Those of us who listen to NPR largely to monitor the bias in the publicly-funded network’s news programming were treated to a whole series of stories about Hugo Chavez and Venezuela this week in advance of that country’s election on Sunday.   While it is easy for NPR to downplay the bias in its reporting on North Korea since few on the American left are foolish enough to openly praise Kim Jong-un, reporting on Chavez and Venezuela poses a large number of challenges for the network, as it tries to appear “balanced” while still advancing its agenda.

When I woke up on Wednesday morning, for instance, I heard part of this interview and couldn’t believe what I was listening to, as NPR’s Steve Inskeep interviewed Rory Carroll, a correspondent for The Guardian who has written a book about Chavez.  The interview began with Carroll making an observation about Chavez’s strong support among poor Venezuelans:

I would say about a third of Venezuelans adored him right through everything. From the beginning, right until the end. And, it’s impressive. I mean, for a guy who’s in power for 14 years? And you would tramp up the barrios — these hillside slums were his bedrock of support — and these people felt that down below in the palace, in Miraflores, there was a guy who was on their side — that he was their champion. He looked like them, he spoke like them. He was them. And that was an incredibly powerful connection that Chavez was able to maintain all through his 14 years in power.

In a subsequent exchange, Carroll related the story of a “clash” he once had with Chavez on television where Chavez responded to the question in part by deploying the rhetoric of race and class which is so popular on the left.  Summing up the encounter, Carroll made it clear he thought Chavez had made a valuable point: “I was a perfect fall guy or rhetorical punch bag, in the sense that, yes, I’m Irish, freckly and blond, or ginger, if you like — I was in that sense a perfect foil as a stand-in agent of imperialism.”

As the interview continued, though, Carroll acknowledged that the longer Chavez remained in power, the less enthusiastic he and the staff at The Guardian felt about Chavez’s reign.  Carroll talked about economic stagnation in Venezuela, the rising crime rate, and the fact that the failure of many of Chavez’s policies disproportionately affected the poor.  Carroll answered a question about his declining enthusiasm for Chavez as follows:

Well, it’s a good question. Yes, at the beginning — and I think most liberals and right-thinking people would have been, in his first couple of years in power. There was plenty of reason to give him any benefit of the doubt. Now, over time, when he became a bit more oppressive, shutting down television stations, and when the wheels were kind of beginning to come off the economy in some ways, I, in my own reporting, became very critical, just reflecting what I saw on the ground. And this prompted quite a debate, internal debate, in my newspaper, because a lot of editors then and to this day feel and felt that we should have supported Hugo Chavez because he was a standard-bearer for the left. Whereas I, very close up, I thought, well, no, actually. Because sadly, he’s running the country into the ground and we have to report that.

In other words, even a reporter for The Guardian feels compelled to actually practice journalism once in a while.  And it was at this point when this interview–and other stories like it during the week–started to get very challenging for NPR and its listeners.

My reaction to the interview–and other stories like it during the week–was rather like Tim Graham’s take at Newsbusters: “Thatcher, Schmatcher. NPR is still obsessing over its loss of leftist Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez.”  But when I actually looked up the interview on the NPR website, I saw something else completely.  Even when normally far-left NPR decides to air a mostly positive story about Chavez, it is still not positive enough for its left-wing listeners.

Many listeners were voicing their anger at NPR for daring to mention any of the negative realities of life under Chavez.  One listener wrote:

The tone of this article is most disappointing. Where do I start and is it worth it, given that NPR has become a mouthpiece for North American pursuit of control over everyone, starting from its docile citizens? Or are they simply immoral and prefer to ignore military intervention so they can continue to shop and charge everything on (more…)

Does Rich Lowry get it?

Chávez got his first political break in a failed military coup and never lost his taste for militarizing politics. Fidel Castro was his mentor, and he propped up the Castro regime with Venezuela’s ample oil. He funded guerrillas warring against the democratically elected government of Colombia. He praised every heinous dictator around the planet as a brother-in-arms. He was hell on the plutocrats, and also on the Jews. “Don’t let yourselves be poisoned by those wandering Jews,” he warned his countrymen, in a sentiment worthy of the 15th century.

All of this should make Chávez an unsympathetic figure for everyone in America. Not so, sadly. For some, all is forgiven if you hate the rich with a white-hot passion and talk the language of populist redistribution, while wrapping your program in a bow of rancid, paranoid anti-Americanism. Then, every allowance will be made for your thuggery. Everyone will obsess about your colorful and charming personality. And praise you when you’re gone.

Emphasis added.  Via Powerline Picks.

Somebody needs update White House Press Secretary Jay Carney on the anti-American nature of Islamicist movements. In his press briefing earlier today, he claimed that those protesting in the Middle East are not angry at the United States or its policies, but because of a video released on the Internets.

Via the Blaze, also National Review.

The video was only a pretext.  The protesters were planing to protest.  This mentality is akin to that of the statement the Romney campaign criticized — and which the State Department later retracted.

Oh, and, when Mitt Romney initially criticized that statement, it still stood as the only one of three administration reactions to the attacks on our embassies. The embassy statement stood for nearly fourteen hours until the Obama administration claimed it had not been “cleared by Washington and does not reflect the views of the United States government”. [NB: Tweaked this paragraph by adding in the italicized words and striking the "struck" words when I learned that Secretary of State Clinton condemned the Benghazi violence before Romney released his statement.]

UPDATE:  A reminder to Mr. Carney:  The attack was pre-planned:  ”According to U.S. intel, the attack on the Benghazi consulate was pre-planned and unrelated to the protest over the movie outside the building, except to the extent that it used the latter as a diversion for security.”

“Don’t expect the media to make a big deal of it,” writes Rand Simberg about the passing of an artist who devoted much of  theatrical career to challenging Communism.

Although Vaclev Havel stood up for artistic freedom and defended the political systems which allowed for freedom of expression, he never achieved the accolades as did many with fewer accomplishments and a smaller vision.  He was, as Simberg put it,

. . . the wrong kind of dissenter, being too American for Europe. The fact that he never won a Peace Prize, while Yasser Arafat and Barack Obama did, says something very fundamental about the corruption and uselessness of that once-honorable achievement.

(Via Insapundit.)  Why do so many on the left so often champion those voices dissenting not just the systems which oppressed them, but also the Western ideals which promote the very idea of dissent?

Bruce Bawer thinks we need more leaders like Havel.   More on this great man, anon.  Much more.

*from Western intellectuals.

Remember back in the early years of this century how many on the left — and in the Democratic Party– faulted then-President George W. Bush for going it alone on foreign policy. Despite the fact that this good man had developed strong relationships with the leaders of a great variety of nations, including the United Kingdom, Japan, Spain (until 2004), Australia, Poland and Denmark to name but a few, his critics all focused on the opposition generated by the then-President of France.

That man, a Monsieur J. Chirac famously rebuked European nations working with Bush on liberating Iraq for losing a “good opportunity to keep quiet”.  The problem was not that Bush did not forge strong relationships with our allies, but that Chirac (and members of his government) actively sought to frustrate them.

Seems like the Frenchman has gotten his comeuppance. According to Glenn Reynolds, the immediate past president of the Fifth Republic has been

CONVICTED OF CORRUPTION CHARGES. “Jacques Chirac, mayor of Paris from 1977 to 1995, is the first former French head of state to be convicted since Marshal Philippe Petain, the leader of the wartime Vichy regime, was found guilty in 1945 of collaborating with the Nazis.”

George W Bush could not be reached for comment.

“To the extent that there is any European patriotism beyond the expensively furnished lairs of the upscale”, Andrew Stuttaford writes in the Weekly Standard, “it finds its most powerful expression in, significantly, something negative—distaste for the United States.”

Kind of sounds a lot like Democrats prior to the advent of the savior who would halt the rise of the oceans and being the healing of the planet.  They found their most powerful expression in, significantly something negative—distaste for George W. Bush.

(Stuttaford’s is a good piece, especially with his references to “an elite unimpressed by its homeland”.)

On Monday, realizing that nearly 500 e-mails had accumulated in my blog and personal e-mail accounts, I started wading through them, going through nearly 200 e-mails.  I did catch a few personal ones I missed, but most (fortunately!) were just links to (or summaries of) news and opinion pieces which I mostly skimmed over.

A number caught my eye, including this one from the globe-trotting Jamie Kirchick:

The subtitle struck me even more than the title, “The political legacy of opposition to apartheid has devolved into hostility toward the West — and sympathy for anyone else engaged in ‘anti-imperial struggle’”. It’s almost as if that statement defines many facets of American liberalism — and other left-wing ideologies — particularly since the Civil Rights movement.

All too many on the left saw segregation not as an ugly stain on a noble experiment, but instead as a defining aspect of America. In opposing that heinous system, many became hostile toward the United States and, by extension, the West. Their animosity is often furthered by the way the legacy of the Civil Rights’ movement is taught on college campi. Western civilization, our teachers tell us, is fundamentally hostile to “the other.”

No wonder some left-wing outfits show support for the ostensible representatives of other oppressed groups, even when those representatives are themselves hostile to those supposedly represented by the groups themselves. Witness Codepink. Or “Queers for Palestine.”

All too few (alas!) recognize that Dr. King drew on the very best of the Western tradition in crafting his (successful) movement to end segregation, frequently citing, in his speeches, our country’s founding documents and national hymns and regularly referencing Scripture and lessons drawn from his education in Christian theology.

Former French President Chirac to stand trial.  This is why this news brings such cheer to so many:

The former president, a bugaboo for George W. Bush during his rush to war in Iraq, on Monday becomes France’s first former head of state to go on trial since its Nazi-era leader was exiled.

Together with his sidekick, former German Chanceller Gerhard Schröder, Chirac raised such a ruckus opposing Bush’s efforts to enforce multiple United Nations’ resolutions in the early 2000s as Iraq repeatedly flouted them.   The American and European media used this opposition to peddle the (false) narrative that W had developed a go-it-alone foreign policy, acting without consulting our allies.  It was Chirac’s petulance that caused a rift among Western nations.

Yet, Chirac defied the United States not on the merits of the arguments, but for the sake of defiance.  And to try to preserve France’s stature on the world stage.

Now, to be sure, the trial does not address Chirac’s self-important posturing while President of France.  But, it is sweet to see such a man in legal jeopardy.  I believe the term is schadenfreude.

I had a flash of brilliance over the weekend. I know how to make Obama pay attention to terrorists and dictators threatening America.

Let’s put golf courses in Iran, Yemen, Afghanistan, Somalia, Iraq & Venezuela.

He might just be interested in threats against our nation if that were the case!

-Bruce (GayPatriot)

This is just too delicious to ignore.  Recall the conventional wisdom of the better part of the last decade about then-President George W. Bush’s supposedly go-it-alone foreign policy and how that man antagonized our allies.  This silly notion was all based on the failure of two of our allies, France and Germany, to support that good man’s commitment to enforcing numerous United Nations resolutions which Iraq had violated.

Well, when Jacques Chirac, the man who served as President of France for the better part of W’s tenure in the White House stepped down in 2007, our relations with the Gallic nation quickly improved.  The problem was not the American President, but the French one.

Now, that perfidious Parisian has been ordered to stand trial for corruption.  Pardon my schadenfreude.

*NB, I flipped the order of the clauses in the title as, upon further reflection, I realized this version just plain sounded better.

FROM THE COMMENTS: Sean A offers an important reminder:

And just to be clear, during the Bush Presidency, when liberals were constantly bemoaning America’s “standing in the world community,” and shrieking about “the rest of the world laughing at us,” Chirac is one of the paragons of integrity whose approval they judged as indispensable.

Given the parallels between the various world and economic crises in the late 1970s and today as well as the world views of the Democratic Presidents then and now, some are wondering if it’s 1979 all over again.  Back then, we saw unrest in Iran, with mass demonstrations in the streets.  Government spending was skyrocketing with inflation looming.  Gas prices were on the uptick, with the President urging us to drive smaller, more fuel efficient cars.  Chrysler, tin cup in hand, came to Washington begging for a federal bailout.

And the President of the United States, then as now, was blaming American policies for creating unrest among the Iranian people:

The fantasy that “moderates” within the mullah regime can be coaxed into a “grand bargain” has taken in better men than Barack Obama, but Obama doesn’t even have the excuse of not being aware of that prior history. The level of self-loathing an American has to possess to believe that the Khomeinists are a brutal, terror-supporting regime entirely because the US hasn’t been nice enough to them is pretty staggering.

Khoemeini and his heirs were and are brutal fanatics. Period, dot. They have subjugated and terrorized their own people and done their level best to kill ours for thirty years because that’s what they are and that’s what they do. The devil didn’t make them do it. There’s nothing you or I or Jimmy Carter or George W. Bush or Barack Obama ever could have said that would have changed them

Read the whole thing where Will Collier, its author, puts forward Ronald Reagan (rather than his predecessor) as an example of how an American President should react to power-hungry regimes which oppress their people.  And he’s not the only one.

So, I’m wondering, given the similarities between Barack Obama and Jimmy Carter if the one Democrat shares the other’s naiveté about the ways of the world?

I think there’s something more than naiveté at play here. I think we’re seeing instead the influence of leftist academic theories, particularly those of Edward Said, and the President’s left-wing associations before he leapt onto the national stage.

Here (via Gateway) is Obama with Said:

Jimmy Carter was just plain naive and blind to the realities of the world.  I fear that Barack Obama really believes the hooey peddled on so many university campuses that repression abroad is just a natural reaction to American “aggression/imperialism.”

By that logic, increasing gay activism since Stonewall has fueled anti-gay bigotry and is thus responsible for hate crimes against homosexuals.

It’s time that President Obama woke up and recognize the brutal reality of some of our nation’s adversaries.

Is David Axelrod on the outs with President Barack Obama? Witness a Washington Post article this afternoon that quotes the White House advisor as saying:

What’s happened is anti-Americanism isn’t cool anymore.

Really? Maybe someone should tell the president. After all, he’s the one on the Badmouth America World Tour.

- Nick (ColoradoPatriot) from HQ

Something struck me as incredibly self-serving, narcissistic even, when I read than in response to Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega’s lengthy and angry tirade against the United States at the Summit of the Americas, the President of the United States responded, “You can’t blame the U.S. for every problem in this hemisphere. . . . I am very grateful that President Ortega didn’t blame me for things that happened when I was three months old.a’  (Emphasis added.)

Well, Law Professor William Jacobson, referencing the times the President attempted to use his youth to excuse the behavior of a terrorist associate, helped me find the words to express why Obama’s response to Ortega was so off-putting:

There is something truly bizarre about this reasoning. If something happened when Obama was not of a certain age (we know it is at least eight years old, although we don’t know where the line is drawn) then he accepts no responsibility. That is fine if one is talking about personal responsibility only. Obama is no more responsible on a personal level for what others did, be it yesterday or 30 years ago, than anyone else.

But Obama no longer is “anyone else.” Obama is the President and bears the burden of dealing with accusations and attacks on this country related to events which did not take place on his watch.

Exactly.  Obama is no longer “anyone else.”  He speaks for the nation, for all of us.  Not just himself.

Someone please help me answer this:  If Obama cannot stand up to Somali pirates who capture a US vessel and kidnap its captain… how confident am I that he will protect the USA from much more serious enemies who have already declared war on America and Western values and who want to murder Americans by the thousands?

Answer: Scared to death.

-Bruce (GayPatriot)

In writing about the president’s remarks in Strasbourg, most conservative bloggers have (with good reason) faulted him for labeling American “arrogant” and for apologizing for the liberation of Iraq. ( I too had fun with the first comment.) It’s clear he was taking shots at his predecessor, borrowing from the standard arsenal of liberal rhetoric and ideas to do so.

Indeed, it seemed there were a number of such cheap shots shattered throughout the speech, particularly his reference to emerging “from an era marked by irresponsibility.”*

Let’s hope his successor shows him greater deference four years hence.

Despite the pettiness of parts of his speech, there were some moments when he seemed to be using his popularity abroad to good effect.  He took on European anti-Americanism:

But in Europe, there is an anti-Americanism that is at once casual but can also be insidious. Instead of recognizing the good that America so often does in the world, there have been times where Europeans choose to blame America for much of what’s bad.

I wish the president has built on this, addressing some of the points Jean-François Revel made in his book Anti-Americanism.  European anti-Americanism is a serious problem and it precedes George W. Bush.  (I lived there before he took office and experienced it firsthand.)

Still, it’s important that he said it.  Let’s hope Europeans take his words to heart and examine their attitudes.

It wasn’t just in addressing European anti-Americanism where the president made some strong points.  He underscored the importance of the war in Afghanistan:

I understand that there is doubt about this war in Europe. There’s doubt at times even in the United States. But know this: The United States of America did not choose to fight a war in Afghanistan. We were attacked by an al Qaeda network that killed thousands on American soil, including French and Germans. Along the border of Afghanistan and Pakistan, those terrorists are still plotting today. And they’re — if there is another al Qaeda attack, it is just as likely, if not more, that it will be here in Europe in a European city.

The American President thus reminded his European audience of something many of them would rather forget: they face an ever increasing risk of a terror attack.

Despite the potshots at his predecessor, President Obama, in Strasbourg, did say some things which needed to be said to our European allies.  Let’s hope they listen.

* (more…)

Wow.  Not only does our big-screen HDTV (sure to be outlawed by the Obama Regime) show the awesome color and detail of the Bejing Olympics — it also clearly highlights the collaborative language being used constantly NBC commentators toward the Communist Chinese regime.

Have they forgotten Tianamen Square Massacre?  This the same regime, remember.  The biggest violator?  NBC’s “China Expert” from Friday night’s Opening Ceremonies coverage:  Joshua Ramo.

The most jarring moment for NBC?  When the athletes from USA and Iraq got nearly as much applause as China’s team.  Wait!  I thought the world hated us?   Matt Lauer stuttered at the rousing USA welcome Friday night — obviously not knowing what to say.

Still, the praising of today’s China by NBC since Friday night is becoming embarrassing.  They are openly rooting for Chinese athletes against all others — including our USA Olympians.

Quite disgusting, but more and more typical and expected for the Peacock Channel.

-Bruce (GayPatriot)

From the President of Iran, the same man the American Left embraced when he spoke at Columbia University: (h/t – The Corner)

“I must announce that the Zionist regime (Israel), with a 60-year record of genocide, plunder, invasion and betrayal is about to die and will soon be erased from the geographical scene,” he said.

“Today, the time for the fall of the satanic power of the United States has come and the countdown to the annihilation of the emperor of power and wealth has started.”

Since taking the presidency in August 2005, Ahmadinejad has repeatedly provoked international outrage by predicting Israel is doomed to disappear.

“I tell you that with the unity and awareness of all the Islamic countries all the satanic powers will soon be destroyed,” he said to a group of foreign visitors ahead of the 19th anniversary of the death of revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

What exactly would a President Obama talk to this guy about??  Oh, its okay.  No need to worry….. Let’s just get the child-raping, money-stealing, dictator-propping, resolution ignoring, Isreal-hating  United Nations on the case!

-Bruce (GayPatriot)

Dear Gay Patriot readers:

As you may recall, just about one year ago, we awarded Dan Rather the first James Earl Carter Bitter Old Man Award, an honor bestowed on those “men over 70 who, in their dotage, by the very bitterness of their manner, follow in the footsteps of the nation’s worst president.”

In several statements in the past few days, Carter has demonstrated the very bitterness which defines the award. Having long since forgotten the tradition of U.S. presidents never criticizing their successors while abroad, this unhappy octogenarian faulted the incumbent administration for drafting a Middle East policy which has become “one of the greatest human rights crimes on Earth” as he suggests the current president is a “war criminal.” And even after being rejected overwhelmingly by the American people, he has tried to engage in diplomacy on behalf of the United States.

And we haven’t even gotten to his criticism of the Administration’s Iraq policy, offering such criticisms Memorial Day weekend.

Just moments ago, I received an e-mail from a reader, alerting me to a post highlighting the former president’s follies. But, he wasn’t referencing the comments I made above. This time, Carter was musing about Iran acquiring a nuclear bomb:

I’m not sure that is going to happen, but if it does, what do we do? They are rational people like all of us in this room. Do they want to commit suicide? I would guess not. So what we have to do is talk with them now and say to them we want to be their friends . . .

Um, Jimmy, do you recall what happened in those dark days when you were president and the Iranian mullahs violated international law and took our allowed our diplomats to be taken hostage? Do you want to be friends with those people?

Calling them rational!?!?!? Guessing that they don’t want to commit suicide!?!?!? Have you been paying any attention to Islamofascism over the past quarter-century or so? These are not rational people. They believe in committing suicide to advance their goals. Not just believe in it, practice and promote it — and train for it.

So, the question is, is this an example of Jimmy’s bitterness? Or just his stupidity or his support of anything which opposes the interests of the country he once led?

If stupidity, then we probably can’t offer him his own award. If bitterness, then the question is, should he be awarded an eponymous honor?

Please use the comments section to share your thoughts.

Sincerely,

B. Daniel Blatt
(AKA GayPatriotWest)

Glenn Reynolds reports that “Red Ken” Livingstone, the leftist Mayor of London, has lost his job, with Londoners voting this lover of all things anti-American out of office.

Oh Happy Day! Oh Happy, happy!

UPDATE: It seems London’s Telegraph pulled this article declaring Tory Mayoral candidate Boris Johnson the winner, but running this piece on the count dragging on.

ADDENDUM TO UPDATE: This google search shows the headline announcing Johnson’s victory.

UP-UPDATE: This London Times blog helps explain why we don’t yet have an official verdict on the election.

UP-UP-UPDATE: SkyNews reports that Boris Johnson has won. Red Ken is out. Breitbart confirms.

I’m glad I didn’t have to do all of the hard civics work and research needed to present the “Terrorists Guide to the USA Election”…. Michelle Malkin has done it for me.

Bravo!

-Bruce (GayPatriot)