A few things in no particular order

I am on the road and have just a few minutes to update.

Students. They went to the High Court. There they asked to have their right of protest be recognized. They also asked for the High Court to help the students form inside Venezuela to reach Caracas. Right now the Nazional Guard is diligently stopping any bus arriving with a boat load of young people. At least, for a change, probably sensing the wind, a chavista official received them: The High Court Chief, Morales, received the students for an hour.

To be continued.

Freedom of expression. We had a priceless exchange between Condi Rice and Maduro at the OAS meeting (video here). Condi Rice had very pointed words about the freedom of expression in Venezuela reminding the audience that in the US any of the accusations that the Venezuelan foreign minister had levied were discussed every night. Not to mention that she blew away the attempt of Venezuela to remove freedom of expression from the meting agenda.

So, how did Maduro reply? The cassette inserted in chavistas brain was working fine. He went on Guantanamo offering to send a crew from the new Tves which killed RCTV. Now, let's move beyond the anecdotal and that self inflicted injury for the US that Guantanamo is. Focus instead on the attitude, words and intonation of Maduro. And observe how he compares Guantanamo with the worst of Hitler days. Granted, Guantanamo is not a nice place but I for one would trade happily that place for any one offered at Auschwitz. The thing is that from the tone of Maduro you do detect the primitive level of education and even more backward level of understanding of the man. this is simply a parrot sent over to repeat a few clichés lines, whether or not they are relevant to the topic of the day. I think Condi Rice was right in leaving the room and ignoring such an asinine comment from Maduro. Such stupidity should not be rewarded: when Venezuela decides to discuss issues seriously, serious people will pay attention.

Besides Maduro would be well advised to allow students to protest in peace in Venezuela before worrying about Guantanamo, no? Why is it that chavista feel free to comment on any of other people's internal affairs but develop deep rashes when any one even slightly wonders about what is going on inside Venezuela?

Freedom of the press. A personal experience from a journalist that got a job at the Daily Journal, once the very respected English only paper in Venezuela with a circulation of 20 000 and now a propaganda rag for Chavez with barely 1000 issues sold (probably to embassies to help them write their reports). A paper that has no proper income anymore but has managed to renew its facilities, courtesy of propaganda money. A priceless reading from Rachel Jones.

The Wall Street journal latest by O'Grady. The video of Anastasia O'Grady posted earlier was accompanied by an article and I finally got it. For those like me who have no access tot he WSJ, you can read it here. And if you have access you can try here.

(hat tips to Pedro, Al.Ma. and Ed)

-The end-