Letter Never Sent

The US-supported coup against Hugo Chavez backfired and now the US looks like a deceitful liar. Bush himself repeated the lies that Chavez had resigned. The statements around the world repeating that Chavez had resigned, despite any evidence, were craven attempts to pass on the necessary legitimacy to the corporate junta which had hoped to rule. It is disgusting that the US took such measures to support a coup against a democratically elected official and played a part offering succor and vocal support to the coup.

In an article today the Bush administration chided from atop their moral high ground that Chavez should respect democracy and constitutional process. HUH? They are the ones who supported oil executive, Pedro Carmona as the new dictator of Venezuela. The first thing Carmona did was dissolve the government and the constitution. Even if Chavez had really resigned his vice-president should have taken over. The Bush administration is simply trying to save face in what is shaping up to be a huge embarrassment for them since they had made it abundantly clear that they had no problems with an extraconstitutional seizure of power.

In sharp contrast to several Latin American countries that denounced Friday’s irregular transition of power, the United States had said Chavez was responsible for his own ouster.

Bush also repeated the half-truths about the demonstrations, implying that the protests were simply a peaceful expression by Venezuelans opposed to Chavez’s policies: Chavez “suppressed what was a peaceful demonstration of the people. … It led very quickly to a combustible situation in which Chavez resigned.” The truth is the protests were arranged and controlled by the corporate interests which led the coup. The private media in Venezuela actively attempted to control and manipulate information. Eye-witnesses reported that the corporate media in Venezuela urged people to hit the streets to protest and also tried to give the impression that Chavez had resigned after having ordered soldiers to fire on civilians. There is no evidence of any of this. Even once people hit the streets again to protest Chavez’s ouster the media downplayed the numbers and aired almost no footage of it. This differs greatly from how they charged the previous protests.

You can expect some heads to roll despite the talk of reconciliation. If I played some part in the coup I would hit the road. Condoleezza Rice, clearly attempting to protect the Bush Amdimistration’s friends among the corporate junta, admonished Chavez that “This is no time for a witch hunt. This is a time for national reconciliation in Venezuela.”

Related links:

1. U.S. Advises Chavez to Respect Democracy What a laugh!
2. Popular Uprising Allows Chavez to Reclaim Venezuelan Presidency (Ny Times)
3. BBC: Chavez returns to power “The US, which had previously said Mr Chavez’s ousting was not a coup, responded to his return with stern words.” Yeah, but what do you expect from liars in the US government.
4. In pictures: Chavez defies opponents Great photos.
5. Acting Leader Of Venezuela Steps Down
   Term Ends After One Day As Pro-Chavez Protests Grow: “This was a fascist coup,” said Rafael Rojas Rincon, a 38-year-old doctor and one of more than 50,000 pro-Chavez protesters outside Miraflores. “This government is a farce, representing nobody.”

6. A Coup by Any Other Name Great article. “What else to call the fall on Friday of Venezuela’s president, Hugo Chávez? An armed transition of power? By any other name, though its European and Latin American allies deplored it, it was a consummation devoutly wished for by the White House.”
7. Forbes: Coup D’Etat In Venezuela Will Let Oil Flow Written before Chavez regained power.
8. NARCONEWS! Great coverage.

Narconews has been doing a great job of covering the Chavez coup. Actually, Narconews is a great resource for information on the Drug War and on Central South America in general. Definitely check them out. Here are some good links I’ve snatched off their site:

1. Coup Questions Journalists should be asking
2. Gunpoint democracy from SFGate.com: Leading the junta is Pedro Carmona, leader of the nation’s business lobby. With no apparent legal authority, he dismissed the entire Congress and Supreme Court, abolished the constitution and claimed the right to fire any elected state or municipal leaders
3. Narconews: Q & A on “Remote Control Coup” Journalist Jules Siegel interviews
   Narco News Publisher Al Giordano

4. Common Dreams News Center: Coup in Venezuela: An Eyewitness Account by Gregory Wilpert
5. EYEWITNESS: THE PLOT WAS WELL PREPARED by Maximilien Averlaiz, Caracas
6. Why US tries to overthrow Venezuelan government: Thorn in the side of new world order By Vincent Browne of the Irish Times

On the flight to Venezuela

Night was falling as Carlos Andrés Pérez got off the plane from Davos in Switzerland. He was surprised to see that General Fernando Ochoa Antich, his minister of defence, had come to meet him. “What is the matter,” Pérez asked, intrigued. Antich was so persuasive and reassuring that the president did not drive to the Miraflores palace, in the centre of Caracas, but to his residence at La Casona. He was dropping off to sleep when Antich woke him with a phonecall to tell him that a military uprising had started in the Maracay region. He had only just reached the Miraflores palace when the first artillery salvoes were heard.

That was on 4 February 1992. Colonel Hugo Chávez Frías, who has an almost religious obsession with historic dates, directed the revolt from improvised headquarters in La Planicie museum. Pérez realised that his only hope was to rally popular support and went to the television studios to speak to the nation. Two hours later the coup was over. Chávez surrendered, but on condition that he too might speak to the people.

The young Creole colonel, with his paratrooper’s red beret and admirable gift for public speaking, took full responsibility for the movement. His broadcast speech was a political master stroke. He spent two years in prison before being amnestied by President Rafael Caldera. However, many of his supporters – and opponents – realised that his speech, at a moment of defeat, was the start of an electoral campaign that would ultimately make him president of the republic.

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The plans of the IMF and corporate interests are not going as planned in Venezuela. Despite statements by the presiding military junta to the contrary there has been no evidence that Chavez resigned. His daughter reported talking to him over the telephone and he told her he had been imprisoned and had not resigned. No formal letter of resignation has been made public. Despite all the evidence of a violent extraconstitutional military coup the Bush administration is standing behind the planned military dictatorship.

This is the biggest story going on right now, but it really isn’t getting that much attention. Venezuela is the 3rd largest supplier of oil to the United States! There is nothing the US would like more than to have a ‘friendly’ government there, dictatorship or not. CNN is reporting on the pro-Chavez protests that are going on right now. The ‘interim’ government has postponed the swearing-in of the US-supported business puppet, Carmona, due to huge street protests:

Another military commander, army Gen. Julio Garcia Montoya, said in a telephone interview with Cuban television that the constitution must be followed.

“We don’t recognize de facto juntas,” Garcia said. He said Chavez’s Vice President Diosdado Cabello should be named interim president and that elections should be held within one month.

Venezuelan TV and many radio stations did not carry his comments, and have not reported on Saturday’s disturbances.

Notice how the media lines up behind the business dictatorship even in Venezuela.

Outside the presidential palace, police used tear gas to push back hundreds of Chavez supporters rallying outside the palace, chanting, “Chavez will be back!” and “Democracy, not dictatorship.” Gunshots were heard coming from Catia slum near the presidential palace. …

Mexican President Vicente Fox said his country would not recognize Venezuela’s new government until new elections are held, and the leaders of Argentina and Paraguay called the new government illegitimate. Leaders of the 19-nation Rio Group of Latin American countries condemned “the interruption of constitutional order” in Venezuela.

Since Chavez’s ouster, police and soldiers have arrested some members of his government and hunted groups of his supporters thought to have been given weapons before Chavez fell.

Pro-Chavez protests were reported in at least 20 neighborhoods of Caracas, as well as the cities of Los Teques, Guarenas, Maracay and Coro. “We want to see Chavez. The Venezuelan people don’t buy it that he has resigned,” said Maria Brito, 36, who lives in the Catia slum.

Earlier Saturday, Carmona — who has promised elections within a year — dissolved the Chavez-controlled Congress, Supreme Court, attorney general’s and comptroller’s offices, and declared a 1999 Constitution sponsored by Chavez null and void.

This is the “Constitution that now provides guarantees for indigenous rights and women’s rights, free health care and education up to the university level. To reduce corruption Chavez has restructured the judicial and legislative branches. The government serves breakfast and lunch to schoolchildren year round and enrollment has increased by over a million students.” Later the new dictatorship met with their friends in the US and EU.

“There have been detentions that are not legal and don’t respect the Constitution,” said Liliana Ortega, director of the local Cofavic rights organization. New York-based Human Rights Watch warned that rights and the rule of law were threatened in Venezuela.

Thousands of Cubans demonstrated Saturday in Havana to protest Chavez’s removal. Cuba’s government condemned the harassment and called on the United Nations to investigate the overthrow of Chavez

Earlier Saturday, Carmona and newly appointed Foreign Minister Jose Rodriguez Iturbe met with the ambassadors of the United States and Spain, which holds the rotating presidency of the European Union. Officials did not immediately give any details of the talks.

In a case of birds of a feather flocking together, the Bush administration has applauded the coup of Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez. As Steve from Ethel the Blog points out, Chavez’s real sins are what led the US to support the coup:

Chavez won Presidential elections in 1998 and again in 2000 by the largest majority in four decades. He has been governing Venezuela following the principles of a new social movement called the Bolivarianism, named after the South American independence hero, Simón Bolívar. Nearly all Venezuelans were eager for drastic change. They wanted a new government that would eradicate corruption and graft, and redirect the money from the vast oil fields away from the multinationals towards the 80% of the Venezuelans living in poverty.
Using his enormous popularity, Chavez has managed to implement an unprecedented amount of reforms. To highlight just a few, Chavez has ratified a new Constitution that now provides guarantees for indigenous rights and women’s rights, free health care and education up to the university level. To reduce corruption Chavez has restructured the judicial and legislative branches. The government serves breakfast and lunch to schoolchildren year round and enrollment has increased by over a million students. In a change that affected the world economy, Chavez reinvigorated OPEC, raising oil prices from $8 a barrel to $27 – currently the price is $18 a barrel.

So, he’s popular and he works to help the poor majority of his nation. That’s the whole problem. We can’t have someone providing a bad example like that. The current thief in the Whitehouse, Senor Bush, got up on his high horse and intoned, “This man was elected by the people. We respect democracy in our country, and we hope he respects the democratic institutions within his country.” Okay, what does that have to do with him being overthrown by the military? His deposal was not the product of democracy! Bush, obviously, is unclear on the subject.

Despite what has been reported by most of the media, Chavez never resigned. He is at this moment, in prison by the hands of the military junta which the US has expressly and loudly supported. Venezuela is now being ruled by a prominent businessman and by the leaders of the coup.

The exact circumstances of how Mr. Chávez left office remained unclear today, but the former president’s strident supporters as well as some political experts were concerned that he did not resign, violating the Constitution. The interim government caused further concern as it began wiping away vestiges of Mr. Chávez’s rule, dissolving the National Assembly, which Mr. Chávez controlled, firing the Supreme Court members and repealing a series of “revolutionary” laws approved in December.

“This is a classic coup,” said Teodoro Petkoff, editor of the Caracas newspaper Tal Cual and a strident critic of Mr. Chávez who nonetheless is concerned about the changeover in power. “There no letter of resignation for Chávez. We do not see it anywhere.”

The Bush administration has as little respect for the Venezuelan constitution as it has for our own Constitution.

It’s finally happened. The democratically elected government of Hugo Chavez has been overthrown by the military. The IMF and the US have been very outspoken about the fact that they would financially support a ‘transitional’ government once Chavez has been removed. The US has already been busy grooming his replacement, Alfredo Peña, the Mayor of Caracas. In December Pena visited the State Department and the World Bank in Washington. Chavez has been on the Evil Empire’s bad side for a while “for not allowing drug-surveillance flights over Venezuela, being opposed to plan Colombia and working with OPEC.” Basically, Chavez has been acting like the leader of his country instead of as a cabana boy for the US.

This is exactly the same strategy they used with Chile when the US Government helped in the coup there and with the assassination of Salvadore Allende. Be proud of your corrupt government, a supporter of assassination and dictatorship. Money and oil take precedence over freedom and democracy for the United States. My thoughts go out to the Venezuelan people tonight.