26 May 2007

Oppose Censorship In Venezuala

To prevent another anti-democratic move, I am backing this campaign to protect the freedom of the press in Venezuela. By inciting violence against the media in Venezuela, Hugo Chavez has already undermined the workings of the press and caused self-censorship. The growing coalition backing this campaign includes the European Parliament, the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations (including Senators Lugar, Dodd, Clinton, Obama, Kennedy, and McCain) and organizations as diverse as Reporters Without Borders, the Committee to Protect Journalists, Human Rights Watch, and Amnesty International.

Disgusting Hypocrites

Meanwhile, certain so-called democrats from the British Labour Party and the "liberal elite" stand side-by-side with Chavez. First this from Labour MP Colin Burgon in the Guardian and then this letter in the same rag.

For all of Cruddas' blather of democracy as he pitches for the Deputy Leadership, don't forget that he is strongly in favour of ID cards - 3 million Venezuelans are discriminated against for signing a petition in 2004. It is deeply worrying that Cruddas and others on this list are influential within the UK's governing party. Turns out that both MPs on this list have previous with Chavez. Still unsure? More on Chavez here. And don't forget the price that Chavez put on the cheap oil that he supplies to London's Mayor - Ken Livingstone. Genetic scanning and fingerprinting and cctv technologies. Source.

Rather puts the grammar schools debate into perspective. Well it ought to.

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'd point out that it is important that somebody somewhere in the world is stupid/corrupt enough to run a socialist experiment every few years, just to prove that, no, it still doesn't work.

Anonymous said...

They are the same no brainers and paid for arse lickers that support the Zombie President of Cuba Mr PT...

Ross said...

Even if Cruddas wasn't making himself Hugo Chavez's bitch, anyone who signs one of those pompous group letters to the Guardian should be barred from holding any office ever.

Anonymous said...

If a TV station in Britain was constantly calling for an uprising against the democratically elected government I would probably have issues with it too. Get over it you reactionary pillocks

Ross said...

It's amazing how Chavez groupies are so abysmally ignorant about their hero. Hint: Hugo Chavez is not exactly a stranger to coup d'etats against the elected government.

Chris Paul said...

Would and should a future British Government tolerate a TV station calling for the overthrow of democratically elected politicians, anarchy and servitude to the USA? Rhetorical.

Old BE said...

Chris Paul and the anonymong:

Don't you think that bad ideas should be exposed as bad rather than banned?

That's the difference between the Labour Party and the rest of the human race: we want to decide for ourselves, you want to decide for us and tell us you're doing it in our own best interest.

It amazes me that these politicians and more in the Labour Party actually do seem to think that elected dictatorships (in the UK and Venezuela) are perfectly normal and desirable.

Chris Paul said...

My question was of course rhetorical for the UK, and for the UK I might well accept that some kind of The Day-to-Day meets Tiswas fronted by Nick Griffin and Margaret Hodge and calling for a broomstick rebellion, a military putsch and a following fascist dictatorship could be tolerated as absurd.

However in Venezuela the question is real and elected leaders of whatever politics cannot yet afford the luxury of being media libertarians.

In your hatred of lefties you are completely missing the point. Which is that IN VENEZUELA at the moment no democratically elected (and let's be honest extremely popular with the broad population) politician could tolerate sponsored uprisings with foreign support AND unfettered propaganda.

The foreign support is hard to deal with but unfettered destructive propaganda is.

I'm no expert on Venezuela but I do think it is pointless using London values to crow about this.

Stephen Newton said...

Ed doesn't seem to understand that democracy doesn't work when a country's institutions refuse to accept the people's choice. Given that the station calls for the violent overthrow of an elected government, to remain logically consistent Ed should argue that those who supported the IRA's bombing campaigns (including Brighton) were equally legitimate.

Chris Paul said...

I agree with Newton's Theory. Blogged it here. Come over and have your say ... if you haven't realised how bonkers your position is.

Chris Paul said...

There's more here now. Goodness you lot are twisters.

Praguetory said...

Venezuela is one of the oldest democracies in South America. In 1992, Hugo Chavez staged a failed coup. Press freedom is dying. Let's turn this around, Stephen and Chris. At what point did you stop supporting Robert Mugabe if at all?

SocialistLily said...

I am a journalist, I live in the Wesern World. Yet, i support Chavez, You cannot demand absolute freedom of the press, there is no such thing as free speech! according to article 10 of the human rights charter freedom of speech is only a right so far as it does not interfere with other rights and so long as it does not jeopardis national or social security. the tv station in venezuala was inciting violene by criticising Chavez, anytime anyone says a word against the man, there are riots. By taking over the station, Chavez has reduced the chances of more violence in the streets of Venezuala. Unless you understand the social and political structure of Venezuala you cannot factually comment or criticise on the Venezualan government or Chavez. and if you cannot factually comment on something, you are merely expressing your ignorance.