Tall & Rich

A Yanqui’s View of Latin American Politics

Archive for June, 2007

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Venezuelan soccer fans protest Chavez at Copa

Posted by Jonn Lilyea on June 29, 2007

Despite Chavez best efforts to keep protesters away from the Copa America soccer tournament, Associated Press reports about half of the 40,000 fans broke into anti-Chavez chants;

MARACAIBO, Venezuela (AP) – Thousands of Venezuelan soccer fans used an international tournament to show opposition to President Hugo Chavez, rising to their feet with chants of “Freedom!” The chants, which included “This government is going to fall,” began shortly into the second half of Thursday’s match between the United States and Argentina in the western city of Maracaibo, a stronghold of opposition to Chavez. 

Chavez opponents are hoping the arrival of thousands of tourists for the Copa America tournament will draw attention to their protests against the president’s refusal to renew the licence of a popular opposition-aligned television channel.

“We want the world to know we’re not all with Chavez,” said Gabriel Gonzalez, a business student at the University of Zulia, who attended Thursday’s match.

About half the crowd of 40,000 appeared to join in the chants, which filled the stadium for about three minutes.

Chavez, who was re-elected by a wide margin in December, has gone to great lengths to keep Venezuela’s bitter political divide from spilling into the tournament, banning protests in and near stadiums and ordering state security forces to crack down on any that do arise.

Only one match in the three-week-long tournament is being held in the protest-prone capital of Caracas.

But opposition activists seem determined to voice their criticisms about Chavez to the world.

“I don’t really know whether it’s spontaneous, semi-spontaneous or directed from above” by the political opposition, said Steve Ellner, a political science professor at Venezuela’s University of the East. “This could be part of a strategy to erode support and create uncertainty.”

The chants on Thursday followed a heckling incident two days earlier, when a small number of fans booed Chavez as he attended a ceremony.

All this despite Chavez best laid plans to make the Copa about him, according to Daniel at Venezuela News and Views;

As expected Chavez could not resist to make the Copa America his. From “ahora es de todos” the Soccer tournament went to “ahora es de Chavez“. How come the Conmebol allowed 1) the silly and stupid speech of Chavez, something which was never allowed in previous editions of the Copa? and 2) this picture below (from EFE through Tal Cual)?

Gateway Pundit has a link to the video on YouTube and another wire service story. But the Venezuelan blogs seem silent on it.

And Chavez is making deals with Russia to build four new refineries. No wonder he slammed the US missile defense plans for Europe. I wonder if he’ll be using Cuban slave labor for his refineries, too.

RCTV’s Observador Online reports that Chavez is in negotiations with Belarussia to buy Venezuela a modern air defense system including missiles, radar and a command system;

29 de junio de 2007.-
El presidente de Venezuela, Hugo Chávez, llegó este viernes a Minsk, la capital de Bielorrusia, para concretar la adquisición de un moderno sistema de defensa aérea. Según medios rusos y bielorrusos, se trata de un sistema de defensa aérea a partir de baterías de misiles rusos S-300 PMU-2 y Tor M-1, dotadas de radares, para el que Bielorrusia ha ofrecido crear un sistema de mando automático.

Paranoia writ large.

Posted in Hugo Chavez, Politics, Society, US Foreign Policy | Leave a Comment »

Chavez needs submarines to find his popularity rating

Posted by Jonn Lilyea on June 28, 2007

(Photo from Venezuela Llora, Venezuela Sangra)

There was another march against Chavez yesterday not that you’d read about it from any US news organization. But Tank at Venezuela Llora, Venezuela Sangra has photos and videos. Pretty impressive crowd, actually. For the story, El Universal;

On the National Journalists’ Day, on June 27, Venezuelan journalists are not celebrating. Rather, they are staging a march in Caracas streets to demand President Hugo Chávez to order resumption of private television station RCTV’s broadcast on its original open signal and to advocate freedom of expression.

The march -organized by Periodistas Unidos por la Libertad de Expresión (Journalists United for Freedom of Expression)- is departing from Plaza Venezuela at 10:00 a.m. to the headquarters of RCTV in Quinta Crespo, west Caracas.

The student movement, actors, and workers and trade unions of news media, professional associations, political parties, and non-governmental associations will join reporters.  

Gateway Pundit has more photos and news.

Chavez missed the protests, though – he was submarine shopping in Russia. According to Daniel at Venezuela News and Views;

Thus as it is usual with Chavez, when the going gets rough, the rough start traveling overseas. First a trip to Russia to see if the submarines, 9 of them, will be bought or not. Venezuela as just gadget to go and rescue people that will be taken by the frequent floods of our starting raining season. Even there ridicule pursues Chavez.

And then he will move on to Tehran.

And while Chavez was in Russia, he couldn’t help but inject himself into another dispute that doesn’t involve him (how would a missile shield in Europe possibly affect the people of Venezuela) so he could cozy-up to Vlad Putin and get some verbal shots in against the US;

Venezuela supports Russia’s opposition to the deployment of a US missile shield in Europe, President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela said here Thursday.

[...]

“We support Russia (in its stance), we need Russia, which is becoming stronger day by day,” he said, adding that Venezuela intended to continue cooperating closely with Moscow, including in the military sphere.

Russia has repeatedly stated that it would actively participate in the modernization of the Venezuelan armed forces until 2013.

In 2005-2006, Venezuela ordered weaponry from Russia worth $3.4 billion, including 24 Su-30MK2V Flanker fighters, Tor-M1 air defense missile systems, Mi-17B multi-role helicopters, Mi-35 Hind E attack helicopters and Mi-26 Halo heavy transport helicopters.

The country also purchased 100,000 AK-103 Kalashnikov assault rifles from Russia in 2005 and sent its fighter and helicopter pilots for training in Russia.

The South American country has been vigorously pursuing the modernization of its armed forces to counter a possible US blockade of its oil fields and to prepare for a direct military confrontation with Washington.

Comforting, isn’t it? Except we know that the Venezuelans would never directly engage in a war with the US – it’s not in our mutual interest. Neither country has anything the other would want – the only possible exception is that it would increase Chavez’ power to engage us in a shooting war – at least the perception of his power, in the region if not among his own people.

Chavez also said;

“If the United States attacks Venezuela, we are ready to die defending our sacred land,” Chavez said Thursday.

Who is “we”, little fella? First of all, the US has no intention of ever invading the peaceful Venezuelan people. Secondly, I’m pretty sure you’d have trouble summoning anyone to help you if we did. And that’s probably why Chavez is pushing for a defense pact with his new Left neighbors – to use them against his people like Mugabe planned on using Angolan troops to quell his own people in Zimbabwe.

So, as I said the other day, Chavez is building up his army to protect himself from his own people. Either to stir up something with the US to build a false sense of patriotism, or, failing that, a direct action against the people of Venezuela when their sense of patriotism tells them that Chavez is bad for Venezuela.

Why? Well, how about economic reasons;

Venezuela’s bolivar weakened in unregulated trading and dollar-denominated bonds tumbled after Exxon Mobil Corp. and ConocoPhillips abandoned operations in the country, raising doubts about future oil output in the world’s fifth-largest crude-oil exporter.

[...]

“[Exxon conceding control of it's facilities in Venezuela] sparks additional anxiety regarding the future of oil investment in Venezuela,” said Enrique Alvarez, a Latin America economist at the research firm Ideaglobal in New York. “Investors are going to the dollar as a safe haven.”

The bolivar weakened to 4,180 per dollar in the unofficial dollar market from 4,050 yesterday, traders said. People and businesses turn to the parallel market when they are unable to acquire the limited number of dollars the government sells at the official exchange rate of 2,150 bolivars per dollar.

All of the oil in the world can’t do you any good if you don’t have cash. Investors rushing to buy dollars will only compound Chavez problems. Daniel at Venezuela News and Views   has already reported food shortages in parts of Venezuela;

Gas shortages too , and winter is starting. And all due, as in Venezuela, to unreasonable price controls which are kept up for political reasons. Price control, the eternal soft drug of populist regimes…. and with always the same consequences: higher inflation than the neighboring countries.

While Hugo cavorts and glad hands with all the tyrants he can find.

Cartoon from Noticias 24 (h/t Kate)

Posted in Hugo Chavez, Politics, US Foreign Policy | Leave a Comment »

Chavez’ brain-drain (Updated)

Posted by Jonn Lilyea on June 26, 2007

Yesterday I posted this article from CNN Money that Chavez decided to let some oil companies leave Venezuela since they weren’t interested renegotiating with the Chavez government for the operation of their oilfields. At the time no one was sure which companies planned on leaving. Today we find out that it was Exxon and ConocoPhillips;

Two US oil companies have moved a step closer to pulling out of Venezuela. Exxon Mobil and Conoco Phillips are both reported to have rejected an offer from the government of President Hugo Chavez to continue their operations in the OPEC-member nation’s most promising oil reserve. Venezuela has set a deadline for foreign companies to accept its terms for keeping them in the massive Orinoco reserve projects as it moves to nationalise the country’s oil industry. Observers say another American company, Chevron, as well as Norway’s Statoil, Britain’s BP and France’s Total are expected to sign a deal.

An article from the Wall Street Journal (requires subscription) tells about the deal that the oil companies were forced to walk away from;

Earlier this year, Venezuela said the companies had until June 26 to turn over at least 60% ownership of the projects, including four large heavy-oil fields with a combined output of nearly 600,000 barrels a day. The projects’ estimated value is some $31 billion.

Attempts to meet the Venezuelan government halfway were unsuccessful, said the person familiar with the matter, so ConocoPhillips decided to end talks and preserve its right to seek international arbitration. Venezuela has assets in the U.S., including refineries owned by PDVSA’s Citgo Petroleum Corp. Western oil companies have discussed swapping stakes in Venezuelan oil fields for Citgo refineries in Illinois, Louisiana and Texas. A Citgo spokesman declined to comment.

Another interesting story from the Wall Street Journal (requires subscription) tells about Venezuelan oilfield workers who are moving to Alberta, Canada to find work – away from Chavez (and explains my traffic from Alberta);

Frigid, remote Alberta has become one of the world’s fastest growing enclaves of Venezuelans, rivaling such warm-weather spots as Weston, Fla., outside Miami; and Sugar Land, Texas, near Houston. There are now 3,000 Venezuelan-Albertan families, up from 800 or so last year. Some Albertans now call Evergreen, a Calgary housing development, “Vene-green” because of the 100 families who have bought split-level homes there, and dangle Venezuelan flags from car rearview mirrors.

The loss of so many skilled oil workers has hit PdVSA hard. Since Mr. Chávez took power in 1999, Venezuela’s oil production — according to U.S. government statistics — is down to 2.4 million barrels a day, from 3.1 million barrels a day, despite high prices. (Venezuela has consistently accused the U.S. of undercounting PdVSA’s production in recent years.)

So already Chavez is in trouble. I feel sorry for the people who believed that Chavez was the answer to their poverty.

UPDATED: Conoco, according to a new story from the Wall Street Journal, may cost Venezuela some money in the short-term;

Conoco isn’t washing its hands of its assets in Venezuela, though it says it will take a $4.5 billion impairment charge in its second-quarter earnings. The company’s assets there represent about 5% of its oil-and-gas equivalent production last year. Exxon’s Venezuelan assets are about 1% of its overall output for 2006.

[...]

However, even if a Conoco arbitration claim is successful, it could be years before the company gets any money. Still, Venezuela has considerable international assets that Conoco could attach. These include PdVSA’s ownership of Citgo Petroleum Corp. — which has several valuable refineries in the U.S. — and of tankers full of crude oil landing in ports along the Gulf Coast and elsewhere. A Citgo spokesman declined to comment.

[...]

BP won an arbitration case against Libya in the 1970s after the North African nation nationalized, and chased tankers of Libyan crude around the world to seize them as payment. Within the past year, Western companies that purchased debt for unpaid for construction work in the Congo have tried to seize tankers of Congolese oil to satisfy arbitration awards.

Of course, this won’t hurt Chavez, only the Venezuelan people. And Chavez can blame the big oil companies – or it’ll serve as his excuse to seize more private assets.

Posted in Hugo Chavez, Politics | Leave a Comment »

Chavez warns of US guerilla war (Updated)

Posted by Jonn Lilyea on June 25, 2007

 

(Photo from Venezuela Llora, Venezuela Sangra)

Well, Chavez is acting like he plans on blaming the student protests against his dictatorship on the US. According to the AP;

President Hugo Chavez urged soldiers on Sunday to prepare for a guerrilla-style war against the United States, saying that Washington is using psychological and economic warfare as part of an unconventional campaign aimed at derailing his government.

Dressed in olive green fatigues and a red beret, Chavez spoke inside Tiuna Fort—Venezuela’s military nerve-center—before hundreds of uniformed soldiers standing alongside armored vehicles and tanks decorated with banners reading: “Fatherland, Socialism, or Death! We will triumph!”

“We must continue developing the resistance war, that’s the anti- imperialist weapon. We must think and prepare for the resistance war everyday,” said Chavez, who has repeatedly warned that American soldiers could invade Venezuela to seize control of the South American nation’s immense oil reserves.

Como no? The US is the boogeyman that hides in every dictator’s closet – especially in Latin America. No matter who is President, he is evil incarnate to those who rape and pillage their own communities for personal gain.

I guess it couldn’t have anything to do with Chavez tossing out oil companies this weekend could it? I linked to this earlier from Reuters (by way of CNNMoney):

Some major oil companies have rejected Venezuela’s terms for the takeover of their multi-billion dollar projects and can leave the OPEC nation, President Hugo Chavez said Friday, days before a deadline for them to strike nationalization deals.

Exxon Mobil , ConocoPhillips , Chevron Corp . , Norway’s Statoil , Britain’s BP Plc and France’s Total are the targeted companies in projects valued above $30 billion and capable of producing 600,000 barrels per day.

“It seems there are some transnational companies that do not want to accept (the terms),” said Chavez, who met his energy minister to review the progress in negotiations earlier Friday.

“Well if they do not want (to accept the terms), I told the minister to tell them they can go, that they should leave, that we, in truth, do not need them,” he added during a political speech to swear in the government’s new “central planning committee.”

Chavez, who calls Cuban leader Fidel Castro his mentor and is on a drive to nationalize swathes of the economy this year, did not say which companies rejected the government’s terms.

Or it couldn’t have anything to do with his anticipated purchase of Russian Subs, which I also mentioned earlier from Bloomberg;

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said his government may buy a fleet of Russian-made submarines when he visits Moscow next week, continuing an arms buildup that has cost his nation more than $4.3 billion since 2005.

“The only way Venezuela could totally discard the idea of not buying submarines is if we didn’t have a sea,” Chavez told cabinet members at a televised ceremony tonight in Caracas. “We have to protect that sea.”

Chavez said he also is looking to strengthen the nation’s short-range air-defense system to counter supersonic and “invisible” radar-evading aircraft he claimed Venezuela would face in the event of a U.S. invasion. Most U.S. analysts deem such an offensive unlikely.

And the LATimes is, of course, impressed with Chavez’ socialist tendencies;

Last year, public spending leapt to one-third of Venezuela’s economic output of about $180 billion, up from the average of one-quarter of output in the 1990s, said Jose Manuel Puente, an economist with the Institute for Advanced Administrative Studies in Caracas.

Chavez’s social engineering has taken his predecessors’ plans a step further in giving worker groups a piece of the enterprises and letting them manage the businesses in concert with networks of “community councils” that are local governing modules.

But, the thing is; it all depends on the world maintaining the status quo. When Chavez’ business sense finally shows no result, the world finds its oil elsewhere  – or finds it doesn’t need his oil at all, Venezuela collapses and Chavez needs to blame someone – of course the best people to blame are Americans. 

Afterall, we’re the ones that caused Cuba’s economy to collapse, right? Even though Cuba trades with the 160+ other countries in the world, because we refuse to trade with them, they’re destitute – according to the Left. And everything bad that happens in Cuba is blamed either on our policies or the Cuban “ex-patriots”.

So that’s really all Chavez is doing – setting us up to take the blame for his anticipated failures. from the AP article;

“It’s not just armed warfare,” said Chavez, a former army officer who is leading what he calls the “Bolivarian Revolution,” a socialist movement named after 19th-century independence hero Simon Bolivar. “I’m also referring to psychological warfare, media warfare, political warfare, economic warfare.”

Yeah, we’re going to be attacking them, but no one can tell because we’re so sneaky. Typical Latin American paranoia. probably more disturbing is;

Under Chavez, Venezuela has recently purchased some $3 billion worth of arms from Russia, including 53 military helicopters, 100,000 Kalashnikov rifles, 24 SU-30 Sukhoi fighter jets.

All the stuff needed to quell his own rebellions and control the inevitable “counter-revolution”. Bloomberg reports that Chavez is also aware of the fact that the military is the final arbiter in Latin American politics. He urged his troops to support his socialism;

“The armed forces are an institution of the people, meant to promote our constitutionally mandated national project, and the national project we have is socialism,” Chavez told 3,000 troops gathered at a military ceremony in Caracas. “You can’t separate military thinking from political thinking.”

“When a soldier says `Country, Socialism or Death,’ he’s giving the essence of the project we’re now involved in, and don’t be fooled, socialism is the road to nationhood,” he said at the event….

It’s a pretty well known fact that if a Latin American leader can’t convince the military that what he’s doing is in the best interest of the country, they’re doomed. The military acts in the interests of the country and the people, not an ideology – that’s why there have already been attempts at a military coup against Chavez. His slogan “Fatherland (the article says ‘country’, but I know he used ‘patria‘ – which means ‘Fatherland’), Socialism or Death” doesn’t mention the pueblo - that means that Chavez wants his soldiers to defend socialism against their own people if they must.

Ed Morrisey at Captain’s Quarters writes that Chavez is building his military might to use against US interests, but I think it’s to use against his own people when war with the US doesn’t overtly materialize in the form of a shooting war. Then he can blame the Compania and start shooting his own folks as agents of the imperialist US. That seems more plausible. The chavistas appear willing to swallow any red meat Hugo throws them-kind of like Noreiga’s Dignity Battalions.

Meanwhile, as I also mentioned earlier this weekend, Evo Morales, Chavez’ “Mini-Me” is having his own problems with a few thousand protesters according to The Lima Bean (by way of Gateway Pundit);

Locals of an ecological reserve in Bolivia have held protests demanding that they be annexed by Peru. Waving Peruvian flags, as many as 4,000 people filled the local square and called on the mayor to extend an invitation to Peru to occupy the region.

The small town of Apolo, located just 6 hours’ walk from the Peruvian border, marks the entrance to the Madidi National Park, an Amazon wildlife refuge that includes around 1.8 million hectares (4.5 million acres) of pristine rainforest.

Officials opposing the protest claimed that the people were angered that the protected nature of the area prevents them from being legally allowed to log the forest or take advantage of oil reserves thought to exist in the region.

Speaking from La Paz 200km away, Bolivian President Evo Morales referred to the protesters as “drug traffickers and wood smugglers”.

Well, at least it’s only wood smugglers. A couple thousand of them.

Oddly enough, the protest happened just after the documentary “Cocalero”, Morales’ political biography opened at the Sundance Film Festival according to Bloomberg;

“Cocalero,” the directorial debut of 26-year-old Alejandro Landes, chronicles Morales’s rise to power with the backing of the coca growers, or cocaleros, who fought U.S.- supported efforts to cut Bolivian drug production. Coca leaves, chewed for religious and cultural purposes across the Andes, are the main ingredient in cocaine.

“The cocaleros are the sons and daughters of the U.S. war on drugs,” the Brazilian-born Landes said. “Their defense of the coca leaf detonated a nationalist wave that drove Evo to power.”

The evil US makes such a convenient foil for Latin American dictators. Because we’re interested in criminals who poison our people in our own country, somehow we’re responsible for the rise of socialist governments. Suddenly, “defense of the coca leaf” is noble. 

If you want to read about what’s happening inside Venezuela, on recommendation of my new friend Kate at A Colombo-Americana’s Perspective, I’ve been rereading much of the posts by Julia at The end of Venezuela as I know it - an English language blog written by a student in the middle of the White Hands movement. Last week, she wrote about the class-struggle inuendos that being flung at the students from Chavistas as if “rich kids are not people“ 

I’ve noticed an increase in my traffic from Venezuela, Chile and Peru everytime I type Chavez’ name, so I have to guess that the internet is becoming an important information pipeline in that direction. So if I repeat myself and links, I apologize. 

UPDATE: Apparently there was more to this speech to the army than was reported by the press (unsurprisingly) and the truth about what the event was supposed to represent and how it was staged from Daniel at Venezuela News and Views;

Yesterday was yet another anniversary of the battle of Carabobo, our Yorktown (our Austerlitz?, our Waterloo?), that battle that made the independence of Venezuela irreversible.

Usually at that date the armed forces hold a nice rally on the Carabobo field, in all regalia. The background is not bad, graced with the famous Carabobo arch, with lots of space for crowds to attend the festivities, a large tribune for officials, speeches and what not.

Well, under Chavez things have started to change. First the governor of Carabobo was barred to attend the festivities…

[...]

This year, Chavez is hurt by the student dissenting protest, a general animosity as per the closing of RCTV, and duly scalded by the failure of the intended pump and circumstances of the bridge reopening when crowds of neighboring shantytowns crashed the party. Thus Chavez did not take chances: Carabobo now was held in Caracas, as a private ceremony between Chavez and HIS army, the one he will use to stop the invasion of the Empire.

There is much more at Daniel’s blog including screenshots Daniel took from his television. It appears that Chavez is getting a bit paranoid and not the guy he used to be among his “pueblo“. It appears more and more that yesterday’s speech was a plea to the military that they not toss his butt out of Venezuela.

Daniel also tells of food and fuel shortages here.

Posted in Hugo Chavez, Politics, Society, Terror War, US Foreign Policy | Leave a Comment »

The Hugo Chavez method comes to the US

Posted by Jonn Lilyea on June 22, 2007

I wrote yesterday about Think Progress’ new report on the Right’s domination of the airwaves, at the same time Michele Malkin was writing about the Center for American Progress’ report that came out on the same day – oddly enough. Now the news services are announcing that Hillary and gal pal Barbara Boxer were overheard trying to strategize to legislate the Right’s dominance on radio away. 

I’ve always wondered why the Left, who claim to be “liberal” and “progressive” “human rights” and “defenders of the First Amendment” weren’t more vocal about what Chavez, Correa and Moreno were doing down in Latin America – and now I know. In fact, there was even a piece on the DailyKos defending Chavez’ shut down of Radio Caracas Television (RCTV) – all because that’s what the Left here in the US intend to accomplish as well.

From CNSNews;

Derek Turner, research director of Free Press, said “the potential one-sidedness on the radio dial in terms of political programming is strongly and directly related to ownership and market structure.”

Turner argued that “increasing diversity and localism in ownership will produce more diverse speech [and] more choice for listeners.”

Mark Lloyd, another CAP senior fellow, attributed the “imbalance” to “the breakdown in the Federal Communications Commission regulatory system during the Reagan administration in the 1980s and the elimination of caps on ownership in telecommunications during the 1990s.”

It’s a “structural imbalance” – see a structural imbalance means that it can corrected – if it were a market imbalance, no amount of legislation could MAKE people listen to Moonbattery. The imbalance can’t be because of market forces, it’s because the evil Republican white guys have been plotting nearly thirty years to take over AM radio. Nevermind that AM radio was almost dead before Rush Limbaugh came along. But that doesn’t matter – the Republicans have an advantage, so to “level the playing field” Democrats want to legislate away that advantage. The solution to fairness and equality, you see, is legislation – not hardwork.

Blake Dvorak of RealClearPolitics quotes an American Spectator interview with a Pelosi aide last month;

The report would be easy to dismiss if not for the fact that Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said she will “aggressively pursue” reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine, according to two House Democrats who spoke to the American Spectator last month.

A senior adviser to Pelosi explained the Speaker’s reasons to the Spectator:

First, [Democrats] failed on the radio airwaves with Air America, no one wanted to listen … Conservative radio is a huge threat and political advantage for Republicans and we have had to find a way to limit it. Second, it looks like the Republicans are going to have someone in the presidential race who has access to media in ways our folks don’t want, so we want to make sure the GOP has no advantages going into 2008.

Again, it’s blind adherence to what the nutroots want (whenever the media says “Democrat base” – they mean that Leftist vocal minority that spends every minute of every day on the internet).

So now we know why there was hardly a peep from the Congressional Democrats when Chavez started censoring his opposition - Venezuela was a guinea pig test case to see if Americans were paying attention. They weren’t, with the exception of a few, so now the Clinton/Boxer team figures it’s time to strike.

Monica Crowley calls Clinton “Putin in Drag“;

The former head of the KGB and current president of Russia, Vladimir Putin, recently made it illegal to engage in so-called “extremist” talk and activity.  In Russia today, you can get arrested and silenced—and often, killed—for publicly criticizing the government.  Over 1000 Russian journalists have been murdered since last year—all for speaking out against the corruption, cronyism, and tyrannical oppression of the Putin regime.

I’m reminded that Brigette Bardot was arrested and fined in France for “hate speech” – hate speech that warned about Arab/Muslim immigration diluting the french culture in her book. So can ridiculous laws like that be far behind this latest Orwellian plot to silence conservatism?

What’s next? Blogs?

Kate at A Colombo-Americana’s Perpective provides a lot of Spanish language press on goings-on in Latin America in reference to Chavez and our policy towards him. Apparently the Senate Foreign Relations Committe is finally discussing Chavez’ authoritarian tendencies and the House has authorized more radio frequencies to be directed at Venezuela.  But that doesn’t solve our own problems with Chavez-wannabes, the fugly girls of the Senate.

Kara Rowland in today’s Washington Times talks to local DC radio programming directors about the Center for American Progress report;

“Nothing in this report addresses the tremendous impact that public radio has,” said Chris Berry, general manager of D.C. conservative talk station WMAL-AM (630). “The fact is, many people, even NPR listeners, consider public radio if not liberal, then certainly in the category of ‘progressive.’ “

In the Arbitron winter ratings, D.C. public radio outlet WETA-FM (90.9) scored a 4.9 share — although it changed to classical music in the middle of the ratings period — and WAMU-FM (88.5) had a 4.3 share. Together, the public stations top the most-listened-to commercial station, urban WHUR-FM (96.3), which had a 6.9 share.

Moreover, Mr. Berry noted, the report does not include morning FM radio shows that are topical or cover political issues, especially programs targeted at black listeners.

WMAL is owned by Citadel Broadcasting, one of the five major broadcasters examined in the Center for Progress study, whose results argue that Clear Channel Communications has the most liberal talk content in absolute terms — 229 hours a week, or 14 percent of its programming. As a percentage, CBS devotes the most time to liberal talk at 26 percent; followed by Clear Channel at 14 percent and Citadel, Cumulus and Salem all at zero percent liberal (and 100 percent conservative).

“I think that it basically is saying that conservative talk radio is dominated by conservatives,” said Michael Harrison, editor of Talkers magazine. “I don’t know what it means. If it’s an attempt to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine, that’s unconstitutional. If it’s to try to end consolidation, it’ll create a bunch of independent radio stations that will go out of business because of the economics of 2007.”

Which is exactly what the Left wants – no private broadcasts. In the Chavez model, they want everyone listening to the Democrat-approved drivel on NPR. They want radio stations that plug I-Pods into their transmitter and hit “shuffle” – all music, no comments. That’s basically what would result from a new Fairness Doctrine.

In typical, Democrat hypocrit-fashion the sponsor of the new legislation says there’s not enough “choices”;

“The American people should have a wide array of news sources available to them. The more opinions they can hear, the more news sources they can learn from, the better able they will be to make decisions,” said Jeff Lieberson, spokesman for Rep. Maurice D. Hinchey, New York Democrat.

Mr. Hinchey is preparing to reintroduce his Media Ownership Reform Act, which among other proposals calls for a return to the “Fairness Doctrine,” a long-held requirement that broadcasters give equal time to opposing views when covering political issues. The doctrine was repealed in 1987 because it violated the First Amendment.

“…a wide array of news sources…”, huh? I wonder what Hinchey thought of Fox News being frozen out of Democrat Presidential debates.

Update: Hillary and Boxer claim Inhofe didn’t hear them saying what he said they said;

Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barbara Boxer say Oklahoma Sen. James Inhofe “needs to have his hearing checked” if he thinks he heard them talking about a “legislative fix” to curb conservative talk radio.

I tend to believe the worst.

And, almost completely unnoticed is Amanda of Think Progress explaining how they don’t advocate bringing back the Fairness Doctrine – just take private property away from people to redistribute it;

The report argues instead that we should address the more significant problem of concentrated ownership and ineffective regulation in order to push the market structure to better meet local needs. As report co-author John Halpin stated, “If we break up concentrated ownership, and encourage greater local accountability over radio licensing, and still end up with lots of conservative talk, then so be it. We don’t think this will happen but at least the playing field would have been made more level.”

The CAP/Free Press report argues for more speech, not less. Conservatives should get their facts straight before blindly attacking others.

Yeah, we should have noticed that their intentions were much more socialistic. A report entitled “Right Wing Domination Of Talk Radio And How To End It” should have been more readily accepted by the Right. The basis of the Right’s argument remains that the Left is looking for ways to get and keep their people on the air on talk radio even though no one is listening. That’s even closer to Hugo Chavez’ method than we originally thought.

It all boils down the fact that they want a new fairness doctrine enforced by the FCC or the SEC or some government agency who will seize private property and redistribute it to the Left.

I wonder if they feel just as strongly about breaking up concentrated union power in our schools and encouraging local accountability in the education system.

Posted in Hugo Chavez, Media, Politics | Leave a Comment »

Where’s the media on Venezuela?

Posted by Jonn Lilyea on June 18, 2007

 

(Photos from Venezuela Llora)

I’ve been waiting for the media to start covering the student protests in Venezuela for a few weeks now – but not a word. So I have to go to the bloggers. I find it odd that none of the media are doing much of anything – including the Spanish-language networks (which seem more interested in Shakira than the freedom of speech of a few million Latins).

From A Columbo-Americana’s Perspective, Kate writes that most Venezuelan’s support the student movement;

A Datos poll of 600 Venezuelans across social classes found 56.2 percent supported the students, with only 23.8 percent opposed to them.

Of the rest of those surveyed, 19.3 percent had no strong opinion and 0.7 percent said they did not know or did not want to reply.

The poll, published in newspapers on Sunday, was conducted on June 8-10 and had a margin of error of 4 percentage points.

Of course, Hugo claims that it’s a another Bush plot;

Chavez has accused the students of being part of a U.S.-backed “soft revolution,” saying they are trying to model their protests on the 2004 “Orange revolution” in Ukraine.

Daniel at Venezuela News and Views writes that Chavez went to Cuba to meet with his mentor and gets the idea that more socialism is the answer;

In front of mounting trouble Chavez did what he does usually: escape to Cuba for a few days. Now that Castro is healthy enough to discuss politics some, Chavez went to look for new inspiration. The results came today through a lengthy cadena, an unusual event on a Saturday and yet another sure sign of worries inside the government. So, trying to seize back the agenda held by the students, Chavez went on a new rampage of promises and threats:

And from DEBKAFiles (h/t Aaron’s Rod), Chavez just came back from Tehran after discussing the future of a joint defense pact with the mullahs and Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega;

DEBKAfile’s Iranian sources have learned add that the Islamic Republic’s rulers have been sounding out “revolutionary” Latin American governments about creating joint anti-US terrorist cells for attacks in North and South America. The subject came up in talks with Nicararagua’s Daniel Ortega when he arrived in Tehran Sunday and in discussions with Hugo Chavez of Venezuela.

So, Hugo’s been a busy little fella, yet none of this makes it to the pages of the major media. Other than some fawning in the Associated Press about those two lovable rogues getting together in Havana;

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez declared Wednesday that his convalescing ally Fidel Castro has “recovered his fastball” and was in fine form during a six-hour visit.

State TV reported the pair shared an “emotional” meeting Tuesday, discussing Venezuela-Cuba relations, climate change and a socialist-leaning regional pact they created.

Ain’t that just the sweetest? The two major enemies of liberty in this hemisphere sharing an “emotional” meeting. This blatant disregard for impending danger is how al Qaeda became so perilous.

Posted in Hugo Chavez, Media, Politics, Terror War | Leave a Comment »

Communist Victims Memorial unveiled

Posted by Jonn Lilyea on June 13, 2007

 

Yesterday, President Bush dedicated the new memorial to Victims of Communism here in Washington, DC. From the Washington Times‘ Kristen Chick;

President Bush yesterday told hundreds of people whose countries had emerged from the grip of communism that their sacrifices would not be forgotten as he dedicated the Victims of Communism Memorial to the millions oppressed and killed by totalitarian regimes.
    ”We’ll never know the names of all who perished, but at this sacred place, communism’s unknown victims will be consecrated to history and remembered forever,” he said to more than 500 people just blocks from the Capitol. “We dedicate this memorial because we have an obligation to those who died, to acknowledge their lives and honor their memory.”
    The memorial is the only such monument in the world, according to its founders, who estimate that communist governments have killed more than 100 million people.
    Mr. Bush compared the Cold War to the fight against terrorism, saying that the “evil and hatred” that inspired totalitarian regimes to kill millions is shared by terrorists today.  

I took this picture about 20 years from a hill over looking part of the East German border about 20 miles north of the town of Coburg;

This was one of the legal border crossings into East Germany – that narrow road in the bottom of the picture. This picture is the East German checkpoint on that same road;

That’s how I remember Communism – a giant prison walled-in from the North Sea across Europe to Yugoslavia. Everyone remembers that Berlin was walled, but people tend to forget that there was a wall across all of Europe.

I remember in the early 80s when there were Claymore-type mines attached to the razor-wire fence which would slice-to-shreds anyone above the weight of a sparrow who disturbed the fence. An entire population isolated from the world by mine fields and fences. It’s hard to imagine that even today, just a decade or so later.

Oddly, at least in my mind, the world seems to have forgotten about the evil that men do to each other. In fact, people have ho-hummed Communism for years now – despite the cost in human lives. Books like Martin Ami’s Koba the Dread; Laughter and the Twenty Million  and the meticulously researched and footnoted Black Book of Communism should be required reading in schools everywhere – to teach the horrible lessons of the past that we should never forget.

But, I guess it’s inevitable that Mao’s and Stalin’s deniers should crop up – just like Nazis’ Halocaust deniers. Jimmy Carter certainly didn’t learn his lesson from the Pol Pot regime. While Carter ranted and raved about arpartheid in South Africa, millions of Cambodians were butchered by Communists and millions of Vietnamese were “reeducated” or escaped in rickety boats. 

If communism was really remembered as it actually was, no one would be forming a new communist bloc of nations in South America today unopposed.

And, to prove they aren’t Mao’s China anymore, China threatens to step up war preparation against Taiwan because President Bush shook hands with Taiwan’s representative at the ceremony, Joseph Wu. 

More on the lack of media coverage of the event from Newsbusters’ Michael Chapman.

I may put some more pictures of the Inter-German border on this post tonight if I can remember which file I put them in when I get home.

Well, I couldn’t find where I hid my scanned photos of the Border, but I found an early draft (in .pdf) of a book I started years ago that includes a bunch of photos and some stories tentatively titled Hier Grenze.

Posted in Hugo Chavez, Jimmy Carter, US Foreign Policy | Leave a Comment »

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