Venezuela Big Brother

Venezuelans Protest As TV Station Shuts

Venezuelan police fired tear gas and plastic bullets Monday into a crowd of thousands protesting a decision by President Hugo Chavez that forced a television station critical of his leftist government off the air.

Source: Breitbart, May 28, 2007

Rising censorship among world's oil powers

To Chávez supporters, closing the station rids the nation of a source of lies and political manipulation. But the move is also generating massive street protests and worldwide claims of censorship. For Chávez critics, it represents a move toward authoritarianism they say is playing out across the globe. Democratically elected leaders – particularly "petroleum populists" in Venezuela, Russia, and Iran – attack dissent by targeting independent media and civil society groups, say analysts.

Source: Christian Science Monitor (online), May 24, 2007

Chavez gets sweeping new powers

According to the so-called enabling law, the president can remake laws for "the construction of a new, sustainable economic and social model" to achieve an equal distribution of wealth.

Source: BBC News, January 31, 2007

Chavez to shut down opposition TV

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has said he will not renew the licence for the country's second largest TV channel which he said expired in March 2007.

Source: BBC News (online), December 29, 2006

Venezuela seizes private land

In a dramatic step toward Cuban-style communism, the government of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez says it will seize more than 270,000 acres of private property and redistribute it to the poor.

Source: WorldNetDaily, March 16, 2005