Misinformation galore wars: separating the wheat from the chaff

It has been raining political analysis, misplaced opinions, and whatnot, specially from the foreign press, leftists and what not who just learned how to place Venezuela on a map (if that much).

Let's take it in an occamish manner and answer a few questions (keeping in mind idiocies spewed from the left, the leftist press as the worst offender to one's intelligence!)).

Who is Juan Guaido?

The dictator's hour

So we are in a dictatorship. And this one has made new progress these past days to prove to the world it is so.  We had Sunday a totally infamous presentation by the president Nicolas Maduro where live on TV he decided who is guilty of what and how.  This based on torture.  Yesterday he went further on that path convoking the militia to Caracas to stop the massive opposition protest planned for tomorrow and forcing the army to repeat once again their indefectible oath to the revolution and its heir, the dictator.  As a bonus he promised to arm the militia, which one needs to be recalled , is not constitutional. But details are not the regime's forte.

The army today is controlling all the streets it can and all the entries to Caracas to make sure protesters do not come to fill in Caracas protests. Useless as the opposition is convoking protests in all major cities of Venezuela. You need not go to Caracas to state that Maduro is a piece of shit: you can do it in the comfort of your own city where repression awaits for you all the same than in Caracas. Decentralization at its best.

#JeSuisCharlie

Words have failed me through the day.

It is not enough that in one of my countries my freedoms have been reduced to their finite expression, just enough that I am not forced to leave right now. Though the clock is running faster.

But my other country has been struck in what it is dearest in our hearts: freedom of expression, freedom to dissent, freedom to be civilized, freedom to make fun of.

A noisy silence upon our corruption

Silence like a cancer grows.

For the last time maybe I read my Sunday edition of El Universal.  I suppose that the new owners still did not have time to change the contains significantly but I am more than certain that within weeks major journalists will be leaving the paper, that the editorial line will go from confrontational to bland if not outright supportive of the regime. It happened with Ultimas Noticias, it happened with Globovision, it was such since day one at Tves.  And more minor examples that I could list. Today we are left with only two national papers that publish it all, El Nacional and Tal Cual; some local papers like El Carabobeño and El Impulso; some AM radio here and there. Period.  If you live in Yaracuy State, you need to make a significant effort to get news that are not filtered to support the regime in its main points (even though the red page cannot hide the whole truth). The hoi poloi cannot be bothered.

Requiem for El Universal?

UPDATE: It has been confirmed.

The rumors on the sale of El Universal are intensifying again. Not only Bocaranada's Runrunes inside El Universal today mention them, but in his web page he gives more details. But as it is usual in Venezuela gossipmongering, they always fall short of spitting out the beans in full. Which of course creates even more uncertainties.

Notes on Voluntad Popular, under siege

Just a short post to remind readers that the only political party that is truly creative these days in Venezuela is Voluntad Popular. Not that other politicians are not creative, such as Maria Corina Machado, but her failure at creating a solid party handicaps her a lot.  For example today Voluntad Popular promoted a march to defend gay rights in Venezuela, to demand the liberation of one of its activists, Rosmit Mantilla,  unjustly arrested on false charges. The event seems to have been small attendance by current oppo standards. I did not show up since it was my day to take care of the S.O.. But that is not the point.

Adrift

The question here is who is most adrift in Venezuela today, the regime or the opposition?  The crisis that started late January in Tachira has spread as no other crisis has spread in Venezuela since "el caracazo" when looting happened in all major cities, to varied extent for sure, but enough to leave a memory.

This time around is not about looting, is not about kicking Chavez out, it is about a country that sees a devastating economic crisis ahead and the implied final loss of hope.  Failure to understand that is a major handicap in trying to speculate on "what next?".

Homage to the Venezuelan student

I have no credits for it, in case someone can send them please!

The fascists in charge of Venezuela want to kill the press, while banging students

UPDATED with scene of panic food distribution

Maduro yesterday said that he was willing to risk being called dictator but that he was going to restrict press reporting on stuff he does not like it to be reported on.  Let's start with clearing up something: Maduro is ALREADY a dictator because he claims he has won an election that he has refused to verify as the opposition demanded then last April. That the rest of Latin America has decided to screw the opposition (and democracy and human rights) and recognize Maduro anyway does not detract from that fact: the opposition has documented extensively the electoral fraud of last April and the judicial system of Venezuela has simply decided NOT to review the case. The complaint was simply not received. Henceforth, as far as I am concerned Maduro is an illegitimate president, hence a dictator.

This being cleared let's look at the reasoning of Maduro.

2013 in review: the year we also lost freedom of information

The paradox for the casual observer of Venezuela is that people like me can write in blogs or in twitter the darndest things without anything happening to us. Yet. But it is a very misleading appreciation.

The repressive, dictatorship consecrating, enabling law is out

Original

So, after much, much hot air the regime had to show the enabling law it wants for Maduro to become a full time dictator. It does not matter whether the unconstitutional project is to silence the opposition or to purge the ranks of chavismo of its undesirable elements (they are all undesirable but apparently there are gradations within chavismo). The fact of the matter is that chavismo does not want its bankrupt regime to be discussed either on the air waves, or the newspapers and even less at the Nazional Assembly (yes, I am retaking the "Nazional Assembly" moniker because after this re-edition of Ermächtigungsgesetz the next step is our own version of Nuremberg Laws which the projected enabling law contemplates as an extension of our very own Tascon list).


The excuse the government offered is that there is a need to fight corruption and to face down a severe economic crisis. But the solution offered by this enabling law is to silence the opposition, find corruption there and among some token chavistas for good measure, more to make room for other corrupt chavista officials rather than any good intention.  The economic measures are fake ones as a regime whose currency went from 500 to a dollar to 50,000 to a dollar in 14 years has no credibility anymore on this respect. Amen of an inflation currently at 50% annual. As long as the perpetrators of this economic disaster remain in office no enabling law of any type will solve the problems. This is not a matter of laws, it is a matter of personnel.

Fascist "journalists" inside the Nazional Assembly of Venezuela

Sometimes there are little items that truly freeze you blood. A certain Dayra Manuela Rivas is a "journalist" at the National Assembly and its TV network, ANTV which is supposed to be our local version of C-span but that is nothing less than a propaganda outlet where opposition representatives not only cannot participate but are now excoriated. You just need to look at the front page to see that ANTV is nothing else but crap, and at tax payer expense.

Just to make sure that you can
see by yourselves that it comes
from the web page of the
Nazional Assembly of VNZL

Today La Patilla revealed an OpEd (yeah, right...) dedicated to trash in the vilest terms Maria Corina Machado. Of course, MCM has been trashed for years along anyone that criticizes the regime. What is novel here is that she is blasted, without evidence, without proof, already sentenced in the web site of the Nazional Assembly of Venezuela by that little shit of Dayra Rivas. The article is not even original, it has all the cliches in use by the regime, all the "reminders" of past crimes that are STILL without trial, without evidence, charges repeated endlessly in the hope that it will make them true.

Globovision-less evenings, information-less TV

I am back in San Felipe after a few days in Caracas, when we learned the end of Globovision. And thus I had to face my first evening without Leopoldo Castillo, a.k.a. El Ciudadano. It is not that I was a slave of that show, never watching it when I am away from home, but in San Felipe it was part of my routine, the essential routine considering that I got ideas for many a post by listening to the discussions of the talk show.

Maria Corina Machado victim of a Cuban character assassination technique (counts as XXI century fascism too)

Today the fascisto-communist regime of Venezuela (your pick!) has crossed a new line.  Maria Corina Machado, noted Venezuelan National Assembly representative, former primary candidate, one of the main members of the opposition international outreach, and the one of the broken nose during her line of duty at the Nazional Assembly has had her private conversations taped, edited and passed as if it were a conspiracy phone call. Cuban G2 modus operandi.

Media shopping and its future use

We are in an economic crisis of increasing dramatic proportions and yet "groups of investors" are buying media groups....

Globovision last gasp?

It looks like the end of Globovision as we knew it is at hand.  The top group of journalists is fired or resigning and the network new owners have decided after their meeting with the regime to stop broadcasting anything about Capriles. We even learn that Globovision twitter followers are dropping quite fast, a bare few weeks Globovision had bragged becoming the most followed TV account in Venezuela (Note: for full disclosure I never followed Globovision, too many tweets).

Oh well...  back to the newspapers, nothing left to listen or watch in all of Venezuela....

Catastrophic news for the regime: Inflation at 4.3% and RCTV revenge

The regime got two major knockdowns today.

Goodbye Globovision, goodbye freedom of information

Tonight we had final confirmation that the sale of Globovision has been accorded, to a group of financiers that are rumored not to be too distant from the regime. I am choosing the link from El Pais in Spain to announce it so that we detach ourselves a little bit of the local emotion, one I refused to participate in as soon as the first tweets popped this past week end. And also because as far as Venezuela is concerned El Pais, mistaken Chavez picture in its cover or not, has the best track record on Venezuela info overall in the last decade.

Yesterday in Caracas

We saw these:

Foreign Policy top 100 thinkers of the year

What better way to start commemoration and list month (December) than noting the magazine Foreign Policy top 100 thinkers.  Only two Latino Americans made it, and a well deserved choice: Yoani Sanchez and our very own Teodoro Petkoff.  Two anti Castro and anti Chavez thinkers.  And in the list try to find one who seriously would consider defend Chavez or Castro.
ERRATA: although I scanned the list twice I missed Dilma Roussef in it.  So I suppose that I was wrong in assuming that no one in that list would defend Castro or Chavez.  Not that she will necessarily be willing to do so since she is less keen on be seen with Chavez than Lula was, but she will defend Brazil big business in Venezuela and if it means hugging Chavez publicly once a year as she did yesterday, so be it.  Yet, considering her rather significant reversal on Lula support to Iran, I have still hope that she will dump Chavez when necessary.