On this April 13 Chavez defines the future of Venezuela

There is a phenomenon that happens with a certain frequency with leaders that do not benefit of someone in front to force them to slow down, to take a deep breath on occasion. These people who enjoy (?) unfettered power sometimes become crazy, or at least crazed, and start saying all sorts things they should not say. And sometimes they actually try to enforce them. This has always been the case, you could look at Nero or Caligula, or you could jump centuries and look at Hitler or Pol Pot, history and the shadow of human nature have a way to meet again and again.

If I am saying that it is because since last Wednesday we have attended to one of the saddest and scariest spectacle of Chavez since he is president. For three days, in an unnecessary way, he has held the front line by holding everyday cadenas that lasted several hours each. And in each one he announced who will be punished and what he will do for the rest of his rule. It was al done in crescendo until Friday where he has acted almost as a Messiah on judgment day. We are not talking here of communism or fascism, we are talking here about the naked will to establish a totalitarian state with the consent, forced if necessary, of the people. A little bit like the rapist who says "I am going to rape you, you cannot escape, but if you relax and try to get into it then you might enjoy it, you might fall in love with me and we will stay together for ever". I cannot think of a more simplified psychological way to account for what we have seen these three days as Chavez went from commemoration of April 2002 to outright celebration, booze and all, this week.

Resuming all what Chavez said will take pages and pages, and in a certain way it will not be news for readers of this blog who have always been very instructed as to what are the ultimate intentions of Chavez. But redundancy is necessary when we deal with Chavez as it is important to repeat things over and over until eventually people get it. Or at least we can say "there ws blogging on that, you know!" However this post is really not a redundancy, it is a master plan publicly revealed, a reading of "Mi Combate", assuming that Chavez would have the necessary concentration to write his book.

Writing a blog on very regular basis offers an advantage if one has the courage to go back and read one's words. If to that you add an occasional night of rest where you can reflect on the events after writing a blog post forced you to put order in your ideas, then you start seeing the forest behind the trees. I had one of these moments Wednesday night. Through the Easter holiday I had been following carefully the public lynching of Marcel Granier. Then I covered almost accidentally two cadenas in a row, a first for me after 8 years of cadenas. And thus it hit me when I woke up Thursday morning, the cadena of Wednesday night was too choreographed, too planned, too calculated, too staged when compared to the usual Chavez fare. This was a cadena that had been prepared days, if not weeks ago. It was a cadena with a real message.

I did not write on that earlier as I was a little bit afraid of my conclusions. The ad that appeared on Thursday in El Nacional was a good distraction, even though it turned out to be an additional confirmation point to my evolving mindset. The simple conclusion is that Chavez is openly building the groundwork to create the legal apparatus that will make opposition citizens second class citizens, citizens without a future, citizens that will be forced to hide their views. The notion appeared very clearly as early as Wednesday night when Chavez said that the Venezuelan opposition will never learn, will never cease to be anti democratic and thus the veiled implication that he has the right to muzzle them, to dispose of them. Oh sure, Chavez though crazed is not crazy, and he pointed out to some of the right wing, some military that are blinded with hate. But since he reserves for himself the decision as to whom is a rabid opposition you can figure out by yourself that that boundary will be moved at will until all opposition is obliterated. Whenever you remove the outer layer of an onion, well, the closet inner layer suddenly becomes the outer layer and looks as mean to your teary eyes as the layer you just removed.

That awful feeling with which I woke up on Thursday Morning had been confirmed through these two days. That allusion that all of the opposition was now a fair target for removal has been confirmed by an assortment of announcements that have pushed the ante continuously until Friday night rally apotheosis of sorts.

Some of the highlights of the week below:

• Reconciliation or understanding with the opposition, and the US, is impossible. The implication is that the opposition is enslaved by the US ideals and thus it cannot be redeemed. How you prove that, demonstrate that? Who cares as Chavez word is enough for the red crowd filling a respectable few blocks off Miraflores Palace. The day he will say go, they will go and lynch whomever he wants to be lynched.
  

• The military will be purged of any element that is not revolutionary (In English here). There a full agenda to transform the army into the revolution praetorian guard, a tool to control any opposition. The army will officially be transformed into a political arm. Chavez pushed the envelope to an extreme that he had never dared to do beofre. If until now his political harangues to the army were made to army separated from the civilian population, this time he joined both in his audience to declare that the army was not anymore neutral, that people should not fool themselves. The army is revolutionary and will remain so no matter who becomes president next. We assisted to the incredible spectacle that we would had never seen since the times of Gomez. Chavez packed the front rows of Friday night rally with the students of the armed forces schools and asking them to scream Patria, Socialismo o Muerte; Fatherland, Socialism or Death. To give a sense of what that means, let's imagine that the West Point Cadets would be placed in the first rows of a Bush political speech and they started shouting all in unison "Christianity, imperialism or death!"
  

• Private property will cease to exist if it does not submit itself to the will of the socialist state. That gives a new meaning to the "lose-lose proposition". And of course if there is no more private property, only "collective property" then how could an opposition of any type could gather the means to pretend to challenge the central power?
  

• The Judicial power will not counter anymore the executive. In an astounding admission Chavez said that he did not foresee the TSJ ruling against the closing of RCTV. But that was not it, what was more impressive where these words: "I am sure that as the Executive power observes the decisions of other branches, the judiciary will also respect the decisions made by us. It seems to me impossible that another branch will interfere with this, a final decision." So, what is justice for if it cannot rule against the executive!? Or was that a new threat to prepare us to constitutional changes that will neuter the judicial power so that Chavez does not need to worry anymore, not even in making judicial appointments?
  

There are also so many other small details that betray the mood and plans of Chavez. For example making the whole April 2002 experience as simply a plan to kill him. That it took five years to reach such a declaration betrays the creeping folly within chavismo. Or that more frequent switch between using the Yo, Yo (me, me!) and then an occasional "he" to refer to himself. And the return of the menacing rictus when the opposition is nowhere to be seen, even on the Globovision sets were only analysts appear these days as no strong leaders are trying to counter Chavez. Truly a bully looking for some one to abuse, anyone.

Thus we have it clearly announced, clearer than ever, as directly announced as the demanding minimum of diplomatic decency obliges Chavez to abide with, least even the reluctant friends he has amassed around decide to balk at so obvious an attack against Venezuelan freedom, or rather what is left of it. The plan is simple: during the next few months a set of laws and constitutional changes will be established in such a way that with or without Chavez the system he is putting in place cannot change, ever. Just as in Cuba a couple of years ago the Communist regime was declared permanent.

There is no such a thing as permanent, we all know that, all reaches an end one way or the other. But the intention is not really that, the intention is that for the chiefs in place to live a long a peaceful existence never having to worry about some one challenging them or threatening their enjoyment of riches and comfort that they have accumulated for themselves, their families and their close lackeys. What was new and grotesque this week is the directness in the announcement, the dissipation of any doubt as to which were the plans of chavismo. We saw back close to Chavez on Friday the "thuggiest" of the thugs that have surrounded Chavez since the start, such as Barreto or Bernal. Non entities such as Navarro have been brought back and are about to be promoted. It is the time where political savvy or managerial skills are liabilities in an appointee. As of today a lot of dirty work is required and the time of killers has arrived.


-The end-

Chavez versus the Chilean Senate

The latest spat between Chile and Chavez is much more telling than what some would think. But first, let me remind folks that it is not Venezuela's foreign policy, it is Chavez and thus the spat is between Chavez and Chile.

The Chilean Senate, without the socialist votes, decided to ask President Bachelet to protest the closing of RCTV as a violation of freedom of expression. Chavez rudely replied by saying that the Senate majority vote represented a bunch of old time fascists. It is not a waste of time to remember that the Chilean Senate majority of that vote is also an electoral majority duly and freely voted, certainly voted much more freely and democratically than the current 100% monochromatic monster in Venezuela that surrendered what little power to legislate it had to Chavez. President Bachelet, a socialist, decided to protest (Spanish and English links). I think her protestation was not strong enough, but it was at least clear and should shame her socialist brethren that should have known better than to applaud the closing of a free media for the reasons that are advanced. There are reasons why a media should close, but those do not exist in the RCTV case.

What people do not realize in this spat is that the target of Chavez is not Bachelet or even the Senate of Chile. He knows he cannot count on her although her leftist heart tends to try to be forgiving of his excess. We can remember her hesitation at supporting Venezuela for a seat at the UN security council, and hesitation so clumsy that it forced her into an embarrassing abstention vote.

Chavez knows one thing, Bachelet will be out in 3 years and she is already a weakened president when you consider that she is subject to a deteriorating social climate. Chavez is in fact already working for the post Bachelet era. By insultingly so loudly the Chilean Senate he has declared all of democratic Chile his enemy and is forcing the socialists to chose his way or risk break up among themselves. What Chavez is aiming is to a troubled end of Bachelet presidency that will cause the raising of a leftist pro-Chavez leader that might have a chance to take the next elections.

I do not see it happening, Chile is a more stable and prosperous country than Venezuela when he came to power, but Chavez does not know that nor does he care. If the successor of Bachelet is not to his liking then he will wait for another four years. He does not care; he will still be president of Venezuela. Along the way he will crucify Bachelet if he needs to do, just as he is crucifying the real left, including the historical Venezuelan Communist Party, that was with him but who happened to have very minimal differences with him.

Chileans should be very wary of this latest spat and read the writing on the wall. Trouble is heading their way. Uribe for all his merits is not a very palatable guy as the civil war he wages would have eaten alive less worthy contenders. Alan Garcia in Peru is damaged goods anyway. Kirchner is a truant and Lula has his own problems. All of these countries have flaws but Chile does not. Chile is the success story of Latin America and Chavez in his new offensive has decided to turn against Chile. He cannot afford to have Chile shown as the counter example of his misery generating system, hidden behind an avalanche of petrodollars.

The Chilean Senate has given Chavez the perfect opportunity to start his anti Chile campaign. The Senate might not have intended this but it does not know how right that rather fortuitous moment was. Bachelet and the rest of Chile should meet him head on because of they do not they will be all swallowed in the vortex that Chavez will create if allowed to do so. It is a golden opportunity for Chile, who is still a very safe county, to take the democratic lead in Latin America. There is no need to attack Chavez, just to be firm and not let him get away with international vulgarity. Do not worry, chavistas will keep buying Chilean wine, they grew a liking for it now that they can afford the most expensive bottles.

-The end-

The lies of Chavez: tampered evidence

Today I was not planning to write on Venezuela. These April 2002 celebrations (in Caracas they call it commemorations, in San Felipe what I saw were a few small groups of half drunk folks going around with a couple of trucks with loud loudspeakers, redundancy intended) are just too disgusting for words.

But this ad that appeared in the business section of EL Nacional (a hint of what is to come?) forces me out of this three day retirement. As I will explain below, this add has been tampered with. It pretends to represent the huge crowds that supposedly rescued Chavez in April 13 2002. In fact they are pictures of a chavista march POST April 2002 walking through Altamira square. The march might even be from late 2003 or even 2004 during the Recall Election campaign. Chavismo is getting so vile that it cannot even find a picture of their own, or tamper one good enough, to cover up their history rewriting. The amazing thing is that they thought they could get away with such a crass manipulation which anyone slightly observant would get. Click to enlarge. By the way, the objective of the add (paid for by the education ministry!) is to remind folks of the cartoons that were passed on that Saturday 13 by the networks while the Carmona folly was collapsing. Hence the RCTV logo pointed out by the arrow on the Mowgli Disney movie. But I will not get into that choice of cartoon nor the target, RCTV, which I have extensively covered in previous posts.


1) this slogan, "somos rio crecido" (we are a swollen river) did not exist in April 2002. I might be proven wrong, but I am willing to bet that it did not appear until mid 2003. What is that man doing with such a t-shirt on supposedly April 2002?

2) TWO, not one, TWO Venezuelan flags without the stars visible. In fact nowhere can you see a flag with the 7 starts that was de rigueur in 2002. The eight star flag came of use in 2006 so this makes me suspect that this picture might be FROM 2006!!!! And yet misleadingly the add would like us to believe that we are looking at a 2002 popular uprising picture. There is even a hat on the right where you see the 7 stars but the symmetry suggests that in fact there are 8 stars!

3) the name of the building in the background is Hotel Montserrat, a famous and very old hotel in Altamira square. There was NO chavista march in Altamira on April 13 2002. In fact I think there was no chavista march going through Altamira until late 2003.

4) lame allusion to the "revolution will not be televised". Probably the folks with whom they learned how to make fake documentaries. These Irish guys sure did a heck of a job in falsifying the April events, to the point of getting awards. Though lately there is not much herd from them as they have been discovered and the "film"only shows at pro Chavez gatherings....

5) and the date of the paper, just to make sure people know.

I apologize for the poor quality of the picture but I took it directly from the paper as for some reason I cannot access my El Nacional subscription. But I will replace it as soon as possible.

So there you go, how crass can you get in falsifying things? If they can be so crass with such elemental things, what can we expect from the economical numbers such as unemployment or oil production?

PS: I got the Nacional original and it gets better! Click to enlarge.

5) review. In fact in one of the two flags we can see the shade of the stars and it is difficult to see if it is 7 or 8 stars. However the other flag seems tampered when we look at the pixelation fo the image. But what can we say considering that we get a web form a page from a picture...

6) However we get compensations because we can see an add against Bush, something rather rare in the pre April or April 2002 era.

7) We get to see the contrast of the flags in the logo. But the "black flag" has 7 stars and the colorful ones are with 8 stars. so they are aware of the star numbers :)

-The end-

Political persecution of scientists in Venezuela

Miguel gives us the Nature articles on the subject, here and here.

Words fail me.

I guess it is just a matter of time until Chavez names his XXI century Lysenko.

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The Wall Street Journal endorses this blog policies

Full story here.

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April 11 commemoration, Chavez style

I was not going to write on the 5 year pause from the fateful April 2002. But Chavez is providing me with such a incredible moment that it would be a sin to pass on it. So there it is, the pictures form a cadena that just started!!!!

The first picture, the one that opened the show is of Chavez in front of a large crucifix in Miraflores. Notice that the crucifix is in Venezuelan folk tradition, dressed up and clean, not the Mater Dolorosa of a more European tradition. There is no need of course to comment on Chavez new found religious fervor. I am wondering when he will incorporate in his speech Martin Luther of Calvin. Cannot be far in the future. Maybe his entourage is too ignorant of reformation to use such icons yet...

Then he went in front of some of the icons of the room such as Urdaneta, stressing that he was the last president of the Gran Colombia. He was the second and last but who cares when the objective of the message is to attack those who were sabotaging Bolivar work, and by inference Chavez work. I am just putting the picture of Chavez in front of the giant Bolivar so you can see Chavez back, and his insignificance, under Bolivar whom he should be embarrassed of invoking grossly as he does. But Chavez is long gone past any restraint.

The cadena? Fine, thank you. Chavez started to narrate his "personal experience" on April 11 at night and quickly enough went on to rewrite history, in particular the extent of any US involvement in that situation. The way he goes, soon he will be describing the ferocious marines that went to Miraflores to take him away in the night. And you know what is worse, he might start believing it himself....

Ah! but I was forgetting the ominous line: "those that have never accepted my election AND will never do it". Neutral and air perhaps? Watch the context! It means "them or me, thus I will need to eliminate them", which is exactly what he is doing these days as he sets up the means he will dispose to force people like me to kneel or to leave or to end up in jail.

A question for the readership of this blog: which one will become first a national holiday: February 4 or April 13? I go for April 13, it will make a nice long holiday week when tied up with April 19 or Easter (or both!)...

PS: Chavez then passed the cadena to his "friends". So tonight the whole country must put up in every TV and radio station with the silly words of Cilia Flores which is one of the guests of this tasteless talk show whose only objective is to attack the opposition while the attacked opposition is the one who claims for justice for the murders of April 11. Fascism is on the march as of course nobody from the opposition will be allowed at VTV to explain their side of the story. Then again Chavez warned us a few minutes ago: he is in to eradicate the opposition in Venezuela, which ever that one is, from military coupsters to former allies such as PODEMOS. Totalitarianism is on the march, do not doubt it.

PS2: I was not planning on discussing April 2002 (again and again, I am getting tired of it). But I do understand that some folks can be new to this so there is in Spanish a recent summary of these days, causes and consequences. And there is also an interview in English that ghost blogger Arena did to Quico who was a journalist these days in Venezuela. That should be enough to catch up with reality, not the Chavez "april-landia".

PS3: It is 10:30 and Chavez is still going on. The guests were not going to have such amount of coverage.... He is blurting about some declassified files. I do not car, I am watching desperate housewives, very fitting for the circumstances.

PS4: It is 11. At some point Chavez had his Mom on. Now he is saying that the high oil price of today is due to him. That is why the US sent the CIA to oust him on 2002. The world turns around Chavez. It is clinical now. Desperate Housewives is over. I am going to bed. There is so much hubris I can deal with in a single day.

-The end-

A whole day of news in Venezuela, how to keep up

I have been trying to limit my blogging some since last December. I thought, very naively, that things will slow down for a few months, but no. In fact it is becoming very difficult to even limit one self to a post everyday. So I will cheat and in a single post I will review the flashiest items of a single newspaper in a day. That is, all of these items below appears at the El Universal Web page on this late Tuesday night, as I am barely recovering from the cadena of a couple of hours ago. But I trust it will be worth it. Bonus: most in English!

The escapees are back (well, sort of)

The first item is that the TSJ, the high court of Venezuela has decided to ask for the extradition of Carmona, now 5 years in exile in Colombia. Why now? Why so late? Is it even legal since he is sought for crimes while he is in exile for political reasons and that usually takes precedence? Probably just something thrown by the TSJ to appease Chavez a few days before the April 2002 commemorations. Though I admit that Carmona deserves to be tried for incompetence on April 12. If we are in such deep shit today it is of his totally erroneous and over ambitious decisions of 2002. If someone unifies chavista and opposition it certainly is Carmona.

But more interesting was the surprise video of Ortega, who, as Carmona, is on the run after escaping a military prison. Even tough Ortega has been tried and condemned, there is severe questioning on his trial who had more of a Stalinist show trial than a normal trial. But then, of course, we are under a revolution which allows the regime to do as it pleases with justice. Anyway, the said Ortega popped out a video widely played in the still private media. Chavistas are not laughing as Ortega was asking folks to sign up for AD to avoid the CNE to make it illegal. Heck, I am even thinking about supporting the hated AD just to piss off Chavez! Imagine if the dead man resuscitates! I love it!

And the Yaracuy governor, for good measure, says that Lapi escaped through the front door with internal complicity. Looks to me that it is just an excuse for gimenez to try to get rid of a few people, their relationship with Lapi does not even need to have existed. After all Lapi himself wrote that he escaped through an AC duct. Guess which one is the liar here? The druggie or the prisoner? And you know what? Lapi at least has an excuse to lie in this case...

Human rights again, TV rights included

The OAS keeps questioning the evolution of human rights in Venezuela, in particular freedom of the press. At the same time we learn that the Chile Senate votes a resolution condemning the closing of RCTV, creating yet a new problem for the wishy washy Bachelet.

Meanwhile Marcel Granier whose image was burned by a few chavista circles was at the general prosecutor office to sue Lara, the infamous communication minister who I was discussing yesterday extensively. Evidence in favor of Granier can be found even in blogs like this one. Evidence for the stupidity of Lara also.

Meanwhile we learn that in Guarico we have again evidence of organized killings, paramilitary style. Nothing new in Guarico where the governor is a well known thug who was already in trouble before with noteworthy chavista such as Iris Varela (on occasion she has to do something positive) but who was spared by Chavez who needed all the votes he could get. But then again Chavez himself as a 1992 murderer can certainly be forgiving of the Guarico governor.

The ides of April

We are commemorating the April 2002 events. Nobody has received a real trial for that, and even less be condemned, investigations limited to only two of the murders. Now, chavismo in a surprise move, wants to investigate everything and finally put to jail the responsible folks. Let's look at that in detail. Today the National Assembly is 100% chavista. The judicial system is now controlled at will by chavismo as can be seen from the recent judge removal by the Interior and Justice Minister. And to top it off, it is Tascon of the apartheid list who wants to be in charge. Now, does anyone really think that there will be, after 5 years, by a chavista totally controlled apparatus a fair and square investigation? Reeks of history rewriting again.... And revenge and retribution when you hear the videos from today National Assembly miscellaneous posturing.

But democracy advances, or so we are told to believe

While all of these pleasant distractions violating the constitution took place the constitutional commission has been reviewing in secret what should be changed. Would they be about to finally release their proposals? No, Chavez has to decide first. That is right, with incredible chutzpah strangely mixed with unbelievable obsequiousness we see the National Assembly chair tell us that Chavez is the one that will decide what articles will be revised and go to referendum. Chavez alone. His constitution more than ever. Meanwhile some self styled democrats supporting Chavez find nothing weird about this one.

And there is more but I suspect that the reader can handle only so much.

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