Venezuelans Puzzle Over Their Leader's Health

[hack89]

Source: Wall Street Journal

CARACAS—Venezuela's voluble and ubiquitous President Hugo Chávez hasn't returned to the public eye after a surgery in Cuba that has friends and foes alike speculating about the state of his health and the future of his rule.

Mr. Chávez has been in Cuba since June 8, when he was felled by a pelvic abscess for which he underwent an operation two days later. Soon after, Venezuelan officials said the flamboyant leader was in good health but would recuperate in Havana for a "few days."

Those few days have stretched to 11, punctuated by false alarms over the date of his return. On Monday, a ruling party lawmaker said Mr. Chávez was hours from touching down in Caracas and urged his supporters to prepare a "tremendous" welcome for him. The claim was quickly refuted on the Twitter account of Venezuela's Communications Minister Andres Izarra.

In Cuba, he suffered acute pain during a meeting with former Cuban leader Fidel Castro and was rushed into surgery.

Read more: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304070104576399961115943884.html?mod=WSJ_hp_MIDDLENexttoWhatsNewsTop

[Proletariatprincess]

1. uh oh.

Ihope Hugo didn't smoke any poison cigars from the CIA.

[FLPanhandle]

2. Hugo, please don't die.

The conspiracy nuts will have a field day. At least it was in Cuba. Imagine if this happened in the U.S.? DU would have to create an entire forum for Chavez conspiracies.

[SkyDaddy7]

4. Your comment made me laugh! nt.

[nahant]

18. WHY???

HEY if his maker wants him back I say send him on his way....

[SkyDaddy7]

40. This...

"DU would have to create an entire forum for Chavez conspiracies." I thought it was funny & true.

[joshcryer]

29. Please die Hugo.

I love conspiracy nuts, they make my day!

[JackRiddler]

39. Ah yes, calls for death from our pro-imperialist anarchist.

Opposing the state, long as it's on Washington's list of designated enemies.

[dixiegrrrrl]

3. hmmmmmmmmm

[rabs]

5. Photo from Sat., June 18

http://l.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/fjAnuxE2YkTNm2AWE_M.PQ--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9aW5zZXQ7aD02MTI7cT04NTt3PTQ2MA--/


Chavez foes, domestic and international, can judge for themselves.

As can his millions of supporters.

[hack89]

6. The question is what is his underlying illness

the news story says that what he was operated on is just a symptom of a more serious underlying disease. I have seen relatively healthy looking cancer patients for example - that picture does not really answer the question of just how sick he really is.

[JackRiddler]

8. Or, of course, if he has one.

Because it's not like Murdoch-WSJ would want to make imminent-death propaganda out of a mere abscess.

[hack89]

9. You must admit that it is not like Chavez to stay out of the public eye

a mere abscess would not prevent a remote TV or radio broadcast to allay the concerns of his people.

[JackRiddler]

10. You must admit Murdoch-WSJ doesn't have access to his charts.

There are literally hundreds of possible conditions that incapacitate for a month or two and end in full recovery, as well as hundreds of far worse possibilities.

I checked out Google news as an aggregator -- almost all of the sources reporting on this in barely concealed hopeful fashion are US right wing.

Could be something, could be not.

[hack89]

11. I guess we will see.

It would be ironic if the bombastic strong man went out with a whimper.

[JackRiddler]

12. Ironic? Only in an inverted world-view where the popular, democratically elected president

is a "strongman."

He'd have to be, in a sense, given the unscrupulous oligarchic and imperialist forces arrayed to destroy the Venezuelan government. Your buddies?

[hack89]

13. He did attempt a coup once, lets not forget

do you really think that if he had won he would not have ruled as a military strong man?

Leopards don't easily change their spots.

[JackRiddler]

14. Against a government that had murdered thousands of people in the street, let's not forget.

And this is ancient history, after more than a half-dozen clean elections of the Venezuelan people that keep returning him and his party to power.

[Dreamer Tatum]

17. Hah. Nice rationalization stew there, buddy. nt

[Judi Lynn]

19. Really. The man sent his troops to fire directly into crowds of protesting citizens.

No one had any warning it was coming, they couldn't protect themselves.

This man NEEDED to be removed. He WAS removed. He was impeached, spent time in jail, and under house arrest.

Because of his efforts against Carlos Andres Perez, Hugo Chavez became a national hero, and here the US right-wing attempts to use the attempted coup against a mass-murdering asshole as talking point against him. Very strange twist, but predictable.

[Dreamer Tatum]

20. So that whole "democratically elected" thing is really only in play

...after one sweeps into power via coup.

Uh huh.

[Judi Lynn]

21. Take some time out to do your homework. Perez' mass murder is called "El Caracazo."

In February, 1989, he took the steps by slaughtering Venezuelans to pass the point of no return.

Hugo Chavez went to jail, served time, was pardoned by President Rafael Caldera.

Don't even imagine you are going to mislead anyone. Anyone who cares enough to have a valid opinion takes the time to find out the truth first.

[JackRiddler]

27. Uh, hello? Chavez did not come to power in a coup. He led a FAILED coup.

He went to prison for it.

He was pardoned years later, since the government he had tried to topple had murdered its citizens and its officials were in the end imprisoned (by another government, not by Chavez).

THEN, YEARS LATER...

Chavez won the 1998 election, and has been reelected in elections certified as fair and free by international observers ever since.

So either you're rubbing out the history... or you are showing us your cluelessness.

A smart move on your part would be not to snark (and dig your hole further) but just learn the facts and then come back and... apologize for getting the details wrong. It doesn't mean you therefore must support Chavez.

Come on now, show some character!

[CreekDog]

33. do you silently protest our founding fathers? like Washington?

i mean, what did they do with respect to the sitting government?

[JackRiddler]

38. The "nt" is the best part of your attack using Pavlovian hit-words...

Since of course beyond the insult there is Nothing There.

[ChangoLoa]

23. The coup was against a State, not against a government. And it had been planned for 10 years.

The same State impeached Pérez some months later and freed Chavez 2 years later.

Chavez wanted to take power, not to avenge the victims of el Caracazo, which had happened 3 years earlier.

Chavez' movement within the Army, the Bolivarian Revolutionary Army, had sworn to take power in 1982. The act is called "el Juramento del Samán de Güere" (12.17.82).

[EFerrari]

26. There is rarely only 1 reason for a coup and especially one that depends on

a broad coalition.

[JackRiddler]

28. And even if you were right... in the end, Chavez came in by election, free and fair.

[CreekDog]

32. If that's so bad why do we honor Washington with a holiday and with our money?

:wtf:

[boppers]

34. Would "arresting judges when you don't like their decisions" qualify as "democratic"?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/24/AR2010042401791.html

[JackRiddler]

37. Judge Afiuni stands accused of taking bribes from the banker whose release she ordered improperly.

She was not an opponent of Chavez prior to her arrest. She was discovered as an opposition member by the likes of the Washington Post after her arrest on bribery charges. Her trial is pending.

The manner of the accused banker's release was in violation of judicial protocol. The judge let him out of the court via her own elevator, without a ruling and without prosecution present, as should have been the case. He got away on the back of a motorbike and later showed up in Miami seeking asylum. However, it is also true he had been held for too long under the rules governing bail and detention.

The banker Eligio Cedeno had actually grown rich on corrupt dealings with the Chavez government, until he was taken down in a purge. So his status as political opposition is also new-found.

Less propagandistic "mainstream" coverage than in the WaPo explains how the release (or escape, according to the Vz prosecutors) was improper and allows that the Caracas bar association president and the Supreme Court so far back the proceedings against Afiuni for bribery:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/dec/15/chavez-venezuela-judge-cedeno

Venezuela Analysis argues the case has been wildly misrepresented in the West:
http://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/5963

HRW report making the case for Afiuni as a genuine political prisoner in a crackdown on judiciary:
http://www.hrw.org/es/world-report-2011/venezuela

It's hard to point fingers from the country that's held hundreds of people without charges, many of them acknowledged as innocent, in a detention limbo for going on 10 years now.

http://wikileaks.ch/gitmo/

[Springer9]

15. There ya go, being supported by two 80 year old guys in

his hospital room will instill great confidence in people.

[EFerrari]

24. Chavez could fart kittens and cupcakes and people would still find a reason

to complain. :)

[Dreamer Tatum]

16. Of what year? nt

[IamK]

22. Is this photo from Blackwell's worst dresses list....

[JackRiddler]

7. Wall Street Journal, home of Chavez death-porn fan fiction.

The wishful thinking is powerful in this one.

[rabs]

31. Sources cited in the WSJ tale

Lede graph -- speculation
"false alarms"
Teodoro Petkoff (former member of the Ven. Communist Party turned neo-liberal, was going
to run against Chavez in 2006 but dropped out of the race)
"a former top Ven. health official" (unidentified)
"perhaps following Mr. Castro's advice" (speculation)
"an opposition lawmaker" (unidentified)
"some analysts believe"
"but others believe"

Those were just some that jumped out from a quick re-read of the article. There is more unsourced speculation throughout. We in the LatAm Forum have long known the WSJ has it in for Hugo so this article is no surprise. I would not be surprised if the two reporters who wrote it work for the opposition El Universal or El Nacional.
----------------
Chavez's vice president, Elías Jaua today (Wednesday, June 22, 2011 -- adding date, year for benefit of a poster who is confused about what year this is happening) said Chavez was "recuperating satisfactorily" and was tending to state matters, including funding for education, pensions for the elderly and the situation at the Rodeo II prison.

[Judi Lynn]

35. I looked for more on Petkoff, having heard of him for years, found this info.:

~snip~
Petkoff now stands on the right and openly backs the counter-revolutionary opposition to Chavez. In the December 2006 presidential elections, he stood against him, but withdrew in favour of Manuel Rosales. He now tries to distance himself from the coup in April 2002, but at the time he wrote a vicious editorial in TalCual ("Chao Hugo") in which he clearly supported the coup and celebrated Chavez' overthrow.

The article attempts to make heavy use of irony and ridicule. Chavez is referred to as "Chacumbele," a character in a Cuban song, a womanizing police officer in Havana who is killed by a jealous lover. Despite the ironic tone, however, the fact that it appears on the front page of a prominent opposition newspaper and is signed by the editor indicates that the Venezuelan counter-revolutionary opposition takes this very seriously. A verse in the song talks about how Cachumbele "El mismito se mato," meaning he got killed by his own mistakes or actions. Petkoff for a while has been using the name to refer to Chavez, implying that his own actions will lead to him being killed. In the Venezuelan context, this is far from being a joke.

More:
http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=89508

[bemildred]

25. Yawn. nt

[Billy Burnett]

30. Radio Mambi is reporting that Hugito is dead...

... again.


Castro too.

[Judi Lynn]

36. Dead, again! How cruel! I wonder just how many times they've reported Castro's dead, by now?

I remember one time they nearly had Miami convinced he'd died, and people were starting to discuss getting their flotilla together to go to Cuba.

I guess that photo should convince everyone. So sad. It was published after one of the times he died, but not the last time. The last time people here were insisting he was dead, and didn't let up, even with photos of him meeting the Russian Orthodox Metropolitan who paid him a visit. Did you happen to see one guy claiming he could tell the photo had been photo-shopped?

I guess he had the dead/undead guy's number, didn't he? That living dead movie they've made recently in Cuba was no coincidence. It was a documentary!