Posted on 09/23/2006 5:07:43 PM PDT by jdm
CARACAS, Venezuela Sep 23, 2006 (AP)— President Hugo Chavez said his foreign minister was detained by U.S. authorities at a New York airport Saturday for more than hour as he tried to return to the South American country.
Chavez told Venezuela's state TV broadcaster that U.S. officials alleged that Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro had links to a failed coup that Chavez led in Venezuela in 1992.
"They have held him accusing him of participating in terrorist acts here," Chavez said in Venezuela. "He didn't even participate in that patriotic rebellion."
Both Venezuelan politicians were in New York this week attending the yearly U.N. General Assembly, where Chavez attracted attention with a speech calling President Bush "the devil." He later criticized the U.S. leader during a stop in Harlem before returning home.
There was no immediate comment from U.S. officials and it wasn't known if Maduro has since left for Venezuela.
Maduro told CNN Espanol shortly after being released that he was confined to a small room and told to remove his clothes.
Maduro said that when he explained that he was the Venezuelan foreign minister and showed his diplomatic passport, he said he was threatened, pushed and yelled at by immigration and police officials.
"They were violating diplomatic conventions," he said.
Maduro told Venezuela private TV station Globovision separately that U.S. authorities said a code on his airplane ticket identified him as "almost a terrorist."
"This is an outrageous incident, repudiable from all points of view and unacceptable," Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel said, adding Venezuela would protest to the U.S. government.
In 1992, Chavez, then a lieutenant colonel in the army, led a failed uprising aimed at ousting then-President Carlos Andres Perez.
Chavez is ready for the Peter Pan bowl of the Peanut Butter case
Nut Case all the way
Like I said on the previous thread, I like to troch up a Maduro in the afternoon.
Nicolas Maduro
There is really nothing positive to write about him. He is a failed union leader, from the Caracas subway system if memory serves me well. He never did anything smart in his life, and since the press got him as a source of news in 1998, there is nothing I can point that he did that showed creativity, originality or even hard work. He gained weight and got known for his escapades to visit his guru in India, first class ticket of course, at tax payer expense one may presume sinc ehe never bothered showing the receipts and even for an assemblyman paycheck, first class tickets to India is quite a bundle.
However he is a semi gifted opportunist and in a political movement full of nullities carried by Chavez own charisma (plus the general management of Cuban advisers) that was a big advantage. He understood very, very early that the way to go was to accept anything that Chavez will do or order. He was handicapped at first because he comes from labor, from the civilian sector that Chavez wanted to destroy the most at the start of his rule. It took Chavez quite a while to trust Maduro. To gain the trust Maduro did several things. One was to live maritally with Cilia Flores, a talibanic [emphasis added] pasionara of limited intellect but vociferating abilities and overly dyed red hair. She also was one of the few lawyers that volunteered to help Chavez in 1992. Reports of their trips to the US for shopping sprees, kids on tag, have been numerous.
The second thing Maduro did was to choose wisely his revolutionary career. I suppose that we can give him credit for his self knowledge on his limited managerial skills. That would explain his choice of a parliamentary career, never trying to go elsewhere. Not for him to exert in running for governor, mayor or indicating a wish to work in the executive branch. Maduro knew that for someone lazy, with little interest in day to day management, a seat at the newly formed national assembly was the way to go, in particular with a regime that primed the executive more and more. A sinecure so to speak.
The third thing Maduro did was to organize the “civilian” group within chavismo. In this meaning, “civilian group” meant organizing non military folks that were willing to be as devoted to Chavez, no questions asked, as the military that Chavez so obviously favored. Which admittedly was not much hard work either as all were only too willing to imitate Maduro. Leadership by example if you please. He kept gaining weight.
But Maduro always failed to shine, failed to reach higher positions. This started to change some when he sat patiently at the negotiating table in 2003 to nail the conditions for a recall election. We know what happened, but at least Chavez grateful that his delegates took the heat for him started rewarding them. Maduro abilities for stone walling (due to his poor intellect contrary to what people might believe) were certainly handy for an increasingly authoritarian regime who did not want to discuss any parcel of power.
Maduro started moving up and for the last year of the assembly he became the speaker of the house. By then of course the national assembly had become a redoubt of chavismo where the main objective was to stall the remaining opposition, something that Maduro had shown interest for and some ability in doing. In all fairness under the baton of Maduro things did function better in the assembly in that the opposition was less able to start discussion on law projects as a parliament is supposed to do. Chavez appreciated the lowered noise from the National Assembly and the passing of several controversial laws that one had to pinch one's nose to vote for. Maduro surely noted who did pinch his or her own nose and those ones did not get the nod to seek a reelection.
Of course after the assembly became monochromatic in 2005 Maduro was confirmed as speaker and speedily made the National Assembly into the Notary Public of the executive, a place where law projects are sent to be speedily voted, no questions asked. Maduro was now a star of the regime, always starved for people who do as told, without any discussion.
Nicolas Maduro Foreign Minister?
I mean, how can such a non-dialogue person, someone that cannot even speak proper Spanish, someone that probably knows little geography, less history and has no obvious ability in understanding complex international issues be named Foreign Minister?
Well, again his only known qualities: stonewalling and straight face when saying utter nonsense.
It seems that the latest excursion of Chavez has brought some lessons home. With the semi death of Castro (and his imminent death anytime soon no matter what) Chavez has decided to stop any pretense and play his hand on the foreign stage. What this means for Venezuela I reserve for a future post, limiting myself to sate the obvious, that the December election are more compromised than ever, that the international project of Chavez not only cannot contemplate ever losing power, but that the opposition must be shown as not being able to get even a 20% of the vote, the real meaning of the “10 millones por el buche” as we can now fully understand. “Unanimity” of the Venezuelan people is a must for the trials to come, even if such unanimity must be gained on abstention and gross electoral cheating..
The thing is that Chavez has cast his lot once and for all. He is bidding for Castro’s mantle, he is bidding for the leadership of the anti US world crusade, he has declared open support for all regimes severely to totally lacking in democratic value and he must himself degrade the embers of his own democracy to show his new allies his sincerity. The days of Mr. Nice, of trying to pretend to negotiate treaties and stuff are over. He does not need a foreign minister anymore: he needs a parrot like Perez Roque in Cuba, someone that will say the darnedest things with a straight face and limit himself to repeat them as often as needed. He needs someone who will justify what is about to happen in Venezuela without batting an eye, without opening himself to any shred of discussion. Chavez needs a messenger that can only read the script and is absolutely unable to take any weird initiative.
Maduro will be perfect: the anti foreign secretary, the anti negotiator.
------end snip.
If interested, I've posted some more data here. Apparently, Hugo Chavez and his Chavistas devised a software program abrogating the privacy rights of every single citizen in Venezeula.
*** snip:
"This window has lots of information to discriminate, harass, classify and label people near wher you live. You have the ID number, age, whether the person signed petitions against the opposition, against Chavez, whether the person is rated as "opposition", abstainer and in columns not shown, whether the person signed or not against Chavez and if his or her signature were rejected or not. Then in the buttons below, you can print, search, filter according to categories or simply click on the button labeled "patriots". Press that and you only see the true "Aryans" loyal to the process, those that signed against the opposition. These are your revolutionary, fascist buddies, ready to die or whatever for the revolution. In fact, if they are not on your side but they participate in any of the misiones, you can threaten them with removal of their meager perks, if they don't want to follow orders. Cute, immoral and perverse, no?"
*** end snip
I think Maduro was in jail on an unrelated murder rap when that 1992 coup was taking place. The guy was a bus driver unable to control his temper, killed a guy, and would have been put away forever except that he was a communist. The guy is one of the foulest of all Chavez's cronies.
My question is...did they waterboard him?
You no gotta tha tickie, you getta tha special treatment.
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