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bad lately). (I used to think they were a cut above the others--no more!)
Sentence #1: I'll leave "leftist President" alone this round.
Sentence #2: "The former soldier...". (WTF? How about they describe Bush as "the former National Guard shirker"?)
Sentence #2: "...through a self-styled socialist revolution that promises to end U.S. 'imperialism.'" (A "self-styled" socialist revolution? What do they think he was elected president of--his bathroom? Christ.) (And putting "imperialism" in quotes tells us exactly what these snotbags think of the invasion and occupation of Iraq. Not imperialism. Rightful re-possession of white men's oil, over the dead bodies of half a million innocent people.)
Sentence #5: "Chavez has promised to more than double oil and fuel shipments to China as crude prices roar toward $100 per barrel and the communist country is scouring the globe...". (Bad writing! Easy to be confused about "the communist country." And anyway China is not communist anymore. It's fascist.)
(I'll skip over the confusion and misinformation about the deal itself. Bad writing! Deliberate?)
Sentence #7: "...to help finance Chavez's massive social development crusade that has been key to him winning the support of Venezuela's poor and repeatedly sweep elections." ("...crusade"? Since when is building schools and medical centers for needy people not the normal duty of a decent government? And why, pray, would it need to be "massive" and a "crusade"? Could it be because the selfish, greedy, rich oil elite in Venezuela, cozened and bribed by global corporate predators, neglected to build schools for the poor, and didn't give a fuck about their medical care? And these writers could certainly use some time in grammar school themselves. Their parallelism of "winning support" and "sweep elections" is wrong (--a missing "ing"--re: "sweeping"). But perhaps they were just so hot to make their point, that Chavez is buying the love of the poor, that they couldn't even write a fairly simple English sentence. So many lies to tell; so little time.)
Sentence #8: "...a constitutional overhaul that will allow him to remain in office indefinitely." (No, it's a constitutional amendment that will allow him to RUN FOR OFFICE for a third term, and be VOTED up or down, BY THE PEOPLE, just as our own FDR received the vote of the people for FOUR consecutive terms as president. FDR died in his fourth term. He was "president for life." So what? "...will allow him to remain in office indefinitely" implies that what is happening is somehow undemocratic, when, in fact, the proposal has been widely discussed in Venezuela for months (for years, in truth), was debated and voted on by the National Assembly, and now is being put to A VOTE OF THE PEOPLE, and, if it passes, THEN Chavez can run for office again, if he chooses, and "remain in office" IF THE PEOPLE SAY SO.
Overall: Besides all the hot button words for Chavez, and the implication, once again, that his support is not genuine--that he is a "dictator"--and that he is doing something TO Venezuela (bamboozling the poor) rather than doing something FOR Venezuela (doing the will of the people, as their elected president), they are also, in this piece, carefully constructing an impression of this Venezuela-China deal as irresponsible, profligate, and somehow wasteful and wild-eyed (--for instance, "borrowing record amounts of money" to finance "a crusade.") But it is the writers and editors of this piece who are irresponsible--even toward their own investor and business readers, providing a false picture of the nature of Chavez's support and of his policies.
This emotionally colored, propagandistic writing--which seethes with hostility toward the people of Venezuela and THEIR Bolivarian revolution--will not serve Reuters well, in the end. Readers who want and need REAL information will begin turning elsewhere. And Reuters will go the way of RCTV, which tried to convince Venezuelans, in 2002, that Chavez had resigned his office, that Chavez supporters were shooting and killing people in the streets, and that the fascist military coup that was taking place was a fait accompli--they might as well get used to it. Hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans just ignored these lies--they knew this was false information--and poured into the streets, in support of their suspended Constitution and their kidnapped president, and stopped the coup in its tracks. Chavez owes the people of Venezuela for his life, and for whatever power he possesses. And that is at it should be, with politicians. These corporate journalists don't seem to know this history, or seem to have forgotten what democracy is all about.
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Stay alert. Read with a critical eye. Note the hot button words. Ask yourself how many times a day, in how many ways, this Stalinst "Big Lie" technique is being used to convince you that poor people shouldn't be bought--only rich people should be.
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