Tommy Cooper was a much-loved British comedian who died tragically but
perhaps fittingly on stage during a performance - people thought he was
fooling. Cooper's stock in trade was to pose as an incompetent
magician. One of his catchphrases, offered as he explained the
astonishing feat he was just about to perform was "just like that..."
as the heralded magic flatly refused to happen. Britain's Guardian and
Observer newspapers seem to have adopted Tommy Cooper as the
inspiration for their journalism on Venezuela. One can see this in
differing degrees in several articles published over the last month or
so.
In a long account of a visit to Caracas published on May 7th, the
Observer's Foreign Editor Peter Beaumont persistently threw in
Cooper-like efforts to render Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez in an
image short on facts but long on tendentious comment - "just like
that....". It is hard to rebut concisely the kind of argument Beaumont
constructs, because it is done with an unfair adjective here, a failure
to include fact there, a dodgy or baseless interpretation, a half
truth, all mixed in with good legitimate reporting of real people's
views and opinions.
The adjectives
Beaumont: "self-appointed champion against 'the murderer' Bush"
In fact Chavez has only attacked Bush and other members of the US
government in response to the attacks they have made against him
as Venezuela's elected President. As well as the spurious description
"self-appointed champion", Beaumont throws in the designation of Bush
as a murderer by Chavez from some unreferred-to context creating the
impression that Chavez tends to be the aggressor in these exchanges.
Chavez seldom initiates these verbal attacks. But when he defends
himself and refuses to be cowed, journalists like Beaumont rearrange
matters to present Chavez as some kind of aggressor. Chavez's offence
seems to be that he has the self-respect to defend himself, his
governmental colleagues and their policies.
Beaumont: "a farcical coup that lasted two days in 2002"
Dozens of people died in the vicious coup mounted by the
anti-democratic Venezuelan opposition supported by its US government
backers in April 2002. Chavez himself narrowly escaped being executed.
Why trivialize as "farcical" such a traumatic event that has defined so
much of what has happened subsequently in Venezuela? Self-evidently, by
trivializing that defining trauma in Venezuela's recent history,
Beaumont demeans and diminishes the later political and economic
achievements of Chavez and his governmental colleagues. His treatment
also renders mysterious the deep hostility Chavez and his colleagues
feel about the regime of George W. Bush - something that makes
Beaumont's portrayal of Chavez as an enigmatic, unstable, authoritarian
maverick easier to carry off.
Beaumont: "Chávez, a visceral opponent of the influence of
America in a Latin America that, like his 19th-century predecessor
Simón Bolívar, he would like to lead, has found his
dangerous global stage."
How can Beaumont be privy to Chavez' motives? Perhaps Chavez would
"like to lead" Latin America. We do not know. Nor does Beaumont. But
it's a necessary line to add to create the picture of a
quasi-megalomaniac. Having created the implicit suggestion of a
megalomaniac Chavez hunting for regional pre-eminence Beaumont throws
in the adjective "dangerous" to define the "global stage". Clearly,
Beaumont wants us to think that Chavez is a principal contributory
factor to whatever is dangerous about the "global stage", that Chavez
courts this danger. But the danger does not come from Venezuela.
Venezuela is not threatening preemptive wars of aggression or any other
kind of aggression against anybody. Through the Mision Milagro
programme, Venezuela is facilitating hundreds of thousands of people
from many countries - some Venezuelan allies, some not - to recover
their sight. Beaumont neglects to mention this huge regional health
initiative. The US bombs and shells tens of thousands of civilians to
death in Iraq and Afghanistan. Venezuela saves and enhances hundreds of
thousands
of lives. But "Chavez has found his dangerous global stage" - just like
that...
Absent facts
One is confronted here by the extraordinary doubletalk of the
mainstream international media. At this point it may help to show how
the argument developed by careful placing of suggestive adjectives is
reinforced by leaving out pertinent facts. Beaumont writes,
"Chávez has constructed alliances with everyone the White House
hates most - including the Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and
Evo Morales, the left-wing Bolivian President and former coca farmers'
leader." But the Chavez administration has constructed alliances with
almost everybody, US friends as well as US enemies. Venezuela in recent
years has concluded agreements with Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay,
Brazil, and Uruguay.
If it has friendly relations with Iran it also has friendly relations
with Algeria, lately a US ally. Venezuela enjoys good relations with
most European countries and, as a member of OPEC, maintains cordial
relations with US allies like Saudi Arabia. Why focus on two countries
whose governments the Bush regime happens to dislike? Clearly, that
focus reinforces the idea of danger and provocation, throwing the
responsibility onto Chavez rather than where it belongs, with the
criminal gang of warmongers in Washington. On the available facts,
Venezuela seems to be working out a carefully balanced foreign policy
based on Latin American economic integration with a diverse range of
foreign trading partners in the rest of the world. The Observer does
not report those facts.
In the same context, Beaumont writes "On issues as diverse as the
anti-globalisation movement, Latin America's future political shape,
oil, Iran, and even America's relationships with India and China,
Chávez is there stirring it up." But all those issues are of
vital concern to Venezuela. Globalization threatens Venezuela's
sovereignty. How could Venezuela not be anxious about Latin America's
future shape? Venezuela is a member of OPEC, should it not be
concerned about oil? Iran, India and China are all important potential
partners for Venezuela's future trade and energy policy - does Beaumont
think Chavez should not be worried about US policy toward them? Once
one stops to try and think rationally about what Beaumont is writing,
the portrait of Chavez and Venezuela he is trying to present falls to
pieces. Remember that phrase "stirring it up", by the way. It turns up
again elsewhere.
In the domestic Venezuelan context, Beaumont mentions the deep
polarization in Venezuelan society reflected in the alleged use of the
lists from the 2004 recall vote petition "This so-called 'Tascón
list' was subsequently used to deny signatories government jobs and
contracts." But Beaumont fails to note that the vindictive Venezuelan
opposition has also made extensive use of discrimination on the basis
of political affiliation, denying Chavistas employment or contracts. If
Venezuelan society is divided in that way, it may well have plenty to
do with much of the Venezuelan opposition's vengeful behaviour towards
anyone who does not agree with them. One would not know that from
reading Beaumont's article. He notes that the Venezuelan opposition are
referred to as the "escualidos", but fails to explain that there may be
extremely good reasons why that should be so.
Dubious interpretation
Beaumont's piece begins with an account of part of one of the "Alo
Presidente" television programmes President Chavez uses to try and
communicate with people at grass roots. "Chávez governs his
country via his show." Beaumont asserts...just like that... One has to
pinch oneself to remember that this is the Observer's Foreign Editor
writing, not some punk junior reporter. Later one discovers "the truth,
as everybody knows, is that Chávez governs almost alone through
a politics of improvisation." In fact, the truth "as everybody knows"
is that people like Beaumont, highly-paid, top-calibre professional
journalists have enormous feet of clay just like everyone else.
His absurd remarks reproduce time-honoured, old colonial stereotypes.
They seem to derive obviously from the persistent racism of the white,
bourgeois Venezuelan opposition who hate indigenous-descended Chavez
because his tactical flair and strategic acumen make them look stupid.
It is extraordinary that Beaumont should reproduce that racist
opposition image of Chavez in his article, albeit in an indirect way.
The truth "as everybody knows" is that the Chavez administration in
Venezuela works much the same as any other government does, with its
own fair share of success as well as bureaucracy, venality and cock-ups.
Later on, we learn, "as Chávez the failed golpista was jailed,
Chávez the democrat was born. The two characters have never been
reconciled." Beaumont, pop psychologist, has Chavez all worked out,
see? Beaumont quotes opposition politician Petkoff comparing Chavez to
the chameleon character Zelig, who imposes himself retrospectivly on
important historical events. Some subliminal residue from Petkoff's
remarks must have rubbed off there. Beaumont was there when Chavez was
gaoled in 1992, Beaumont in at the birth of Chavez the democrat. "Oh no
he wasn't!" cries the astonished audience....just like that.....
More seriously, Beaumont trots out the usual false, trite Venezuelan
opposition complaints, "there is the fact that in his seven years in
power he has consolidated personal control over all of Venezuela's
institutions". "He has packed the judiciary with his supporters and
rewritten the constitution to suit his ends". "He has done little to
restructure Venezuela's oil business".
The caricature could hardly be more complete. The claim about
Venezuela's oil business is so grossly wide of the mark it hardly
merits attention - the State oil company has completely overhauled its
relations with industry players in Venezuela and with actual and
potential regional customers. Chavez' administration is full of strong
personalities who back him because they agree with his political
vision, not because they are his slavish followers. One has only to
think of people like Ali Rodriguez or Raul Baduel among dozens of other
talented individuals committed to building a prosperous, strong
Venezuela based on principles of social justice and international
solidarity.
The Chavez government's policy on judicial appointments conforms to
general
practice in most of Latin America or the United States for that matter,
where the judiciary tends to be less politically independent than
judges are perhaps generally perceived to be in the United Kingdom.
Venezuela's may well be the most democratic constitution in Latin
America
if not the world. What other country has statutory provision for a
possible recall vote half-way through a presidential term? So perhaps
it may well be true that Chavez and his political supporters have
re-written the constitution for their own ends. But those ends are
profoundly democratic not, as Beaumont implies, sinister moves towards
dictatorship.
Stereotypes and broad brushstrokes
Beaumont's article, despite a few quotes from Chavez supporters,
clearly sympathises with the Venezuelan opposition and their
international supporters in the US and Europe. That general stance is
also repeated constantly in the Guardian's coverage, either through
outright falsehood or unsupported comment. For example, in a note
(apparently credited to Angela Balakrishnan) to a piece by Larry Elliot
on May 20th we read, "Venezuela's president Hugo Chavez angered the US
by stopping oil supplies to them." This is a downright falsehood. To
the contrary, Venezuela has maintained supplies to the United States
and even provided cut-price heating oil to tens of thousands of
low-income families in the northern US through the recent winter-
something not even domestic US petroleum giants could be bothered to do.
Along with outright untruth, Guardian journalists file copy written or
perhaps edited in the best traditions of melodrama and caricature. So
on May 6th we get Duncan Campbell writing vaguely about a "Chavez
effect", a "pink tide" washing
across Latin America "now lapping as far as Mexico to the north and
Brazil to the south." Why Paraguay, Uruguay and Argentina get written
out of the picture is left blank - Venezuela has agreements with all
those countries. It seems that if any left wing politician voices
opposition to the neo-liberal nightmare of social misery and economic
piracy inflicted on the impoverished majority in Latin America, it
somehow has to do with Hugo Chavez. Remember Beaumont's "stirring it
up"?
The editorial policies of the Observer and the Guardian on Latin
America and Venezuela seem designed to reinforce US government
propaganda. The overall message is that Chavez is "dangerous". He
provokes regional instability. The instability is not the direct result
of decades of failed neo-liberal social and economic policies. Oh no.
Chavez is a cunning indigenous Svengali hypnotising regional
politicians like Evo Morales, Ollanta Humala, Andres Manuel Lopez
Obrador - as if these tough, seasoned politicians were witless
pushovers. The infantile strip-cartoon simplicity of this propaganda is
its perverse beauty. It suits the bite-sized gobbets of easily
digestible pap required to feed the corporate media disinformation
machine.
In an otherwise pretty reasonable piece of reporting on Bolivia from
the Guardian of May 6th, we find that Dan Glaister also considers that
Chavez "is not averse to stirring things up in the region." Glaister
tells us that Chavez has "intervened in the forthcoming Peruvian and
Mexican elections" but not exactly how. In fact, what right wing
candidates have done in both Peru and Mexico is attack Chavez,
presumably knowing full well that Chavez will respond in kind. Both
Alan Garcia and Peru's President Toledo initiated attacks on Chavez, as
did President Vicente Fox of Mexico and various of his colleagues.
But we do not hear that Bush, Rice, Garcia, Toledo, Fox or all the
others are "stirring things up". We never hear that they are provoking
instability with their scurrilous attacks on Chavez. It seems as if in
all of Latin America there is only one person who ever raises their
voice. Or that the pernicious machinations of the United States seldom
have anything to do with anything. Or that the endless pressure and
extortion practised by giant energy, mining and agri-business
multinationals may somehow be neutral. Glaister goes on to note
referring to last year's summit in Argentina, that Chavez' presence "at
the Mar del Plata summit was almost as divisive as that of President
Bush" neglecting to note that the public dispute engendered there
resulted from provocative remarks from Mexico's President Vicente Fox
which Argentina's President Kirchner moved quickly to squelch.
Glaister too offers an unsupported deprecatory sneer that Chavez'
"efforts to spread his munificence has sometimes been
counterproductive." Encouraging to note that even professional
journalists get their plurals mixed up, but some attempt at detail
might be helpful, some clarification as to what Chavez' alleged
"munificence" might actually refer. Is Glaister referring to the
Venezuelan government's policy of promoting solidarity and
complementary exchange in trade, energy, healthcare, education and
culture between peoples as in the Peoples Trade Treaty signed with
Bolivia and Cuba at the end of April, to which Glaister assigns the
briefest of passing mentions?
No. Glaister seems to be referring to some mythical giant Chavez who
straddles South America like a latter-day colossus scouring the
continent for opportunities to "stir things up". Chavez is no longer a
person, a man elected to be President of Venezuela, working in concert
with his ministerial colleagues and the governments of neighbouring
countries. Chavez has become a mysterious natural force capable of the
most fantastic and generally sinister feats, a kind of Sauroman of
Caracas, looming over the region...just like that
In another piece from the Guardian stable of Tommy Cooper imitators,
this one from June 3rd by Simon Tisdall, Chavez-Sauroman mutates into a
"self-styled socialist revolutionary who seems hell-bent on recreating
cold war-era confrontation with Washington." In a piece focusing
largely on Nicaragua, Tisdall spreads the falsehood that Venezuela is
supplying "cheap fuel for Sandinista voters". In fact, the Venezuelan
State oil company has signed an agreement with the Nicaraguan
association of local authorities, AMUNIC, to supply fuel to
all 151 municipalities in Nicaragua, regardless of political
affiliation.
Tisdall's fatuous error, presumably the result of poor research,
propagates the standard US government propaganda line of a
Chavez-Sauroman figure cynically and ruthlessly abusing his country's
oil wealth to extend his nefarious influence and control. But it is the
Bush regime that is hell-bent on confrontation, pursuing precisely the
same strategy of imperialist intervention and aggression that it has
always applied to governments who refuse to submit to its will. Part of
that aggression is a cynical manipulative propaganda campaign with
which the editors of the Guardian and the Observer seem content to
string along.
Instability in Latin America results from decades of political and
economic failure to address poverty on the part of the imperialist
powers, their proxies
like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund and their
allies among local political elites . That failure
seldom if ever figures prominently in corporate media accounts of
political and economic affairs in Latin America except as a
regrettable, inscrutable backdrop. It hovers in exile in the
disinformation limbo where the corporate news media banish all
inconvenient facts.
Politicians like Hugo Chavez, Carlos Gaviria, Andres Manuel Lopez
Obrador, Ollanta Humala, Evo Morales, Daniel Ortega and many others are
trying to work out how best to use their countries' resources to
achieve a just settlement for their peoples, to give them a decent
life. Readers seeking reliable, serious, factual analysis of the
challenges they face and their efforts to meet those challenges will
generally not find it in the Guardian or the Observer. Tommy Cooper
style if-you-didn't-laugh-you'd-cry bathos, on the other hand, is there
aplenty...just like that....