Venezuelans protest as TV station shuts

[cynatnite]

CARACAS, Venezuela - Venezuelan police fired tear gas and plastic bullets Monday into a crowd of thousands protesting a decision by President Hugo Chavez that forced a television station critical of his leftist government off the air.

Police fired toward the crowd of up to 5,000 protesters from a raised highway, and protesters fled amid clouds of tear gas. They later regrouped in Caracas' Plaza Brion chanting "freedom!" Some tossed rocks and bottles at police, prompting authorities to scatter demonstrators by firing more gas.

snip:
The group Reporters Without Borders called for international condemnation of the RCTV decision as "a major setback to democracy and pluralism."

Robert Menard, the Paris-based group's secretary-general, called the measure Chavez's "first serious international political error."

Germany, which holds the European Union presidency, officially declared its concern that Venezuela let RCTV's license expire "without holding an open competition for the successor license."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070529/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/venezuela_chavez_vs_tv

[Checkstub]

1. Why are they using wuss methods on the fascists?

Tear gas, cool, but they should be cutting down the pro-fascist anti-Chavez putschists in a hail of lead.

[cynatnite]

3. Shooting protesters=bad...free press=good n/t

[mitchtv]

5. free press = good

coup particpation=bad
throwing rocks at police = bad

[killbotfactory]

23. What if RCTV used their free speech to lead protesters into a sniper trap?

Since that's what the did in 2002, resulting in 18 people killed.

[cynatnite]

29. Those individuals should be prosecuted....

it doesn't warrent taking a TV station off the air.

[rinsd]

37. So prosecute the individuals instead of making the station a gov't propaganda org (nt)

[Selatius]

2. Venezuelan citizens will decide this on their own terms. It's ultimately their country, not ours.

[killbotfactory]

4. Is Free Speech Really at Stake? Venezuela and RCTV

Here are the basic facts. Rádio Caracas Televisión (RCTV) is one of the biggest television networks in Venezuela. It airs news and entertainment programs. It is also openly opposed to the government, including by supporting a military coup that briefly ousted Chávez in 2002. (More information available on what Le Monde Diplomatique has called Venezuela’s “hate media” here and here.) During the oil strike of 2002-2003, the station repeatedly called upon its viewers to come out into the street and help topple the government. As part of its continuing political campaign against the government, the station has also used false allegations, sometimes with gruesome and violent imagery, to convince its viewers that the government was responsible for such crimes as murders where there was no evidence of government involvement.

According to a law enacted in 1987, the licenses given to RCTV and other stations to use the public airwaves expire on May 27. President Chávez has publicly declared that RCTV’s license will not be renewed, citing its involvement in the coup. Although it will not be able to continue to use the public broadcast frequencies, the station will still be able to send its signal out over cable, satellite, and the Internet.

The U.S. media, much of which has been unsuccessfully predicting dictatorship under Chávez for years, has used this case to make accusations of censorship and the end of press freedom in Venezuela.

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/05/23/1405/

[sam sarrha]

6. if we get into the White House ..can we Muzzle that stink'n FOX station!

[vincent_vega_lives]

31. who's "we" exactly?

speak for yourself. I for one am not for muzzling any station.

[sam sarrha]

7. thank lyou for the Reality check......

[cynatnite]

8. I have a big problem with any government shutting down a TV station

Considering that the majority of the people there are opposed to this and there is quite a bit of international condemnation I don't believe that shutting down a TV station is the way to go about it.

Anyway, I put Chavez, bush and Iran's leader all under the same column...crazy nutjobs with delusions of grandeur.

[DFW]

9. I'd add to that:

In the cases of Bush, Chávez and AhmadiNejad, unfortunately, the
money, the packed Supreme Court (or equivalent), and the notion
that they are free to do whatever the hell they like, because any
oppostition is treason (just ask any one of them).

[Greyhound]

10. a: It's not a majority, not even in the neighborhood of a majority.

b: It's not shut down, they continue broadcasting right this very minute, just on cable and satellite not over the airwaves, the government they tried to overthrow let their license expire and will not renew it. Hardly the action of a dictator or a "crazy nutjob with delusions of grandeur".

You really should read some of the materials readily available before deciding that you know enough to make an informed judgment.

[cynatnite]

11. Well, I did read...

Wikipedia and BBC were pretty thorough. 70% of the population in a recent survey were opposed to the shutdown and the government took the buildings and the equipment including towers. Chavez has stacked the courts much like bush has done here so the TV stations didn't have a chance in hell when they fought back.

Chavez, bush and the Iranian guy are all nutjobs with delusions of grandeur, IMO. That's the only uninformed opinion I offer since I'm not a shrink.

[killbotfactory]

12. RCTV will still be available on cable and satellite

We are talking public airwaves, which are a limited resources, and need to be used for the public good, not flagrantly violating the law and advocating for the violent overthrow of the current government.

The people behind RCTV are still able to broadcast their propaganda, but their access to the public airwaves has been revoked.

Access to public airwaves are not a corporate right.

[MonkeyFunk]

13. Why was it OK to seize the stations and equipment?

rather than force a sale?

Why replace it with government-run television instead of forcing a sale?

Why not prosecute those who supposedly participated in the coup?

[killbotfactory]

20. After the coup attemp Chavez promised no "witch-hunts"

And a lot of the main plotters either fled the country, or were let off because of the corrupt justice system.

As to why they didn't sell it to another company, that's up to them.

People died on the streets because of the actions of RCTV. They illegally encouraged an anti-Chavez demonstration to march toward a pro-Chavez demonstration. When the two met, snipers were waiting and started shooting people on both sides. They then used the footage of people being shot, and the resulting chaos, to encourage people to overthrow the government while the military threatened to bomb the presidential palace if Chavez didn't step down. After kidnapping and nearly executing him, the coup leaders disbanded the entire government and congratulated themselves and RCTV on the air. When the coup was overthrown after a couple days, RCTV didn't air any of that footage or news, instead going into a cartoon marathon.

This is not something a reasonable media company does.

Free speech doesn't mean that everyone has the right to their own TV channel on limited public bandwidth.

[MonkeyFunk]

30. I'm not defending the station's role in the coup

(though I've never seen a coherent explanation of exactly what that role was).

Let's assume they were criminally complicit in the coup. Why turn it into a government station when there already IS a government station? Why not keep it independent under new ownership?

This just doesn't sit well with me.

[MonkeyFunk]

35. I have probably asked this question 4 or 5 times in the last

two days, and I can't get a single person to respond.

despite the passionate supporters of Chavez who accuse everyone else of being willfully ignorant, none of them will address this simple question.

I do NOT have a firm position on Chavez. This takeover doesn't sit well with me, though, and i'm trying to get somebody... ANYBODY... to answer some simple questions, but people just yell past each other. It's a shame.

[ShaneGR]

15. You forget to mention the low % who have cable....

Stifling a free press is not acceptible in my opinion. This would be no different than if in 2001 Bush decided to not renew ABC's license because of support of Al Gore.

[killbotfactory]

17. They can still spout whatever they want

They don't have a right to public airwaives, no one company does. They were granted a license to use them, and flagrantly violated the law multiple times, culminating in them calling for people to violent overthrow of the current democratically elected government, and blatantly manipulating footage to incite them.

If ABC, CBS, or NBC had tried to pull the same thing, getting yanked off the public airwaves would be the least of their concern.

[eridani]

14. It wasn't shut down

Its license to use the public air waves wasn't renewed. If it had been shut down, what's it doing still broadcasting on cable and satellite?

[cynatnite]

16. Well, it was shut down...just found this....

"Some of RCTV's programs could be seen in other countries on various channels; RCTV, together with Globovisión, had also created TV Venezuela, a premium subscription channel available to those with a DirecTV service."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RCTV#Programming_and_international_broadcasting

If you check into TV Venezuela you'll find that network can only be watched by people here in the US with a Direct TV subscription. So technically, the station wasn't shut completely down. It's just blocked from people in Venezuela watching it because Chavez didn't like them.

[killbotfactory]

18. They are shut down because they advocated for the violent overthrow of the government

as well as violating many decency laws.

In what kind of bizarro world is this acceptable?

[prolesunited]

21. Only in the one where you only watch MSM

and have your opinion shaped by the same U.S. leaders who actively participated in the attempted coup.


But the crucial figure around the coup was Abrams, who operates in the White House as senior director of the National Security Council for 'democracy, human rights and international opera tions'. He was a leading theoretician of the school known as 'Hemispherism', which put a priority on combating Marxism in the Americas.

It led to the coup in Chile in 1973, and the sponsorship of regimes and death squads that followed it in Argentina, El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala and elsewhere. During the Contras' rampage in Nicaragua, he worked directly to North.

Congressional investigations found Abrams had harvested illegal funding for the rebellion. Convicted for withholding information from the inquiry, he was pardoned by George Bush senior

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,688071,00.html

[killbotfactory]

22. I wonder why those facts are being left out of the story in the US?

Golly, I wonder.

[cynatnite]

26. OMG Decency laws! Did someone say 'fuck' on air?

And why weren't those individuals who wanted a new government arrested? Arresting the people who advocated seems far more reasonable than shutting it down in order to replace it with a pro-Chavez station.

I'm really surprised at how many progressives support shutting down media who don't kiss the government's ass.

[rinsd]

39. Maybe they showed Janet's tittie?

[rinsd]

38. "as well as violating many decency laws." Oh no did they show Janet's tittie too!

Well thank god Chavez did the sensible thing and forced the station off the air so he can replace it with more government and god fearing programming! :sarcasm:

[eridani]

24. "The neutrality of this article or section is disputed"

Enough said.

[cynatnite]

27. The section I DID NOT quote from is being disputed...

If you have information to contradict, please let us know.

[eridani]

34. OK, from that same section--

"RCTV still has the right to operate on satellite and cable. Currently, they have not chosen to broadcast on paid services."

All they have to do is choose to operate there.

[prolesunited]

19. Wow, you should really start reading some alternative news sources

and read up on your history of South America before making such ill-informed statements.

[cynatnite]

28. Do you have sources that contradicts my statements?

Please check out my other posts and see how uninformed I am. I did read unfortunate resources such as BBC and a few other international publications.

[prolesunited]

33. Let's start with what country

Chavez plans to invade and/or destroy?

BBC is "unfortunate"? Does that mean they present things that contradict the USA is great meme?

[rinsd]

40. He called Chavez "a nutjob with delusions of granduer" along with Bush and the leader of Iran

I am unsure if that means he is predisposed to invading other countries or is simply an autocratic asshat determined to solidify his hold on power.

You would have to ask the other poster.

[rinsd]

41. You should start reading some of those sources with a critical eye.

Never fails to amaze me that people "wise up" to the agenda of MSM only to swallow whole opinion based news reporting.

[sam sarrha]

36. he didnt shut it down, still on cable and radio. their license for "Air Waves" expired and was not

renewed do to the fact they supported the Illegal Coup and advocated Mayhem during an election..all against Federal law.. so it wasn't renewed

[MrPrax]

25. Great point...

It's quite surprising that an outfit like RWB would have an 'ideological' problem with public broadcasting...there is sure enough of it in places like France.

:shrug:

(Oh wait a minute...it's corporatism again...all information must pass through information cartels...things like public broadcasting are a threat and so anyone, you or I OR Chavez, would probably run afoul of RWB, CNN, and all the rest of the shameless profit driven companies exploiting the public's airwaves)

Here's a list of national broadcasters in Europe according to their wikipedia:

Europe

* ARD (broadcaster) — working partnership of German public-service broadcasters
o Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk — Leipzig
o Westdeutscher Rundfunk — Cologne
o Norddeutscher Rundfunk — Hamburg
o Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg — Berlin
o Bayerischer Rundfunk — Munich
o Südwestrundfunk — Stuttgart
o Saarländischer Rundfunk — Saarbrücken
o Hessischer Rundfunk — Frankfurt
o Radio Bremen — Bremen
* Arte — France / Germany
* BBC — United Kingdom
* BRF — German-speaking Community of Belgium
* BNT — Bulgaria
* BVN — Flanders and Netherlands television
* Česká televize — Czech Republic
* Channel 4 — United Kingdom
* Danmarks Radio — Denmark
* Duna TV— Hungary
* ERT — Greece
* ETV — Estonia
* France Télévisions
* GBC — Gibraltar
* HRT — Croatia
* LRT — Lithuania
* MRT — FYR Macedonia
* Magyar Televízió — Hungary
* NRK — Norway
* ORF — Austria
* PBS — Malta
* Publieke Omroep — Netherlands
o VARA
o VPRO
* RTP — Portugal
* Radio France
* RAI — Italy
* RAS — South Tyrol, Italy
* RTBF — Wallonia, Belgium
* RTCG — Montenegro
* RTÉ — Ireland
* RTS — Serbia
* RTSH — Albania
* RTVE — Spain
* RTV Slovenija — Slovenia
* RÚV — Iceland
* S4C — Wales, United Kingdom
* Slovak Television — Slovakia
* SRG SSR idée suisse — Switzerland
* Sveriges Radio — Sweden
* Sveriges Television — Sweden
* UR — Sweden
* Turkish Radio and Television Corporation — Turkey
* TVR — Romania
* TVP — Poland
* Sjónvarp Føroya — Faroe Islands
* VRT — Flanders, Belgium
* Yleisradio — Finland
* ZDF — Germany


Why would RWB suggest that this is all that unusual....oh right...reporters WITHOUT borders!!

<-- National broadcaster>
<--another one>

Corporatists hate that shit...they want total control over information and it's distribution. It's not a Chavez thing.

[vincent_vega_lives]

32. This is not very convincing.

During the oil strike of 2002-2003, the station repeatedly called upon its viewers to come out into the street and help topple the government. As part of its continuing political campaign against the government, the station has also used false allegations, sometimes with gruesome and violent imagery, to convince its viewers that the government was responsible for such crimes as murders where there was no evidence of government involvement.

The question remains, did the station or members of acually advocate violence or encourage protest?