…and when Chavistas do it, it’s just a “stunt”.
SUPPORTERS of Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez waved raw meat at hunger strikers yesterday, in mockery of a protest against alleged human rights abuses.More than 50 students have been on hunger strike to highlight cases of jailed Chavez opponents. A small group of his backers tried to set up a barbecue outside a Caracas building where a dozen hunger strikers have been camped for three weeks.
Gee, do you think the anglo whore media is a wee bit biased up there in Scotland? I know the Dissociated Press sure is:
A congressman-elect said Wednesday he has been released from house arrest, apparently because of a three-week hunger strike by students who demanded that opponents of President Hugo Chavez be freed.
Biagio Pilieri was elected to Venezuela’s congress in September, but has been unable to take his seat due to charges he was involved in corruption during his 2000-2004 tenure as mayor of the western city of Bruzual. Pilieri told the Globovision television channel that he was eager to enter the National Assembly.
It is not clear if he is now able to serve. Pilieri’s attorney, Norma Delgado, told Union Radio he was granted “conditional liberty,” meaning the charges against him remain active.
Felix Herrera, another lawyer on Pilieri’s defense team, told Globovision the former mayor was prohibited from leaving the country and must appear in court every 30 days.
Pilieri denied any wrongdoing: “We’ve shown that we are innocent.”
Pilieri’s release came a day after dozens of student activists ended a hunger strike that began on Jan. 31 to demand the release of more than two dozen Chavez foes they consider political prisoners.
Julio Cesar Rivas, who helped organize the hunger strike, called the judge’s decision to release Pilieri “an important signal.”
“We are very happy,” Rivas said in an e-mail sent to The Associated Press.
Notice their sourcing? Globovisión and Union Radio–two rabidly anti-Chávez channels. Nope, no bias there. Also, nothing from VTV or any other unstinky sources.
As for Pa’Julio, maybe they’d like to take a closer look at him, too…he’s not the innocent boy he makes himself out to be. The oppos recently had a little tweet-a-thon that went nowhere. Maybe because their thuggish “student leaders” aren’t really serious people:
“Hi, I’m Julio César Rivas and this is my photo against the DICTATORSHIP.”
And if you really wanna know how whorish they are at the AP’s LatAm desk, look what they buried at the very bottom of that piece. A kernel of reality, just a wee small one:
Chavez vehemently denies his government has used judges and prosecutors to target adversaries.
Justice Minister Tareck El Aissami, who had meet with hungers strikers to discuss their demands, said Wednesday that “democracy triumphed” after the students ended their protest.
El Aissami did not comment on Pilieri’s case, but he told Union Radio that it is impossible to release all prominent Chavez opponents who have been jailed because some have been sentenced on serious charges such as murder.
That’s just three paragraphs. Compare that to the eleven that the oppos got, in which nothing they say was questioned. Whereas there’s plenty of room for doubting Chavecito’s and Tareck’s words in the excerpt above, wouldn’t you say?
And get that very last bit: “…some have been sentenced on serious charges such as murder.” Now, why do you suppose they buried THAT at the bottom? Could it be that they just don’t want to admit that the Venezuelan oppos have a real fascist death fetish going on there?
Nawwww…couldn’t be!
When all else fails, wank and the Dissociated Press will republish it. Without criticism. Because they’re just so fair and unbiased that way.
Hello ‘Bina! Long time, no? Say, I was trolling the Seder board (www.samsedershow.com) and I spotted THIS POST from casual contributor ghettodefender:
Obama Requests Funding For Venezuelan Opposition in 2012 Budget
This week, US President Barack Obama presented Congress with a $3.7 trillion dollar budget for 2012, the most expensive budget in United States history. Within his massive request, which proposes cuts in important social programs and federal jobs throughout the country, is a partition for special funding for anti-Chavez groups in Venezuela.
Included in the whopping $3.7 trillion request is over $670 billion for the Pentagon’s ever-increasing annual budget, nearly $75 billion for the intelligence community and $55.7 billion for the State Department and the US Agency for International Development (USAID).
For the first time in recent history, the Foreign Operations Budget (State Department) openly details direct funding of at least $5 million to anti-Chavez groups in Venezuela…
The story is from ChavezCode.com (Postcards from the Revolution) Obama Requests Funding For Venezuelan Opposition in 2012 Budget . It goes on to point out The State Department’s public disclosure of 2012 funding for the Venezuelan opposition comes just after the Venezuelan National Assembly passed a law prohibiting foreign funding for political activities in late December 2010. The Law in Defense of Political Sovereignty and National Self-Determination clearly renders all foreign funding for political campaigns, parties and organizations, including NGOs, that engage in political activities, illegal. How exactly does Washington propose to channel those $5 million to Venezuelan groups, when such financing clearly constitutes a violation of Venezuelan law?
…
The State Department budget also requests $20 million in funding for anti-Castro groups in Miami and elsewhere to continue efforts to undermine the Cuban Revolution.
Do US taxpayers know their hard-earned dollars are going to fund political activities in other nations instead of being invested in jobs, healthcare and social programs in their own country?
The anti-democratic USAID and the State Dept have EGG ALL OVER THEIR FACES as they waited and waited before supporting the Reformer Protesters in Egypt and elsewhere, and now are standing by the sidelines as one dictatorial/”royal” regime after another falls in the ME and Northern Africa. What to do? Redirect their efforts to topple a true democracy in Venezuela! Look for them to trump up “Chavez the Dictator” with their corporate-controlled “free press” in the US of A to build Chavez up as the next bogeyman (also sitting on their #3 importer of oil, mostly nationalized.) Again, it’s the “What are THOSE people doing living on top of OUR OIL?” card the neo-lib war mongers will play.
imbillorightsmanandiapprovethismessage
Hey, BillO! Sorry this took so long to get a response, it was waiting in my spam filter (onaccounta all the links). Good thing I found it and fished it out. You should be able to comment anytime now without waiting for moderation, as long as you don’t overdo it with linkage. (I can also reset the link filter if it happens again. Legitimate comments shouldn’t have to suffer in spam-filter ignominy like that.)
Yes, this is a scandal, all right. The White House is undoubtedly looking to tie Chávez to Gaddafi; good luck with that, since he’s not in Venezuela! And they’re not making matters any better now by talking “sanctions” against Libya, either. Won’t do a thing to budge Gaddafi. All it’ll end up doing is hurting ordinary Libyans. If they sent in the marines, at least the “shores of Tripoli” line in their fight song would start to make sense again.