector is totally owned by transnationals - Banco De Venezuela by Santander, Banco Provincial by Banco Bisbao, (which illegally gave funds to Chávez' 1998 campaign) Seguros Caracas by Liberty Mutual, and the list goes on. The security sector is almost totally controlled by a Spanish company, as is Movistar, one of the nation's largest cellular service providers. Two of other big ones, CanTV and MovilNet, are both owned by Verizon. In 2004, former US President (and "neutral" advocate for Capital-D Democracy in South America) Jimmy Carter arranged a meeting between Hugo Chávez and Gustavo Cisneros, a Venezuelan media mogul considered by Forbes to be among the world's richest men. Shortly after, the Cisneros Group bought Digitel, leaving the nation's telecom sector entirely in the hands of the multinationals.


On November 13th of 2003, Hugo Chávez announced that Venezuela would be tripling its coal production, principally through the incredibly destructive method of open pit mining - again, keep in mind that Venezuela does not actually need this energy for its own development, and the primary consumers of coal in the near future will continue to be the United States and Europe. It hardly seems a strategy for reducing reliance on Northern markets, particularly as this desarollo will rely directly on the participation of several multinational companies.....The increase in production is to be centered in a region of Zulia known as the Sierra del Perijá, which is home to hundreds of families from indigenous Wayuú, Yukpa, Barí, and Japreria tribes. Several of these groups have already suffered greatly as a result of mining operations already underway on their lands, and regard the Chávez government's plans as an impending death sentence. Seven Barí and three Wayuú tribes are already currently encircled by mining pits through which the coal companies forbid all outside visitors to pass, and members of the tribes themselves are allowed to come and go for only two days out of the week....

[ellisonz]

88. Good post!

This is not about socialism or indigenous rights so much as it is about totalitarianism and real socialists never fair well in those systems because it is all about conformity and cronyism. We've been down this road before...

:headbang:

[Tyrone Slothrop]

69. My "feelings" are based on actually going to Caracas a couple weeks ago

Chavez has turned the country into a living, breathing nightmare.

I cannot understand how any person on this board would support him. However, I've kept my feelings to myself thus far due to the attacks and harassment that seem to follow anyone who says that they don't particularly approve of what he's doing.

[MADem]

82. I have a friend who's here on a visa and wanting to stay in country.

He's a dual national, but one of the duals isn't US. He doesn't feel safe going back to VZ and if he has to leave, will go to Central America instead. And he's not one of those rich bastards Chavez keeps railing about, either. Just a working guy, a middle class schmuck.

[ellisonz]

89. Have you considered writing a short travel diary and posting it?

I'm sure many of us would be enthused to read it. Say the Lord's Prayer and get too it! Welcome back!

B-)

[Critters2]

100. My Venezuelan friends say the same.

They can't understand his support among American progressives. But, like you, I've found it useless to share this perspective here.

[MADem]

52. That "coup support" happened in 2002. He's shutting them down in a Falwellian move.

Doesn't want the children seeing naughty telenovelas and beer drinkers at soccer games. That's his "reason"--or so he says.

He refused to honor a bid process. He did that deliberately. He wanted those beautiful studios, that well-maintained antennae, those modern cameras, lights and associated gear--and he STOLE them--by DECREE, because that's what he does, rule by decree.

[cherokeeprogressive]

55. "They're too poor to afford TVs. They remember what happened in 2002"

How did they get their information? Word of mouth? State controlled newspaper?

Keith Olbermann regularly calls for the impeachment of der chimperor. COULD THAT HAPPEN IN VENEZUELA? Satellite TV creates a limitless number of possible stations that can be shown in world households 24/7. If KO were to call for the peaceful overthrow of Chavez tomorrow, how much longer would MSNBC be allowed to present programming in Venezuela?

Where does the term "free press" end for you?

[killbotfactory]

58. "COULD THAT HAPPEN IN VENEZUELA?"

Yes, it could. Venezuela can have referendums, and have had one, to oust Chavez. It is a right granted under their constitution.

RCTV called for the violent overthrow of Chavez, and had people deliberately killed in the process.

[MADem]

62. Yeah. but he now rules by decree. He could decree that they need

a hundred percent of the voters to sign the referendum.

He also owns all the voting machines.

The legislature and judiciary are packed with his peeps.

And RCTV did NOT do what you claim....they reported the news in a slanted fashion, and they showed cartoons when the Chavezistas were marching in the streets. Their reporters behaved no differently from the Faux bastards when they interview whack jobs who fly off the handle.

The coup happened FIVE YEARS AGO, too....so what took the dude so long?

Finally, the reason Chavez gave for yanking the license was because of the "pornography" of the telenovelas, and the depictions of guys drinking BEER, that would "sully the minds of the children."

The coup had nutthin' ta do with it--so HE said. What was really happening was he wanted those nice studios, that new equipment, that jazzy antennae--he wanted a purpose-built propaganda station, which is why he STOLE all of the euipment from the station.

If they'd put the station up for bid, and RCTV lost, the winner would have to pay them for their stuff. Chavez stole it, and got it for free.

He's a thug. Anyone who is a dual citizen has already run like hell, because he's planning on STRIPPING dual citizenship from anyone in country, so he says. The lines at the embassies are around the block for visas--people see the handwriting on the wall, and it doesn't say "democracy."

[killbotfactory]

63. No, he can not just decree that.

The decree, which has exercised by previous presidents, and are limited in scope. He can't just change the constitution on a whim.

[MADem]

64. He can propose the law change, and have the assembly, which is 100 percent Chavistas, OK it.

Then the judiciary, which is also 100 percent Chavistas and has RULED UNCONSTITUTIONALLY recently--most particularly with regard to some of this nationalization shit--will back him up.

Sorta like Bush-Gore 2000, only unanimous. And more far-reaching. It's a rubber-stamp government.

Venezuela is NOT what democracy looks like.

You can apologize for the guy all day long, but he is what he is--a despotic dictator in the making, arguments for "the greater good" notwithstanding.

I find it hysterical and supremely ironic that the same crowd that pounds the desk, stomps feet, and quotes Ben Franklin about trading liberty for security will totally, cheerfully, eagerly excuse this asshole down in Venezuela. The claim, "Oh, geeee, he's helping the POOOOOOOOOR" doesn't float with me. You can help the poor without turning the joint into a dictatorship--you've got to sell the concept, appeal to greater angels, guilt the shit out of people, and do a little WORK--which is harder than ruling by decree. You can lift up the disenfranchised without fucking the wage-earning, gear turning end of the population, too. FDR and LBJ managed it. For some reason, I get the impression that some here feel it is NOT ok to trade liberty for PHSYICAL security, but in Venezuela, it's completely ok to trade liberty for ECONOMIC security.

And that's just funny as hell to me. If GWB pulled this crap (and he's pulled a lot of shit, but NOTHING like what Chavez is doing) there'd be blood in the streets.

And a lot of 'rightwingers' like Nancy Pelosi http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601086&sid=aia9a2weAY1I&refer=latin_america agree with me. Those 'neocons' at the Carter Center do too: http://www.forextv.com/FT/AFX/ShowStory.jsp?seq=218978

And for everyone who insists that those protests were "no big deal"--all I can say is if you were picked up, say, protesting the war in DC, and held for three or four days (they haven't been released yet, either), would you think that was "ok?" Hell, the screams of "Police brutality!!! Totalitarian state!!! Fascist PIGS!!" that I heard after people were held for less than half a day in some protest actions here in the US were quite vociferous. But four days, and counting? Where's the outrage and empathy for those youngsters?

And the protests continue even today--hell, you don't see that kind of passion here in the US for anything, not even the Iraq War--haven't since Vietnam, frankly. Well, if they're selling cheap Wiis at WALMART, you might be able to muster up a crowd of a few thousand, but in the streets, with signs, for four days running? Like I said, not since Vietnam.

A top opponent of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has demanded the release of jailed protesters as university students poured into the streets for a third day to protest the removal of a leading opposition TV station...Former presidential candidate Manuel Rosales said protests over the government's move to halt the broadcasts of Radio Caracas Television show that "freedom cannot be negotiated nor bargained".

Protesters have filled the capital's plazas and streets since the opposition-aligned channel went off the air at midnight Sunday. Chavez refused to renew its broadcast licence, and police in Caracas have clashed with angry crowds...A total of 182 people - mostly university students and minors - have been detained in nearly 100 protests since Sunday, Justice Minister Pedro Carreno said late on Wednesday. At least 30 were charged with violent acts, prosecutors said, but it was unclear how many remained behind bars.

"Freedom for those young men and women, immediately. They should not be treated like criminals," said Rosales..."I know that Radio Caracas will return to the air," Rosales said. He said protesters are demanding not only free speech but also the right to protest "peacefully and democratically".

Rosales noted that a home video broadcast on the Globovision network showed unidentified men in the doorway of a government office - apparently Chavez allies - firing guns at unseen targets....
As he spoke, roughly 8,000 student protesters chanting "freedom!" marched toward the offices of the People's Defender, a government official in charge of monitoring human rights. Marchers stopped at a police barricade, while several leaders delivered a protest letter..."The students are taking a stand, but not to oust the government or cause chaos as some allege," student leader John Goicochea said.....Separately, about 1,000 government opponents protested outside Venezuela's Air Force Command headquarters in central Caracas, banging on pots while shouting: "Soldiers, listen! Unite with the struggle!"...

"We don't want a totalitarian country. We have the right to defend our freedom," office worker Virginia Montilla, 46....


http://www.smh.com.au/news/World/Calls-to-release-Venezuelan-protesters/2007/05/31/1180205395659.html

[killbotfactory]

78. The National Assembly is 100% "Chavista" because the opposition

boycotted the last election.

When, as president, could he not propose a law change?

[MADem]

80. When, without any oppostion, could he propose it, have it rubber stamped, and then have a packed

court rule in his favor as to the constitutionality of ANYTHING he proposes, from taking TV stations, or ancestral sacred lands of indigenous people to do strip mining of coal? There are no checks or balances. It's not just the proposing, it's the rubber stamping by the legislature and the judiciary. He is the law. It's his way or the highway.

And even with that, poor little Hugo just can't bear that the world is giving him the same shit that they give Georgie, and he's blaming Georgie for his woes--he's the victim of a right wing conspiracy; even Europe and Brazil just hate him: http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6675941,00.html

And there's more to come: University students planned to hold another large protest in Caracas Friday.

One of Chavez's former buddies isn't too sanguine about VZ's future, either...
http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=61e9dbc5-bb46-4de2-b6cc-731650f89d93&k=0

....Teodoro Petkoff saw it coming. Few people outside Venezuela would recognize the name, but inside the country he is known as one of Chavez's fiercest critics, a one-time socialist ally and revolutionary who grew disillusioned by El Presidente's more autocratic tendencies.

When I met the 75-year-old newspaper editor in Caracas on the eve of last year's presidential balloting, he had the air of a man headed for the funeral of a lifelong friend.
He was cranky, impatient and - more than anything - terribly pessimistic about the future of Venezuelan democracy.

"I must say that we still have free speech, a free press. But we live under suspicion. We are suspected citizens, always," said Petkoff...."For radio and television, we have a law that permits the government to close a TV channel for 72 hours, five years, or forever. It has not been applied yet. But it exists. It is a Damocles' sword hanging over our heads."

The sword fell on Sunday....independent observers maintain RCTV has done little to deserve its fate - even by the standards of Venezuela's draconian media laws - and are sounding the alarm about Chavez's crackdown on independent stations. ....Venezuelans have sent their own message. Thousands of university students have protested RCTV's closure in some of the worst civil unrest since the 2002 coup.

What's significant about the protests is that they are being led not by the upper classes - whom Chavez dismisses as members of a self-interested oligarchy - but by young people from universities where his socialism is far more entrenched.

But rather than being deterred, Chavez seems emboldened by the outrage. On Tuesday, he threatened another leading opposition station....He branded its operators "enemies of the homeland" and urged poor Venezuelans "on the hillsides and in the shantytowns" to be on alert for subversive activity. "Take a tranquillizer and get into gear, because if not, I am going to do what is necessary," he told Globovision's owners.

Batshit crazy sumbitch sounds just like Bush--enemies of the homeland, be alert for subversives...hell, when's he gonna start calling his enemies 'terrists?' and using the "with me or against me" theme?

Two crazy peas in a pod....

[Critters2]

98. If the power is vested in the people, why do we only hear about Chavez?

I mean, Nancy Pelosi went to the Middle East, a rep of the legislative branch of our government. Other members of congress make news for a whole lot of things. Bush gets most of the media attention, but not all of it. Where are the legislative leaders of Venezuela? Where are other office holders? Why do we only hear about Chavez?

This is a serious question. I want to understand this.

[rinsd]

40. Why for all its footnoting that Chavez love letter is just so much bullshit.

See everyone is lying except the Chavez government.

The opposition parties, former allies of Chavez, Reporters without Borders, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International etc.

Anything supportive of Chavez is cited without any qualification in terms of bias. Anything negative about Chavez and there's a qualifier especially if that organization is internationally respected.

[MADem]

65. It really gives you a surprising insight into how democratic some of our Democratic brethren are, or

more properly, aren't.

The same crowd that screams "fascist" at the asshole we have running our country looks benignly on this fat little Sudamericano Mussolini in miniature...and the ONLY reason they do it is because the guy fucking HATES Bush. If teenagers protesting in the US were rounded up and held without right to counsel or contact with their families for four fucking days, people here would be up in arms. Apparently, though, since it is Saint Hugo doing it, there's no problem with it. It's rank hypocrisy of the highest order.

I swear, if Chavez and Bush were in bed with one another, and allies instead of enemies, these very same people would be calling him the Hitler of the Southern Hemisphere, if he were doing the EXACT same things he's doing right now.

I'd laugh like hell if they WERE 'secret lovers'--trading ideas as to how to cow the population, playing a fake 'hate' game, like WWF wrestlers, and skimming off those 'nationalized' oil profits for their mutual benefit--it would make one helluva SNL sketch:

CHAVEZ: "Hola, Georgie Arbusto, mi amigo--I am taking over the opposition tee vee station; you know the one that said mean things about me five years ago. I'm telling the people that the reason I am taking it is because they showed those pornographic telenovelas--you know, the ones your sister-in-law watches all day! And also, because they show people drinking the BEER at the futbol matches--we cannot have children seeing such things...amazing, how the pendejos believe this shit when I say it!!!


BUSH: "Ooooh, good ah-dear (idea), OOOOH-go, mah ole pal. Ah wish ah'd done that SOONER with CBS, mahsef!!! That wuz the last oppostion network in mah country, and ah finally got it. It took me forever to get that sumbitch Rather outta there--but now I got Katie in there, and all is well fer me!!! You mighta wanted to buy those guys off, though, and mebbe have a few of them get hit by buses--this protestin' shit is gettin' kinda messy.....could cut into 'our'oil profits, if ya know what I mean, heh heh!!!"

CHAVEZ: Yes, I DO know what you mean, amigo, and this is why I need you to say some 'mean' things about me in the press!! Because you are hated too, and more than me--I have a lot to learn from you, my friend--the people will rally to me because they see you as the world's biggest asshole--no offense, compadre. I'll cut you in on a little extra of my "nationalized" oil for your trouble, eh?

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

76. Stuff the innuendo. -nt

[MADem]

77. It wasn't innuendo. It was a plainspoken expression of my viewpoint.

I didn't "allude" -- I came right out and said I have a problem with people here who apply a double standard. What's good for the asshole running the USA is good for the asshole running Venezuela.

Plain enough for ya?

[Codeine]

79. Bravo!

:applause: :applause: :applause:

Apparently as long as you mouth the right platitudes and holler about Che enough you're allowed to act like a fascist and gain an adoring fan-club of smitten "progressives" in love with the swaggering posture of their new pet strongman.

[ellisonz]

90. Bravo! Bravo!

:patriot:

[skypilot]

70. kick

for reading later.

[leftchick]

73. thank you for that

I see a lot of folks here are not even reading it. What a shock. not!

[ellisonz]

92. I read it.

Please go get this book from your local library, read it, and then report back:

http://www.amazon.com/Origins-Totalitarianism-Introduction-Samantha-Power/dp/0805242252/ref=sr_1_1/002-3498101-6807236?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1180909303&sr=8-1

[Swamp Rat]

93. Excellent book

:thumbsup:

[ellisonz]

95. Totalitarianism comes from both left and right.

That is Arendt's fundamental argument and it is spot on.

1. Demonization of the "enemy" i.e. "neo-liberalism," see Robert Mugabe for a prime example.
2. Imperialist expansion in Chavez's case this is more informal empire as can be seen by his increasing relationship with other totalitarian states such as the PRC and Iran.
3. Totalitarianism.

THIS IS NOT TO SAY THE UNITED STATES HASN'T DONE THE SAME THING.:mad:

[Swamp Rat]

96. Right, we should not waste our time criticizing Chavez when we have a MUCH WORSE problem here.

And what goes down here in the USA likely has a more immediate impact on the whole world.

[ellisonz]

102. I would rather talk about NCLB than Chavez.

However, the man does make news and I cannot help the fact that many on here are committed to cheerleading Hugo all along the way while paying lip service to the real problems in America (and no, Iraq is not the most important issue.) American Capitalism is in full fledged decay.

[martymar64]

74. It's interesting

Everyone bitches about Chavez but when it comes to Uribe killing labor leaders in Colombia, the dictator in Uzbekistan (supposedly our ally) boiling people in oil, Batista's crimes prior to Castro and Piochet, Peron in Argentina, they fall silent.
I guess they only like Right Wing dictators.

[MADem]

81. Who here falls silent? Start a thread on those issues, I'm sure you'd get a few takers

I know I've seen more than a few eye-opening threads on that Uzbeki batshit crazy bastard before, when we were first setting up logistic support bases over that way.

Just because George Bush likes them doesn't mean that people here can't take serious issue with the way these governments conduct themselves. But by the same token, just because Bush has problems with some governments doesn't necessarily mean that he's off the mark. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

We certainly DO have some pretty shitty allies--BushCo's attitude is that if they're with him on his War On Terra, they can brutalize their own populations, abrogate any and all civil rights, even chop off heads in the public square for all he cares.

You've got to weigh each circumstance on its own merits, and not look first to what Bush likes or hates in making your decision. Hell, if that were our standard, if Bush likes it, we must then, hate it, why, there'd be a lot of pissed off people here who'd be told to forego their finger-licking good barbecue, because it's one of the Monkey's favorite foods.

[Swamp Rat]

85. Casi nadie aquí entiende que pasa allí ahora.

.. especialmente los que creen la propaganda del partido derecho.

[Swamp Rat]

94. Read more articles by Deborah James here:

http://www.globalexchange.org/getInvolved/speakers/21.html

[DireStrike]

99. Ugh, please warn when linking to a pdf

I hate that format. I can't express how much. There's very little reason for anyone to use it, and most people use it when they don't need to. It's incredibly slow and usually crashes browsers.