Sunday, October 15, 2006

More lies and tidbits from the pretty revolution --And some more lies or at least inconsistencies proving once again that the verbal incontinence among revolutionaries does create some problems. First, we heard from the Venezuelan side that there will be 20 military bases built and financed by Venezuelans along the Bolivian border. This was immediately denied by the Bolivian Foreign Minister, who said that only two facilities would be built. But then today, none other than Bolivia's Army Commander says the plan is to build ten border "modules". So, they can't even agree on the numbers, let alone on what they are building. I guess the term "asymmetric" war must have something to do with this. --And today Chavez in his exuberance over inaugurating a train, that is not ready, was planned before Chavez, has no stations other than the first and the last which have been completed, offered to build a train that would connect the Mercosur countries. I guess it will run with the apparently forgotten "Pipeline of the South" for which Venezuela has failed to show up at the last two meetings or the now infamous TV station Telesur, which Venezuela created, financed and I guess will shut down when the people that run it, its only viewers to date, stop watching it. --And why did a Central Bank Director say that Venezuela was producing only 2.6 million barrels of oil a day. Could there be another lie in there? But we knew this one! --Oh yeah! And Chavez invited to end the “corrupt state”. What has he done in eight years? Has he looked around? His family? His Cabinet? Who is he going to call? Ghostbusters? --And as usual, the Government simply rejects another Human Rights report. Somehow they are always biased, but things are beautiful in the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. Ask for example, the gold miners… --And how about this report by Economist Orlando Ochoa in Reporte Diario de la Economia: “Venezuelan banks lend related companies Bolivars to buy dollars…official deposits are paid 2% to attract them to private commercial banks…Argentinean bonds are assigned via obscure communications from the Ministry of Finance…the open impunity is an incentive to financial corruption and a few members of the revolutionary-socialist hierarchy are complacent with the local bankers” --And tonight, the Governor of Tachira state proceeded to expropriate some houses. Unfortunately for him, the President’s relative Lieutenant Ramon Chavez was one of those affected. He threatened to call his relative. How long will it be before his home is returned? Make your bets! 9:18:40 PM    comment []

Venezuela's illiteracy lies hit the mainstream media And continuing on the subject of official Government lies, two articles in El Universal this week by reporter Gustavo Mendez, told the public what the blogosphere has known for quite a while: UNESCO never certified that Venezuela is free of illiteracy. This has been a huge lie, President Chavez and his Minister of Education Aristobulo Isturiz have not only made the claim publicly, but a huge banner with the claim was plastered over the Ministrys building for months. Mendez has clearly been very thorough in his research of the issue. In the first article on Friday, Mendez shows how according to UNESCO's own statistics for 2005, 7% of Venezuelans were till illiterate. Thus, despite all of the noise about Mision Robinson, illiteracy ahs barely budged during Chavez' years in power. The lie was there from the beginning as Mision Robinson was supposed to eliminate illiteracy in the 1.5 million Venezuelans who could not read and write, but the 2001 census said there were only 1.2 million. Thus, a researcher from Universidad Central de Venezuela asks in the article: Where are the 660 thousand people that the Government claimed were going to be taught to read and write in the first six months of Mision Robinson? It turns out that the infamous "certification" was simply backing by UNESCO for the method being used in Mision Robinson which was twisted around by the spinners of the Chavista Government as a "certification" of the elimination of illiteracy in Venezuela.. In today's article, Mendez quotes a study by Francisco Rodriguez, a one time Chavez supporter, now at Wesleyan University and researchers at IESA and the University of California at Berkeley, which show that indeed in 2001, there were only 1.08 million people in Venezuela who could not read and write and compared it with the 1.05 million who, according to the Government Statistics Institute, were in that condition in 2005: 1.01 million. The researchers conclude that it is next to impossible to evaluate if Mision Robinson had an impact or not. Thus, another fraud, another lie and another claim by the autocrat and his followers. So now, they plan to export the plan to Bolivia and the Dominican Republic. Will they export the lie or actually do something? The "pretty" revolution strikes again! 7:30:05 PM    comment []

Liar! Liar! So, the lying President said this week: “Last night (Tuesday) Foreign Minister Maduro was in Bolivia, he must arrive today bringing me a report, but we are ready to defend ourselves…Evo, Resist brother and may God take care of you.” Well, in the same speech Chavez said he had information there would be a coup led by the US in Bolivia. But it was all lies. Today, the Bolivian Government said that Maduro was not there at all. They said he could come anytime, but he didn’t, so Chavez was just improvising, letting his imagination go, the same way he does with his accomplishments, his proposed projects, the assassination attempts, his love. It is just all lies, in his mind, that’s all, as simple as that. Maduro did not go, there was no trip, no report, no arrival... 12:14:15 AM    comment []