 Media Critiques "It underscores how hard it is to get rid of these people." - Philip Gordon, "foreign policy expert"
Washington on the verge of a nervous breakdown
They toss these leaders into a mixed salad of "known" bad boys like Robert Mugabe, Kim Jon Il and Moammar Gadafi. They cite President Bush's recent verbal attack on Robert Mugabe, President of Zimbabwe when he called Mugabe "a discredited dictator" who has brought a "nightmare" to Zimbabwe, and the nightmare is unthinkable. Mugabe "... has seized farms owned by white citizens and cracked down on its opponents"; North Korean Kim Jong Il is in the salad. His government they charge, "churns out a daily stream of anti-American diatribes while praising its dictator's "undying feats", and they add that the real danger here is "Kim's nuclear and missile arsenal"; The bad boy salad also includes Moammar Gadhafi of Libya, but USA Today shows that prodigal sons can realize the error of their ways and come home: "Past pariahs don't always stay that way. Moammar Gadhafi of Libya, a bitter opponent of the United States in the 1980s, renounced terrorism and allowed international inspectors to dismantle Libya's chemical and nuclear weapons programs after the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003." What a finish! On the other hand, the resilient president of Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega barely scored a footnote from USA Today as they arrogantly shunted him aside as "little more than a minor annoyance". After lacing their verbal attacks on heads of state like Presidents Fidel Castro, Hugo Chávez Frias, Evo Morales with dire warnings and angry epithets, the corporate media went to their wishing well, predicting their impending failure and fall from their ill-gotten, democratically-elected positions. The Wishing Well and Imperial Lamentations President Fidel Castro: The shadow of Commandante Fidel Castro provides a fearsome backdrop for USA Today's frenetic duckshoot. Philip Gordon, "a foreign policy expert at the Brookings Institution, a foreign policy think tank" laments that Cuba's leader for 49 years has withstood, "massive sanctions on this little, nearby island" and "now is leaving the scene on his own terms". Gordon's lamentations continue, "It underscores how hard it is to get rid of these people", barely able to hide his disappointment that the CIA failed in every single one of their assassination plots against this head of state. But Gordon drops another Valium on Washington, assuring them that "The seriousness of the threat posed by such leaders has diminished since Castro brought the world to the brink of nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1961". Note that Gordon bends over to give Washington's shoes a spit-polish when he characterizes President Castro as one who "brought the world to the brink of nuclear war". Apparently, the glare from the shine has blinded him to the root causes of the missile crisis - the economic embargo that forced Cuba to turn to the Soviets for help and the CIA assassination attempts against their beloved president. President Chávez: Ignoring the respect that has come to President Chávez in Venezuela, Latin America and around the globe, USA Today cites the wafer-thin vote against constitutional reforms last December, "food shortages" and "discontent" - all sponsored with funding by Washington through USAID and National Endowment for Democracy. Trying to diminish Chávez power at home and abroad, they report "Things have not gone smoothly for Chávez lately" and the bald lie that the "constitutional changes ... would have allowed him to rule indefinitely". This handwringing is nothing short of precious. USA Today goes on to cheer King Juan Carlos, "who oversaw Spain's transition to democracy" while Juan was never democratically elected himself. They gloat over this demagogue's graceless verbal attack on President Chávez when he "told Chávez to 'shut up' during a summit in November" and disinform that "many Latin Americans cheered", ignoring that most Latin Americans fiercely objected to the King's ignorant sucker punch. Evo Morales: President Morales only enjoys the crosshairs of this capitalist medium's rifle scope for a few brief lines. They malign him with insinuations that he is one responsible for the empire's corrupted Hollywood/New York culture and its misery-numbing appetite for cocaine: "The leftist president of Bolivia has opposed U.S. efforts to eradicate coca, the raw ingredient of cocaine, and has accused the United States of trying to destabilize his government", they say. Daniel Ortega: They express their relief that "Leftist" President Ortega has "has toned down his anti-American talk and wears dress shirts instead of the revolutionary fatigues he used to wear in the 1980s." Then they discount him with aplomb saying that he is "little more than a minor annoyance". How those revolutionary fatigues of Ortega, Fidel Castro and Chávez must disturb these soothsayers! Why can't all these men act a little more civilized and just put everyone at ease by wearing a nice Brooks Brothers dress shirt with a silk, hand-painted necktie, otherwise known as the capitalists' noose. My father once said that whoever was responsible for this invention should have been hung by one! Raul Castro: Another disgruntled Miamian is quoted by the media sycophant regarding the brother of President Castro who worked for the Cuban revolution from the very beginning: "Castro's apparent successor as Cuba's ruler, Raul Castro, lacks his brother's charisma and bluster", said Uva de Aragon, associate director of the Cuban Research Institute at Florida International University". Aragon is a well known critic of the Cuban Revoluton, living in Miami and the author of American Jewish History along with other books to her credit. Her beloved step-father once ran against Batista for president and lost before she "escaped" Fidel Castro's "heavy hand" for her refuge in US academia. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: USA Today calls Iran's president Ahmadinejad, "The Bush administration's loudest foe in the Middle East" and utilizes the canard that Iran is "a state sponsor of terrorism for its alleged support of extremist groups in Lebanon and the Palestinian territories", i.e. according to the U.S. They also refer to the debunked allegation that Iran wants "to build nuclear weapons and supplying arms to Iraqi militants". They top off their assault, charging the Iranian president with the following unforgiveable sins: "Ahmadinejad's verbal attacks on Israel, Iran's influence as an oil exporter, and the continuing doubt over Iran's nuclear ambitions make him a destabilizing force", quoting Peter Beinart, no less than a senior fellow at the infamous Council on Foreign Relations which was primarily responsible for the buildup for war on Iraq, now hawking for war on Iran. Apparently, the USA Today writer forgot to throw in the charge that President Ahmadinejad declared that the State of Israel "should be wiped off the map." (What he really said was that the present government of Israel should be brought down.) Perhaps the writer realized that that thread-bare corporate media dog just don't hunt anymore. They finish their reassurances that all is well in the empire by stating, "Since the end of the Cold War, anti-U.S. diatribes ... are more likely to end up as viral YouTube clips than they are to spark a major global confrontation". But the writer cannot hide his lingering resentment toward President Chávez ... "anti-U.S. diatribes such as Chavez's rant in which he called President Bush 'the devil'." - A "rant" we might add that brought the U.N. General Assembly to their feet for applause so vigorous it had to be quelled by the Chair. Presidential Relationships USAToday whines on in an attempt to deny President Chávez the international respect he has earned through his commitment to the Venezuelan people and to the poor around the world. On the weakest possible evidence, they drop the bucket into their wishing well again to suggest there are new fissures in the obvious rock-solidarity between the Venezuelan and Cuban governments: "Even in Cuba, Chavez's star may be fading", quoting Susan K. Purcell, of the University of Miami. Purecell is cut from the same fabric in Florida's heart of hatred where disgruntled Cubans and Venezuelans sit on Miami beaches, drink their Cosmopolitans, complain and lobby Washington to maintain the embargo and food shortages against their own blood relatives in Cuba and Venezuela respectively. What feeds their rage most is the fact that they know their spawn do not have, and hopefully will never have, access to their parents' pre-revolution control of wealth and power under Batista in Cuba and the 4th Republic in Venezuela at the expense of the poor. The capitalist media drops another Valium on Washington's panic attacks by claiming that Fidel's brother, Raul Castro and President Chávez aren't the best of friends: Raul Castro "wants to develop bio-fuels and increase oil exploration, possibly to wean Cuba off Venezuela's gifts of oil" (Unlikely considering Cuba's rejection of displacing the food supply with bio-fuels for SUV gasoline); and "Raul is not so keen on Chavez ... Just look at the body language when they meet. Chavez is embracing Fidel ... and it's a much more distant relationship with Raul", says Susan Purcell. And so it goes as the Royal Media Physicians tell the King and his subjects that while there is reason for some concern, all is well in the empire; not to worry about Castro and Chávez because Fidel's days are numbered and that Raul Castro doesn't really like President Chavez. Sitting in Miami's Little Havana, Susan Purcell assures them that she can see these things in Raul's body language and puts everyone at ease! And we ask, "What body language are you seeing these days, Susan, when the bumbling Idiot Prince walks out of the Oval Office with his fake military bearing to the Rose Garden where he occasionally faces a few of his friendlier subjects in the press corps?" Please enlighten us with your clairvoyance! Perhaps you could also provide some insight into Cheney's sneer as he hawks for war on Iran and Condi's nervous, reflexive grin as she poses for film clips, sitting in protected palaces with foreign dignitaries! - Les Blough in Venezuela
© Copyright 2008 by AxisofLogic.com
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