Chavez party seeks changes for third term

[Zorro]

<snip>

Venezuela's ruling party pledged Thursday to seek to reform the nation's constitution to let President Hugo Chavez seek indefinite re-election.

Proposed changes to end the two-term limit for presidents will be presented to Congress or the National Electoral Council and ultimately to voters after state and municipal elections now scheduled for November, said Freddy Bernal, a leader of Chavez's United Socialist Party.

"The purpose of this amendment is to ask the country if they want or don't want the re-election of President Hugo Chavez," Bernal said in a televised interview. "If we want peace, tranquility and development in the country, Hugo Chavez must continue being president."

Chavez, who was first elected in 1998, is barred from running again when his term expires in 2013...

<snip>

More at: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080718/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/venezuela_chavez_re_election

[Judi Lynn]

1. Hope they won't stoop to BRIBING the legislators to do it behind voters' backs, like Uribe. n/t

[AlphaCentauri]

2. Uribe is the role model to follow n/t

[Judi Lynn]

3. And when he DOES get the chance to run again, you'd better believe all the death squad members will

be right back at the voting places to help voters with their choices, as in the past!

COLOMBIA: "Mark Him on the Ballot - The One Wearing Glasses"
By Constanza Vieira

Credit:Procuraduría General

BOGOTA, May 8 (IPS) - "With Uribe, we thought: this is the guy who is going to change the country," the 41-year-old fisherwoman told IPS.

That is why her fishing and farming village of 800 people in the central Colombian region of Magdalena Medio decided overwhelmingly to vote for current President Álvaro Uribe in the 2002 presidential elections, when he first ran.

The woman agreed to talk to IPS on the condition that she be asked neither her name (we will call her "L.") nor the name of her village.

The main city in the fertile region of Magdalena Medio is Barrancabermeja, an oil port on the Magdalena River, which runs across Colombia from south to north before emptying into the Caribbean Sea.

What convinced the villagers to vote for Uribe? "Because the region where we live is poor, very poor, it’s so difficult to find work, and when I heard him say ‘I am going to work for the poor, I am going to help them,’ I thought ‘this is a good president’."

When the rightwing president’s first four-year term came to an end in 2006, most of the villagers decided again to vote for him, reasoning that he just needed more time to reduce poverty.

The odd thing was that in both the 2002 and 2006 elections, despite the fact that the villagers had already decided to vote for Uribe, the far-right paramilitaries, who had committed a number of murders since 1998, when they appeared in the region that was previously dominated by the leftwing guerrillas, pressured the local residents to vote for Uribe anyway.

The paramilitaries did not kill people to pressure the rest to vote for Uribe, as they did in other communities, but merely used "threats," said L.

"If you don't vote for Uribe, you know what the consequences will be," the villagers were told ominously.

And on election day, they breathed down voters’ necks: "This is the candidate you’re going to vote for. You’re going to put your mark by this one. The one wearing glasses," they would say, pointing to Uribe’s photo on the ballot, L. recalled.

"One (of the paramilitaries) was on the precinct board, another one was standing next to the table, and another was a little way off, all of them watching to see if you voted for Uribe," she added, referring to the less than subtle way that the death squads commanded by drug traffickers and allies of the army ensured that L.’s village voted en masse for the current president in both elections.

More:
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=42290

[Bacchus39]

4. didn't Venezuela vote on this already?

yes, I believe they did.

"Venezuelan voters rejected a sweeping package of reforms that would have ended presidential term limits by a vote of 51 percent to 49 percent in a national referendum last December, according to partial results released by Venezuela's National Electoral Council. The proposed reforms had raised concerns among government opponents that Chavez intends to serve as president for life."

[Judi Lynn]

5. Anyone sober recognizes that they voted on 69 individual issues contained in one fell swoop.

The opposition spent millions on advertising campaigns fighting the package.

".....raised concerns among government opponents that Chavez intends to serve as president for life." Yeah, for sure! He would have had to win the elections, first. You don't get to be president without being elected by a majority, and that's democratic, as Peace Patriot has patiently explained to you, with the example of FDR who died in office in his fourth term.

(Too bad it never raises any concerns among the whore corporate media that they might sound like conscience-free degenerates, serving as stooges and mouthpieces for a pack of criminals.)

The fascists in the U.S. who branded FDR a commie, who fought him every step of the way, just as they fight Democrats now, rushed to reform our voting laws so another popular Democrat couldn't do the same thing again. It's a problem with Republicans, as there ARE no popular Republicans, actually. They have to resort to filthy, crippling, utterly dishonest attacks on human beings to get into office in the first place.

If Venezuelans had voted yes or no specifically on dropping limits to running for re-election, THEN you'd have a point, but that didn't happen, did it?

Chavez didn't sneak around behind the backs of the public like your fascist Uribe, bribing legislators, trying to fix it with the Senate so they'd remove all the obstacles to repeated elections. That would be classless, and criminal altogether.

[Bacchus39]

7. and eliminating term limits were part of that package, yes or no?

the Venezuelans voted no. who's fault was it that they bundled proposals? and as if that wasn't the key issue.

[Judi Lynn]

8. This may assist you in your conspicuous moment of perplexity:

<ahem>

The Venezuelan Referendum
by Clifton Ross / December 4th, 2007

~snip~
Indeed, the lies and black propaganda reached absurd levels, with some ads proclaiming that the reform would “take children away from their parents” and expropriate homes from their rightful owners. (The reform, in fact, would have guaranteed precisely the opposite, making it more difficult for people to lose their homes in case of bankruptcy.) However, the most universal mischaracterization of the reforms was the constantly repeated lie that they would “make Chavez president-for-life.” Once again, in the US and Venezuelan opposition press, we were led to believe, falsely, of course, that this reform was all about Chavez and not the Venezuelan people. This fiction was repeated so often and so forcefully that the other 69 articles of reform in the two slates proposed, one by Chavez himself, and one by the National Assembly, got little or no coverage. Those much-neglected articles included guaranteeing social security for workers in the informal economy; lowering the voting age from 18 to 16; lowering the work week from 44 to 36 hours; prohibiting discrimination based on disability or sexual preference and requiring gender parity in political parties; giving five percent of tax revenues disbursed to the states directly to the community councils; guaranteeing free education to all Venezuelans through the university (yes, that would include PhD’s), and making organic agriculture the “strategic basis of integral rural development.” Because the media reduced the entire Reform to this one issue, they presented the defeat of the Reforms as a “defeat for Chavez” rather than a temporary setback for greater democracy, social justice and the struggle of the working people and middle class of Venezuela who stood to gain from the reform. After all, Chavez still has five years left in office, a National Assembly and, according to polls, a majority of the people on his side.

Even the President of the National Electoral Council, Tibisay Lucena, acknowledged that the media was weighted against Chavez and the reforms when she pointed out that, in the month of November, the media dedicated 59 percent of its coverage to the opposition and 41 percent to supporters of the Reforms. This fact has led intellectuals like Jose Sant Roz, Professor of the University of the Andes and author of over 20 books on Venezuelan politics, to call for the creation of a national revolutionary daily since the only pro-government daily paper, Diario Vea, is of relatively small size and circulation compared to the half-dozen or so newspapers of the opposition.

More:
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2007/12/1247/

[Zorro]

9. So I guess your point is the Venezuelans didn't know what they were voting for

Quite a patronizing attitude you have about the citizens of Venezuela. Typical for you, though.

[Bacchus39]

10. given some of those juicy proposals like a shorter work week and voting at 16

you'd almost think that the Chavistas wanted to include some incentives to sweeten the pot for never ending rule wouldn't you? I mean if you're 16 and someone gives you the right to vote, who would you consider voting for in the next election?

guess who wrote this?

"Maybe you should spend a little more time learning why it is so many uninformed (hope that's their excuse) people support a government which is so heavily connected to its death squads and, together with the paramilitaries bears the distinction as noted by human rights groups of having murdered 75 to 80% of the dead Colombian citizens."

[Zorro]

11. Was it you?

Ha ha.

Yes, of course it's just one of many patronizing insults from a self-anointed know-it-all motormouth.

I've collected quite a few myself, and a few more from the FARCie minions that hang out in this forum.

[Judi Lynn]

12. I looked up 75 to 80% in google, found this:

~snip~
"Colombian army brigades and police detachments promote, work with, support, and tolerate paramilitary groups, treating them as a force allied to and compatible with their own. At their most brazen, these relationships involve active coordination during military operations between government and paramilitary units; communication via radios, cellular telephones, and beepers; the sharing of intelligence, including the names of suspected guerrilla collaborators; the sharing of fighters, including active-duty soldiers serving in paramilitary units and paramilitary commanders lodging on military bases; the sharing of vehicles, including army trucks used to transport paramilitary fighters; and the coordination of army roadblocks, which routinely let heavily-armed paramilitary fighters pass...." (http://www.hrw.org/backgrounder/americas/coltestimony.htm)

For years, the Colombian armed forces have been the leading Latin American recipient of U.S. military aid, culminating in a billion-dollar aid package last year. Thus, as the armed forces' lifeline, we've got all the leverage in the world. Alas, if the Bush Administration is anything like its Clinton, Bush and Reagan predecessors, no matter what it says publicly, privately it approves of army-death squad collaboration.

Back in 1996, HRW summarized the enduring relationship in the book Colombia's Killer Networks: The Military-Paramilitary Partnership and the United States: "a sophisticated mechanism, in part supported by years of advice, training, weaponry, and official silence by the United States, that allows the Colombian military to fight a dirty war and Colombian officialdom to deny it. The price: thousands of dead, disappeared, maimed, and terrorized Colombians."

In the years since HRW penned that passage, the "privatization" of the dirty war has accelerated: The number of political murders committed by the army has declined dramatically in recent years, while paramilitary killings have skyrocketed. For the past few years the paramilitaries have committed 75-80 percent of the political killings of civilians compared to about 20 percent by the guerrillas (who've earned their own "terrorist" label) and just 2-4 percent by the armed forces.

By an odd coincidence, the AUC kills the same types of people that army intelligence long has targeted. Meanwhile, most of the officers coordinating the partnership reap rewards and promotions, while cynical proponents of aid, such as McCaffrey, cite the army's dwindling direct contribution to the death toll as proof of its sterling character. (It's a sad commentary on our mainstream media that this transparent charade remains effective.)

More:
http://www.colombiajournal.org/colombia85.htm

Is this the same source?

[AlphaCentauri]

13. Yon Goicoechea was paid $500,000

is that bribery, Mandela or MLK were not paid any money for their service.

[Zorro]

6. Hugo wants a Mulligan

Can't let the will of the people as expressed last December interfere with his future plans.

[AlphaCentauri]

15. Seen people naming their kids Yon instead of John, Guiliam instead of William

I know the opposition like english names but they can't spell them correctly. So can they be trusted to make a good choice?

[Bacchus39]

16. Jhonny, Leidy, Estafanie, the list goes on

it has nothing to do with the Venezuelan opposition. seen numerous English names spelled phonetically in Spanish throughout Latin America.

[AlphaCentauri]

17. Yon, it's just a funny name

that type of name are adopted from watching too many hollywood movies. That name doesn't exist in the spanish language.

Yon (John) got paid 500 000

did anybody saw Mandela, Gandhi or MLK get those prices?

[Judi Lynn]

18. Yon Goicoechea. It is a funny name, and it's a nasty little fascist, too.

Here are some photos, and a bit of information on the oligarchy darling:
http://nyc.indymedia.org/en/2008/05/97072.html

http://www.handsoffvenezuela.org.nyud.net:8090/images/stories/venezuela/goicoechea-pr.jpg

~snip~
After spending weeks denouncing the totalitarian character of the "Chávez regime", Yon Goicoechea and his friends demanded their "right" to be heard at the National Assembly. Contrary to what they were expecting, the National Assembly invited them, along with students belonging to revolutionary organisations, to express their concerns and debate about free speech and freedom of the press; never before had a student representative been invited into the National Assembly.

The session opened with Douglas Bravo, a student opposition leader from the Metropolitan University, a private and notoriously elitist centre. He read out his speech, which was as vague as it was well written. On the one hand, he promised to continue the fight for the RCTV to the very end. On the other, he hinted to the possibility of a national reconciliation process if the revolutionary government stopped being a revolutionary government and behaved as every respectable government is expected to behave, defending the interests of the capitalist and landlords.

At the end of his speech he said in a declamatory way: "a dream of a country in which we can be taken into account without the need to wear a uniform", at which point he and his friends took off the red T-shirts they were wearing and revealed a series of pro-RCTV slogans. They started to withdraw from the Assembly, but revolutionary students convinced them to stay and, at least, listen to the intervention of Andreína Taranzón, a revolutionary student from the Central University of Venezuela.

Taranzón finished, and here came our hero. Yon Goicoechea took on the speaker's role, but having already done their show for the media, he did not feel like debating anything. Goicoechea announced that the opposition party was leaving. "We did not come to this Assembly to play at being politicians, we are students", said Goicoechea, "Having spoken once and listened once, we leave". And they left, leaving behind the script of the speech read earlier by Douglas Bravo.

The script was signed by ARS Publicity, part of Globovision's business group. Not only was the speech scripted, but also its performance. César Trompiz, a revolutionary student from the Bolivarian University, read out the last sheet of the script: "A dream of a country in which we can be taken into account without the need to wear a uniform {take off the t-shirt} with no more to say {pause} so far".

These "oppositionists" are not just generously funded by the oligarchy, they are also remote-controlled!

Tools of world capitalism
Mr Goicoechea has been long praised by the Western press for his role in giving the Venezuelan opposition a "fresh" image and a new, relatively clean, face. Among the Goicoechea enthusiasts we also find the editorial board of Playboy-Venezuela, who put him (not his picture, that space was already occupied by a half-naked girl) on the front page of this, er..., serious political magazine.

The talent scouts who have hailed him the champion of anti-Chavism are not such an innocent group. The board who appointed Yon as a modern-day capitalist hero has an interesting composition:

• Kakha Bendukidze, a Georgian leading politician and good friend of the White House, who profited out of the US-backed privatisation and destruction of the Soviet planned economy.
  
• Ed Crane, president of the Institute, member of the Mont Pelerin Society, a freemasonry-like think tank founded by rabid anti-socialist economist Friedrich von Hayek. He is a vocal supporter for the abolition of the Social Security insurance system in the US, because the sick, old and disabled, if poor, should be given the freedom to die without any government interference in their health conditions.
  
• Francisco Gil Díaz, Mexican minister of finances until 2006, now hired by the giant banking group HSBC (the largest capitalist company in the world).
  
• The capitalist Charles G. Koch (Koch Industries), who's been described as "the world's most successful private billionaire".
  
• Another European neo-liberal ultra-rich ideologue known by the name of Karen Horn.
  
• Andrew Mwenda, a Ugandan journalist who opposes sending aid to Africa and debt relief for the highly indebted countries.
  
• Mary O'Grady (The Wall Street Journal) and Fareed Zakaria (Newsweek), two other journalists on the payroll of Big Business.
  
• Rose Director, the widow of the laissez-faire economist Milton Friedman and a lunatic "libertarian" economist herself.
  
• Another individual who has won a Friedman "award" was Hernando de Soto, who was economic adviser in promoting the "Fujishock" in Perú, a packet of shock economic measures during the Fujimori dictatorship (free market and dictatoirship!).

Milton Friedman gave good economic advice to the dictator Augusto Pinochet who strictly collaborated with his pupils, the Chicago Boys, while he was in charge of dramatically worsening the living conditions of Chilean workers, killing and torturing thousands in the process. Receiving the Friedman Prize must have been a great honour for Yon Goicoechea. Who knows, a future career as a Venezuelan Pinochet is still possible for this brilliant advocate of capitalist freedom!

http://www.handsoffvenezuela.org/violence_venezuela_university.htm

~~~~~~~~~~
Remember this pathetic situation at the Central University of Venezuela:

Opposition violence at Venezuelan university - What really happened at the UCV
By Rodrigo Trompiz and Jorge Martin (with eyewitness information from Caracas)
Thursday, 08 November 2007

According to eyewitness reports from Hands Off Venezuela members, violence broke out yesterday in Caracas when opposition students arrived back from a peaceful demonstration against the proposed constitutional reforms. Apparently frustrated by the lack of violence, a group of about 250 of the opposition students (many from other universities) went straight to the Central University of Venezuela (UCV) to the School of Social Work which is a stronghold of revolutionary students inside UCV.

There, a group of revolutionary students was campaigning for a yes vote in the referendum. They had an assembly for students/teachers/non-teaching staff in the morning and were putting up posters and giving out leaflets.

They were then attacked by the opposition students who surrounded the School. Molotov cocktails and stones were thrown, the toilets were destroyed, the door of the Students Centre (Bolivarian dominated) was burned down, and around 150 people (students, teachers and non-teaching staff) were trapped inside the building for several hours, with the violent opposition students trying to force their way into the building to lynch them.

Some of the students inside the Faculty are nationally known Bolivarian student leaders (including Andreina Taranzon who spoke in the debate with opposition students at the National Assembly earlier this year at the time of the RCTV protests). They managed to call the state TV and reported live on what was happening.

The police are not allowed to enter University premises owing to a law on University autonomy. The Mayor of Caracas offered the possibility of the Metropolitan Police going in to contain violence and allow people in the School to come out, but the rector of the University, a member of the opposition, refused the offer. The University authorities are responsible for security on their own premises and did nothing to prevent violence from escalating.

Meanwhile, opposition TV stations were full of reports that masked Chavista supporters had fired on opposition students and that one person had been killed (this was then proven to be false, nine students were injured, most of them from inhaling fumes from the fires started by opposition students).

Finally, the head of emergency and fire-fighting services was allowed by the rector to go into the university and negotiate the safe exit of the people who were trapped inside the School of Social Work by a violent mob of opposition students.

More, including 2 videos:
http://www.handsoffvenezuela.org/violence_venezuela_university.htm

[Judi Lynn]

19. There's a group of individual videos at this link, watching them now:

http://www.radiomundial.com.ve/yvke/noticia.php?988

They include some speeches by actual young MEN, people with conviction, with real intelligence, with something to say. They're quite a far cry from the squishy, pudgy, and now wealthier little _Bush-world pet oligarchy snot, Yon.

On edit:

You may ask yourself what this anti-Chavista "student" "protestor" is doing on campus, trying to ding the Chavista students trapped inside the building under seize by the NED-sponsored anti-Chavists.

[JohnnyCougar]

14. I don't agree with this.

As much as I hate all the ridiculous anti-Chavez conspiracy theories and BS, I think the best thing for Venezuela is if Chavez packs it up and lets someone else from his own party run.

Chavez's rhetoric and actions make sense when an international threat like Bush is constantly trying to destabilize your country. But as the nightmare of the last 7.5 years comes to a close, he's going to have to moderate his positions and rhetoric -- including the third term stuff.

[AlphaCentauri]

20. That might be the position of many democrats -To stop all criticism-

because it's our turn in the whitehouse, we just have to wait and see changes in the foreign policies that won't trigger reactions in other countries. Or may there will be no changes in foreign diplomacy even with a democrat president.