José Vicente Rangel's Message to Venezuelans

José Vicente Rangel is one of my favorite figures in the Venezuelan government, now 85 years old, a politician, lawyer and journalist. He was an active political leader and journalist from the left from 1960 through the 1980s and ran as a candidate for president twice, first supported by the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS) and the second time in 1983 supported by the Electoral Movement of People and the Communist Party of Venezuela. He was Vice President of the Republic, a position he held from 28 April 2002 until 8 January 2007, the longest of all those who have occupied this post during the government of Hugo Chavez. So Rangel has a great deal of experience and a profound understanding of history, society and political life of Venezuela. He is frequently interviewed in the Venezuelan media and is a fervent supporter of the Bolivarian Revolution.

He published the message that appears below as a message to the Venezuelan people this week and it comports with my own observations of the work of the US backed opposition. We have the occasional violence that they sponsor, like the destructive and deadly "guarimbas" last February and March and the assassination of the youngest member of parliament, Robert Serra and his partner in their home on 1 October, 2014. We continue to experience their sabotage of food distribution, hoarding and dumping, smuggling of subsidized products into Colombia with diminishing frequency and their assault on the Venezuelan economy through the illegal currency exchange and speculation. But in his message to the people, Mr. Rangel describes something else: the opposition's steady, unrelenting psychological campaign to weaken the spirit and will of the Venezuelan people, the very foundation of the Bolivarian Revolution.

This operation described by Rangel is not simply a natural development by typical political dissent, critical of the government as commonly seen in all countries - and it is not "home-grown." The evidence that this campaign, sponsored by MUD (allied political opposition parties), emanates from the US Embassy in Caracas, Washington think-tanks and the US State Department is abundant and clear. In a sentence, this creeping movement is designed to wear down the ruling majority, particularly the revolutionary youth. The violent guarimbas, described by the opposition and international press as "student protests" and the assassination of young, vibrant Robert Serra were by design, meant to punctuate the campaign described by Rangel below. Serra spoke and led with the energy and spirit of former President Chavez and many saw him as a viable candidate for the presidency in the future. The young members of the opposition, a minority of Venezuelan youth, were manipulated and aided by the fascists to violence for the same purpose earlier this year. This chronic psy-ops campaign will continue and the incitements to riot and possible assassinations are undoubtedly already planned and outlined for 2015, an election year. But the masks have been removed from the clowns at the top who simply cannot win by democratic means and the majority of Venezuelans are aware that the opposition has no national plan except to destroy and destabilize the elected government.

- Les Blough in Venezuela
Axis of Logic

Perhaps the Solution is to Abandon the Country?
José Vicente Rangel's Message to the Venezuelan People:

Increasingly, they preach pessimism about the current situation in Venezuela. MUD is a party, there can be no doubt, with the destabilizing campaign that continues to progress into the future.

The meta-message is to emphasize the negatives, every day. Nothing is good in the country: everything is bad. Nothing works. Venezuela is paralyzed and exacerbates the process of disintegration that may culminate violently. Certain media shakes the ghost of a popular outbreak that could lead to a civil war.

The country's image that is projected to the outside is deplorable. While the country is calm, the vision that they disseminate, through skillful and permanent media campaigns, is that it’s falling to pieces. It’s message is that the people are killed in the streets, there is no food, that you can't talk or criticize the government, that people are governed by fear in the community and that the government is a dictatorship that oppresses relentlessly.

A vital part of the campaign is the spreading of this version that Venezuelans are desperate to leave the country, looking for safety and work in other nations. The campaign focuses especially on young people, whom they try to discourage and at the same time encourage them to seek for a way to go abroad. In the end, it is a campaign that not only threatens destabilization but it is also an attack on the fundamental values of the people who have internal cohesion, attachment to the homeland and the desire to work together in national destiny. It generates (and this is the most disturbing aspect of the message directed to that segment of the population inviting exodus), apathy, indifference, even contempt for the place where you were born.

What solution is the abandonment of the country? Perhaps it is for a few, but not for most. The destinations chosen outside are often misleading: precarious jobs, depressing living conditions, insecurity, contempt. Many are returning after a bitter experience abroad and many others remain outside affected by disappointment, nostalgia and conformism.

Meanwhile, in Venezuela the vast majority will not go away. Thousands of young people, professionals, entrepreneurs, merchants prefer to fight and work within the country, and to reject the attitude of the opposition and their pessimistic message. Believe in Venezuela. Have faith in the national destiny and time will tell who is right, those who leave or those who are left.

(translated by Les Blough)