The Devil's Excrement

No, it is not German thanksgiving, it is simply that last night I closed my post by saying that Goebbels would have been proud of the ability to lie of Venezuela’s Vice-President and today Goebbels seems to have been all over the place. The first place was in the usual mini-Editorial in Tal Cual by “Simon Bocanegra” (Teodoro Petkoff) which roughly translates as:

Goebbels?

The qualification of “Goebbelian” to define propaganda politics based on great lies,in reality has become more or less metaphorical in current (local) politics, but the propaganda procedures of this Government and its party force us to reexamine certain versions that years ago circulated about the presence of Mein Kampf, Hitler’s book, in the nigh table of the man himself or the enthusiasm with which some of his collaborators referred to it. Because the way in which this Government and its party use advertising appears to be inspired by the criteria of the limping Goebbels. The campaign about the “megafraud” based in pure affirmations without support in the facts, starts, there is no doubt about it, in the Goebbelian saying that a lie repeated a thousand times will end being believed. The “Comando Ayacucho” has insisted that the opposition delays handing in the signatures because it either does not have them or is making them up.

It does not matter that Ismael Garcia and his group of “useless people”, as Chavez calls them, have yet to complete handing in their signatures. They have taken six days longer then the opposition to hand it theirs, but you know, Goebbels also used to say that a lie, the bigger it was, the more credible it would be.

The second one comes from the more mundane radio program that Chavez holds every Sunday:

As part of the “evidence” of the megafraud Chavez offered a conversation between two lawyers, father and son, who have little to do with the signature drive, talking that one of them had heard while the drive was still going on, that only 1.9 million signatures had been gathered. The second one was even more anecdotal, when Chavez said that a person from Tachira state named Yerson Giovanni Medina, a minor not old enough to vote, was actually one of the many signatures faked by the opposition. (Curious, what would they gain by that, if you are not in the electoral registry your signatures can not count). Unfortunately for President Chávez, Mr. Medina showed up in the last two days all over the media asking for more respect from Chavez. First of all, he said, he is not a minor, in fact, he claimed, he is married and has two kids. But he then proceeded to say that he had signed with “a lot of pride” and asked others that may be accused to be brave, face the media and not fear any revenge. According to a report in today’s El universal, the worst part was that Mr. Medina was a witness during the opposition Reafirmazo for the Chavistas, placed there by MVR Deputy Luis Tascon. If the last part is true, then the story is even better than I thought. Goebbles Revenge?

I never liked now Vice-President Jose Vicente Rangel when he was a reporter. He would sometimes use his column to vent personal issues with people and would make outrageous accusations using his “sources” but never would provide proof about anything. Curiously, he made his career and reputation blasting the military for corruption and later became great friends of the same people and as a member of the Government has done nothing but defend them against all charges of corruption. While he blasts the “oligarchs” he fails to mention how rich he is, his immense art collection and the fact that he has always drawn a salary from the state and got to where he is today thanks to the space given to him by the major media outlets.

But I never believed he would be the great cynic that he has proven to be. In a post last Thursday I showed pictures of Rangel in Plaza Altamira (Francia) the day the pro-Chavez march went by, invaded the Plaza, took over the whole area and proceeded to destroy what was there, including an image of the virgin that was beheaded and another that was painted over with graffiti and desecrated. The picture is very clear; Rangel is looking towards Plaza Altamira and applauding. There is no other possible interpretation to what he is doing, he is encouraging, approving what the Chavistas are doing, and he can not be applauding the dissident military in the Plaza. Whether at that time the religious figure were being abused or not is irrelevant. He was there, the Vice-President of Venezuela, approving the invasion of the Plaza by political thugs . That is not what civilized people do, his role should have been the opposite, he should have tried to ask the Chavistas to follow the path of the march, avoid confrontation, violence and respect private and public property. That is what leaders are supposed to do, lead by example. Instead he encouraged the destruction and it went overboard.

But his cynicism today was simply too much. In statements made to the press, he asked the Catholic Church leaders to be more “responsible” questioning how Bishop Porras could even look towards the Government and blame it for recent attacks on the church. He said there were millions of Catholics in Venezuela, many of them Chavistas and they should be respected. The climax was when he denied that Chavistas have participated in attacks on the church in Caracas or Falcon state. (The only attack in Caracas was the one from which the pictures below were taken). He finally suggested that the church leaders look to the dissident military of Plaza Altamira for the blame in the violence against the church. Ummm, the same ones that placed the altar and the images in Plaza Altamira and have been there for over a year. I guess Goebbels would have been very proud of him.

I never liked now Vice-President Jose Vicente Rangel when he was a reporter. He would sometimes use his column to vent personal issues with people and would make outrageous accusations using his “sources” but never would provide proof about anything. Curiously, he made his career and reputation blasting the military for corruption and later became great friends of the same people and as a member of the Government has done nothing but defend them against all charges of corruption. While he blasts the “oligarchs” he fails to mention how rich he is, his immense art collection and the fact that he has always drawn a salary from the state and got to where he is today thanks to the space given to him by the major media outlets.

But I never believed he would be the great cynic that he has proven to be. In a post last Thursday I showed pictures of Rangel in Plaza Altamira (Francia) the day the pro-Chavez march went by, invaded the Plaza, took over the whole area and proceeded to destroy what was there, including an image of the virgin that was beheaded and another that was painted over with graffiti and desecrated. The picture is very clear; Rangel is looking towards Plaza Altamira and applauding. There is no other possible interpretation to what he is doing, he is encouraging, approving what the Chavistas are doing, and he can not be applauding the dissident military in the Plaza. Whether at that time the religious figure were being abused or not is irrelevant. He was there, the Vice-President of Venezuela, approving the invasion of the Plaza by political thugs . That is not what civilized people do, his role should have been the opposite, he should have tried to ask the Chavistas to follow the path of the march, avoid confrontation, violence and respect private and public property. That is what leaders are supposed to do, lead by example. Instead he encouraged the destruction and it went overboard.

But his cynicism today was simply too much. In statements made to the press, he asked the Catholic Church leaders to be more “responsible” questioning how Bishop Porras could even look towards the Government and blame it for recent attacks on the church. He said there were millions of Catholics in Venezuela, many of them Chavistas and they should be respected. The climax was when he denied that Chavistas have participated in attacks on the church in Caracas or Falcon state. (The only attack in Caracas was the one from which the pictures below were taken). He finally suggested that the church leaders look to the dissident military of Plaza Altamira for the blame in the violence against the church. Ummm, the same ones that placed the altar and the images in Plaza Altamira and have been there for over a year. I guess Goebbels would have been very proud of him.