Seeking United Latin America, Venezuela's Chávez Is a Divider

[William769]

BOGOTÁ, Colombia, May 19 — As Venezuela's president, Hugo Chávez, insinuates himself deeper in the politics of his region, something of a backlash is building among his neighbors.

Mr. Chávez — stridently anti-American, leftist and never short on words — has cast himself as spokesman for a united Latin America free of Washington's influence. He has backed Bolivia's recent gas nationalization, set up his own Socialist trade bloc and jumped into the middle of disputes between his neighbors, even when no one has asked.

Some nations are beginning to take umbrage. The mere association with Mr. Chávez has helped reverse the leads of presidential candidates in Mexico and Peru. Officials from Mexico to Nicaragua, Peru and Brazil have expressed rising impatience at what they see as Mr. Chávez's meddling and grandstanding, often at their expense.

Diplomatic sparring has broken into the open. Last month, after very public sniping between Mr. Chávez and Peru's president, Alejandro Toledo, the country withdrew its ambassador from Caracas, citing "flagrant interference" in its affairs.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/20/world/americas/20chavez.html?ex=1305777600&en=205644ed584e31d0&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

:hide:

[xchrom]

1. viva hugo!

i love chavez -- and i hope for a much stronger latin american union.

that's as it should be.

[Cooley Hurd]

2. Chavez isn't anti-American, he's anti-Bush...

[Jeffersons Ghost]

34. chavez discounted heating oil to poor US citizens up north last winter

By having bad relations with Venezuela, a MAJOR exporter of oil, Republicans further fuel the crisis on gas prices.

[Benhurst]

3. The New York Times:

All The News The Bush Crime Family Sees Fit to Print.

[William769]

4. I live in a heavily populated Latin Community in S.W. Florida

No one here likes Chavez. I did not make that the main post for the simple fact, I doubt few on DU would believe it (it goes against their grain).

BTW. The community I speak of is not made up of Cubans. It is made up of people from North, Central & South American Countries. Would just mention this because I know that would be the next question asked.

[AllieB]

5. Unfortunately, that would be considered heresay, not factual

I live next door to a Venezuelan family who loves him. But they were very poor growing up. Again, my example is just heresay.

[William769]

6. Thanks for making my point.

I know it's a shame that trust is lost here.

On Edit: Feel free to visit East Fort Myers, Florida anytime you like to see for yourself. :hi:

[Horse with no Name]

10. The same ones that voted for Jeb?

There ya go. The Bush family has had HEAVY ties in Florida for decades.
Voting for SW counties in Florida 2004 cycle:
Charlotte George BUSH 44,402 56%
Collier George BUSH 83,485 65%
Glades George BUSH 2,443 58%
Hendry George BUSH 5,756 59%
Lee George BUSH 144,414 60%
Sarasota George BUSH 104,630 54%

SW Florida is hardly a bastion of liberalism, and I truly do find it "odd" that you can, without a doubt, state that there aren't ANY Cubans. How the hell do you know that to be the case? Sounds to me like a particular person does not like Chavez and is desperately trying to paint a picture.
Besides, the NY Times? Please. Along with many other things Bush has touched, he has ruined their credibility.

[AllieB]

11. I'm inclined to agree with you

Having seen the anti-Chavez posters present no factsw on any threads where they inevitably start bringing up ties to Castro, heresay type arguments are even more suspect.

[William769]

20. The majority of this community are illegals

So I don't think they voted for Jeb.

On Edit: "and I truly do find it "odd" that you can, without a doubt, state that there aren't ANY Cubans. How the hell do you know that to be the case?" Do you live here? I didn't think so. :eyes: This area is not good enough for the Cubans to live in.

[Horse with no Name]

22. What a wonderful strawman you have set up here!

An entire community of "illegals" that hate Chavez.
Do you have a link for this propagan...oops, I mean story?
Of course, one other than just the fact that "you" know about it?
Because personally, the people that I know that are illegal, wouldn't dare speak out against topics such as this because they are deathly afraid of being caught and sent back, so they go along with their lives, as quietly as possible.

[William769]

23. Just come have a looksy for your self.

[Horse with no Name]

26. No thanks.

Sorry, I don't believe a word of it.
The NYT "story" you brought, is a vapid, self-serving piece of Republican propaganda designed to whip the anti-Chavez crowd into a lather.
Your anecdotal story is not much different.

[William769]

27. Yea thats right keep your eyes closed to the truth

And be a quarterback from an armchair. People are so good at doing that.

[Horse with no Name]

29. You just stick to your truth.

However, I will keep mine educated...not blinded by racism and hatred.

[William769]

30. Iv'e been called alot of things, but a racist!

:rofl:

ON EDIT: My new partner is Hispanic. So I take it by your post you don't hate Bush?

[William769]

25. Oh is that your tactic, changing my words?

Won't work!

I didn't say "entire", I said majority. There is a difference. But I guess that doesn't matter to you.

[Horse with no Name]

28. Not hardly. Your words just trapped you.

"No one here likes Chavez."

Look at what you have written. Those are your words.
You didn't say "most people" or "some people", you said "NO ONE"--meaning, not one.
I don't imagine honesty in discussion matters to you much.:shrug:

[William769]

31. Ditto!

[Judi Lynn]

60. Don't know why you're taking that position. I've been lucky to have

known a WONDERFUL poster over the years who came from Colombia, now living in Ft. Myers, who told us YEARS ago that Cubans moved into the area.

I think I'll continue to believe him.

[Jeffersons Ghost]

35. I've seen Ft. Myers: It's one of the wealthiest communities in the USA

[Horse with no Name]

36. I figured as much

*considering* the source.

[William769]

42. Oy vey!

Holier than thou. to some place you have never been.

[AllieB]

37. Yup-it's where the Red Sox have their spring training.

It's full of rich, mostly white retirees. SW Florida is heavily Republican also. HWNN stated some stats above.

[William769]

43. So are you saying Fort Myers has no poor?

[AllieB]

53. No but I'm saying *anecdotally* that I go down there every year

and there *appears* to be a prepoderance of rich white people, just like you say *all* the Latinos that you know don't like Chavez. Again, it seems that you like to argue, but present nothing factual to back up your assertions.

[William769]

41. Did you visit MLK Blvd?

East Fort Myers? Central Fort myers? Or just the resort part of Fort Myers?

[Zorra]

12. Do they like Bu*h? n/t

[Squeech]

16. Anecdotal evidence

I met a guy (US citizen, Peace Corps alum) who owns and farms a small coffee plantation in Brazil, and married a Brazilian woman. They didn't think George Bush was a bad guy-- they've met him, and in fact she really likes him-- but they couldn't say enough negative things about Jeb, who they've also met. (They ship the coffee to Miami to process and market it, so they do business in both countries. And, being the sort of small businesspeople the Repukes claim to support, they get actively courted.)

Regrettably I didn't get their opinions on Lula, let alone Chavez.

[William769]

24. No!

[Scoody Boo]

39. The Mexicans I know and...

Work for me don't like Chavez. Most of these men go back to Mexico on weekends and from what they say, Chavez is not really popular down there. In fact they have told me that the people are pretty suspicious of the politicians that pro-Chavez.

The Mexican people are fervent believers in capitalism and much like here, you taint something as "communist" and they run from it. Chavez has been labeled a communist by the PAN Party in Mexico and they point to his association with Castro.

[Judi Lynn]

40. Canada's Pierre Trudeau was a good friend of Fidel Castro's as well.

Apparently your all-seeing Mexican sources would recognize him as a "communist" as well.

I assume you yourself aren't a rabid right-winger, but are just telling what the lord loves about the political view of the Mexican people.









Invited guest at the Trudeau funeral.

[AllieB]

54. I smell socks here, if you get my drift

:hide:

Or are strawmen and anecdotal evidence about how Latinos hate Chavez common around here?

[Scoody Boo]

59. I speak only what my personal experience is.

Nothing else. I am not trying in anyway to sway you or anyone. Just posting what I see and hear from my employees and what I learned growing up in Mexico.

[William769]

44. Welcome toDU.

Some sanity for a change.

[Jim Warren]

45. Anecdotal at best.

"The Mexican people are fervent believers in capitalism"

The Mexican people I know, including my wife, are fervent believers in putting food on the table.

From living there many years I can tell you there are com/soc open meetings through-out the country.

http://www.ppsdemexico.org/

[Scoody Boo]

55. I was born in Mexico...

I lived there until I was 14. I sold chicles to tourists when I was five. Shined shoes in the street when I was 10. I worked for my uncle at his auto salvage yard scraping cars with axes and wedges when I was 12.

My grandfather (I thought he was my father until I was 13) sold barrels of water and firewood from the back of a horse drawn wagon. Most of the people I was around and knew worked hard for a living and when they could opened up little businesses like corner stores or botiques. The people that were always in favor of socialism or communism were without exception the ones who were well off or rich. Not once, when I lived in Mexico did I meet a socialist who was poor. Some of the socialists I did know were ones I shined shoes for. My family used to laugh at how "for the poor" they were.

Mexicans are a hard working people that strive to get ahead for themselves and their families through the fruits of their labor. They put little faith in socialists who are really elites. What they hear from Chavez are the same words they have been hearing from elites in Mexico for years.

If some actions followed the words, then maybe they would have a little more faith. For the longest time, words have been just that in Mexico.

Nothing wrong with a socialist society, but when the people espousing the virtues of it are the ones who have everything, people tend to get a little jaded.

[Adelante]

62. Give it up

Here in Hugo Love Land, nobody will credit your opinions and observations or even allow them. They will shout you down every time, call you names or just dismiss you. At some point you stop posting in these threads and read or stay out. However, I will say to you that the Mexicans I know, both professional and working class, don't like Chavez. They think he is a boorish, arrogant, obnoxious blowhard sticking his nose in their country's business. I tend to agree with you that Mexicans are about work and family advancement, but I would add that dignity in behavior means very much and Chavez offends that sensibility. So now I join you in going under attack because freedom of thought or speech has no place in this or any thread related to Hugo Chavez. Now I happen to live in Mexico, but everyone in this thread who doesn't believes he or she knows more than I do about what goes on in Mexico, same with you who were born and raised here. It's just the way it is.

Viva Mexico :pals:

[pretzel4gore]

7. nytimes=Bush Protection Team

lying liars from hell, imho.....
btw Hugo Chavez is representative of the voiceless, the powerless, the mass of beatup humanity. Question: how can a nation that exported trillions in oil and other wealth over generations still be dirt poor?
nytimes mediawhiores should answer that question before pontificating on how wonderfully wisely bush wipes his nose

[Clark2008]

8. How can someone from South AMERICA be anti-AMERICAN?

My, isn't the NY Times pompus.

[Joe Bacon]

9. More LIES from the New York Pravada

Outside of Krugman, is there ANY PRE$$TITUTE who will tell the truth at the Times?

[Judi Lynn]

13. The NY Times has NEVER been clean in its reporting of Venezuelan news

after Hugo Chavez was elected.

Their current go-to-reporter, Juan Forero is wildly warped, and has been pro-right-wing in his reporting throughout Latin America. For anyone interested, here's a look at the Times/Forero laughable coverage:
http://thecommonills.blogspot.com/2004_11_28_thecommonills_archive.html

Another of the NY Times "stellar" reporting team, Francisco Toro, had to quit because it was learned he was wildly caught up in the Venezuelan opposition way of life in Caracas, and was incapable of honest writing on the subject:

Financial Times Reporter "Can't Possibly Be Neutral"

6/6/03

In January, New York Times Venezuela correspondent Francisco Toro resigned his post after acknowledging that he "can't possibly be neutral" about the political situation in that country (Narco News Bulletin, 1/14/03). Now the same reporter is covering Venezuela for another prestigious paper, the Financial Times, contributing reports on May 29 and June 3.

The Financial Times is a London-based, business-oriented daily; most of its circulation is outside of Britain, with a quarter of its sales in the United States.

Toro is a fierce partisan in Venezuela's heated political environment, a participant in anti-government protests who posts name-calling attacks on President Hugo Chavez on his website. He describes himself as a "Venezuelan journalist opposed to Hugo Chavez" (Mother Jones, 3/1/03), and has written frankly about what he perceives as his own inability to impartially report the news from Venezuela.

While all journalists have political opinions, Toro described himself as unable to put aside his strong feelings about Chavez and cover the Venezuelan controversy without prejudice. After a Times editor indicated that his anti-government weblog was unacceptable, Toro responded: "I've decided I can't continue reporting for the New York Times.... I realize it would take much more than just pulling down my blog to address your conflict-of-interests concerns. Too much of my lifestyle is bound up with opposition activism at the moment, from participating in several NGOs, to organizing events and attending protest marches. But even if I gave all of that up, I don't think I could muster the level of emotional detachment from the story that the New York Times demands.... My country's democracy is in peril now, and I can’t possibly be neutral about that."

A look at his Toro's weblog (http://caracaschronicles.blogspot.com)reveals a deep personal antipathy toward Chavez. "As his face contorts and the bombastic nonsense spews out in thicker and thicker densities, it's impossible not to wonder about the man's mental health," he wrote in a January 11 post. In a January 28 entry Chavez was called Venezuela's "Narcissist-in-Chief," and Toro insisted that the president's behavior matched the American Psychiatric Association's definition of Narcissistic Personality Disorder. (Toro also has strong criticisms of Venezuela's opposition movement, calling it "shrill and vacuous" in a May 4 post that also called Chavez a "two-bit tropical despot wannabe" with a "mind-numbingly incompetent" government.)
(snip/...)

http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1624

[DFW]

33. Three I can think of:

Bob Herbert
Frank Rich
Maureen Dowd

[Joe Bacon]

51. Dowd?

What a liar Maureen Dowd is!

She lied any lie to elect Bush in 2000, and she STILL trashes Al Gore and the Clintons. She's the #3 liar at the New York TImes, right behind Judith Miller and Adam Nagourney!

[Horse with no Name]

14. Let's break this down a little further

Who is The Inter-American Dialogue policy group in Washington?
Peter Hakim is the President.
>>>snip
Why, you might ask, does Mr. Peter Hakim, the President of a club of distinguished business and government leaders, have to hang around the World Bank, by his own admission, kissing asses?

Because that's his business as a member of Civil Society and a Partner in Development. Partners like Mr. Hakim and the Inter-American Dialogue are an aggressively metastasizing outgrowth of our re-invented federal/corporate public sector. They are largely funded by government and transnational corporations, but they pretend to be representative of someone or something else -- which they call non-government. And with their research, they can give an unpopular initiative a real boost. Let's take a look at the funders of the Inter-American Dialogue, for example: The World Bank, The Inter-American Development Bank, U.S.A.I.D., the Canadian International Development Agency, the Organization of American States, the Government of Chile. Those are some of the public sector funders. Then there are the corporations: BankAmerica (Featuring the Investment Future Value Calculator and the Major Purchase Planner), Bell South International (Making the I.C.Q. chat-line more convenient), Xerox (Providing your strategic document outsourcing partner), and BP America (Sponsoring the BP Review of World Gas). Plus the big foundations: Ford, Kellogg, Tinker, MacArthur. If these people say that Latin American teachers have excessively large pensions, then they have excessively large pensions, by God. Would you argue with this line-up? I wouldn't. I'd never work again.

As the government has reconfigured itself, this is what has taken shape: this plethora of well-heeled, Washington-based, policy-pushing N.G.O.s whose people move fluidly from private to public to profit to non-profit sectors. The whole thing is getting a little creepy. You think those nice-looking young people from Montana sitting next to you at the North-South Center Breakfast one rainy morning are interested in sustainable development and environmental law, the topic of today's gathering. And they are, but it's because they're with a well-know environmental N.G.O. called The World Resources Institute, which is partnering with Dow Chemical and Monsanto.
http://www.texasobserver.org/showArticle.asp?ArticleID=166

[bemildred]

15. Pay no attention to the little man behind the machine. nt

[leftchick]

32. thank you!

it certainly shows who is buttering the NYTs bread this morning. THE NGOs!!!

[William769]

47. Heres an idea

Why don't we hear from the people from venezuela themselves. Oh wait that would be very unDemocratic. :eyes:

http://daniel-venezuela.blogspot.com

[Judi Lynn]

48. The people of Venezuela themselves? Do you mean the ones

who voted for Hugo Chavez in a massive landslide election? Those people?

Or do you mean your source, described as a "Political commentator and opposition activist Daniel Duquenal?"

There's a world of difference, it would seem. Nice try.

[William769]

49. ROFLOL!!!

And we have perfect elections just like them! :rofl:

[Judi Lynn]

50. (International) Observers endorse Venezuela vote

Last Updated: Tuesday, 17 August, 2004, 04:12 GMT 05:12 UK

Observers endorse Venezuela vote

International observers in Venezuela have confirmed President Hugo Chavez's victory in a referendum on whether he should be removed from office.

The former US president, Jimmy Carter, said Mr Chavez had won fairly, and the Organization of American States said it had not found any element of fraud.

With nearly all the votes counted, Mr Chavez has 58% backing him.
(snip)

Mr Carter, who helped monitor Sunday's vote, said his team of observers had concluded there was a "clear difference in favour" of Mr Chavez.

The head of the Organization of American States, Cesar Gaviria, also said his monitors had not found "any element of fraud".
(snip/...)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/americas/3571350.stm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Did George W. Bush Steal America's 2004 Election?
By Bob Fitrakis, Steve Rosenfeld and Harvey Wasserman
The Free Press

Thursday 16 June 2005

~snip~
Despite repeated pre-election calls from officials across the nation and the world, Ohio's Republican Secretary of State, who also served as Ohio's co-chair for the Bush-Cheney campaign, refused to allow non-partisan international and United Nations observers the access they requested to monitor the Ohio vote. While such access is routinely demanded by the US government in third world nations, it was banned in the American heartland.
(snip)

http://www.truthout.org/cgi-bin/artman/exec/view.cgi/38/11970

[leftchick]

17. Wow! What a piece of horseshit on a plate from the NYT!

I will not even bother with the rest. More anti-chavez propaganda. :puke:

[rucky]

19. still steaming off the press! n/t

[rucky]

18. NY times doesn't like change.

every time there's change, there's going to be resistance. it's not that the leader is a "divider", it's just a natural byproduct. Remeber when they switched to the New Coke in the '80's?

the NY times has set the status quo for too long. anything out of their world view, they feel threatened by and spew out hit pieces like this one.

[Laughing Mirror]

21. Chávez IS American, just not YOUR America

You stupid-ass imperialist NY Times!

[Jim Warren]

38. The handmaiden to government speaks

Like the stories about Jews being required to wear badges in Iran.
Tainted :puke:

[Judi Lynn]

46. Well, well, well. What a timely find! Maybe this will help shed some light

May 20 / 21, 2006

Talk About "Meddlesome"
The New York Times Versus Chavez
By GREG GRANDIN

You can tell that the US-led campaign against Hugo Chávez has reached a critical stage when the New York Times starts providing rhetorical cover for Condoleezza Rice's and Donald Rumsfeld's increasingly desperate efforts to isolate the Venezuelan president.

Chile's center-left president Michelle Bachelet -- who Rice name-drops every chance she gets to prove she can have socialist friends -- just last week warned Washington not to "demonize" Chávez. Yet despite this endorsement from Latin America's most lauded reformer, the Times on Saturday ran a 1300-word, front-page hatchet job by Juan Forero titled "Seeking United Latin America, Venezuela's Chávez Is a Divider; Some Neighbors Resent His Style as Meddlesome."

The article quotes seven sources, all openly anti-Chávez save for Brazil's president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Lula, like Bachelet, has repeatedly defended his Venezuelan counterpart against Washington. But Forero ignores this support, instead choosing to cherry-pick through Lula's public statements to find, and take out of context, a rare criticism.

Other supposedly objective comments come from the center-right -- NYU's Jorge Castañeda -- to the Right-Right -- Johns Hopkin's Riordan Roett -- of the political spectrum. Its worth noting that Roett's primary claim to fame was a 1995 memo he wrote while an emerging-market consultant to Chase Manhattan Bank urging the Mexican government to "eliminate the Zapatistas" and to slowdown democratic reforms. Now that's "meddlesome."

Forero holds Chávez's "grandstanding" responsible for any number of Latin American ills, along with the slip in the polls of Peru's Ollanta Humala and Mexico's Andrés Manuel López Obrador -- both of whom are running for president in their respective countries and have received Chávez's endorsement. Humala has plenty of his own baggage that can account for his declining numbers, while Forero misrepresents the Mexican race. López Obrador's opponent and now frontrunner, Felipe Calderón, has only managed to overcome his personality deficit with the help of U.S. political consultants, including toe-fetishist Dick Morris, who have used focus groups to frame a series of highly negative TV ads. "They're selling" Calderón "as if they were selling shampoo,'' López Obrador's campaign coordinator recently complained.
(snip/...)

http://www.counterpunch.org/grandin05202006.html

[Cleita]

52. Since much of S. America is still run like a feudal society,

I can see where Chavez is ruffling up the establishment's feathers. Time will tell if his experiment will become the Latin America of the future or just another unsuccessful attempt to unseat the oligarchy.

[mountebank]

56. I am so tired of Juan Forero's coverage of Venezula for the NYT....

He is so obviously biased. In his articles, Chavez is always "declaring," "demanding," and "defying." Funny, when I've seen Chavez speak, most of the time he appears to be simply "saying." And Forero always, always gets quotes from "policy analysts" in the US and other elites living abroad. And, not that this is any surprise because the NYT is like all major newspapers basically a paper about business, Forero always sees everything from the perspective of the stock market. If a socialist takes a lead in the polls or wins an election, be it in Venezuela or Peru, Forero will begin by telling you how the stock market dipped on investors' worry about capital flight. Fear, fear, fear. Forero needs to go and at least put somebody neutral in there, or somebody who's not an elitist. I'm not exactly thrilled with Chavez these days and think he's wasting a lot of time and energy with pugilistic nonsense when he should concentrate on governing his country, i.e. what he seems to have done best. But Forero's article is just pure bullshit.

BTW, responding to the original poster's comments about his South American neighbors dislike of Chavez. I wouldn't count that as a represetative sample because many Latinos who come to this country, even illegally, do so because they want the American Lifestyle, in a ridiculously simplified nutshell: life in pursuit of money and goods to spend it on. So it's not particularly surprising that there is no love lost between many expats and Latin American leaders who do not embrace the ideology of the United States. The best indicator of Chavez's popularity is his total in the last election: something over 60% of his country re-elected him and the opposition basically collapsed. In free elections.

[Zhade]

57. Viva Chavez!

I wouldn't trust the NYT not to give me a papercut if I wiped my ass with it.

Laughable nonsense.

[killbotfactory]

58. Latin America has been trending left

But, sure, they are totally rejecting Chavez, and embracing the glorious past of right-wing dictatorships and exploitation that the US has subjected them to for decades.

[nick303]

61. Some unfair behavior on this thread

I've seen plenty of people link to the NYT when it suited their worldview-- and then turn around and call it a worthless rag whenever it didn't.

There is some substance to the article. According to a composite poll (of 5 polls) by Centro de Investigacion para el Desarrollo (CIDAC), Obrador has fallen to 2nd place in Mexico's election race. This was after campaign ads linked him to Hugo Chavez (fairly or otherwise).



Link (Spanish, see p. 8 for graph of polls)