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Catherina
Catherina's Journal
Catherina's Journal
March 11, 2013
In reality, AEI is talking about dismantling entirely the obstacles that have prevented the US and the corporate-financier interests that direct it, from installing a client regime and extracting entirely Venezuela’s wealth while obstructing, even dismantling the progress and geopolitical influence achieved by the late President Hugo Chavez throughout South America and beyond.
...
Of course, by “Venezuelan democrats,” AEI means Wall Street-backed proxies like Henrique Capriles Radonski and his Primero Justicia (Justice First) political front, two entities the Western media is already gearing up to support ahead of anticipated elections.
http://landdestroyer.blogspot.com/2013/03/us-plots-conquest-of-venezuela-in-wake.html
AEI's Post-Chávez checklist for US policymakers
Foreign and Defense Policy, Latin America
A post-Chávez checklist for US policymakers
Roger Noriega | March 5, 2013, 4:59 pm
Now is the time for US diplomats to begin a quiet dialogue with key regional powers to explain the high cost of Chávez’s criminal regime, including the impact of chavista complicity with narcotraffickers who sow mayhem in Colombia, Central America, and Mexico. Perhaps then we can convince regional leaders to show solidarity with Venezuelan democrats who want to restore a commitment to the rule of law and to rebuild an economy that can be an engine for growth in South America.
...
As Venezuelan democrats wage that struggle against chavismo, regional leaders must make clear that Syria-style repression will never be tolerated in the Americas. We should defend the right of Venezuelans to struggle democratically to reclaim control of their country and its future. Only Washington can make clear to Chinese, Russian, Iranian, and Cuban leaders that, yes, the United States does mind if they try to sustain an undemocratic and hostile regime in Venezuela. Any attempt to suppress their self-determination with Chinese cash, Russian arms, Iranian terrorists, or Cuban thuggery will be met with a coordinated regional response.
...
US development agencies should work with friends in the region to form a task force of private sector representatives, economists, and engineers to work with Venezuelans to identify the economic reforms, infrastructure investments, security assistance, and humanitarian aid that will be required to stabilize and rebuild that country. Of course, the expectation will be that all the costs of these activities will be borne by an oil sector restored to productivity and profitability.
Finally, we need to work with like-minded nations to reinvigorate regional organizations committed to democracy, human rights, anti-drug cooperation, and hemispheric solidarity, which have been neutered by Chávez’s destructive agenda.
http://www.aei-ideas.org/2013/03/a-post-chavez-checklist-for-us-policymakers/
A post-Chávez checklist for US policymakers
Roger Noriega | March 5, 2013, 4:59 pm
Now is the time for US diplomats to begin a quiet dialogue with key regional powers to explain the high cost of Chávez’s criminal regime, including the impact of chavista complicity with narcotraffickers who sow mayhem in Colombia, Central America, and Mexico. Perhaps then we can convince regional leaders to show solidarity with Venezuelan democrats who want to restore a commitment to the rule of law and to rebuild an economy that can be an engine for growth in South America.
...
- The ouster of narco-kingpins who now hold senior posts in government;
- The respect for a constitutional succession;
- The adoption of meaningful electoral reforms to ensure a fair campaign environment and a transparent vote count in expected presidential elections; and
- The dismantling of Iranian and Hezbollah networks in Venezuela.
As Venezuelan democrats wage that struggle against chavismo, regional leaders must make clear that Syria-style repression will never be tolerated in the Americas. We should defend the right of Venezuelans to struggle democratically to reclaim control of their country and its future. Only Washington can make clear to Chinese, Russian, Iranian, and Cuban leaders that, yes, the United States does mind if they try to sustain an undemocratic and hostile regime in Venezuela. Any attempt to suppress their self-determination with Chinese cash, Russian arms, Iranian terrorists, or Cuban thuggery will be met with a coordinated regional response.
...
US development agencies should work with friends in the region to form a task force of private sector representatives, economists, and engineers to work with Venezuelans to identify the economic reforms, infrastructure investments, security assistance, and humanitarian aid that will be required to stabilize and rebuild that country. Of course, the expectation will be that all the costs of these activities will be borne by an oil sector restored to productivity and profitability.
Finally, we need to work with like-minded nations to reinvigorate regional organizations committed to democracy, human rights, anti-drug cooperation, and hemispheric solidarity, which have been neutered by Chávez’s destructive agenda.
http://www.aei-ideas.org/2013/03/a-post-chavez-checklist-for-us-policymakers/
In reality, AEI is talking about dismantling entirely the obstacles that have prevented the US and the corporate-financier interests that direct it, from installing a client regime and extracting entirely Venezuela’s wealth while obstructing, even dismantling the progress and geopolitical influence achieved by the late President Hugo Chavez throughout South America and beyond.
...
Of course, by “Venezuelan democrats,” AEI means Wall Street-backed proxies like Henrique Capriles Radonski and his Primero Justicia (Justice First) political front, two entities the Western media is already gearing up to support ahead of anticipated elections.
http://landdestroyer.blogspot.com/2013/03/us-plots-conquest-of-venezuela-in-wake.html
March 10, 2013
Why the barrios still love Hugo
Posting this because we had a new person stop by and tell us there's no food in Venezuela and how they went to a restaurant and couldn't even get milk for their coffee. Pffffft. And also for all the wailing that there's no freedom of the press in Venezuela because that tyrant won't permit any criticism of himself and shut down the private press. Oh and that there really isn't any healthcare, just aspirin. The barrage of nonsense knows no end.
Why the barrios still love Hugo
Despite the rightwing press campaign against him, Chavez is still popular in Venezuela, since his tenure has made a difference
Calvin Tucker
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 17 February 2008 14.00 GMT
...
Hugo Chávez, the country's socialist president, is often blamed for the political polarisation of Venezuelan society. But the fact that the basis of that divide - the polarisation of wealth and power - long preceded Chávez, is proved by the urban landscape.
...
Despite Chávez having won 10 elections and referendums (and immediately accepting defeat in the one he lost), the disinformation war against Venezuelan democracy continues unabated. Two weeks ago, one of the presenters on Globovision told his viewers, apparently with a straight face, that a bank robbery in Altagracia de Orituco was the fault of Chávez. Later I watched a talk show where three upper-class pundits announced, again with no detectable trace of irony, that they were planning to march against "hunger and poverty". Incredibly, they meant their hunger and their poverty.
A few days earlier, I had been shopping in a typical Caracas supermarket in an upmarket part of town. The selection of foodstuffs, fresh, frozen and tinned, stacked high on every shelf, was as impressive as anything offered by Tesco or Wal-Mart. The only product we could not find was milk, which is being hoarded and illegally exported to Colombia by producers and distributors in an attempt to bust government price controls on basic foodstuffs. And despite the sporadic shortages, Venezuelans of all social classes are consuming more food than ever before. In the barrios, state-owned Mercal supermarkets sell food at around half the market price.
...
On another occasion, I stopped for a cafe negro at one of the multi-purpose street kiosks that are dotted all around Caracas. The usual selection of anti-government newspapers were on display: El Nacional, El Universal, El Mundo, El Nuevo Pais, as well as one or two more moderate organs. Most of them led with an anti-Chávez story, but the headline that grabbed my attention was the one from Tal Cual, a supposedly liberal paper: "Another dictatorship? Never!" it screamed. Last year one of their front page headlines was "Heil Hugo". Underneath was a photomontage of Chavez in a Hitler moustache. Despite these provocations, neither Tal Cual nor any of the more extreme rightwing papers has ever been subject to any censorship by the Chávez administration. Polls show that the percentage of Venezuelans who are "satisfied with their democracy works", has risen from 35% to 59% during the Chávez presidency. The Latin American average is 37%.
...
But the changes in people's lives involve more than just improvements in material living standards. While on a visit to the town of Naiguata on the Caribbean coast, I happened upon one of the 2,000 new clinics which are providing top-quality healthcare to Venezuela's poor majority. Inside, I spoke to Antonio Brito, a 25-year-old Venezuelan doctor who had recently graduated from the Latin American School of Medicine in Cuba. Doctor Brito told me that of the 94 students in his class, over one-third were from indigenous communities. Those who graduated with him are now serving in their tribal villages. I asked Brito how much a foreigner like me would be charged for treatment. "Here, medical treatment is completely free for everybody," he replied. "The only qualification is that you are a human being."
...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/feb/17/whythebarriosstilllovehug?INTCMP=SRCH
Despite the rightwing press campaign against him, Chavez is still popular in Venezuela, since his tenure has made a difference
Calvin Tucker
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 17 February 2008 14.00 GMT
...
Hugo Chávez, the country's socialist president, is often blamed for the political polarisation of Venezuelan society. But the fact that the basis of that divide - the polarisation of wealth and power - long preceded Chávez, is proved by the urban landscape.
...
Despite Chávez having won 10 elections and referendums (and immediately accepting defeat in the one he lost), the disinformation war against Venezuelan democracy continues unabated. Two weeks ago, one of the presenters on Globovision told his viewers, apparently with a straight face, that a bank robbery in Altagracia de Orituco was the fault of Chávez. Later I watched a talk show where three upper-class pundits announced, again with no detectable trace of irony, that they were planning to march against "hunger and poverty". Incredibly, they meant their hunger and their poverty.
A few days earlier, I had been shopping in a typical Caracas supermarket in an upmarket part of town. The selection of foodstuffs, fresh, frozen and tinned, stacked high on every shelf, was as impressive as anything offered by Tesco or Wal-Mart. The only product we could not find was milk, which is being hoarded and illegally exported to Colombia by producers and distributors in an attempt to bust government price controls on basic foodstuffs. And despite the sporadic shortages, Venezuelans of all social classes are consuming more food than ever before. In the barrios, state-owned Mercal supermarkets sell food at around half the market price.
...
On another occasion, I stopped for a cafe negro at one of the multi-purpose street kiosks that are dotted all around Caracas. The usual selection of anti-government newspapers were on display: El Nacional, El Universal, El Mundo, El Nuevo Pais, as well as one or two more moderate organs. Most of them led with an anti-Chávez story, but the headline that grabbed my attention was the one from Tal Cual, a supposedly liberal paper: "Another dictatorship? Never!" it screamed. Last year one of their front page headlines was "Heil Hugo". Underneath was a photomontage of Chavez in a Hitler moustache. Despite these provocations, neither Tal Cual nor any of the more extreme rightwing papers has ever been subject to any censorship by the Chávez administration. Polls show that the percentage of Venezuelans who are "satisfied with their democracy works", has risen from 35% to 59% during the Chávez presidency. The Latin American average is 37%.
...
But the changes in people's lives involve more than just improvements in material living standards. While on a visit to the town of Naiguata on the Caribbean coast, I happened upon one of the 2,000 new clinics which are providing top-quality healthcare to Venezuela's poor majority. Inside, I spoke to Antonio Brito, a 25-year-old Venezuelan doctor who had recently graduated from the Latin American School of Medicine in Cuba. Doctor Brito told me that of the 94 students in his class, over one-third were from indigenous communities. Those who graduated with him are now serving in their tribal villages. I asked Brito how much a foreigner like me would be charged for treatment. "Here, medical treatment is completely free for everybody," he replied. "The only qualification is that you are a human being."
...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/feb/17/whythebarriosstilllovehug?INTCMP=SRCH
March 10, 2013
Murder of the campesinos
Over a year old but well worth rereading as rightwingers rage about the *violence*Chavez is responsible for in Venezuela
Murder of the campesinos
It is not Hugo Chavez who endangers Venezuelans, but the greedy landowners killing peasant farmers with impunity
Edward Ellis
The Guardian, Sunday 2 October 2011 21.59 BST
A farmer casts fertilizer in a rice plantation on the expropriated and now redistributed farm of El Charcote in the central state of Cojedes in Venezuela, October 2010. Photograph: Carlos Garcia Rawlins/REUTERS
...
Perhaps the starkest example of this neglect concerns the Venezuelan countryside – an area that has been transformed into the battleground for a conflict occurring beneath the radar of both the international human rights community and the major media for more than 10 years.
Since 2001, when the Chávez government pledged to break up the country's vastly unequal land holdings that have stifled agricultural development for more than a century, a wave of reprisal killings have consumed rural areas as large landowners contract assassins to end the "invasions" by pro-government campesinos on their illegitimately acquired and many times fallow estates.
Many of the deaths have taken place in the Western region of the country, where paramilitary activity originating from Colombia has spilled over into the largely lawless border areas. Such was the case with Pedro Doria, a doctor and community activist who was gunned down in front of his home in 2002. Doria's assassination, the result of his support for a local land struggle occurring in the area South of Lake Maracaibo, was followed two years later by the murder of his father as he pressed for a comprehensive investigation into his son's death.
...
While powerful anti-government ranchers hire paramilitaries or hitmen to eliminate peasant leaders, the upper class judges and technocrats who dominate the local tribunals systematically impede the effective implementation of justice. This alliance of interests has robbed the impoverished families of murdered farmers of any sense of justice and has permitted the deaths to continue.
...
Until real reform is enacted in the Venezuelan judicial system in order to enshrine the rule of law and break up the power of local elites, the politically motivated murder of landless farmers will not end. And until the international and domestic human rights communities take notice of this issue, rather than employing all available resources to portray the democratically elected Chávez as a repressive dictator, the lives of many of the nation's most vulnerable residents will continue to be lived in peril.
...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/oct/02/venezuela-land-rights-chavez-farmers?INTCMP=SRCH
March 7, 2013
Hasta siempre compañero, el mundo te llora y la lucha sigue.
RIP Commandante.
Tariq Ali: Hugo Chávez and me
Tariq Ali: Hugo Chávez and me
Tariq Ali
The Guardian, Wednesday 6 March 2013 17.07 GMT
The late president of Venezuela, who I have met many times, will be remembered by his supporters as a lover of literature, a fiery speaker and a man who fought for his people and won
...
Politicians like him had become unacceptable. What he loathed most was the contemptuous indifference of mainstream politicians in South America towards their own people. The Venezuelan elite is notoriously racist. They regarded the elected president of their country as uncouth and uncivilised, a zambo of mixed African and indigenous blood who could not be trusted. His supporters were portrayed on private TV networks as monkeys. Colin Powell had to publicly reprimand the US embassy in Caracas for hosting a party where Chávez was portrayed as a gorilla.
The following year in Caracas I questioned him further on the Bolívarian project. What could be accomplished? He was very clear; much more so than some of his over-enthusiastic supporters: ''I don't believe in the dogmatic postulates of Marxist revolution. I don't accept that we are living in a period of proletarian revolutions. All that must be revised. Reality is telling us that every day. Are we aiming in Venezuela today for the abolition of private property or a classless society? I don't think so. But if I'm told that because of that reality you can't do anything to help the poor, the people who have made this country rich through their labour – and never forget that some of it was slave labour – then I say: 'We part company.' I will never accept that there can be no redistribution of wealth in society. Our upper classes don't even like paying taxes. That's one reason they hate me. We said: 'You must pay your taxes.' I believe it's better to die in battle, rather than hold aloft a very revolutionary and very pure banner, and do nothing … That position often strikes me as very convenient, a good excuse … Try and make your revolution, go into combat, advance a little, even if it's only a millimetre, in the right direction, instead of dreaming about utopias."
...
The image of Chávez most popular in the west was that of an oppressive caudillo. Had this been true I would wish for more of them. The Bolívarian constitution, opposed by the Venezuelan opposition, its newspapers and TV channels and the local CNN, plus western supporters, was approved by a large majority of the population. It is the only constitution in the world that affords the possibility of removing an elected president from office via a referendum based on collecting sufficient signatures. Consistent only in their hatred for Chávez, the opposition tried to use this mechanism in 2004 to remove him. Regardless of the fact that many of the signatures were those of dead people, the Venezuelan government decided to accept the challenge.
..
Did he ever tire? Get depressed? Lose confidence? "Yes," he replied. But it was not the coup attempt or the referendum. It was the strike organised by the corrupted oil unions and backed by the middle-classes that worried him because it would affect the entire population, especially the poor: "Two factors helped sustain my morale. The first was the support we retained throughout the country. I got fed up sitting in my office. So with one security guard and two comrades I drove out to listen to people and breathe better air. The response moved me greatly. A woman came up to me and said: 'Chávez follow me, I want to show you something.' I followed her into her tiny dwelling. Inside, her husband and children were waiting for the soup to be cooked. 'Look at what I'm using for fuel … the back of our bed. Tomorrow I'll burn the legs, the day after the table, then the chairs and doors. We will survive, but don't give up now.' On my way out the kids from the gangs came and shook hands. 'We can live without beer. You make sure you screw these motherfuckers.'"
...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/mar/06/hugo-chavez-and-me-tariq-ali
Tariq Ali
The Guardian, Wednesday 6 March 2013 17.07 GMT
The late president of Venezuela, who I have met many times, will be remembered by his supporters as a lover of literature, a fiery speaker and a man who fought for his people and won
...
Politicians like him had become unacceptable. What he loathed most was the contemptuous indifference of mainstream politicians in South America towards their own people. The Venezuelan elite is notoriously racist. They regarded the elected president of their country as uncouth and uncivilised, a zambo of mixed African and indigenous blood who could not be trusted. His supporters were portrayed on private TV networks as monkeys. Colin Powell had to publicly reprimand the US embassy in Caracas for hosting a party where Chávez was portrayed as a gorilla.
The following year in Caracas I questioned him further on the Bolívarian project. What could be accomplished? He was very clear; much more so than some of his over-enthusiastic supporters: ''I don't believe in the dogmatic postulates of Marxist revolution. I don't accept that we are living in a period of proletarian revolutions. All that must be revised. Reality is telling us that every day. Are we aiming in Venezuela today for the abolition of private property or a classless society? I don't think so. But if I'm told that because of that reality you can't do anything to help the poor, the people who have made this country rich through their labour – and never forget that some of it was slave labour – then I say: 'We part company.' I will never accept that there can be no redistribution of wealth in society. Our upper classes don't even like paying taxes. That's one reason they hate me. We said: 'You must pay your taxes.' I believe it's better to die in battle, rather than hold aloft a very revolutionary and very pure banner, and do nothing … That position often strikes me as very convenient, a good excuse … Try and make your revolution, go into combat, advance a little, even if it's only a millimetre, in the right direction, instead of dreaming about utopias."
...
The image of Chávez most popular in the west was that of an oppressive caudillo. Had this been true I would wish for more of them. The Bolívarian constitution, opposed by the Venezuelan opposition, its newspapers and TV channels and the local CNN, plus western supporters, was approved by a large majority of the population. It is the only constitution in the world that affords the possibility of removing an elected president from office via a referendum based on collecting sufficient signatures. Consistent only in their hatred for Chávez, the opposition tried to use this mechanism in 2004 to remove him. Regardless of the fact that many of the signatures were those of dead people, the Venezuelan government decided to accept the challenge.
..
Did he ever tire? Get depressed? Lose confidence? "Yes," he replied. But it was not the coup attempt or the referendum. It was the strike organised by the corrupted oil unions and backed by the middle-classes that worried him because it would affect the entire population, especially the poor: "Two factors helped sustain my morale. The first was the support we retained throughout the country. I got fed up sitting in my office. So with one security guard and two comrades I drove out to listen to people and breathe better air. The response moved me greatly. A woman came up to me and said: 'Chávez follow me, I want to show you something.' I followed her into her tiny dwelling. Inside, her husband and children were waiting for the soup to be cooked. 'Look at what I'm using for fuel … the back of our bed. Tomorrow I'll burn the legs, the day after the table, then the chairs and doors. We will survive, but don't give up now.' On my way out the kids from the gangs came and shook hands. 'We can live without beer. You make sure you screw these motherfuckers.'"
...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/mar/06/hugo-chavez-and-me-tariq-ali
Hasta siempre compañero, el mundo te llora y la lucha sigue.
RIP Commandante.
March 7, 2013
Hasta siempre compañero, el mundo te llora y la lucha sigue.
RIP Commandante.
Tariq Ali: Hugo Chávez and me
Tariq Ali: Hugo Chávez and me
Tariq Ali
The Guardian, Wednesday 6 March 2013 17.07 GMT
The late president of Venezuela, who I have met many times, will be remembered by his supporters as a lover of literature, a fiery speaker and a man who fought for his people and won
...
Politicians like him had become unacceptable. What he loathed most was the contemptuous indifference of mainstream politicians in South America towards their own people. The Venezuelan elite is notoriously racist. They regarded the elected president of their country as uncouth and uncivilised, a zambo of mixed African and indigenous blood who could not be trusted. His supporters were portrayed on private TV networks as monkeys. Colin Powell had to publicly reprimand the US embassy in Caracas for hosting a party where Chávez was portrayed as a gorilla.
The following year in Caracas I questioned him further on the Bolívarian project. What could be accomplished? He was very clear; much more so than some of his over-enthusiastic supporters: ''I don't believe in the dogmatic postulates of Marxist revolution. I don't accept that we are living in a period of proletarian revolutions. All that must be revised. Reality is telling us that every day. Are we aiming in Venezuela today for the abolition of private property or a classless society? I don't think so. But if I'm told that because of that reality you can't do anything to help the poor, the people who have made this country rich through their labour – and never forget that some of it was slave labour – then I say: 'We part company.' I will never accept that there can be no redistribution of wealth in society. Our upper classes don't even like paying taxes. That's one reason they hate me. We said: 'You must pay your taxes.' I believe it's better to die in battle, rather than hold aloft a very revolutionary and very pure banner, and do nothing … That position often strikes me as very convenient, a good excuse … Try and make your revolution, go into combat, advance a little, even if it's only a millimetre, in the right direction, instead of dreaming about utopias."
...
The image of Chávez most popular in the west was that of an oppressive caudillo. Had this been true I would wish for more of them. The Bolívarian constitution, opposed by the Venezuelan opposition, its newspapers and TV channels and the local CNN, plus western supporters, was approved by a large majority of the population. It is the only constitution in the world that affords the possibility of removing an elected president from office via a referendum based on collecting sufficient signatures. Consistent only in their hatred for Chávez, the opposition tried to use this mechanism in 2004 to remove him. Regardless of the fact that many of the signatures were those of dead people, the Venezuelan government decided to accept the challenge.
..
Did he ever tire? Get depressed? Lose confidence? "Yes," he replied. But it was not the coup attempt or the referendum. It was the strike organised by the corrupted oil unions and backed by the middle-classes that worried him because it would affect the entire population, especially the poor: "Two factors helped sustain my morale. The first was the support we retained throughout the country. I got fed up sitting in my office. So with one security guard and two comrades I drove out to listen to people and breathe better air. The response moved me greatly. A woman came up to me and said: 'Chávez follow me, I want to show you something.' I followed her into her tiny dwelling. Inside, her husband and children were waiting for the soup to be cooked. 'Look at what I'm using for fuel … the back of our bed. Tomorrow I'll burn the legs, the day after the table, then the chairs and doors. We will survive, but don't give up now.' On my way out the kids from the gangs came and shook hands. 'We can live without beer. You make sure you screw these motherfuckers.'"
...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/mar/06/hugo-chavez-and-me-tariq-ali
Tariq Ali
The Guardian, Wednesday 6 March 2013 17.07 GMT
The late president of Venezuela, who I have met many times, will be remembered by his supporters as a lover of literature, a fiery speaker and a man who fought for his people and won
...
Politicians like him had become unacceptable. What he loathed most was the contemptuous indifference of mainstream politicians in South America towards their own people. The Venezuelan elite is notoriously racist. They regarded the elected president of their country as uncouth and uncivilised, a zambo of mixed African and indigenous blood who could not be trusted. His supporters were portrayed on private TV networks as monkeys. Colin Powell had to publicly reprimand the US embassy in Caracas for hosting a party where Chávez was portrayed as a gorilla.
The following year in Caracas I questioned him further on the Bolívarian project. What could be accomplished? He was very clear; much more so than some of his over-enthusiastic supporters: ''I don't believe in the dogmatic postulates of Marxist revolution. I don't accept that we are living in a period of proletarian revolutions. All that must be revised. Reality is telling us that every day. Are we aiming in Venezuela today for the abolition of private property or a classless society? I don't think so. But if I'm told that because of that reality you can't do anything to help the poor, the people who have made this country rich through their labour – and never forget that some of it was slave labour – then I say: 'We part company.' I will never accept that there can be no redistribution of wealth in society. Our upper classes don't even like paying taxes. That's one reason they hate me. We said: 'You must pay your taxes.' I believe it's better to die in battle, rather than hold aloft a very revolutionary and very pure banner, and do nothing … That position often strikes me as very convenient, a good excuse … Try and make your revolution, go into combat, advance a little, even if it's only a millimetre, in the right direction, instead of dreaming about utopias."
...
The image of Chávez most popular in the west was that of an oppressive caudillo. Had this been true I would wish for more of them. The Bolívarian constitution, opposed by the Venezuelan opposition, its newspapers and TV channels and the local CNN, plus western supporters, was approved by a large majority of the population. It is the only constitution in the world that affords the possibility of removing an elected president from office via a referendum based on collecting sufficient signatures. Consistent only in their hatred for Chávez, the opposition tried to use this mechanism in 2004 to remove him. Regardless of the fact that many of the signatures were those of dead people, the Venezuelan government decided to accept the challenge.
..
Did he ever tire? Get depressed? Lose confidence? "Yes," he replied. But it was not the coup attempt or the referendum. It was the strike organised by the corrupted oil unions and backed by the middle-classes that worried him because it would affect the entire population, especially the poor: "Two factors helped sustain my morale. The first was the support we retained throughout the country. I got fed up sitting in my office. So with one security guard and two comrades I drove out to listen to people and breathe better air. The response moved me greatly. A woman came up to me and said: 'Chávez follow me, I want to show you something.' I followed her into her tiny dwelling. Inside, her husband and children were waiting for the soup to be cooked. 'Look at what I'm using for fuel … the back of our bed. Tomorrow I'll burn the legs, the day after the table, then the chairs and doors. We will survive, but don't give up now.' On my way out the kids from the gangs came and shook hands. 'We can live without beer. You make sure you screw these motherfuckers.'"
...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/mar/06/hugo-chavez-and-me-tariq-ali
Hasta siempre compañero, el mundo te llora y la lucha sigue.
RIP Commandante.
Profile Information
Name: CatherinaGender: Female
Member since: Mon Mar 3, 2008, 03:08 PM
Number of posts: 35,568
