Vezuela offers to recieve Guantanamo detinee's

[Ecofarm]

Chavez hated Bush, not America, is what i understood from him. I guess he doesn't mind Obama. They are also both the first Minority presidents of their countries, maybe Chavez likes him cause of that? Though i doubt race has anything to do with it...

Chavez probably will get along better with Obama than he did with Bush (I don't see Chavez calling Obama 'the devil'), but it doesn't look like they are off to a very good start....

To add to the event you reference, there is an even better one:

Sun Mar 22, 2009

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez said on Sunday his U.S. counterpart Barack Obama was at best an "ignoramus" for saying the socialist leader exported terrorism and obstructed progress in Latin America.

"He goes and accuses me of exporting terrorism: the least I can say is that he's a poor ignoramus; he should read and study a little to understand reality," said Chavez, who heads a group of left-wing Latin American leaders opposed to the U.S. influence in the region.

Chavez said Obama's comments had made him change his mind about sending a new ambassador to Washington, after he withdrew the previous envoy in a dispute last year with the Bush administration in which he also expelled the U.S. ambassador to Venezuela.

"When I saw Obama saying what he said, I put the decision back in the drawer; let's wait and see," Chavez said on his weekly television show, adding he had wanted to send a new ambassador to improve relations with the United States after the departure of George W. Bush as president.

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE52L19G20090322

He sounds like a frustrated CFCOTer.

Kind of ironic; Obama says Chavez exports terrorism and Chavez is like "hey, how about sending me those Gitmo guys". hah

ps.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez slamemd the Israeli government as "genocidal" on Wednesday in an interview on Al-Jazeera television in Doha.

"The Hebrew people do not deserve this genocidal, murderous government," said Chavez, who is in the Qatari capital, where he attended an Arab-Latin American summit on Tuesday.

Calling for "solidarity with the Palestinian people," he said "we have broken (diplomatic) relations with Israel and have no plans to restore them, even less so now."

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.a617f16aa1e8b3b201551b0572fbe7f7.761&show_article=1

I don't suppose Obama will make him happy on that issue.

 

[Bill3000]

He sounds like a frustrated CFCOTer.

 

[Formaldehyde]

You know, it's funny. Chavez has actually done many positive things to the US, offering aid, providing cheap oil for the poor etc etc and every single time, people here have just shot it down and said he's only doing it to sway public opinion, etc, etc. Of course there is an element of truth to that, but other countries dont get criticised for it when they send aid, and that not the only reason he's doing it, the oil to the poor is for ideological reasons, and of course for propaganda..

I guess you didn't watch that O'Reilly/Letterman interview yet. Chavez is a tyrant! He is evil! Burn him at the stake!

No, I meant anti-American, as in anti-American government. His words speak louder than his actions, and the US government is not going to seek cooperation with a leader that constantly criticizes it.

And vice versa. Most Americans forget that part in their rush to hate countries which have socialist governments. Gee, why do they hate us in return for merely wanting to overthrow their democratically elected government?

 

[Bill3000]

And vice versa. Most Americans forget that part in their rush to hate countries which have socialist governments. Gee, why do they hate us in return for merely wanting to overthrow their democratically elected government?

I have never even seen a neoconservative calling for the invasion of Venezuela, much less a generalized "us".

 

[Formaldehyde]

You don't have to invade a country to overthrow its government, much less advocate it as the neocons have been doing for years now.

Or don't you remember Iran, Chile, and numerous attempts on Cuba?

http://www.dailynewscaster.com/2009/01/09/fox-news-venezuela-more-dangerous-than-the-middle-east/

FOX NEWS - Venezuela more dangerous than the Middle East!

“We have to make Venezuela a state sponsor of terrorism. We have to isolate him [Hugo Chavez]. And we have to make it clear that we are going to move away from relying on Citgo and their oil.” Neocon Shoen continues by saying, “Why do we have to talk to these people? What do they have to say?”

 

[Patroklos]

Please find any conservative of note, or even better one in power, advocating the forced overthrow of the Chavez.

 

[JollyRoger]

I wonder if Chavez's lawyer put him up to this. Rudy Giuliani can be pretty clever sometimes.

 

[Formaldehyde]

Please find any conservative of note, or even better one in power, advocating the forced overthrow of the Chavez.

You mean like this?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/apr/21/usa.venezuela

The failed coup in Venezuela was closely tied to senior officials in the US government, The Observer has established. They have long histories in the 'dirty wars' of the 1980s, and links to death squads working in Central America at that time.
Washington's involvement in the turbulent events that briefly removed left-wing leader Hugo Chavez from power last weekend resurrects fears about US ambitions in the hemisphere.

It also also deepens doubts about policy in the region being made by appointees to the Bush administration, all of whom owe their careers to serving in the dirty wars under President Reagan.

One of them, Elliot Abrams, who gave a nod to the attempted Venezuelan coup, has a conviction for misleading Congress over the infamous Iran-Contra affair.

The Bush administration has tried to distance itself from the coup. It immediately endorsed the new government under businessman Pedro Carmona. But the coup was sent dramatically into reverse after 48 hours.

The visits by Venezuelans plotting a coup, including Carmona himself, began, say sources, 'several months ago', and continued until weeks before the putsch last weekend. The visitors were received at the White House by the man President George Bush tasked to be his key policy-maker for Latin America, Otto Reich.

Reich is a right-wing Cuban-American who, under Reagan, ran the Office for Public Diplomacy. It reported in theory to the State Department, but Reich was shown by congressional investigations to report directly to Reagan's National Security Aide, Colonel Oliver North, in the White House.

North was convicted and shamed for his role in Iran-Contra, whereby arms bought by busting US sanctions on Iran were sold to the Contra guerrillas and death squads, in revolt against the Marxist government in Nicaragua.

Reich also has close ties to Venezuela, having been made ambassador to Caracas in 1986. His appointment was contested both by Democrats in Washington and political leaders in the Latin American country. The objections were overridden as Venezuela sought access to the US oil market.

Reich is said by OAS sources to have had 'a number of meetings with Carmona and other leaders of the coup' over several months. The coup was discussed in some detail, right down to its timing and chances of success, which were deemed to be excellent.

It led to the coup in Chile in 1973, and the sponsorship of regimes and death squads that followed it in Argentina, El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala and elsewhere. During the Contras' rampage in Nicaragua, he worked directly to North.

Congressional investigations found Abrams had harvested illegal funding for the rebellion. Convicted for withholding information from the inquiry, he was pardoned by George Bush senior.

A third member of the Latin American triangle in US policy-making is John Negroponte, now ambassador to the United Nations. He was Reagan's ambassador to Honduras from 1981 to 1985 when a US-trained death squad, Battalion 3-16, tortured and murdered scores of activists. A diplomatic source said Negroponte had been 'informed that there might be some movement in Venezuela on Chavez' at the beginning of the year.

Or this:

http://www.plenglish.com/article.asp?ID={17D51624-7DA8-4028-AA99-03E2486BCDC4})&language=EN

Caracas, Dec 26 (Prensa Latina) The disclosure that a US official attended a meeting to conspire against Venezuela corroborates the predictions that Washington intends to augment pressures against Caracas in 2006.

According to the regional Telesur TV channel, a Peruvian-born major of the US Drug Enforcement Administration, whose surname is Thomas, recently met with former Venezuelan military coupists in Bogota, Colombia.

A source, who asked for anonymity, said Thomas attended a meeting at the Colombian Administrative Security Department (DAS), as confirmed in a video later broadcast by a US channel.

The disclosure provided evidence for Venezuelan authorities´ accusations over the US involvement in subversive plans to overthrow the government of President Hugo Chavez, given the opposition has failed to defeat him in elections.

Regarding the Colombia meeting, Chavez himself submitted evidence to Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, who later admitted an official headquarter had been used for the plotting.

Nestor Gonzalez, a former Venezuelan general involved in the anti-Chavez coup, also participated in the secretive gathering.

Government officials have warned a probable increase of destabilizing actions by a radical opposition sector, backed up by the US, due to the lack of alternatives to defeat Chavez democratically.

Or this:

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0610/S00391.htm

At an October 6 public meeting in Boston, US dissident intellectual Noam Chomsky gave the following remarks on the threat posed to the radical governments of Venezuela and Bolivia by Washington in response to an audience member’s question.

We know that the US did support a military coup, which briefly overthrew [Venezuelan President Hugo] Chavez [in 2002] and the US had to back down when he was restored quickly, and also had to back down in the face of a very angry reaction in Latin America. In almost all of Latin America, there was a very angry reaction. They take democracy there more seriously then we do here.

Right after trying to overthrow the government by force, the US immediately turned to subversion, supporting anti-Chavez groups. That’s described in the press, the way it’s described is, the US is supporting pro-democracy groups, which are opposed to President Chavez.

Notice it’s true by definition that if you oppose the president, you are pro-democracy. It’s completely irrelevant that according to the best polls (Latin America has very good polling agencies which take regular polls on these issues around the continent) support for democracy has been declining — not for democracy but for the democratic governments — has been declining through Latin America, for a pretty good reason: the governments have been associated with neoliberal programs which undermine democracy — IMF [International Monetary Fund], treasury department programs … There are exceptions, and the major exception by far is Venezuela.

Since 1998, when Chavez was elected, support for the elected government has been rising very fast. It’s now by far the highest in Latin America. He has won several elections that have been recognised to be free and fair, he has won numerous referendums, but he is a “dictator”, a tin-pot dictator, which is proven by the fact that our Dear Leader said so. And, since we are voluntary North Koreans, when the Dear Leader says it, it’s true. So therefore, he’s a dictator, and if you carry out subversion to overthrow him, that’s pro-democracy by definition …

We might ask ourselves how we would react if Iran, say, had just supported a military coup that overthrew the government in the United States and when they have to back off from that, immediately turned to supporting pro-democracy groups in the United States that are opposed to the government. Would we give them ice cream and candy?

Well in dictatorial Venezuela, they let them keep functioning. In fact, [they] even let the newspapers [that supported] the coup keep functioning …

[T]he US has had two major weapons for controlling Latin America for a long time. One of them is economic controls, the other is military force. They have both been used continually. Both of them are weakening and it’s a very serious problem for US planners.

 

[Patroklos]

I fail to see anything in there about SEAL teams, Rangers, CIA assassins or unmanned drone attacks. Oh well, better luck next time eh?

Oh, we talked to some people, OMG THE OVERWHELMING FORCE!!!!

HINT: Venezuelans opposing their own government /= US forcibly overthrowing Chavez.

 

[Formaldehyde]

And what part of this statement do you have so much difficulty comprehending?

You don't have to invade a country to overthrow its government, much less advocate it as the neocons have been doing for years now.

Nice straw man. As usual.

And you seem to have forgotten your previous comment quite quickly:

Please find any conservative of note, or even better one in power, advocating the forced overthrow of the Chavez.

Which I clearly did.

As usual, you are trying to apologize for the actions of warmongering fools.

 

[Patroklos]

I asked you to show me where anyone in the US supported forcibly overthrowing the Venezuelan government. You failed to do so.

Of course we would be more than happy if Chavez was gone for whatever reason (this includes both Bush and Obama), that doesn't mean we were going to do it ourselves.

 

[Formaldehyde]

So you now admit your initial argument was a straw man all along?

And I can only post the factual articles. I can't force you to read and comprehend them. That part is up to you to do.

http://marc.perkel.com/2004/02/03/bush-to-try-again-to-overthrow-venezuela/

Sources in Washington D.C. have revealed that Bush 2 administration officials are again seeking to “stimulate” a regime change in Venezuela after a USA-backed coup d’etat against democratically-elected President Hugo Chavez Frias failed when US puppet dictator Pedro Carmona Estanga moved to dissolve parliament, the judiciary and the constitution in one fell swoop.

Our sources (which must remain confidential, but have been verified) say that Venezuelan nationals, recruited on the promise of fast-track US citizenship and benefits, have been trained in the arts of USA terror tactics at the US Army School of Americas-SOA (renamed 3 years ago as the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation-WHISC) at Fort Benning (Georgia) were relocated to training camps at Iquitos in the northern jungles of Peru under the direction of US Southern Command (Latin America & Caribbean) regional HQ at Fort Buchanan (San Juan, Puerto Rico).

SOA/WHISC commanders are said to be “smarting” over their failure to impose a US-backed military/civilian dictatorship in Venezuela in April 2002 when democratically-elected President Hugo Chavez Frias was swiftly returned to power after US-puppet dictator Pedro Carmona Estanga dissolved parliament, the judiciary and Venezuela’s constitution in one fell swoop. Carmona Estanga was not able to control the massive surge against him as millions of Venezuelans took to the streets repudiating his imposition and demanding the return of reformist Chavez Frias.

Covert US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) operatives are already in place in Venezuela as the SOA/WHISC prepares for what it is calling “a second bite at the cherry.” Bush 2 Latin America ‘enforcer’ Otto Reich has been holding top level meetings with strategists from the Venezuelan political opposition in Washington D.C. who also had meetings there last week with shadowy Venezuelan billionaire Gustavo Cisneros and former US White House insider Henry Kissinger.

http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/news/498

Sunday, May 9, 2004 (Venezuelanalysis.com).- Venezuelan authorities captured this morning a group of 55 Colombian paramilitaries who were receiving training at a farm nearby Caracas in preparation for attacks on Venezuelan military bases and for a coup d'etat against the government of Hugo Chavez.

The raid was conducted by the civilian intelligence service DISIP, military intelligence officers and the Scientific, Penal and Criminal Investigation Department (CICPC). The property where the paramilitaries were captured is located in the municipality of Baruta, in southeastern Caracas. Footage by state TV showed what appeared to be living quarters, with beds and kitchens.

According to authorities, the property where the paramilitaries were captured belongs to anti-government political leader Robert Alonso. Mr. Alonso, of Cuban origin, is a legal resident of the United States, and creator of the civilian resistance plan called "Guarimba", aimed at toppling the Chavez government and which was first implemented at the end of February in Caracas during the Presidential Summit of the Group of the 15.

Mr. Robert Alonso is one of the leaders of an opposition coalition know as Bloque Democrático (Democratic Block) and he is also tied to the larger Coordinadora Democratica opposition coalition. He is the brother of Cuban-Venezuelan actress Maria Conchita Alonso.

Ismael Garcia, a pro-government member of the legislature said that the paramilitaries who managed to escape did so through a property belonging to Cuban-Venezuelan media magnate and Chavez opponent Gustavo Cisneros. According to sources such as Newsweek, Cisneros was one on the main architects of the April 11 of 2002 coup against Chavez.

 

[Ecofarm]

Sources =

The Observer (who established fact by historical precidence), plenglish.com, and scoop.co.nz

Get a mainstream source.

:rollie eyes:

Please, if we can just post articles by any random blog than we can "prove" anything. At least I note when my source is wacky.

 

[Patroklos]

Which I clearly did.

I don't think you quite understand what force is. Nothing you have posted thus far shows the US using any force whatsoever. Did we bomb anyone? Did we arm anyone? Did we even at least transport anyone a la bay of pigs?

Anyone here want to classify talking as force like Form seems to want to do? In that case Iran forcibly overthrew Bush! UNBELIEVABLE!!!

 

[RedRalph]

Please find any conservative of note, or even better one in power, advocating the forced overthrow of the Chavez.

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/US/08/23/robertson.chavez/

 

[Formaldehyde]

I don't think you quite understand what force is.

"I don't think you quite understand what" reading and comprehension is. Nice straw men, as usual...

http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/1598

Today’s statements by Rumsfeld and Negroponte merely confirm the diehard intentions of the U.S. government to continue its efforts to remove President Chávez from power and impede the development of the Bolivarian Revolution. Over the past few years, the Bush Administration has funneled millions upon millions of dollars into building up an opposition movement to the Chávez administration in Venezuela, utilizing U.S. tax payer dollars filtered through the National Endowment for Democracy and the U.S. Agency for International Development, and has backed a failed coup d’état against President Chávez and oil industry sabotage that caused billions of dollars in damages to the nation yet failed to oust the government from power. For the year 2006, the U.S. Congress has allocated more than $9 million dollars to opposition groups in Venezuela (again, U.S. taxpayer dollars) and has launched a psychological operations campaign coordinated from the Pentagon’s Special Operations Command in Tampa, Florida. In a document published by the U.S. Army in October 2005 entitled “Doctrine for Asymmetric War Against Venezuela,” President Chávez and the Bolivarian Revolution were labeled as the “largest threat since the Soviet Union and communism.”

Clearly, the Bush Administration has decided Venezuela and President Chávez represent a “severe threat” to U.S. domination in the region and U.S. control over energy resources in the hemisphere. Venezuela may very well be next on the list for a “preemptory war” in the style of Iraq. Citizens of the United States need to be aware of these dangerous steps taken by their government against a nation exercising its democratic and sovereign right to decide the type of socio-political system it desires. Venezuela’s democracy, participatory in nature, is supported by more than 70% of its populace. Recent polls place President Chávez’s popularity at 77%.

 

[Bill3000]

Sources =

The Observer (who established fact by historical precidence), plenglish.com, and scoop.co.nz

Get a mainstream source.

:rollie eyes:

Please, if we can just post articles by any random blog than we can "prove" anything. At least I note when my source is wacky.

More relevantly, the idea that the 2002 coup was caused by, or endorsed by the US was investigated by the government already and debunked. This is unclassified information.

http://oig.state.gov/documents/organization/13682.pdf

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/US/08/23/robertson.chavez/

I believe he said "relevant conservative"

Chavez is as I said before - a loudmouth and a blowhard. He's hated because of what he says far more than what he actually does, and he's certainly not dictatorish enough to warrant a coup in the eyes of conservatives.

 

[GoodGame]

Would Caracas just rearm them and ship them back to the Mideast?

My thoughts, except maybe some against the US.

 

[Patroklos]

So Form, I take it you consider Air America to be the US using force to overthrown regimes? Precious.

Again, please provide anything even remotely qualifying as the US using force to overthrow Chavez. Actually, all I was asking for was a relevant conservative advocating the US use force to overthrow Chavez. Multiple irrelevant articles later, we are strill waiting with bated breath.

 

[Formaldehyde]

http://www.tlaxcala.es/pp.asp?reference=7199&lg=en

The arrival of the US Army's 4th Psychological Operations Group (Airborne) in Colombia in the year 2006 and the strategy of pushing the FARC and the Colombian civil conflict into Venezuelan territory cannot be taken as a coincidence; for it is exactly the moment when the US State Department and the Pentagon also started to publicly accuse Venezuela of collaborating with terrorism, specifically by referring to alleged dealings with the FARC. In the first semester of 2006 Washington added Venezuela to a list of “countries that do not fully collaborate in the struggle against terrorism”, and then imposed sanctions against the South American country that resulted in the prohibition of the sales of arms from the United States and from any international company that uses US technology. The 2006 report of the US State Department said,

“The Secretary of State certified Venezuela as “not fully cooperating” with U.S. antiterrorism efforts... It remained unclear to what extent the Government of Venezuela provided material support to Colombian terrorists, if it did, and on which level…” (Report of the US State Department of 2006, available at www.state.gov)2

A few months later, in July 2006, the United States House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on International Terrorism and Nonproliferation, held a hearing titled “Venezuela: Terrorism Hub of South America?”, in which they declared that

“Venezuela, under President Hugo Chavez, has tolerated terrorists on its soil and has forged close relationships with officially designated state sponsors of terrorism: Cuba, Iran and North Korea. Colombian terrorist groups use Venezuelan territory for safe haven...”.3

At the same time, the international press started to promote a matrix of opinion, associating Venezuela with terrorism. Articles and editorials published by the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Washington Times, the Wall Street Journal, El País of Spain, El Tiempo of Bogota, and the Miami Herald, amongst others, repeated time and again [affirmations about] the alleged link between the Venezuelan government and the FARC in Colombia, although they never provided any conclusive proof. All the evidences were based on “anonymous” sources, “high-level officials in Washington”, and “analysts”, without giving any concrete names, data or facts.

From these companies, SAIC has a pretty dirty past history in Venezuela. It was the company that, together with PDVSA, the state owned petroleum industry, constructed a mixed company named INTESA that began to automate the petroleum industry in Venezuela in 1995. And INTESA was the same company that executed one of the most brutal sabotage acts against the Venezuelan industry at the end of the year 2002, with the intention to force President Hugo Chávez out of power. The company was used as a platform to attack the “brains of PDVSA” by destroying its entire data-base and automated systems and converting it again into a manually operating company. Their actions caused billions of dollars of damage to the Venezuelan economy and its international reputation as a secure petroleum provider and producer. Nevertheless, they did not reach their objective to topple President Chávez, and little later INTESA was closed and forced to cease their operations in the country. Three years later, their new contracts appeared - to carry out psychological operations against the same government they previously had tried to neutralize without success.

Since the United States' most powerful team of psychological operations is working actively against Venezuela, the fruits of their work have been seen both on an international level and also within the country on a national level.5 President Chávez is already classified as “dictator” in international public opinion and there are few who would doubt his alleged “dealings” with the FARC in Colombia – despite the fact that there was never a single proof offered that would confirm such "dealings".

Psychological operations are considered by the Pentagon to be their “most powerful weapon” to date. Through screens, broadcasting stations, newspapers, posters, design of clothes and objects, they transmit their purposeful and well planned message to subtly exert influence on public opinion and perceptions about topics of interest. It is the new battlefield where all of us are forced to assume a role, because nobody escapes from information and communication in today's world. It is the struggle for truth and justice against lies and manipulation. The decision to be either victim or combatant within that asymmetric war is in the hands of each of us. Don't be fooled.

Be sure to watch the US training and psyops films at the bottom of the article. They are a real hoot.