Cynical US Sponsored Coup in Venezuala: IMF Snipers do their bit for the Empire?

Saturday April 13, 2002 23:27

by blisset

“The oil drilling is going fine but the locals are giving us a bit of trouble”

We in Dublin got advance warning on the SOA/CIA/IMF (7) coup which has just taken place in Venezuela from Greg Palast during his recent public lecture in NCAD. He had spoken to Chavez just before the lecture and he was saying to Palast at the time that he wouldn’t last a month. Well he lasted a little longer. But just a little. Just long enough for the peaking of the Israel/Palestine conflict to provide something to occupy and divert the attention of the World’s press while a cynical anti-democratic coup to took place with minimal and mindbendingly uncritical reporting on the part of the World’s mainstream media.

Cynical US Sponsored Coup in Venezuala: IMF Snipers do their bit for the Empire?

“ The oil drilling is going fine but the locals are giving us a bit of trouble”

“With the destruction of history, contemporary events themselves retreat into a remote and fabulous realm of unverifiable stories, uncheckable statistics, unlikely explanations and untenable reasoning. For every imbecility presented by the spectacle, there are only the media's professionals to give an answer, with a few respectful rectifications or remonstrations. And they are hardly extravagant, even with these, for besides their extreme ignorance, their personal and professional solidarity with the spectacle's overall authority and the society it expresses makes it their duty, and their pleasure, never to diverge from that authority whose majesty must not be threatened.”
Guy Debord (Notes on The Society of the Spectacle)

We in Dublin got advance warning on the SOA/CIA/IMF (7) coup which has just taken place in Venezuela from Greg Palast during his recent public lecture in NCAD. He had spoken to Chavez just before the lecture and he was saying to Palast at the time that he wouldn’t last a month. Well he lasted a little longer. But just a little. Just long enough for the peaking of the Israel/Palestine conflict to provide something to occupy and divert the attention of the World’s press while a cynical anti-democratic coup to took place with minimal and mindbendingly uncritical reporting on the part of the World’s mainstream media. A military coup supporting a general strike organized by business and employers associations – Yeah Right! Oil barons protecting their supply and keeping the prices of those barrels down rings truer. Just like Iraq, just like Afghanistan.

Chavez was a popular and democratically elected leader but he dared to raise a defiant finger to the Washington consensus. He began to make the Oil work for the citizens of his country. So, as so often in recent history in Latin America, he had to be taken care of. He resigned we are told repeatedly – but did he? So where’s the letter? Why can’t he be accessed for an interview? Why no public statement? (6)

Cuban representatives at the UN(1) have made no bones about bluntly stating that the whole affair was stage managed by those notorious lovers of freedom – the CIA (1). Other sources point to the hand of the notorious graduates of the (recently renamed for PR purposes) School of the Americas (3). The IMF has stated in recent times that it was prepared to support and finance an alternative administration if one presented itself.

Why did they all want rid of him?
Because he was an active opponent of neo-liberalism and the IMF with a hell of a mandate and a hell of a lot of power. He needed time for his program to take effect. Something that could not be allowed to happen if the interests of the Washington Consensus (8) were to be upheld in Latin America. Neo-liberalism is the only way to organize society that is acceptable now that ‘history has ended’. Anything else is Terrorism or Communism.
“His administration introduced a new democratic constitution which broke the power monopoly of the two hopelessly corrupt and discredited main parties and put Venezuela at the forefront in terms of progressive constitutions; introduced fundamental land reform; financed numerous progressive ecological community development projects; cracked-down on corruption; promoted educational reform which schooled over 1 million children for the first time and doubled investment in education; regulated the informal economy so as to reduce the insecurity of the poor; achieved a fairer price for oil through OPEC which significantly increased government income; internationally
campaigned tirelessly against neo-liberalism; reduced official unemployment from
18% to 13%; introduced a large-scale micro-credit program for the poor and for
women; reformed the tax system which dramatically reduced tax evasion and
increased government revenue; lowered infant mortality from 21% to 17%; tripled
literacy courses; modernized the legal system, etc., etc.” (5)
If this all worked out in the long-term it might encourage other countries to say so-long to the IMF. That is not acceptable to Bush and his cronies. Just like Nicaragua and the Sandinistas were not acceptable to Ronnie. History repeats. First time tragedy. Second time farce. How do you categorise it when it endlessly repeats while the World turns a blind eye?
The coup itself took place in a blaze of unbelievably cynical Media Manipulation (2) and already independent journalists (5) in the region are criticizing the absolutely dumb, uninformed and fundamentally propagandistic news emerging through US journalistic channels. Chavez is labeled a fascist/communist dictator despite the fact that he has received a democratic mandate – most recently in 2000. The bloodshed at the demonstration and who caused it is made to seem opaque and straightforward when this is patently not the case (9). A journalist is shot by a military sniper (7) during a military coup and the western media unquestioningly reports that this is the result of unprovoked shooting by Chavez supporters. Big Brother rears his ugly and unwelcome head again and again this year but this is so blatant a manipulation of fact and history that my head spins.

The story will not remain so simple for long. Already strong opposition (4) to the coup is growing in the country. 150,000 on the streets does not represent a democratic people’s uprising in a city of 3,000,000 and a country of 30,000,000.

For breaking news on this check out Narconews.com for the best independent journalism in Latin America and beyond on the subject.