Reply #1: This is mine. It's too long by about half, though [View All]

[EFerrari]

It is difficult to say if the news side of the New York Times skews its Venezuela reporting more than the editorial side spins to the right. Sunday, Simon Romero ("Chávez Reaches Out to Obama Ahead of Vote") manages to insert the thoroughly debunked accusation that Mr. Chavez supports Colomibian guerillas into a story about easing relations with the new Obama administration.

That accusation was made by President Bush and by Uribe of Colombia. Their story was that emails from Chavez had been found on a captured FARC laptop. It turned out to be a complete fabrication. Not a single email was found on that machine.

Similarly, the Sunday editorial ("Venezuelans’ Right to Say No") makes the accusation that two Human Rights Watch workers were abducted when they issued an unfavorable report. Mr. Vivanco, who began his career in human rights as an apologist for Agosto Pinochet, was expelled along with his assistant for interfering in the internal affairs of Venezuela. And very rightfully so.

A cursory search for his name in news items shows that Mr. Vivanco inserted himself in the press whenever there was a vote or a crisis in Venezuela. The very release of the report itself was politicized by him -- its release was moved up by nearly five months and coincided with Bush Administration destabilization attempts in Venezuela and in Bolivia. Students of Venezuela and the intellectual community around the world have protested both the report and the false claims of abuse repeated yet again in this unsigned editorial.

It's precisely because of such biased coverage that F.A.I.R.'s February report concluded, American coverage of Venezuela serves a political agenda more than it serves its readers.

Elizabeth Ferrari
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