The arrogance of these people just knows no bounds. I wonder if the reporter for the Canadian Press agency wasn’t chuckling when s/he wrote this:
Fedecamaras, which counts thousands of large and small businesses among its members, rejected Chavez’s constitutional overhaul as an “illegal act” in mid-November, and has since called on Venezuelans to oppose its passage in a Dec. 2 referendum “by every possible legal means.”
First of all, what gives THEM the authority to pronounce on the legality of a constitutional reform? Do they still think they write the law in Venezuela, and the government’s duty is to rubber-stamp it? Apparently they do. Which is why they oppose those reforms–the reforms were written by not only Chavez, but the National Assembly, and some of them directly undermine the unelected power of the business sector, which is led by Fedecamaras.
And secondly, what is “every possible legal means”? The only way the reforms can be defeated is by VOTING. Anything else is NOT legal. Empty rhetoric? Hey, no one farts it like business leaders. Empty barrel, loudest noise, blah blah.
But what really makes me giggle over all this is how the CP reported this as if Fedecamaras had any moral standing left. I wonder how hard it was to keep a straight face while noting the following:
Chavez accuses the business chamber of helping to orchestrate a 2002 coup that ousted him from office for two days – during which time Fedecamaras’ then-president Pedro Carmona headed the country’s interim government.
“Chavez accuses“? This makes it sound like he’s the only one who thinks so, and that his word is a mere accusation, nothing more. But this coup is a fact, and so is the blood on Fedecamaras’ hands. The “interim government” was no government at all; it was illegal. Chavez was president of Venezuela throughout the coup, which means that when he was taken into custody by Carmona’s henchmen, it was a kidnapping and attempted assassination.
In other words, A CRIME.
Which means that Fedecamaras has no right to pronounce on the legality of anything, since it is still in direct violation of the laws of the land itself.
Who died and made Fedecamaras king of Venezuela, anyway? And WTF is the Canadian Press doing, carrying water for them? It’s supposed to be a press agency, not a fucking PR firm. The least they can do is report the facts, not perpetuate a dead myth.
I can’t believe that people here still buy this crapaganda that Chavez is some kind of dictator when Chavez hasn’t even laid a finger on most of the coup supporters that continue to live in Venezuela. As if people in the U.S. or even Canada would let such supporters roam free after attempting such a thing in our own countries. The level of mental departmentalization needed to hold these two contradictory beliefs must be enormous.