Right-leaning media bias in the US has so carefully selected the information it provides about Venezuela that most people in the US probably know precious little other than that it is an oil-producing country whose president recently called Bush the devil.
Given the Bush administration's record of promoting violence and political discord in Venezuela, why wouldn't President Chávez think badly of Bush? Indeed, personal attacks from the Bush administration and the right-leaning US media on President Chávez have been plentiful. The administration has tried to link Chávez to the "axis of evil," to characterize him as a clone of Hitler, and they have claimed he is tied to terrorists and drug dealers.
Despite the open hostility from the Bush administration, according to Garcia Gunderson, who travels frequently to Venezuela and whose family lives there, most Venezuelans distinguish between the bad policies and harsh attitude of the US president and the friendship and common history they share with the people of the United States. "President Chávez is always talking about Martin Luther King, Lincoln, and all the ideals that we share, because we have a similar history," Garcia Gunderson stated.
She pointed to the similarities of the independence movements of both countries and at the economic ties mainly oil that bind the two countries. She said that President Chávez's program of providing discounted heating oil to poor and marginalized communities in the US demonstrates "that never before has the connection [between our countries] been so strong, people to people." Several local and state entities in the US have either made agreements with the Venezuelan government to receive discounted oil shipments or are currently in talks to do so.
In addition to this program, after the disaster caused by Hurricane Katrina and the failure of the Bush administration to respond rapidly and adequately to prevent the deaths of over 1,800 people, President Chávez immediately offered financial aid to the people affected by the disaster. He also volunteered assistance in petroleum and gasoline products that might be needed in the rescue and recovery operations. In a surprising and shameful gesture, President Bush declined the offer and proceeded to continue to botch recovery and reconstruction projects.
With Bush's unrelenting and irresponsible antagonism, it is easy to see why President Chávez, his political supporters, and millions of ordinary Venezuelans would be seriously concerned about additional interference in the upcoming December 3rd elections. Chávez's opponent has earned the suspicion of Venezuelan voters because he has sought and won public support from Venezuela's elites and the Bush administration.
Garcia Gunderson said she believes Chávez will win by a large margin. "He has to be overwhelmingly elected by at least the same percent he got in the referendum so that they can once more prove to the international community that he is the president that the people in Venezuela want to elect," she added. She expressed frustration that it will take a fourth election to prove this but believes it will be accomplished.
The role of the solidarity movement and organizations like Venezuela Solidarity is to promote the basic idea that the people of a country like Venezuela have the right to elect whom they want, Garcia Gunderson concluded. Venezuela has "the right to self-determination," she stated emphatically, "without having somebody always pointing the finger and saying this is what you should do." She compared the current interference in Venezuela by the Bush administration to that of the Nixon administration in Chile in 1973. After President Salvador Allende was elected in Chile in 1970, Henry Kissinger said that the US government couldn't let those "irresponsible people" choose their own president and proceeded to order assistance to the military coup plotters.
People in the US need not agree with Chávez's policies in order to support the basic notion that the people of Venezuela should be able to choose their own government without interference. It is nothing more than what we expect from other countries every other November.
--Joel Wendland is managing editor of Political Affairs and can be reached at jwendland@politicalaffairs.net
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