triple post
Hugo Chavez, RIP
Wed, 2013-03-13 00:38
#152
Bec.De.Corbin
Wed, 2013-03-13 02:20
#153
Just because one is paranoid doesn't mean the CIA isn't out to kill you. I don't think a drone strike was practical.
Wed, 2013-03-13 10:21
#154
From that RT article upthread:
"Would it be so strange that they've invented the technology to spread cancer and we won't know about it for 50 years,” (Chavez) asked a press conference in December 2011 after it was announced that Argentinian President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner had thyroid cancer.
Emphasizing that he was wary of making "rash accusations," Chavez nevertheless said the incidences of cancer among Latin American leaders were "difficult to explain using the law of probabilities."
http://rt.com/news/chavez-death-us-russia-plot-zyuganov-923/
I don't know why they are even holding a commission, because even if they don't find anything it means nothing, and the onus is still on the imperialists to prove that they DIDN'T assassinate him. And of course they will never be able to do that, because the whole way this has been set up, no evidence is required.
For them to raise the question is one thing. To politicize an autopsy, strike a federal commission and go into it looking for evidence to fit their theory is shameful. Double shameful because they don't need to resort to this to win the support of the people, to point out how they have changed that country, or to show real evidence that the U.S. is trying to undermine their government.
This is myth-making and martyrdom.
Wed, 2013-03-13 11:05
#155
It seems to me that the evidence that the US is trying to undermine the PSUV government is so pervasive that any court would take judicial notice and not require days of testimony to prove the obvious. According to your theory it seems that trying to find out who killed Bishop Romero would have been meaningless gesture and putting war criminals on trial a waste of time.
Wed, 2013-03-13 11:10
#156
I don't know why they are even holding a commission, because even if they don't find anything it means nothing, and the onus is still on the imperialists to prove that they DIDN'T assassinate him. And of course they will never be able to do that, because the whole way this has been set up, no evidence is required. For them to raise the question is one thing. To politicize an autopsy, strike a federal commission and go into it looking for evidence to fit their theory is shameful. Double shameful because they don't need to resort to this to win the support of the people, to point out how they have changed that country, or to show real evidence that the U.S. is trying to undermine their government. This is myth-making and martyrdom.
Here in Canada, I can't imagine a situation where if the authorities entertained the slightest suspicion around the cause of death of a prominent politician, that a full inquiry for the purpose of determining the true cause of death through an autopsy would be ruled out over opposition concerns of partisan politicking. The nations of South and Central America have quite a long history to show of popular leaders being replaced by any and all measures at the behest of external interests. The only 'myth making' going on here is your inference that it constitues a preposterous idea to suggest that anyone would be interested in poisoning Chavez. For far too many people who apparently think they know better, it's a shameful turn of events when Venezuelans decide what to do on their own.
Wed, 2013-03-13 11:13
#157
No, seeing as Romero was riddled with bullets in public there was a bit of evidence to suggest foul play might have been involved.
And you seem to be making my point; if there is so much evidence of real interference (and there is) why do they have to make shit up? Seems to me their time might be better spent focusing on real threats to their government and their country from the U.S.
I mean, I understand exactly why they might want to do this; that's why I don't like it.
Wed, 2013-03-13 11:26
#158
So before the autopsy you can say they are making shit up. I am fascinated to learn that one can be omniscient from a position in front of a keyboard in Canada. What other godlike powers do you possess?
Wed, 2013-03-13 11:37
#159
I think you said it yourself, k. Without evidence from an autopsy or other source (assuming they haven't done that already) it IS all made up.
And again, it is one thing to suggest that this might have happened. The propaganda storm and reverse onus around this is quite another.
It is also curious, given the fact that they are being so public and making open accusations about this, that it has not been revealed what kind of cancer he actually had.
Wed, 2013-03-13 11:52
#160
6079 nothing I said supports your diatribe against the PSUV officials. The authorities are conducting an autopsy. The purpose of autopsies is to find out the actual cause of death rather than relying on made up shit. Where to you get this idea that holding an autopsy amounts to applying a revers onus to the outcome. I can't help but think that is merely your view of the matter not the reality of the situation. Speaking of announcing the verdict before the autopsy Venezuela is not nearly as blatant as the UK. Then of course we have the US President announcing Bradley and others guilt before they even have a show trial.
"I have no hope of achieving justice in Great Britain," Andrei Lugovoi told a hastily called press conference in Moscow. "I have fully lost belief in the possibility of an impartial investigation of this case in England. I'm forced to say that I am leaving the coroner's investigation and will not participate in it."
Britain has named Lugovoi, and fellow former KGB agent Dmitry Kovtun, as chief suspects in the 2006 death of Litvinenko, a Kremlin critic who fled Russia for England in 2000. He died an excruciating death in hospital three weeks after drinking a cup of tea laced with the radioactive isotope polonium-2010 during a meeting with the two men in central London. Lugovoi and Kovtun have denied involvement.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/mar/12/suspect-alexander-litvinenko...
Wed, 2013-03-13 12:10
#161
Where to you get this idea that holding an autopsy amounts to applying a revers onus to the outcome.
What I was referring to is Chavez's own words - that it may take 50 years to develop the technology to find that the U.S. did this.
In other words, it doesn't matter what this commission finds.
And you can knock yourself out with exploding cigars and poisoned pens and blowgun darts. I'm talking about this situation, and so far there is no evidence to suggest it is anything but propaganda.
Wed, 2013-03-13 12:36
#162
LOL Your cherry picking of one statement from a number of years ago reminds me of the homophobia debate further up thread. The PSUV are anti Semites, homophobic assholes who don't believe in a fair trial. I'll just have to remember that.
Wed, 2013-03-13 12:45
#163
The PSUV are anti Semites, homophobic assholes who don't believe in a fair trial.
Kropotkin, the articles I posted countered that argument (you posted an excerpt yourself), which I think was a bit better than not actually looking at the evidence.
Wed, 2013-03-13 12:53
#164
There you go again implying that they are not going to look at evidence and have already reached a verdict based on something Chavez said a long time ago. One thing is for sure you have made your mind up in advance about the fairness of the autopsy but I don't see much evidence that the authorities conducting the autopsy have determined its outcome.
Wed, 2013-03-13 13:10
#165
Catchfire
I agree with Winston. It is ludicrous for a South American democracy to believe that the United States attempted to poison Chavez with cancer. It's not nearly as creative as these top ten methods considered or attempted to assassinate Fidel Castro:
1. Femme fatale. Marita Lorenz, just one of many women Castro counted as a mistress, allegedly accepted a deal from the CIA in which she would feed him capsules filled with poison. She managed to get as far as smuggling the pills into his bedroom in her jar of cold cream, but the pills dissolved in the cream and she doubted her ability to force-feed Castro face lotion, and she also just chickened out. According to Lorenz, Castro somehow figured out her plan and offered her his gun. “I can’t do it, Fidel,” she told him.
2. Poisoned wetsuit.
While there’s nothing suspicious about receiving random diving gear from your enemy right in the middle of the Bay of Pigs Invasion, the CIA gave it a shot. In 1975, the Senate Intelligence Committee claimed it had "concrete evidence" of a plan to offer Castro a wetsuit lined with spores and bacteria that would give him a skin disease (and maybe worse). The plan supposedly involved American lawyer James B. Donovan, who would present Castro with the suit when he went to negotiate the release of the Bay of Pigs prisoners. A 1975 AP report said the plan was abandoned "because Donovan gave Castro a different diving suit on his own initiative."
3. Ballpoint hypodermic syringe. An ordinary-looking pen would be rigged with a hypodermic needle so fine that Castro wouldn’t notice when someone bumped into him with the pen and injected him with an extremely potent poison.
4. Exploding cigar. But this was no parlor trick – this cigar would have been packed with enough real explosives to take Fidel’s head off. In 1967, the Saturday Evening Post reported that a New York City police officer had been propositioned with the idea and hoped to carry it out during Castro's United Nations visit in September 1960.
5. Contaminated cigar. They may have given up on the TNT stogie, but the idea of spiking his smokes was still being floated around. The CIA even went as far as to recruit a double agent who would slip Castro a cigar filled with botulin, a toxin that would kill the leader in short order. The double agent was allegedly given the cigars in February of 1961, but he apparently got cold feet.
And so on.
Of course, the US has intervened dozens of times in South or Central American sovereign states in the last hundred years, usually with troops or CIA cells. Obama already has two coups to his name, Honduras and Paraguay. Not one of these interventions have been for the benefit of Latin American people (if it needs pointing out).
You know, my instinct tells me that the US did not poison Chavez with cancer -- but of course, my uncritical, unscientific instinct is not important. What's important is that the US has played at this shit for so long that not only is it possible for a Venezuelan politician, even Chavez himself, perhaps, to believe that the CIA gave their democratically elected, anti-capitalist president cancer in order to propagate neoliberalism -- it is possible for a cynical politician to convince the people of Venezuela that this is possible because the US has already done all the heavy lifting.
And if said cynical politician should do this to consolidate the power of anti-capitalist, leftist electoral might in Latin America, then I have so little sympathy for the US in this instance I don't care. The Venezuelan people are welcome to expose their politicians as self-serving powermongers if that's indeed what they are -- and I have little doubt that they will, knowing how well-versed our cousins are in democracy -- but you won't find me ridiculing the open musing of this very possible possibility, because I know which poisonous discourses I'm playing into when I do that.
Wed, 2013-03-13 13:23
#166
@ Catchfire
You can add to that reports that the U.S. actually did plot to kill Chavez, and the kidnapping, of course. I have no doubt it is something they considered and perhaps even tried. But that he was actually killed? I don't know. The only possible story I can imagine was that Chavez was actually recovering and the heart attack which killed him was murder. But again.... speculation.
Beyond that, I don't need to repeat what I have already said about this.
Wed, 2013-03-13 13:38
#167
Catchfire
I guess you missed the point again.
Wed, 2013-03-13 13:59
#168
I guess you missed the point again.
No, I got it. And in part I agree with you. I just don't want to get back into stuff we have hashed out already and are not going to come to an agreement on. That doesn't mean I don't understand what you are saying.
Wed, 2013-03-13 14:06
#169
No, I got it. And in part I agree with you.
Boy anyone who says you are predicable would be really out to lunch. I am daily impressed at how you can always be on both sides of an issue. May I call that pretzel logic? However must say I find pretzels a little too salty for my taste.
Wed, 2013-03-13 21:10
#170
And the issue is current. At least Capriles wants it to be so, as he held a news conference about it yesterday.
Capriles' response:
I'd like to send a respectful and considerate message in rejection to the homophobic remarks made by Nicolás [Maduro] today. It's not the first time. I believe in a society without exclusion and that's the way I express it to the country. A society where no one feels excluded based on the way they think, their race, their creed, their sexual orientation. People should go out and reject it.
That's fascism. Absolute fascism. From the extreme right.
If that's how you want to attack me, let it be. But from here on I will always demand respect for all Venezuelans. Because the society that we want to build in Venezuela is a society without exclusion.
You cannot talk of inclusion if there is exclusion. There should be overwhelming rejection of something like that.
Wed, 2013-03-13 21:24
#171
Wed, 2013-03-13 21:40
#172
AJ do you have link to the statement that he is supposedly reacting to?
I must admit I find it less than amusing when the right wing accuses leftists of being fascist. Fascists led the coup in 2002 and I think they are still Capriles' allies. He is definitely supported by Venezuela's fascist media.
Wed, 2013-03-13 23:01
#173
Maduro apologized for that a year ago. I posted the link upthread.
Correction - Reuters is reporting similar references in this campaign... and the opposition is mocking Marudo because of his former job as a bus driver.
(edit)
I read a book a decade or so ago about what happened to Eva Peron's body after it was embalmed. Not a fate I would wish on anyone.
Wed, 2013-03-13 23:07
#174
No, I got it. And in part I agree with you.
Boy anyone who says you are predicable would be really out to lunch. I am daily impressed at how you can always be on both sides of an issue. May I call that pretzel logic? However must say I find pretzels a little too salty for my taste.
I've always suspected that Smith has a quantum double. When observed by an unobserved observer he automatically collapses into a wave form.
Mon, 2013-03-18 22:43
#175
Long-term readers of this report know that I’m not much of a knee-reflex conspiracy theorist. But when someone like Chávez dies at the young age of 58 I have to wonder about the circumstances. Unremitting cancer, intractable respiratory infections, massive heart attack, one after the other … It is well known that during the Cold War, the CIA worked diligently to develop substances that could kill without leaving a trace. I would like to see the Venezuelan government pursue every avenue of investigation in having an autopsy performed.
The CIA conspired to murder about 50 foreign leaders including Chavez, and they succeeded about half the time. That is not wild coincidence. It is historical. They should be pros at it by know with all the practice they've had.
And so are former Italian president Cossiga\s and prime minister Andreotti's acknowledments of NATO's Gladio operations during the cold war era part of the historical record of established facts. Chomsky and Herman both tell us that the U.S. Military's and CIA's normal operating procedure manuals are the documented confessions of terrorist organizations.
Chomsky said that the world is run like the mafia, and that the head don knows all about the goings on in the hood.
Glasnost part two is a lapdog newz media non-event.
Mon, 2013-03-25 19:40
#176
What I just can't comprehend if that if Dobbin likes this guy so much, why does he like the Liberals so much as they are such worlds apart from anything Chavez represented.
This Is What Democracy Could Look Like
Chavez took social progress seriously, and the Western capitalist elite demonized him for it.
Wed, 2013-05-01 12:26
#177
Thu, 2014-02-13 12:32
#178
Venezuela Coup? Gunfire, Clashes as 3 Dead in Violent Caracas Protest (photos, video)
http://rt.com/news/venezuela-riots-kill-students-827/
"President Nicolas Maduro has condemned the unrest as an attempt at a coup d'etat orchestrated by extremist members of the political opposition..."
Fri, 2014-02-14 12:04
#179
More Protests Erupt in Caracas After Wednesday's Deadly Demonstrations (and vid)
http://www.presstv.com/detail/2014/02/14/350639/more-protests-erupt-in-c...
"Caracas was the scene of further demonstrations on Thursday. These opposition protests are the first of their kind after President Maduro took office."
Fri, 2014-02-14 15:11
#180
I'm very concerned about this, and haven't seen much of substance, even in alternative media, or on Latin American sites such as Rebelión, whose coverage remains very general.
Fri, 2014-02-14 17:23
#181
This looks informative:
http://venezuelawearewithyou.blogspot.ca
ETA: On second thought, not nuch substantive here either.
Fri, 2014-02-14 17:50
#182
Coups, Media and Stalemates: What Violent Protests Mean for Venezuela
Venezuelanalysis.com’s staff writers offer their concise insights on three different angles of the violent protests that have been occurring in the country: the opposition’s strategy, how the media have reacted, and the implications of the protests for the Bolivarian Revolution.
Fri, 2014-02-14 18:33
#183
laine lowe
Here is an excellent overview of what is happening:
[url=http://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/10353]Coups, Media and Stalemates: What Violent Protests Mean for Venezuela[/url]
Sat, 2014-02-15 02:25
#184
I like them both...
Sat, 2014-02-15 14:02
#185
laine lowe
Looks like epaulo and I crossed paths while posting.
[url=http://www.sabinabecker.com/2014/02/venezuelan-oppo-fascists-unmasked-ag... oppo fascists unmasked…again[/url]
Wed, 2014-02-19 08:17
#186
Venezuelan Government Shows Restraint
By Council on Hemispheric Affairs
The Council on Hemispheric Affairs (COHA) views with great alarm the violence perpetrated against the democratically elected government and civilians in Venezuela that has resulted, as of February 12, 2014, in three confirmed deaths, 61 persons wounded and 69 detained. The carnage and destruction in Caracas on Wednesday comes on the heels of generally peaceful marches held on the 200th anniversary of the battle of La Victoria, a battle in which students played a critical role in a victory against royalist forces during Venezuela’s war of independence. While some groups of students marched in celebration of the Day of the Student, anti-government demonstrators used the occasion to protest episodic shortages of some basic goods, persistent crime, and to demand the release of students who had been arrested in earlier demonstrations.....
http://zcomm.org/znetarticle/venezuelan-government-shows-restraint/
Wed, 2014-02-19 12:30
#187
Large Marches By Venezuelan Opposition and Government Supporters, Leopoldo Lopez Turns Himself In
http://venezuelanalysis.com/news/10365
"This people will rise up from the north to the south to the east and the west if the bourgeoisie manage to get to power."
Fri, 2014-02-21 03:33
#188
NDP Calls For Restraint and Dialogue in Venezuela
http://www.ndp.ca/news/ndp-calls-restraint-and-dialogue-venezuela
"My thoughts are with the families of those killed or injured during the ongoing public protests in Venezuela,' said NDP Foreign Affairs Critic Paul Dewar (Ottawa Centre).
'The Canadian government should urge Venezuelan authorities to be proactive in seeking to de-escalate the conflict and protecting the human rights and democratic freedoms of Venezuelan citizens..."
Fri, 2014-02-21 10:41
#189
laine lowe
Venezuela Analysis has an excellent overview of the anti-government bias of the private and international media on their site:
http://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/10377
Some interesting info about the "student movement" that probably applies in many situations of unrest, not just in Venezuela:
...In 2008, the US-based Cato Institute awarded the US$500,000 Milton Friedman Prize for Advancing Liberty to student leader Yon Goicoechea for his role in mobilising protests against the suspension of private broadcaster RCTV’s licence. At the same time, a sizeable amount of the US$45 million in funding provided annually by US institutions to Venezuelan opposition groups was channelled to ‘youth outreach’ programmes...
Plus more observations about lazy international media reporting, especially with the repetition of unverified "tweets":
http://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/10380
As for the NDP's foreign Affairs critic, it seems that Paul Dewar is getting his speaking points from John Kerry's office.
Fri, 2014-02-21 12:12
#190
Soon The Battle For Venezuela - by Andre Vltchek
http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/02/21/soon-the-battle-for-venezuela/
"They are already sewing your funeral gown Venezuela.
They are now readying to welcome you back to that world of the lobotomized and destroyed nations that are fully submissive to Western political and economic interests..."
Fri, 2014-02-21 14:38
#191
@NDPP
So is the point that 50% inflation and shortages of basic goods is supposed to make you think that the government is doing a wonderful job? Seems implausible.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/83cc820e-8681-11e3-885c-00144feab7de.html#axzz...
Fri, 2014-02-21 16:11
#192
As for the NDP's foreign Affairs critic, it seems that Paul Dewar is getting his speaking points from John Kerry's office.
That's an improvement. They used to come from John Baird.
Fri, 2014-02-21 19:37
#193
From Wikipedia:
Venezuela is among the most violent places on Earth. In Venezuela, a person is murdered every 21 minutes.[1] Crimes have been so prevalent in Venezuela that the government no longer produces crime data.[2]Class tension has long been a part of life in the South American country, where armed robberies, carjackings and kidnappings are frequent. In 2013, the homicide rate was approximately 79 per 100,000, one of the world’s highest, having quadrupled in the past 15 years with over 200,000 murdered.[3] The capital Caracas has one of the greatest homicide rates of any large city in the world, with 122 homicides per 100,000 residents.[4] In 2008, polls indicated that crime was the number one concern of voters.[5]
Crime rates are higher in 'barrios' or 'ranchos' (slum areas) after dark. Petty crime such as pick-pocketing is prevalent, particularly on public transport in Caracas. The government in 2009 created a security force, the Bolivarian National Police, which has lowered crime rates in the areas in which it is so far deployed, and a new Experimental Security University.[6]
Fri, 2014-02-21 21:31
#194
And your point is?
Colombia, with a rightwing government, has a similar reputation. These things fluctuate, but the social problems in both these neighbouring countries have deep roots.
Fri, 2014-02-21 23:26
#195
@NDPP
So is the point that 50% inflation and shortages of basic goods is supposed to make you think that the government is doing a wonderful job? Seems implausible.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/83cc820e-8681-11e3-885c-00144feab7de.html#axzz...
Imagine what the economic and social conditions of Venezuela will be when it runs out of oil. The leaders have done virtually nothing to take advantage of the country's temporary oil windfall to create a sustainable means of generating non-oil income in the future.
Fri, 2014-02-21 23:27
#196
And your point is?
Colombia, with a rightwing government, has a similar reputation. These things fluctuate, but the social problems in both these neighbouring countries have deep roots.
Shouldn't one expect more from a left-wing government?
Sat, 2014-02-22 00:35
#197
And your point is?
Colombia, with a rightwing government, has a similar reputation. These things fluctuate, but the social problems in both these neighbouring countries have deep roots.
Shouldn't one expect more from a left-wing government?
Criminals are the ones to blame for any crime.[url=http://rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers/campus-notes/2013/10/i-rewrote-emily-yof...
Sat, 2014-02-22 07:21
#198
A country with that much wealth should not be experiencing these problems. The people of Venezuela should be enjoying the best of times, not the worst of times. Columbia does not have the oil wealth of Venezuela. "Criminals are the ones to blame for any crime"? I thought the left wing view was that poverty was to blame for crime. Socialism does not work. It looks great on paper, but it does not work.
Sat, 2014-02-22 09:03
#199
He also wrote this charming thing:
"I want income splitting too.
Minimum wage laws definitely hurt the unemployed poor. If the price is raised on something, consumers will demand less of it. Raise the price of labour and employers will demand less labour. It is simply common sense".
And this, after fulsome praise for Reagan of all the rightwing shits:
"Show me a country were the gap between the rich and poor is low and I will show you a country where everyone is poor.
Your schemes don't work. When you take more money from those who are producing and give more money to those who don't produce, you get less production.
We need less production and consumption to save the planet? You sound a little like Malthuis who warned about the catastrophe that would occur once the population reached a billion. Sitting at 6 billion, the human race is doing better than ever".
What on earth is he doing here? Doesn't he realise that this is a progressive site and board?
Sat, 2014-02-22 09:14
#200
Shouldn't one expect more from a left-wing government?And your point is?
Colombia, with a rightwing government, has a similar reputation. These things fluctuate, but the social problems in both these neighbouring countries have deep roots.
The Wikipedia article above states that although Venezuela has a high crime rate, the crime rate has also dropped wherever the Bolivarian National Police have been deployed.
Sat, 2014-02-22 09:19
#201
Yes, our Reaganite f(r)iend has conveniently ignored that angle.
There are also extremely harsh problems of criminality in some northern regions of Mexico. Of course that would not mean as high an overall crime rate in that very populous country, but there is a reign of terror by criminal bands in some areas. Guess that proves that capitalist, rightwing rule doesn't work?