Two emails from sciftp
Stuart,
Given the long and sorry history of repression and human rights abuses by governments that called themselves socialist and Communist, such as China, the Soviet Union, and the many countries of Eastern Europe, and given the devastating and disastrous discrediting of the socialist movement worldwide that these abuses have led to, I would think that anyone interested in the future of socialism would have their antenna up high and finely tuned to anything that smacks of the same trend. But no, some leftists are continue to make apologies for the reincarnation of Stalinism again and again.
MB
On Sun, Apr 4, 2010 at 9:28 PM, Stuart Newman
Michael,
If you are going to continue posting reports from the U.S. press on the
situation in Venezuela on this Science for the People list, I think it is
incumbent on you to provide a scientific, i.e., social class/economic
analysis of the balance of forces within that country and in the Western
hemisphere, the U.S. stance in Latin America, e.g., vis-a-vis Colombia,
the Cuban embargo, etc., and the history of the region, particularly with
regard to the indigenous populations and imperialism.
Being against Chavez per se doesn’t automatically brand you as a
liberal, a designation I know you reject, but the nature of these posts
and Marc Cooper’s ahistorical analyses which you also provide
periodicially, does not distinguish your postion from that of conventional
liberals who would reject any attempt to build socialism anywhere.
Whatevever you think of Chavez’s motivation, it seems inconceivable
that breaking the hegemony of the monied and propertied classes could
proceed without some kind of coercion.
Stuart
On Sun, 4 Apr 2010 03:43:17 +0200, Michael Balter
>http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/04/world/americas/04venez.html?hp
>
>April 3, 2010
>Criticism of Ch�vez Stifled by Arrests By SIMON
>ROMERO
>
>LOS TEQUES, Venezuela � When Judge Mar�a Lourdes Afiuni issued a
ruling in
>December that irked President Hugo
>Ch�vez
>he did little to contain his outrage. The president, contending on
national
>television that she would have been put before a firing squad in earlier
>times
fusilado/>,
>sent his secret intelligence police to arrest her.
>
>Then the agents took her to the overcrowded women�s prison in this
city of
>slums near Caracas. They put her in a cell near more than 20 inmates
whom
>Judge Afiuni had sentenced on charges like murder and drug smuggling.
>
>�I�ve received threats from inmates telling me they will burn me alive
>because they see me as a symbol of the system that put them in
prison,� said
>Judge Afiuni, 46, in her prison cell. �I�m in this hell because I had the
>temerity to do my job as a judge in a way that didn�t please Ch�vez.�
>
>Since Judge Afiuni�s imprisonment, a dizzying sequence of other high-
profile
>arrests has taken place, pointing to Mr. Ch�vez�s recent use of his
security
>and intelligence apparatus to quash challenges to his grip on the
country�s
>political institutions. The arrests come at a time of spreading public ire
>over an economy hobbled by electricity shortages and soaring inflation.
>
>Senior officials in Mr. Ch�vez�s government here, including Attorney
General
>Luisa Ortega, say the most recent arrests were necessary to suppress
>conspiracies or to prosecute people whose comments were deemed
offensive to
>Mr. Ch�vez. In Judge Afiuni�s case, Attorney General Ortega said the
judge
>had illegally freed another high-profile
>prisoner,
>businessman Eligio Cede�o.
>
>In March, intelligence agents arrested Oswaldo �lvarez Paz, a former
>presidential candidate, charging him with conspiracy after he said in
>televised remarks that
>Venezuela
>become a haven for drug trafficking; he also supported a Spanish
>indictment asserting that officials here had helped Basque separatists
train
>on Venezuelan soil.
>
>Only days later, agents arrested Guillermo
>Zuloaga
>the owner of the opposition television network Globovisi�n, after he
>criticized the government�s efforts to shut down media outlets that
>challenged the president. After an outcry by rights groups, Mr. Zuloaga
was
>released on the condition that he could not travel outside the country.
>
>Next, agents arrested Wilmer Azuaje, an opposition lawmaker, on
charges of
>insulting and striking a police official during a heated discussion. Mr.
>Azuaje had in the past revealed corruption claims against Mr. Ch�vez�s
>siblings. Like Mr. Zuloaga, Mr. Azuaje was released, but the Supreme
Court
>forbade him to discuss his arrest with the media.
>
>The arrests have taken aim at some of Mr. Ch�vez�s most prominent
critics
>ahead of legislative elections in September that put control of the
National
>Assembly in play, and they illustrate Mr. Ch�vez�s attempts to tighten
>control over institutions like the judiciary.
>
>Judge Afiuni, previously an obscure jurist, quickly rose to prominence
when
>she freed Mr. Cede�o, a businessman jailed on charges of
circumventing
>currency controls. The imprisonment of Mr. Cede�o, who had previously
>financed opposition politicians, was explicitly criticized last year by a
>panel of United Nations legal
>experts
>his pretrial detention exceeded the limits set by Venezuelan law.
>
>Judge Afiuni contended that she was following United
>Nations
>when she released Mr. Cede�o, who subsequently fled to the United
>States. But Mr. Ch�vez immediately claimed that she had been bribed
to
>release Mr. Cede�o, demanding that she be jailed for 30 years, even if
new
>laws were needed to keep her in prison that long.
>
>�The corruption charges are false, and prosecutors know that by
looking at
>all of my banking records,� Judge Afiuni said. �But the damage to me
has
>been done.�
>
>Prosecutors overseeing Judge Afiuni�s case did not respond to
repeated
>requests for comment. Criticism of her imprisonment from fellow
judges in
>Venezuela has also been relatively muted, a reaction that is not
entirely
>surprising because Mr. Ch�vez and his loyalists in the National
>Assembly stripped
>the Supreme Court of its autonomy in
>2004
>
>
>Outside Venezuela, criticism of her arrest has been more vocal. United
>Nations legal experts called for her immediate release. The Inter-
American
>Commission on Human
>Rights
>her arrest came within a political system already under stress because
>of a lack of judicial independence. Independent human rights group
have
>assailed Mr. Ch�vez�s government over the arrest.
>
>�It is not the sort of thing that happens in a functioning democracy, in
>which judicial institutions offer safeguards for rule of law,� said Jos�
>Miguel Vivanco, Americas director for Human Rights
>Watch
>
>
>Still, there appear to be relatively few political prisoners in Venezuelan
>jails, legal experts here say. Twenty to 30 Venezuelans, including
Judge
>Afiuni, are now imprisoned here because of their political activity or for
>reasons connected to publicly contradicting Mr. Ch�vez�s wishes, said
Roc�o
>San Miguel, a legal scholar here who leads a nongovernmental group
that
>monitors Venezuelan security.
>
>The high-profile prisoners also include Ra�l Isa�as
>Baduel
>a former defense minister, and Franklin Brito, a biologist arrested at
>around the same time as Judge Afiuni and put under guard in a military
>hospital after refusing to end a hunger
>strike
>the government�s handling of the seizure of his farmland by squatters.
>
>While Judge Afiuni�s case has raised concern over the erosion of
judicial
>independence, the most recent arrests are stoking fears about freedom
of
>expression.
>
>�The government is fraudulently inventing conspiracies, assassination
plots
>and national emergencies,� said Mr. �lvarez Paz, the former
presidential
>candidate, who was charged with conspiracy after his televised
remarks. He
>is now being detained in a holding cell at the headquarters of the
>intelligence police. He responded to written questions submitted
through his
>lawyer. �It is doing so out of nervousness over the precarious decline
in
>the president�s credibility at home and abroad,� he said.
>
>Judge Afiuni said she followed news of the other arrests from a small
>television in her cell that received a state network signal. She also gets
>updates from her 17-year-old daughter, who visits twice a week.
Otherwise,
>she remains in her cell and reads, most recently a biography of the
Dalai
>Lama
>fearful of venturing into other areas of the prison.
>
>One respite from her life in jail, she said, came when the rehearsal
sounds
>from a prison
orchestra
>inmates traveled past the bars of her cell. She said its rendition of
>Vivaldi could move her close to tears. �Just when I cannot stand it any
>longer here,� she said, �the music lets me escape from reality a little
and
>remember that this nightmare will end someday.�
>
>Mar�a Eugenia D�az contributed reporting.
>
>
>–
>******************************************
>Michael Balter
>Contributing Correspondent, Science
>Adjunct Professor of Journalism,
>New York University
>
>Email: michael.balter@gmail.com
>Web: michaelbalter.com
>NYU: journalism.nyu.edu/faculty/balter.html
>******************************************
>
>”When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why
the poor
>have no food, they call me a Communist.” — H�lder Pessoa C�mara
>
–
******************************************
Michael Balter
Contributing Correspondent, Science
Adjunct Professor of Journalism,
New York University