Donate


Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Chavez has The Empire worried.

The most revealing thing about Hugo Chavez's visit to Britain has been the way The Empire has tried to discredit the popular Venezuelan leader through the placing of articles in the British media. I had a friendly wager with my wife that The Times would run at least two anti-Chavez diatribes- and lo and behold they did.
(If all racehorses were as easy to predict as Times comment editor Daniel Finkelstein- bookmakers would go out of business).
But the story which really took my interest was a full page article in the Daily Mail by a certain 'Jonathan Foreman'. Foreman is not a regular Daily Mail comment writer and there was nothing about his credentials for writing about Venezvuela at the foot of the piece. Intrigued, I set out to find out more about the man who assured readers that President Chavez 'helps drug barons', 'backs the Taliban' and 'jails his enemies'. Here are Foreman's website details- I'll leave it to you to make your own minds up on just how impartial a commentator he is.
http://www.jonathanforeman.com/
The superb website medialens has more on the barrage of anti-Chavez propaganda we have been subject to over the last few days.
http://www.medialens.org/
UPDATE: The pro-war writer Stephen Pollard has pointed out, in his usual jocular and good-humoured way, that Jonathan Foreman is a regular Daily Mail features writer. As Stephen writes regularly for the Mail himself, I will take his word for it. Even so, the question of Foreman's credentials to write authoritatively- and impartially- about Hugo Chavez remain.

No comments: