| April
18 , 2006
Jackson Diehl: Worse Than Page
Six?
The Washington Post
vs. Venezuela
By ERIC WINGERTER
Anyone
looking to keep up to date with the current talking points for the
Venezuelan opposition need only follow the writings of Jackson Diehl
in the Washington Post. As deputy editorial page editor, Diehl drafts
the un-bylined editorials about President Hugo Chavez.
When
Diehl writes a particularly unsubstantiated column, the Post publishes
his work on the right-hand side of the opinion page, thus minutely
distancing his ravings from the official opinion of the paper.
Over
the years, progressive Venezuela watchers have come to regard Jackson
Diehl Op-Eds as a sounding board for the urban legends and gossip
promoted by Venezuela’s well-connected opposition leaders--sort
of a Page Six for anti-Chavez innuendo. His columns have given mainstream
credence to the ideas that the democratically elected president
is actually a dictator, that a media law banning explicit sex on
television is an act of political censorship, and that important
literacy and health care programs are nothing more than a cynical
attempt to buy votes from Venezuela’s unwashed masses.
The
power of a Post editorial is significant, and it is partly due to
the work of Mr. Diehl that the storylines above, although easily
refuted, have framed the discussion of Venezuela in the U.S. press.
Diehl’s
propensity for not letting facts get in the way of an anti-Chavez
rant have often drawn the man well-merited and well documented rebuke.
In
the lead up to the 2004 recall referendum against Chavez, the Washington
think tank Council On Hemispheric Affairs published a paper on the
inaccuracies of Diehl’s coverage of Venezuela. “Shame
on such a senior Washington Post figure,” COHA wrote, “for
dousing Chávez with such flammable fuel which, if ignited,
could further seriously undermine the U.S.’ professed intention
to consolidate democracy throughout the hemisphere and destroy what
little standing this country has today throughout the region.”
In
December of last year, the media watchdog group Fairness and Accuracy
In Reporting (FAIR) took Diehl to task for publishing unsubstantiated
rumors about President Chavez’s supposed funding of leftist
movements in the hemisphere.
In
April 2005, the Venezuela Ministry of Information and Communication
felt itself compelled to respond to a series of Diehl’s tirades,
which painted an “incomplete, cartoonish, and malicious portrait
of Venezuelan media and law.”
But
for the Venezuelan elite, eager to promote the latest rumor about
the president they despise, a visit to Mr. Diehl’s office
has become an essential assignation on their U.S. itinerary.
An
Election Year Press Strategy
It’s
an election year in Venezuela. In other countries, this would be
a time for parties and candidates to spend time with hometown crowds,
explaining their platform and making optimistic stump speeches.
But the Venezuelan opposition long ago abandoned the idea of winning
over the hearts and minds of the Venezuelan public (polling results
show the most popular opposition candidate unable to break through
the 20 per cent popularity mark). Unable to win in an up or down
vote, the opposition strategy has been to promote the idea in the
international press that the electoral system can’t be trusted.
To
this end, the latest storyline involves President Chavez using the
courts to intimidate viable opposition candidates. The face of this
sordid tale is former Caracas mayor Henrique Capriles Radonski,
and the obvious spot to place the story is a Jackson Diehl column.
On April 10th, the Washington Post took this storyline for a test
run in a piece whose title accuses Chavez of “Locking Up the
Vote.” Described by Mr. Diehl, Capriles is “a slim,
handsome and fast-talking pol” who just happened to be “in
Washington last month to drum up interest in his case.” Diehl
doesn’t discuss why a sinister strongmen would let his political
prisoner out of the country for a publicity tour.
According
to Diehl’s column, Capriles was an “energetic democrat”,
the mayor of an affluent Caracas borough during the 2002 coup d’etat
against President Chavez. When opposition leaders stormed the Cuban
embassy to attack Chavez’s Vice President, whom the crowd
believed had sought refuge there, Capriles was at the scene. Here
the story gets murky: Capriles backers insist he was there in an
unsuccessful attempt to defuse a tense situation, while others claim
that he encouraged the mob by keeping his police force at bay. Capriles
was eventually charged with not enforcing the law that day and endangering
the public, and his trial has gone through a series of appeals.
In
Diehl’s analysis, the Chavez administration is simply “toying
with” Capriles out of political fear, because:
1)Capriles
“is one of the brightest stars in a new generation of Venezuelan
politicians,”
2)“He
is popular, having won 80 percent of the vote in his district…”
and, significantly
3)“Unlike
much of the rest of the opposition, he and his First Justice party
are unambiguously committed to democracy.”
To
his credit, Mr. Diehl has almost conceded a basic and important
fact about the vast majority of the Venezuelan opposition. This
is a fundamentally anti-democratic movement, whose members have
tried every possible illegal means of overthrowing the government,
including a U.S.-backed military coup (April 2002) and several oil
strikes (one that devastated the economy in 2003). Only after all
of these efforts failed did they agree to use the ballot box, attempting
to recall the President in August 2004. When they lost overwhelmingly,
they refused to accept the results, claming the referendum was somehow
stolen despite the certification of international observers from
the OAS and the Carter Center. They then gave up on the ballot box
again, boycotting the December 2005 national elections, once again
despite the certification of international observers, this time
from the OAS and the European Union.
So
what about points one and two? To be sure, Capriles is popular within
his sphere of influence. But as mayor of Caracas’ smallest
district, and one of the wealthiest, it’s not as if he was
cutting into Chavez’s political base. A shining star of the
opposition? Maybe one day, but in this campaign cycle the big cheese
of the Justice First party is 36-year old Julio Borges, the unibrowed
wunderkind who is actually running against Chavez for president.
Any crafty caudillo running a campaign of intimidation would find
better results going after the real competition.
In
the end, the Venezuelan courts may indeed find Capriles innocent.
But the fact is that the charges against him are serious, and involve
one of the most complicated and ugly days in modern Venezuelan history.
Jackson Diehl judges the case on the basis of an interview with
the defendant, because it matches his preconceived thesis.
The
same is true for this item:
Now,
with a vote on his tenure coming up, the president's prosecutors
are back. First up in court was the election-monitoring group
Sumate, which has meticulously documented Chavez's manipulation
of the electoral system. The caudillo ordered up the trial of
its top leaders on treason charges during his weekly television
show two years ago; Maria Corina Machado and Alejandro Plaz have
been in and out of court every few months since.
Some corrections: first Sumate is not an election-monitoring group,
but as even the rabidly anti-Chavez Miami Herald reports, an opposition
group that, with funding from the United States, led the recall
effort. Second, Sumate did not “meticulously document Chavez’
manipulation of the electoral system”, but rather tried
to discredit the referendum and the international observers by
claiming, on the basis of fraudulent exit polls, that it was stolen.
It also encouraged a boycott in December on this basis.
Here
is what Newsday reported about Maria Corina Machado and her alleged
involvement in the military coup:
Asked
why she was in the presidential palace hours after the coup, Machado
insisted she was only accompanying her mother, who'd wanted to
visit her "very good friend" - the wife of coup leader
Pedro Carmona.
As
for her signature on the decree suspending or dissolving the Supreme
Court, National Assembly and Constitution, Machado claimed she
innocently put her name and national identity number on a blank
paper she assumed was a reception sheet.
It
may be that her story is completely true. It may also be true
that she had no communications with the U.S. government, which
funded her, that could be considered conspiring with a foreign
power for the purpose of overthrowing the elected government of
Venezuela. On the other hand, she may also have committed a serious
crime. As with the Capriles case, this is a matter for the courts
to decide.
The
themes in a Jackson Diehl column are usually just a template for
a laundry list of unsubstantiated asides, and “Locking Up”
contains more than its fair share. The most outlandish include:
*
The idea that “for years” Chavez “has been nursing
along prosecutions of politicians, human rights activists, labor
leaders, journalists and election monitors.” The statement
is unsupported by the reports of any human rights organization.
We have already seen what Diehl means by prosecuting the “election
monitor” Maria Corina Machado. No one has been prosecuted
in Venezuela under Chavez for political offenses.
*
The notion that Chavez “has never enjoyed overwhelming support
in Venezuela; his ratings has mostly fluctuated a few points above
and below 50 percent.” In fact Chavez has three times won
an election with 60 percent of the vote, a figure that holds steady
with most current opposition polling.
*
The implication that the president is “rooting” for
an opposition boycott. Barring an extreme change in public perceptions,
Chavez will handily win the presidency this December. It is clearly
in the interests of the administration to have this victory be
within the context of an open and competitive race.
*
The suggestion that Chavez is immersed in “a tidal wave
of corruption revelations.” No specifics are given, of course,
but perhaps Mr. Diehl is saving the juicy tidbits for an upcoming
tell-all column.
While
Jackson Diehl fashions himself as the confidant, crusader and voice
of Venezuela’s elite, the Chavistas have a country to run.
Although the education and health missions have been a remarkable
success, Venezuela’s leaders must continue to work on the
chronic problems of reducing poverty and combating crime. And yes,
there will be prosecutors who bring charges against the participants
of the 2002 coup d’etat. Amidst the gossip and innuendo, bringing
these cases to the judicial system is crucial to promoting the rule
of law. Even in an election year.
Eric
Wingerter works for the Venezuela Information Office.
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