John Chuckman

COMMENT POSTED TO AN ARTICLE BY ALAN MACLEOD IN CONSORTIUM NEWS

 

“How Journalists Demonize Venezuela’s Government, in Their Own Words”

 

https://consortiumnews.com/2019/12/20/how-journalists-demonize-venezuelas-government-in-their-own-words/

 

A very interesting piece.

And anyone expects truth in anything from America?

Inside and outside the country, Americans walk through a dense haze of lies.

It resembles a science-fiction tale, but it is real.

It’s what happens when you have an empire instead of a country.

John Chuckman

EXPANSION OF A COMMENT POSTED TO AN ARTICLE IN CHECKPOINT ASIA

 

“Trump Has Been Suggesting a Naval Blockade of Venezuela for a Year but Pentagon Won’t Take Him Seriously”

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Response to a comment:

 

Sorry, you are just wrong.

This is not, and never has been, about oil, although I’m sure American major oil companies would like buying up the assets of Venezuela’s state oil company, especially if they could be had at “fire sale” prices.

What’s going on in Venezuela is part of a larger CIA initiative in Latin American to squelch independent-minded, highly-nationalistic governments.

The Lima Group, an ad hoc organization of states, was formed as part of the initiative, to give what is essentially a CIA operation a sense of broad support on the continent, the much larger and long-established Organization of American States (OAS) having declined support.

The United States likes Latin America as it was in, say, the 1950s, as a set of plantation economies whose proprietors are highly receptive to American views and policies. It is so much easier enforcing the imperialistic aims of the decrepit Monroe Doctrine that way.

States all going their own way, according to popular will, and forming independent relationships and attachments abroad is exactly what the United States does not want to see.

Venezuela’s Maduro, who very much is not receptive to America’s views and policies, is just one of their targets, although the most prominent.

He is one hell of an effective political leader and a truly brave man. It does take extraordinary courage to stand up to the threats and pressures America can bring to bear. Just look at the example of Castro, someone the United States spent a generation trying to hurt and, literally, to kill.

He wasn’t elected, as Maduro is, but he was brave and tough, and clearly the people stood behind him. Otherwise, he could never have endured what he did – everything from an American-arranged and supplied invasion by exiles to a massive embargo and many forms of economic and political terror – bombings, fires set, places shot-up from boats – plus many serious attempts to assassinate him.

If you don’t agree with the country’s socialism, so what?

It is up to the Venezuelan people to work that out, to go through the experience of discovering what works and doesn’t work for them.

It should be unnecessary to say the United States should mind its own business, but it sadly is not. They’ve been at this dirty work of trying to discredit and overthrow an elected Venezuelan government for years, going well back into Obama’s time, that great smiling advocate for democracy, at least in speeches.

America’s economic measures, attacking everything from Venezuela’s markets and suppliers to its currency, have immensely hurt the people, circumstances CIA flacks then pitch as the harm Maduro’s government has done to the country.

I assume your use of the phrase, “economic idiot,” directly reflects that effort. The notion that Maduro is responsible for all the county’s woes is echoed and reinforced constantly in the corporate press, one of the CIA’s main mechanisms for getting things “out there.”

I note, too, though, that it is closely embraced by alternative Internet sites of the Alt-Right, perhaps even more fanatically than by the mainline press. It is a reminder that being independent often doesn’t really mean “independent,” if you see what I mean.

The people elected Maduro, twice, apart from having elected his predecessor, the much beloved Hugo Chavez, founder of the political movement, and Maduro remains pretty popular despite all the American-imposed hardship.

Immensely so, when contrasted with the unpopularity of the man the United States tried foisting off as President, Juan Guaidó, a man who hadn’t even run for the office but laughably administered an oath of office to himself. Even a humble peasant can understand the absurdity of that.

The great and enduring irony of all America’s many interventions abroad is that it can’t even run its own country. Just have a good look around at the United States, close-up and away from its privileged and beautiful places.

There are millions of Americans in immense poverty. There is just plain squalor to be seen in a thousand places. Many landscapes and cityscapes literally resemble the Third World. And the country’s infrastructure – of every description, from drinking water equipment to school buildings and to roads and bridges – is just in awful shape.

How are Americans qualified to tell anyone how to run their country?

John Chuckman

EXPANSION OF COMMENT POSTED TO AN ARTICLE IN CBC NEW

 

“Venezuelans gather as Guaido calls for more protests amid uprising

“Russia, which backs Maduro, warns U.S. over ‘aggressive’ moves in Venezuela”

 

Guaido is simply a nincompoop.

I think that’s just about the right word to describe him.

His “uprising” just completely failed, embarrassingly so if you pay attention to details not discussed here.

One of his associates sought refuge in the Chilean Embassy.

He just goes on blubbering in CIA-made videos few even watch.

The people, the great majority, stood solidly with the elected, constitutional government of the country.

So did the army.

Guaido had, as his army, a relatively small number of men from the National Guard in uniform wearing blue armbands. They failed to achieve anything anywhere except some noise and threats.

By all traditions in every single country, Guaido should be put on trial for treason, but I think Maduro will avoid that, which would only heat things up.

John Bolton is left spluttering in Washington about “all options are on the table,” something he has tiresomely repeated at least four hundred times. Such classy diplomatic language, too.

As for Canada’s Ms. Freeland, Bolton’s willing helper from the True North, well, who knows, or even cares, what she is doing?

She is a very sad representative for our country’s traditional values.

You can’t get further away from those values than opposing an elected government, instead supporting someone who was not elected, someone who didn’t even run in the election, just because the United States says it is the thing to do.

Readers should note that this piece comes from Reuters.

It is widely understood that that is a news service which has been closely associated with the CIA in the past.

That fact may account for its tone, which is not in keeping with what actually appears to have happened, as I have pieced together from several other sources.

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Response to a comment saying that I defend dictators who starve their own people:

You really should know the words to the music before standing up to sing.

Maduro cannot be called a dictator because he was elected, twice.

The polls say the people still strongly support him.

He has starved no one.

Indeed, his government has worked very hard to keep the food supplies flowing, even opening temporary stores in some districts.

It is the severe American-imposed sanctions which starve people. There have been sanctions against Venezuela of varying degrees since Obama’s time, a man who consistently did the CIA’s bidding.

Oh, and let’s not forget that ugly American stunt of disabling the county’s electrical system which certainly would have resulted in ruining food in millions of ordinary people’s fridges.

The United States’ government has hated the Venezuelan revolutionary government since its beginning with Chavez, someone who was also an elected leader and a very popular one.

America wants to reimpose the plantation system it has supported and protected in Latin America going back for many, many decades, but that system is starting to fall apart, and America’s establishment is very angry about that.

It keeps reminding us of nonsense like “the Monroe Doctrine,” as though it were quoting holy scripture.

https://chuckmanwordsincomments.wordpress.com/2019/04/20/john-chuckman-comment-who-was-james-monroeand-why-would-high-american-officials-cite-his-doctrine-today-just-one-more-example-of-the-dangerous-absurdity-into-which-america-sinks/

Your charges against me personally show no knowledge of me and very little politesse, to say the least.

I am in fact a writer (in my retirement from industry) with a sizable body of work. The record couldn’t be clearer concerning what I stand for.

I’m a classic liberal who loves freedom and democracy and human rights and peace. I hate oppression and bullying and brutality – which is precisely what I see America doing in Venezuela.

Saying anything else, as you did, is wrong and, really, quite shameful.

 

John Chuckman

COMMENT POSTED TO AN ARTICLE IN CBC NEWS

 

“Canada joins multilateral move to send Venezuelan government to International Criminal Court”

 

This is beyond ridiculous, and, as a Canadian, I am ashamed.

Justin Trudeau is doing John Bolton’s bidding. The several South American countries are only a front.

Bolton doesn’t even accept the legitimacy of the International Court, yet it is okay to use and abuse it to get at a government he hates. He just recently condemned it and threatened its judges with sanctions if they tried any American or Israeli.

Trudeau’s father, Pierre, did not bend to the United States on the matter of Castro despite a great deal of pressure. While the US was busy trying to destabilize Cuba and assassinate Castro, Trudeau’s father visited Cuba, established friendships, and started new areas of trade and business.

But here is Justin going along with Washington’s nasty games.

What I expect is that once the horror that is the administration in Washington gets any kind of decision out of any international body, it will exploit it to invade Venezuela.

This is a democratic government. It is having a terrible time because the CIA has been drilling away at its foundations for several years, doing all kinds of dirty tricks, just as they once did to Cuba.

So, Justin Trudeau decides to play along. Just shameful.