Venezuela's Chavez welcomes Russian warships, the first of its kind in the Caribbean since the Cold War

On May 8, 2007, this blog made a memorial post about the events that happened on May 19, 1967 in Machurucuto beach in Venezuela, when Fidel Castro and his communist ilk tried to invade the coast in an attempt to introduce communist guerrilla in the country.

It is worthy to mention the proud Venezuelan patriots who died defending their country on that bloody day of May, 1967:

Mayor (Av.) Pedro J González,

ST1 (A.C.) Jesús Eduardo Bermúdez,

Teniente (a.C.) Jesús E. Rodríguez,

Subteniente (a.C.) José Monsalve Planchara,

MT2 (a.C.) Irradio Jesús Herrera,

ST3 (A.C.) Pablo Carero Muñoz,

Teniente Coronel (A.C.) Juan Ignacio Leyceaga,

Capitán (a.C.) Diego Lavado Castillo,

Capitán de Corbeta Fabio Galipolli,

Teniente (Ej.) Leonel Ramón Tapia,

Tte. (Ej.) Abelardo Estrada Vale,

Tte. (Ej.) Lino Irribarren Forzan,

Tte. (GN) Juan Bautista León,

Tte. (GN) Andrés Moreno Uribe,

Tte. (Ej.) Jesús Ávila Paolini and,

Subteniente (Ej.) Alberto Verde Graterol, (brother of a revolutionary chavista General).

Today, we can say that the blood of those Venezuelans heroic patriots was spilled in vain and it is totally disregarded in mockery by Venezuela's communist president, Hugo Chavez, when he allowed Russian warships to arrive this Tuesday, in a (...) show of strength aimed at the United States as Moscow seeks to expand its influence in Latin America.

Venezuelan sailors fired off cannons in a 21-gun salute as the destroyer Admiral Chabanenko docked in La Guaira, near Caracas. Russians sailors dressed in black-and-white uniforms lined up along the bow.

The deployment is the first of its kind in the Caribbean since the Cold War and was timed to coincide with President Dmitry Medvedev's visit to Caracas — the first ever by a Russian president. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has eagerly welcomed the ships, basking in the support of a powerful ally and traditional U.S. rival. Via GMANews.tv.

Hugo, looking like Tony Soprano, with Raul Castro and Vladimir Putin.

Shame on Hugo Chavez and his traitors.

Michael Moore's Sicko and the gruesome reality of the Cuban health care system

Even upper mid class Americans are struggling to get a good health medical, there's no questions about that if you want to get good health care in America you have to have money, or being an illegal. And there's also no question that something has to be done in regards of American's health system (I don't even want to talk about the stratospheric cost of drugs) . However, what's the point of Michael Moron to lie again to the Americans one more time? Oh I know! He wants to make money! Money is good!

I know that the feeling of many Americans is to socialize medicine. I am not so sure this will be as great as many people think it will be. Would you be able to see a doctor whenever you want? Can you choose to see an specialist or some name will be given to you and that's the one you must visit? How fast would you be able to get your appointment? It seems to me that you won't be able to be proactive with your health anymore. Right now, with the worst insurance available, you always can change your primary care doctor if you don't like him or her. Would you be able to pick and change doctors if you wish?

"Canadians concede that waiting time is a problem that stems from the country's lower costs and commitment to universal coverage. In a letter to the Wall Street Journal, Robert S. Bell, M.D., President and CEO of University Health Network, Toronto, said that Michael Moore's film SICKO "exaggerated the performance of the Canadian health system — there is no doubt that too many patients still stay in our emergency departments waiting for admission to scarce hospital beds." However, "Canadians spend about 55% of what Americans spend on health care and have longer life expectancy, and lower infant mortality rates. Many Americans have access to quality health care. All Canadians have access to similar care at a considerably lower cost." Canadians pay 9% of GDP to insure 100% of citizens, compared with 14% of GDP to insure 85% of Americans. The Kaiser Family Foundation found that 63% of Americans were worried about not being able to afford health-care services. There is "no question" that the lower cost has come at the cost of "restriction of supply with sub-optimal access to services," said Bell. A new approach is targeting waiting times, which are reported on public web site"

Source.

Now, regarding Sicko and Cuba:



This is the great health care that Cubans get... yeah righ let's get Michael Moore the same treatment that Fidel likes to give to the Cubans. No wonder why the Cubans who have such a great health care jump into rubber boats to the Caribbean sea full of sharks to arrive to Miami.

Is Israel the evil country of the Universe in regards of Human Rights?

If you don't like to read me, or if stumbled on my page by accident, please read carefully this article by Jackson Diehl at least, and tell me.

I was kind of ashtonished by the answers I got in the British Journalist post in regards to Israel. How come Cuba has better rights than the only democracy of the middle east, Israel? How come Cuba is not a problem but Israel is in regards of Human Rights? (The pict on your left are not Israeli children, they are Cuban swimming in the pool of happiness and prosperity that Fidel has given to their people).

Can one be more cynic that nobel prize winner Kofi Annan? That piece of shit who was caught in corruption (Sex Harassement and Oil-for-Food program) and the scum who works at the UN didn't asked him to step out but cleared him from any guilt?

Jamie in the comment section was mocking my British Journalist post saying "... to point to some other situation and scream that the world is anti-semitic." Well, I don't know about that but after reading Diehls' article, it really seems there is a clear agenda against Israel from the UN. This is not a line of defense for Israel, it is an insult for the people who live under Cuba, Belarus, China, Sudan, Zimbawe, Burma, Syria, Russia and Venezuela.

So, we are not doing any better with Human Rights. I would say that we actually are doing pretty bad. I cannot care less about the UN. To me, it lost any credibility whatsoever.

Something else, are we, Venezuelans, expecting anything from the UN in regards of taking some actions against Hugo Chavez? Keep dreaming folks, because it's not gonna happen. Not even an angry letter.

-f

Making a mockery of human rights
JACKSON DIEHL, THE JERUSALEM POST. Jun. 26, 2007.

Where does the global human rights movement stand in the seventh year of the 21st century? If the first year of the United Nations Human Rights Council is any indication, it's grown sick and cynical - partly because of the fecklessness and flexible morality of some of the very governments and groups that claim to be most committed to democratic values.

At a session in Geneva last week, the council - established a year ago to reform the UN Human Rights Commission -listened to reports by special envoys appointed by its predecessor condemning the governments of Cuba and Belarus. It then abolished the jobs of both "rapporteurs" in a post-midnight maneuver orchestrated by its chairman, who announced a "consensus" in spite of loud objections by the ambassador from Canada that there was no such accord.

While ending the scrutiny of those dictatorships, the council chose to establish one permanent and special agenda item: the "human rights situation in Palestine and other occupied Arab territories."

In other words, Israel (or "Palestine," in the council's terminology), alone among the nations of the world, will be subjected to continual and open-ended examination. That's in keeping with the record of the council's first year: Eleven resolutions were directed at the Jewish state. None criticized any other government.

Genocide in Sudan, child slavery and religious persecution in China, mass repression in Zimbabwe and Burma, state-sponsored murder in Syria and Russia - and, for that matter, suicide bombings by Arab terrorist movements - will not receive systematic attention from the world body charged with monitoring human rights. That is reserved only for Israel, a democratic country that has been guilty of human rights violations but also has been under sustained assault from terrorists and governments openly committed to its extinction.

THE OLD human rights commission, which was disparaged by former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan for casting "a shadow on the United Nations system as a whole," frequently issued unbalanced condemnations of Israel but also typically adopted half a dozen resolutions a year aimed at the worst human rights abusers.

For the new council, Israel is the only target. Eighteen of the 19 states dubbed "the worst of the worst" by the monitoring group Freedom House (Israel is not on the list) were ignored by the council in its first year. One mission was dispatched to examine the situation in Darfur. When it returned with a report criticizing the Sudanese government, the council refused to endorse it or accept its recommendations.

The regime of Gen. Omar al-Bashir, which is responsible for at least 200,000 deaths in Darfur, didn't just escape any censure. Sudan was a co-sponsor on behalf of the Arab League of the latest condemnations of Israel, adopted last week.

This record is far darker than Kofi Annan's "shadow." You'd think it would be intolerable to the democratic states that sit on the council. Sadly, it's not. Several of them - India, South Africa, Indonesia - have regularly supported the Organization of the Islamic Conference and the Non-Aligned Movement in their assaults on Israel and defense of Cuba, Belarus and Sudan. The council's chairman, who rammed through last week's decisions without a vote, is a diplomat from Mexico.

The European Union includes countries holding eight of the council's 47 seats. It has made no serious effort to focus the council's attention on the world's worst human rights violators.

According to a report by the independent group UN Watch, the European Union "has for the most part abandoned initiating any country-specific resolutions." At one point before last week's meeting, the European Union threatened to quit the council, effectively killing it. Yet when the meeting ended, Europe's representative, Ambassador Michael Steiner of Germany, said that while the package of procedural decisions singling out Israel "is certainly not ideal ... we have a basis we can work with."

What about Western human rights groups - surely they cannot accept such a travesty of human rights advocacy? In fact, they can. While critical of the council, New York-based Human Rights Watch said its procedural decisions "lay a foundation for its future work."

Global advocacy director Peggy Hicks told me that the council's focus on Israel was in part appropriate, because of last year's war in Lebanon, and was in part caused by Israel itself, because of its refusal to cooperate with missions the council dispatched. (Sudan also refused to cooperate but was not rebuked.) Hicks said she counted only nine condemnations, not 11.

Never mind how you count them: Is there a point at which a vicious and unfounded campaign to delegitimize one country - which happens to be populated mostly by Jews -makes it unconscionable to collaborate with the body that conducts it? "That could happen, but I don't think we're anywhere near there," Hicks said.

That's the human rights movement, seven years into a century that's off to a bad start.

The writer is deputy editorial page editor for The Washington Post.