Hugo Chávez narrowly loses referendum vote

I'm not sure what the Venezuelans were saying in the referendum vote. Were they voting against socialism? Were they voting against Hugo Chávez? Was it both? Or was it some of the other 67 amendments contained in the referendum? My gut feeling is it was a all of the above.

It is a democracy and denying Hugo Chávez the opportunity to hold office as long as he's re-elected doesn't make him president for life. Each seven years the people would have the opportunity to kick his ass out.

Venezuelan voters narrowly rejected a constitutional referendum that would have bolstered President Hugo Chavez's embrace of socialism and granted an indefinite extension of his eligibility to serve as president, the National Electoral Council reported early Monday.

About 51 percent of voters opposed the amendments, while approximately 49 percent were in favor of them.

"Don't feel sad. Don't feel burdened," Chavez told supporters immediately after the results were announced.

More than nine million of Venezuelan's 16 million eligible voters went to the polls Sunday.

President of the National Electoral Council, Tibisay Lucena, said the process "shows the entire world that we are a democratic country."

Chavez, in what he called a talk "from my heart" acknowledging the results, thanked those who opposed his proposal, saying the election had proven that Venezuelan democracy is maturing.

...

The most controversial amendment would do away with term limits, thereby allowing the 53-year-old former paratrooper, who has already served almost eight years in power, to hold it indefinitely as long as he is re-elected.

Well, at least Putin got his.

Vladimir Putin’s party won a crushing victory in Russia’s parliamentary elections, paving the way for the authoritarian leader to remain in control even after he steps down as president.

US Coup Planned for Venezuela?

The only thing surprising here is how long it took. Hugo Chávez has been in Washington's sights ever since he was elected.

It will be interesting to see if the proposed coup d'etat actually materializes now that the world knows about it. Clandestine operations are hardly clandestine when under the klieg lights.

The New York Times had a news article about Venezuela in Thursday’s edition, but it was about Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez saying he would cut diplomatic ties with neighboring Colombia. There wasn’t a word about a memo from a CIA operative in Caracas to CIA Director General Michael Hayden, uncovered yesterday, outlining a plan for interfering with a Venezuelan referendum set for Dec. 2, and laying out the steps for instigating and backing a coup.

The plot, called “Operation Pliers,” and laid out in the letter to Hayden by an undercover operative named Michael Steele, who reportedly works in the US Embassy as a “regional affairs officer,” was intercepted by Venezuelan intelligence and released publicly on state TV yesterday.

...

Among the tactics Steele recommends in his letter are:

* Promoting street demonstrations and violent protests

* Creating a climate of ungovernability

* Provoking a general uprising

* Working through the US military attaché at the embassy to coordinate with ex-military officers and former coup plotters against Chavez.

Even more darkly, the letter calls for initiating “military actions” to support opposition mobilizations and strategic building occupations, involving US military bases in neighboring Curacao and Colombia to provide support, and even taking control of parts of Venezuela in the days after the referendum, while encouraging a “military rebellion” inside the Venezuelan National Guard.

Then there's this story:

Headline: CIA Venezuela Destabilization Memo Surfaces

Much is covered by the above story, but there are some new twists.

On November 26, 2007 the Venezuelan government broadcast and circulated a confidential memo from the US embassy to the CIA which is devastatingly revealing of US clandestine operations and which will influence the referendum this Sunday, December 2, 2007.

The memo sent by an embassy official, Michael Middleton Steere, was addressed to the Director of Central Intelligence, Michael Hayden. The memo was entitled 'Advancing to the Last Phase of Operation Pincer' and updates the activity by a CIA unit with the acronym 'HUMINT' (Human Intelligence) which is engaged in clandestine action to destabilize the forth-coming referendum and coordinate the civil military overthrow of the elected Chavez government. The Embassy-CIA's polls concede that 57 per cent of the voters approved of the constitutional amendments proposed by Chavez but also predicted a 60 per cent abstention.

The US operatives emphasized their capacity to recruit former Chavez supporters among the social democrats (PODEMOS) and the former Minister of Defense Baduel, claiming to have reduced the 'yes' vote by 6 per cent from its original margin. Nevertheless the Embassy operatives concede that they have reached their ceiling, recognizing they cannot defeat the amendments via the electoral route.

The memo then recommends that Operation Pincer (OP) [Operación Tenaza] be operationalized. OP involves a two-pronged strategy of impeding the referendum, rejecting the outcome at the same time as calling for a 'no' vote. The run up to the referendum includes running phony polls, attacking electoral officials and running propaganda through the private media accusing the government of fraud and calling for a 'no' vote. Contradictions, the report emphasizes, are of no matter.

If you haven't, you might want to read The Invisible Government (Amazon) by David Wise and Thomas B. Ross.

This startling and disturbing book is the first full, authentic account of America's intelligence and espionage apparatus, an invisible government, with the CIA at its center, that conducts the clandestine policies of the United States in the cold war. Many of the revelations about abuses and secret unaccountability were things that Americans had not been aware of until this book was released.

Its actually pretty tame stuff compared to what the idiot has done and is doing as I type.

According to Amazon, no fewer than 85 books written since reference this work.

Edwards Offers Heating Oil Plan

This caught my eye because I vaguely recalled someone else's offering solutions to the high costs of heating oil.

The DiversityInc story starts out with this.

Are the oil companies helping them? Not any of the ones based in the United States.

Will government give them a hand? Well, the federal Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program is available, but only 16 percent of eligible families take advantage of this. And some states, especially in the Northeast, do have programs to help low-income families, but again, only a few take advantage of them.

Why? For undocumented immigrants, the fear of registering with a government agency is strong. For others, there is a historic distrust of the government. And in many cases, families just don't know about where to go for help.

Now that's truly a sad state of affairs. There are some programs in place already, but woefully underutilzed.

But back to Edwards.

Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards will outline a plan Sunday to provide immediate relief to families struggling with high heating oil bills and to ensure affordable prices in the future.

Noting that home heating oil prices in New Hampshire have surpassed $3 a gallon, the former North Carolina senator is calling on Congress to release some of the nation's home heating oil and crude oil reserves as a way to bring down prices by increasing supply. He also is urging Congress to fully fund the federal Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program, according to a copy of his plan provided to The Associated Press.

Earlier this month, President Bush vetoed a Democratic health and education spending bill that included $2.4 billion for heating subsidies for the poor, $480 million more than Bush requested.

Via Japan Herald.

Perhaps Hugo Chávez should be running.

So which oil companies are coming to the rescue? Not American-owned or British-owned companies. The main company helping is Citgo, a subsidiary of Petróleos de Venezuela S.A., Venezuela's state-run oil company. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez recently visited the South Bronx to tout his discounted-oil offer.

Citgo partners with Citizens Energy Corporation (CEC), a nonprofit that provides low-cost heating oil to low-income families in 15 states and Washington, D.C. CEC works with oil-heat dealers and local fuel-assistance agencies. This year, it will provide eligible families a one-time delivery of 100 gallons of home-heating oil. CEC has reached out to U.S.-owned oil companies, but only Citgo responded, says Ashley Durmer, CEC spokesperson.

Via DiversityInc. Note: Same link as above.

Protesters face showdown with Chavez over closure of TV station

This is an update to my earlier post.

Angry Venezuelan protesters and journalists on Sunday headed for a showdown with the government of President Hugo Chavez, which is about to take over the country's largest private television station.

RCTV is set to end its broadcasts at midnight Sunday after the government refused to renew its license.

But employees have vowed to continued to occupy the studios overnight, possibly to hinder their handover to the government on Monday.

"A lot of us will sleep here in the station," said news director Manuel Gago.

"This is Venezuela, not Cuba!" chanted protesters rallying outside RCTV studios Saturday. "We have what it takes to fight!"

The rally was reminiscent of protests that led to Chavez's two-day ouster in a 2002 coup, for which he partly blames RCTV.

Chavez has not forgotten RCTV's cheerleading for that brief coup, and vowed soon after he was re-elected in late 2006 to close the station down.

I'm also curious why it seems today leaders feel the need to go beyond "strong" to "controlling". Its everywhere you look.

(read more)