Venezuela

[dadachango69]

What do you folks think of the unravelling events in Venezuela? Is Chavez showing many the true ideals of Marxism without the Dictator aspect?

I think he has done a lot for Latin American morale... at least in paving the road for the last U.S. colonies to break free from Imperialistic countries, as well as establishing a more democratic form of socialism. His example shines through for me.

He has done wonderful things he has done for Venezuela's working class, but the elite-media there won't cut the Chavez gov't any slack... with the exception of "Alo, Presidente!" being aired on the Chavez dime, they get no exposure. I suppose he has a reason for his allowing democratic elections. I read that 11,000 of the 16,000 votes needed to get the petition signed were actually of deceased Venezuelans.

Any one care to comment?

(Intelligent discourse only please.)

[Pedro Alonso Lopez]

That's two posts I've had to move from here to Politics for you man, this is Philosophy.

[Louis Pio]

Well this topic has been discussed throughly here, check out these threads

http://www.che-lives.com/forum/index.php?s...opic=25041&st=0 (http://www.che-lives.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=25041&st=0)

http://www.che-lives.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=27936

http://www.che-lives.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=27853

http://www.che-lives.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=27421

[dadachango69]

:D Thanks, Teis.

[kidicarus20]

Published: Monday, August 09, 2004

Bylined to: VHeadline.com Reporters for photo's go to article at
www.vheadline.com





Massive rallies anticipate President Chavez Frias' victory in Sunday referendum



Russian PRAVDA correspondent Hernan Etchaleco writes:



Hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans marched on Sunday to support president Hugo
Chavez a week before facing a recall vote. Observers from all over the world are
arriving in Caracas to overview the electoral process.



Sunday's massive demonstrations in support of Hugo Chavez, may have anticipated the
results of the incoming August 15 recall vote by which the opposition, that has lost
the political initiative some weeks ago, expects to put an end to the popular
leadership of Venezuela's constitutional President.


Hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans, mostly from the "toiling classes,"
flooded Caracas in a huge show of support for Chavez, as prepare for a stunning
victory in a referendum that was aimed to overthrow him, even when the outcome of
the recall vote is too close to call.





Wearing red, the symbol of Chavez' democratic revolution, the President's supporters
overflowed a central avenue where he was due to address the crowd. Many were bused
in from outside the capital. Slogans on the demonstrators' banners, T-shirts and
caps urged Venezuelans to "Vote No" to oppose the recall of the man that
for the first time in decades learned to express the feelings of Venezuela's poor
majority.



At the same time, the opposition called on a candlelit march that only gathered a
few thousands from the accommodated classes. Since Chavez accepted to go to a recall
referendum, the opposition lost the political initiative and could never get it
back.

www.vheadline.com


* Three pro-Chavez marches originating in La Bandera, Parque del Este, and Plaza Sucre de Catia converged on Bolivar Avenue, wearing red in support of their Head of State.

One more time, the red tide overflowed the location chosen for the rally. The people radiated happiness and fervor, demonstrating to the country and the world that Venezuela has a democracy, and that the majority rules.

The people demonstrated that no one can stop the process of change, and that Venezuela is a free and sovereign country.

During his speech, President Chavez commented on the four polls published in Sunday’s Ultimas Noticias newspaper indicating that the “No” option will win in the August 15 presidential recall referendum by at least 10%.

* “We’re going to break voting records next Sunday, and we’re going to demonstrate how politically conscious our people are today.”

http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=22344

http://www.vheadline.com/graf/040808_SI_vote_demo.jpg



Final North American Opinion Research polls shows “No” winning with 63%
Bylined to: Philip Stinard
Saturday, August 07, 2004

Just one week before the presidential referendum, the option to retain President Hugo Chavez Frias continues to dominate. The final poll conducted by North American Opinion Research (NAOR) shows “No” receiving 63% support while “Yes” gets just 32%.


http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=22322


Only a few thousand people attended concert for “Yes” referendum option
Bylined to: Philip Stinard
Monday, August 09, 2004

Only a few thousand people attended the concerts organized Sunday by the Venezuelan opposition under the theme “artists for ‘Yes’,” as part of the August 15 presidential recall referendum campaign.

http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=22346



US has a more pragmatic view of Chavez ... they know he will win the RR
Bylined to: Philip Stinard
Friday, August 06, 2004

“The United States has a more pragmatic tendency. They’ve realized that to defend our democracy, we don’t need the United States. They’re aware that the ‘No’ option (favoring Chavez) will win.”


Well, the Venezuelan masses have shown that they will support Chavez and his victory looks imminent, which would be a crushing defeat for US imperialism... so when all else fails they send in the CIA. almost ironic that they would stage their operation from the very country where on Sept 11 1973 democartically elected president Salvador Allende was overthrown and murdered by a CIA backed military coup that lead to the appalling rule of one most brutal dictators of the 20th century and one of Americas best buddies.....General Augusto Pinochet a man who murdered and tortured thousands and thousands of Chileans. I can hear the calls now



"Chavez, Chavez the people will defend you"




Published: Monday, August 09, 2004

Bylined to: VHeadline.com Reporters www.vheadline.com





CIA executives gathered in Santiago de Chile revealed in contingency plot to
overthrow Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez Frias





President Hugo Chavez Frias



Venezuela state-owned news agency VENPRES is quoting an El Mundo de Madrid (Spain)
report that the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is set to put a contingency
plan in motion in the (likely) event that President Hugo Chavez Frias wins next
weekend's Recall Referendum.



The Madrid newspaper says that the White House strategy is to avoid a regional
expansion of the President Hugo Chavez Frias 'Bolivarian Revolution' which is seen
by Washington D.C. as a direct step into the kind of socialism espoused by many
European nations and envisaged in the United States if John Kerry wrests control of
the White House from the Bush 2 administration this coming fall.



El Mundo says the CIA plan appears to concede a Chavez Frias victory next weekend
"for good or bad" and that Langley spooks are already working on a
strategy to "neutralize" Chavez Frias by fair means or foul.



CIA under secretary for southern hemispherical affairs, William Spencer, has been
drafted to Santiago de Chile to analyze the "Venezuelan situation" with
CIA country directors from Colombia, Ecuador, Brasil and Peru. Spencer is
reportedly convinced that Chavez Frias intends (no matter how fanciful) to create
two centers of "revolutionary focus" in South America in preparation to
overthrow Colombian President Alvaro Uribe Velez and Bolivia's Head of State, Carlos
Mesa.

www.vheadline.com


Impressions of a Revolution
by Heiko Khoo

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Caracas is a place where people have woken up. Revolution is part of everyday vocabulary, not in the sense of the dead phraseology of the former Stalinist states where the very word was designed to send people to sleep, but in the genuine meaning. Everywhere, amongst street vendors of cheap jeans and magic herbal potions, you also find a vendor selling laws. The Law on Armed Forces, the Law on Intoxicating Substances, the Law on the Rights of Women and Children, and dozens of others. These law pamphlets are not for the consumption of students at the law faculty but for the poor. Not so the poor can to read the laws to become lawyers, but to know how to exercise their rights according to 'their laws'. The masses feel that politics, government and the state belong and should belong, to them. Further along you find a vendor selling pirate DVDs of US films and pornography, amongst the films Farenheit 9-11 and The Revolution Will not be Televised are given pride of place. A vendor selling posters has half his stall decked out in posters of supporting Chavez and the revolution. When I asked their price he says they are not for sale. A T shirt saleswoman shows her Che and Chavez shirts, but also has opposition ones, I ask 'what this?' She says they're for the 'squalid ones' as the opposition are known. Two men digging through piles of stinking bin bags in search of something of value stand upright and I see they are wearing Chavez Will Not Go T shirts.

We stop and talk to older men and women in the Plaza Bolivar. On hearing we are supporters of the revolution from Europe we are welcomed as comrades with warmth, there is no hostility. They seek to know our views and give back with power their own views. The more radical the speaker the more the audience approves breaking into applause as the crowd around listens intently. Here on the street the phraseology is more direct and the overthrow of 'the capitalists' is more readily spoken of than in intellectual circles. A cavalcade of motor bikes takes off to defend and strengthen the resolve of the masses by their hooting and flag waving. A man stands behind a microphone 25 meters further on warning that after the 15th the day of the referendum, 'we must deal with the traitors in red berets'. He is referring to the enemies of the revolution who are seeking a compromise with the opposition, with capitalism. He is referring to those who are corrupt within the revolution, the bureaucrats and careerists.

Young teachers at the Bolivarian University tell me later that night that this man, I assume they mean him by their desciption, is 'more chavista than Chavez', they appreciate his determination.

At the Simon Rodrigez Experimental University, deep inside the impoverished district of El Valle, a creche full of children and childrens' party are noisily taking place, upstairs the local Ali Primera Radio station is broadcasting in FM as the forum, voice and self-organised entertainment channel of the community. On the stairway, a group of twenty or so local activists for the NO vote gather and discuss and plan their action, in another room the Marxists are meeting, next door a room full of beds for those needing rest, this building is a revolutionary centre, organisational, cultural, political and social. There is to my knowledge not a single building in all Europe used like this, this despite decades of attempts to create 'alternative spaces' by the left, sometimes with significant funds behind such projects!

The dynamism and creativity of revolution sweeps aside petty bureaucratic formalism and impels the masses to participate. In a nearby restaurant, well a room that passes as one, we are served food and beer. Meeting me on the street afterwards the owner asks, why and for whom I am filming, when I explain for Hands Off Venezuela a look of great pride exudes from his face, I see him return to his open door and shout out 'Viva la Revolution!' to his family inside.

At the experimental Bolivarian University symbolically located in the former HQ building of the Petrol company PDVSA, our guide Victoria welcomes us as comrades, no suspicion or distrust. The professors expound their thoughts and ideas and welcome ours. They are more 'Bolivarian,' in the sense of believing in a theory of encircling capital and its institutions rather than directly attacking it. This does not at all mean they do not listen to and discuss Marxist ideas, 'Chavez has said Marxism is an important source of inspiration' they inform us, and at no stage do you feel they have any barrier against you expounding and propagating your views. One director who spoke more specifically of the 'Venezuelan road', its 'uniqueness' and so on, welcomes us distributing Marxist literature inside a prestigious event where the minister for higher education was speaking. There is open an honest and open exchange of ideas, what a relief after seeing movements in Britain from the Labour Party to the Stop the War Coalition constantly react in a knee jerk fashion to any serious criticism of their policies, strategy and tactics, as if they have to repress opposition and alternative viewpoints.

At a rally of the Commando Maisanta Electoral Platoons of Caracas, the bureaucratic tendency has a stronger hand, some ten thousand activists pack the hall. A certain former police officer by the name of Freddy Bernal, who is now the mayor of Caracas Libertador Council, takes the microphone. He rallies the troops with chants and slogans and then asks for each district patrol to stand up, which they do almost in Mexican wave style. But then our friend Freddy warns that when Chavez arrives to address them, he may want to know details about how the campaign is being run in each area. So Freddy Bernal calls up representatives to interrogate them and gets them to parrot out his requested facts and figures about their local area commando.

A week or two before, someone on 'Alo President' castigated the local organisation of the Commando, Chavez railed against the bureaucrats responsible. Mr. Bernal's concerns appeared to eminate from a fear for his own position more than the efficiency and success of the situation on the ground. Bernal then called on each district to rise to their feet and then for the leaders of each district to remain standing, the 23rd January District rebelled, chanting 'We Are All Maisanta', a chant which within seconds rung around the auditorium from ten thousand voices. Freddy Bernal's face was visibly shaken, and he was forced to desist from interrogating and demagogically commanding. Chavez as it turned out did not request any such information anyway, so Mr. Bernal was saved the public humiliation he feared... for now

www.handsoffvenezuela.org

[kidicarus20]

Campaigning for electoral victory exposes Chávez’ and the opposition’s democratic scruples.

• Washington has focused on Chávez’ past efforts to escape from a fair recount vote, when it is now likely that it will be Chávez who possesses a victory margin in the August 15 referendum.

• If anyone, it would be an increasingly desperate opposition that will resort to illegal means to thwart the outcome - according to former president Carlos Andrés Pérez (C.A.P.), the referendum’s outcome could mean war or peace.

• C.A.P. ominously predicts that the opposition will lose the recall vote. His call to resort to force to overthrow and kill Chávez highlights his disdain for Venezuela’s democratic process and brings into question the opposition’s true motives.

• Oil interests and other middle-class concerns have, almost from Chávez’ presidential victory in 1998, aligned to oust the populist leader after recognizing that his government favored radically transforming Venezuela to provide equal opportunities for the poor.

• If the opposition gains power, it will most likely duplicate Chávez’ practice of manipulating the country’s constitutional process to safeguard its own interest in preventing future populist movements.

• A Chávez victory would likely be followed by a vast exodus of the middle-class, resulting in a huge expansion of the already large colony of Venezuelans now residing in the greater Miami area.

• Aside from blaming Chávez, leaders of the middle-class opposition will trace their electoral defeat to Washington’s abandonment of its anti-Chávez crusade in order to be focused on Iraq and the upcoming U.S. elections.

Article (http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/articles.php?artno=1229)