It is one thing to read the everyday fascistic acts the regime resorts to on a daily basis, it is another to live through it and to watch how the minds are affected.
Today, at my occasional week day brunch joint, they were out of the papers I read. Only Ultimas Noticias was available. So, to eat my early arepa lunch washed down with fresh squeezed OJ, I had to buy Noticias de lo Ultimo Ultimas Noticias. It is not that this paper is bad. Although indulgent with the regime we need to keep in mind that it is not written for people like me: it is a tabloid and not the NYT. The news are thus short, analysis is brief, when available, the concerns are of everyday life, dressed in man on foot vocabulary. Just reading the everyday needs of the population is, by the way, condemnation enough of the regime which explains why Ultimas Noticias has come under fire on occasion. (1)
Still, Ultimas Noticias by its circulation has always attracted some noted writers for its OpEd pieces. That does not mean they are good, it just mean that people in the know are supposed to read them. On Mondays Jose Vicente Rangel signs a piece, and thus for the first time in years I read it. With difficulty. (2)
Certainly JVR has lost any credibility in public opinion. Besides his sting in several government positions under Chavez, he has gone from pseudo investigative journalist (he was already of the type to throw a stone and hide the hand well before Chavez) to chavismo cheer leader and political "negotiator". Apparently that "negotiator" position has faded some lately, as Chavez is gone and the opposition is refurbished and breathing on chavismo's neck. This certainly goes a long way to explain some of the silly to hysterical unfounded accusations he has proffered such as the opposition buying 18 fighter planes to attack Venezuela from Colombia.
What I am going to discuss below are some excerpts of his column today. There is nothing newsworthy, my aim is to try to make understand the reader that people like JVR are trying to fill up the head of the chavista hoi polloi with garbage, of a fascist nature. (3)
The first part of the piece is an all out attack on Capriles, rehashing once again the post April 14 events. That what JVR writes (about the deaths and damages) has been mostly disproven since does not seem to affect him. For JVR Capriles became mad through his defeat (enloquecio, violento, desconsiderado, la desesperacion lo desbordo). Observe that JVR puts all the blame on Capriles, is careful to sugar coat is depth charges by recognizing a honorable score upon which to build, but of course sweeping aside all the fraud charges that are of the public domain now, such as "voto asistido" and the death voting. (4)
Once JVR has done his character assassination of Capriles (again, not the opposition, which I am sure will get its own OpEd any time soon), the rest of the article is just praise for Maduro. What is more interesting is that JVR accompanies his articles with a few comments on other matters, as is the usage in Venezuela for some OpEd writers. Of course his additional comments are also designed to trash Capriles further.
JVR blames Capriles for hunger in Guarenas as him being the local governor. Certainly if Capriles had access to his full legal budget he would have dealt with hunger in Guarenas but JVR conveniently forgets to mention that roughly half of the states budget is robbed by the regime. Amen of the recession in Guarenas, caused by the regime.
But the most illustrative example is when JVR tries to trash the electoral observations of IAEE. Without any evidence he claims that the IAEE is financed by "powerful economic interests of Colombia and Spain" without naming a single one (of course, they would sue him whereas Capriles cannot sue JVR in Venezuelan courts because it is a waste of time). But that is not the best part: JVR claims that IAEE is a mickey mouse institution, forgetting to mention that the CNE invited them because it was prestigious and fair..... But now that IAEE has revealed the hard truth, they are in the dog house and will not be invited again.
I trust that with these simple examples you will see how sordid people like JVR have become (well, he was always a piece of work, but now he is unfettered). The problem with people like JVR is that inside the regime too many take him at face value, finding in him an excuse to continue operating as they do. And this, my friends, is how fascism works, feeding the feeble minded and the corrupt with what is passed as intellectual work.
NOTE: some may object at my usage of fascist on JVR for someone who was, after all, the standard bearer of the left in some pre Chavez elections. But if JVR was writing from the communist totalitarian angle he would have bagged together Capriles and the opposition; he would have trashed the IAEE as enemy of the people and not just sold out; and such. But JVR chooses to part things in a more analytic or intellectual way, trying to pretend to occupy the high ground, which is what fascists do when they try to prove that communists are inferior beings. He represents now a cause, not a people; and that is why I write he has turned fascist.
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1) Ultimas Noticias has been bought by a still mysterious group so it is to be expected that it will start additional self censorship.
2) For full disclosure I need to remind the readers that JVR hacks have had him cite my name in his Sunday garbage show. Thus I have no qualms trashing him the way he trashed me, though I certainly have more evidence against him than he had against me.
3) By the way, this is not my first attempt at exposing the creep that JVR is. You may want, at random, read that 2007 entry were there was already an invasion from Colombia in the works. Now we assume it has 18 planes.
4) Two fraud charges that the regime cannot get rid of, no matter what the CNE and courts decide is those people that were accompanied to the voting machine by a PSUV agent (videos available) or those voting centers where 100% participation was reported even though some of the voters were dead. Whether these actions are enough to reverse the results is a matter of discussion but that they took place should be a matter of grave concern for all, starting with the CNE.