Perdidos en el espacio - Lost in Space

Impossible to do a better cartoon about the opposition mess in deciding when and how to hold primary elections.

Imposibe dibujar algo mejor sobre la indecision de la MUD en cuanto a fijar fecha y modo de primaria.

Primaries in a month-- Better in two-- What about December?-- Danger! Danger!.. I would say September 2012

Weil's satellite

The cartoon of Weil corresponding to the Chinese satellite launched in the name of Venezuela deserves further comment.



Woman: They just shot dead the neighbor's kid.
Chavista man: We have a satellite
Chavsita man: Shit! Power Outage!

This cartoon is brilliant because it addresses bluntly the inexplicable hold that chavismo has over a portion of the lower classes who after ten years still support him no matter what, no matter how little in reality their lives have improved. Note the old TV, it is not a flat screen. Note that its antenna is a coat hanger. Note that the people are, well, disheveled. Note the contrast in the eyes of the dark half.

The woman probably has doubts about Chavez now. The murder of her neighbor's kid (a female neighbor in the original Spanish) is reaching her. She knows that her own kid, following the empty gesticulation of his Dad might be next in line, or at least as soon as he grows old enough to hang out.

This cartoon raises the question as to what holds such people to Chavez. They have to deal with power outages for sure, when the president spends hundred of millions on a satellite that is really not a necessity for Venezuela except for the propaganda needs of chavismo. Could that money have helped solve the power problem in at least some areas? Is the ability to refrigerate scarce food less important than a f%!$%! satellite that will only transmit Chaevz speeches? What has done Chavez for this family? Do they have a steady job? Do they have running water? We know they have no security as per the neighbors misfortune, but do they have good medical care? How better off are they than ten years ago? Really, how much better? Was barrio adentro good enough to compensate for the lack of a real job which would have allowed them to at least have a proper TV antenna? As I have written often in the past, in some sectors of the population chavismo is just a religion and Weil demonstrates it here brilliantly as people prefer to eat crow but feel cheaply "patrioteros" with Chavez.

These people should follow the Miami trial rather than the satellite launch. Then they will now why the neighbor's kid got murdered.


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Weil and the 26 laws, with Cilia Flores bonus

Ah! We can always count on Weil at critical moments! As usual he says more in a cartoon than the blogosphere posts combined.


What we read here is loosely translatable as: What do you mean? The 26 laws were discussed there.

The there is of course the rubber stamp assembly presided by Silly Flowers who has been way more busy putting dozens of relatives and friends on the National Assembly payrolls. The puppet of the State Capitol with a little flower as flag is just a masterstroke!

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Two Cartoons

Two cartoons. The first one by Weil with street kids watching flying Sukhois needs no editorial comment on the folly of Chavez. How many street kid centers, and indigence refuges could be built and maintained with a pair of worthless Sukhois?


For once I would love to see a PSF post a non erasable comment....

The second cartoon is from Doonesbury, famous journalist Redfern coming back from following Obama through Europe.


And to finish. Apparently many of you have missed this mini survey of surveys. Surprising considering how fast you replied to the first two..... There is still a few answer slots available to close it and post the final results and get done with surveys for a while. Click Here to take survey

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Talking head, gross speech, naked ambition

I suppose that for Chavez to have been put down in public by the King of Spain was a blessing: nobody is talking about the ongoing fascist developments in Venezuela. This probably might explain why Chavez went on a media offensive of sorts, going back through 500 years of colonial grievances and accusing Juan Carlos to have been in the know of the 2002 coup. Boy, the way things are going with chavismo propaganda it might be more productive to write down the list of people WHO DID NOT KNOW about the 2002 Venezuelan coup. The consequences of the ridicule Chavez would suffer from leading that list himself do not seem to have crossed his mind.

Even the Guardian that no one can suspect of strong monarchist positions was slightly amused, underlining that Spain rallied around the King and that Chavez does all the talking alone, comparing himself with nothing less than the prosecuted Christ.

But this cartoon of Weil with which I open the post tells us boatloads of what is really going on as much here as abroad: simply put people are starting to realize that one thing is what Chavez does and another one what Chavez talks about. Chavez speaks of been prosecuted like Christ, while he accuses unarmed students (OK, some had sling shots) of attacking his own naive supporters (who are abundantly documented as carrying all sorts of weapons) . The tales of the martyrdom of Saint Hugo is simply becoming as exasperating outside of Venezuela as it has long become here. Thus to conclude this post the translation of Petkoff editorial yesterday which should bring a smile on any reader of this blog who has known for years what a "patán" Chavez is.
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Shut up!

The exasperated imprecation of King Juan Carlos to Chavez, along with the calm but forceful knock that Rodriguez Zapatero slung back, surely will enable many abroad to better understand what is happening in our country. Because Venezuelans have been suffering first hand for almost nine years this rude exercise of power, that quarrelsome style, vulgar and humiliating, with which not only he mistreats his opponents but even his own followers. Participants at the Ibero-American Summit could evaluate, live and direct, the infinite ability of Chavez to overcome the patience of even the most gentle of spirits. Many now have come to realize what it means to be governed by Chavez. Jose Vicente Rangel years ago during the campaign of 98, when he still dared to criticize him, wrote a memorable article, entitled, "By the mouth the fish dies," where he warned Chavez about the dire consequences of his vulgar and thuggish speech. Shortly thereafter, and in power, he excused Chavez: "That's his style," he said, but this time to suck up to him. However, Rangel was right. That is the "style" of the president. The "style" that has filled with hatred and resentment this country, that has severely damaged its civility; the "style" that serves as fuel to that infernal dynamic that has caused Manichean and foolish divisions among the people of the country. It is the "style" of who confuses the social and political struggle with a tavern brawl, among drunken thugs. Politics, of course, are not a floral game and often occur between its protagonists verbal encounters and even slaps, but Chavez has mired in it in a sewer, has degraded and debased it to extremes that only living through it one can believe. That's what we Venezuelans live; a sample of that is what his counterparts in Latin America and Spain were able to appreciate.

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Unfortunately for us in Venezuela and for people abroad amused by Chavez since they really do not have to suffer his invectives on a daily basis, there is also this power to bring havoc as clearly expressed in this LATimes article by Michael Rowan and Douglas Schoen. Now you have been all told.

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Self Explanatory Road of Venezuela

What is a revolutionary bolivarian?

The DNA scientist in me could not help but smile at this Weil cartoon, even if the DNA structure he draws is totally wrong. Then again, how can we make sure that the corruption in the regime is not the result of some particularly ill twisted gene within these "bolivarian" proceres (bolivarian as in VBE, the currency, not the Libertador). These modern GATTACA men are so hell bent on plundering the country that their genes must be the driving factor for such robbery. Surely they have little suit cases full of cash in lieu of nucleotides....

(legend: DNA of a revolutionary man with power)

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Weil and the Constitutional "reform"

What I like with cartoonist Weil is that when I am too busy to write he has some cartoon worth the thousand of words I could come up with.

The legend is a pun of sort between "probar" taste and "aprobar" approve. The translation: you cannot taste (approve) one portion, you have to taste it as a whole.

Though I do disagree with the cartoon: the size of the turd should be, in my modest opinion, infinitely larger than the roasted fowl.

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