Well, Mark Lloyd’s (AND Sean Penn’s) favorite dictator is at it again, and Lloyd is probably doing a “happy dance.” Ever since assuming dictatorial powers, Chavez has been shutting down any media outlet that dares to oppose him. The rationale seems hauntingly familiar. Here is some coverage from NewsBusters:
Is this what Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chief Diversity Officer Mark Lloyd meant when he said (on camera) Venezuelan thug dictator Hugo Chavez (take that, Sean Penn) had begun “to take very seriously the media in his country”- while praising Chavez’s “incredible…democratic revolution?”
The Associated Press (AP) late Friday night reported “Chavez criticizes US as arrests stir concern.” Which plays down the lead in the headline, but gets right into it in the story itself.
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on Friday defended the arrest of a major TV channel owner, calling him a criminal and denying the government is carrying out an assault on press freedom.
The back-to-back arrests this week of two government opponents – including the owner of Venezuela’s only remaining anti-Chavez TV channel – have drawn accusations that Chavez is growing increasingly intolerant and authoritarian as his popular support has slipped.
Opposition leaders and human rights groups condemned Thursday’s arrest of Globovision’s owner Guillermo Zuloaga, who was detained at an airport and released hours later after a judge issued an order barring him from leaving the country.
Zuloaga is accused of spreading false information and insulting the president at an Inter American Press Association meeting in Aruba last weekend, Attorney General Luisa Ortega said.
Well, well. Someone in the media who speaks out against a sitting president is accused of lying, and that represents a “crime.” Where have we heard that before? And Mark Lloyd is applauding it, right?
Of course, Lloyd has come out on the record as saying that he didn’t say that.
Allow me to clear away some mud: I am not a Czar appointed by President Obama. I am not at the FCC to restore the Fairness Doctrine through the front door or the back door, or to carry out a secret plot funded by George Soros to get rid of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck or any other conservative talk show host. I am not at the FCC to remove anybody, whatever their color, from power. I am not a supporter of Hugo Chavez. The right wing smear campaign has been, in a word – incredible, generating hate mail and death threats. It is the price we pay for freedom of speech. And I do support free speech.
I still get a hearty laugh out of that, even though I wrote about it months ago. And that points to a massive failure of the left. They still haven’t quite come to the understanding that the media paradigm has changed. They just can’t lie in public and assume that millions of people can’t find their earlier statements on the Internet. If a picture is worth a thousand words, a video of the guy contradicting himself has to be worth a million.
Now that we have the blatant lie out of the way, let’s revisit this issue at hand in our country. How many times have “progressives” accused Limbaugh, Beck, and the others, of lying, inciting violence, or being propagandists for the rich? How many people on the “progressive” side have advocated removing them from the air, or publicly wish that they suffer or die? How many times has the “progressives” smeared any one who disagrees with them as a “racist?” Doesn’t it sound a lot like Chavez and his cronies? The themes are similar, but the process is identical; smear, discredit, and criminalize dissent, then use that as a justification to control the means of communication.
Whether you like Limbaugh, Hannity, Beck, Savage, or any of the other Conservative voices out there, or not, the government that has the power to silence them, has the power to one day silence you.
Matt
I believe that future generations should have the same opportunities that myself, and those that came before me, had. My parents taught me that I could do anything I wanted to do. I don’t want to have to tell my daughter, “You can do whatever the government tells you to do.” We are at a crossroads in this country; are we going to be free, or are we going to be slaves to the nanny state. I choose freedom.
Can we trade Sean Penn to Venezuela for a couple first round draft picks? The Yankees could use a good young catcher.
From what I hear, Penn is really only good for hitting women, which reduces his value in a trade.
Yeah, but ARod needs some back up. He doesn’t want to break a nail.
Hey, now. I can be a lifelong Yankees fan and dislike some of the players.
Have to tell you Matt, what disturbs me is how people like Lloyde, Van Jones, Maxine Waters, and Henry Waxman all socialists get elevated and taken seriously in a country that is supposed to love liberty and property rights above all else. I mean the progressive caucus is nothing more than a mini politburo. This is shameful that these socialists are allowed to be in positions of influence in this country. What do we need to do to wake the people up!
Well, if the MSM did it’s job, the whole of the public would know that they are little more than would be dictators. I guess we have to do it then.
This man is dangerous and pathetic. I know that this is a simplistic question but; if people dislike America and what she stands for, why bother with the restructuring when it’s easier to move to a country that has the socio-political dynamic you prefer. Is it a matter of laziness?
LP, I think it deals with maintaining their illusion that statism is an efficient and prosperous system. If the US is left intact, and more free by their leaving, it will outperform any other system. More freedom, more prosperity, and so on. It will then make it harder to manage their useful idiots.
Tom, the reason they stay is that they are drinking the $%(*&^$%ing Kool-Aid.
Thank you gentlemen for your responses. That must be some tasty Kool-Aid…
Tasty, if not extremely potent.