Yon Goicochea gets the Milton Friedman prize

The Milton Friedman award is given every two years since 2002 to the person who has represented the best the fight for individual rights and freedom. This year in what can only be considered a stunning move, the winner is Yon Goicochea, the most prominent leader of the student movement through 2007 (shown on the right after being gassed at some rally). That movement was possibly the biggest factor in stopping the approval of the December 2 referendum in Venezuela, a vote on a proposal that would have been a step back to an obscurantist past where individual rights are sacrificed by the state in benefit of diffuse collective interests. Such diffuse interests, history teaches us, always end up being hijacked by a minority "elite" which controls the state in the name of the collective. OR as I mentioned in my post on Ayn Rand for Venezuela:

The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities.

Surely Yon Goicochea is a deserving winner.

PS: And what better way to celebrate the award for yon than to sign a petition for Zimbabwe as Mugabe is showing the way to Chavez on to steal elections outright in front of compliant neighbors!

PS2: Of course this shows how pathetically Chavez has lost the P.R. wars outside. I will not speculate at this point on how the government is going to react to this, how they are going to slander Yon and probably prosecute him on any silly reason (probably asking him for taxes or accusing him of illegal financial transactions for starters). But Yon is a big boy and from the picture of him I chose I am sure he has the mettle to resist. Meanwhile what does the Qaddafi award winner do? He summoned his paid client state "leaders", Evo, Ortega and Lage (curiously Raul did not come) for a surprise ALBA summit to defend Bolivia against its "secessionist" provinces. Ah! The irony! Chavez attacking Santa Cruz while he defends the very same objectives coming from the FARC!


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