Caracas Chronicles

• God-finger

Remember the good old days when the problem was that Venezuelan food was rotting in the ports? Yeah, at least then we had food. PDVAL was the state-owned company at the center of all food supply scandals. After a while, PDVAL disappeared from the front pages.

It seems as if the government wants to relaunch the rotten food franchise. A few days ago, a cousin of Diosdado’s was appointed as President of PDVAL. We expect great things from him, given how Gustavo José Cabello Canales combines the names of the two most powerful living Venezuelans.

• Pull out your old PIPs

The Daily Beast came up with this article titled Venezuela now has toilet paper but no breast implants. Self explanatory. A future article could be about the relation between the breast implant shortage and the next toilet paper shortage. Remember, before silicone there was TeePee.

• Dueño de nada

José Luis Rodríguez “El Puma” is calling on the military to step up to the plate and honor their uniform. “Save the country from disaster”. El Puma should know that it is the military who rigged the game.

Of course, Maduro did not miss the opportunity to make a fool of himself while dissing the beloved Maracucho singer. Guess he didn’t know Chávez was a fan. (Please do hit this link to listen to the Supreme Commander singing Dueño de Nada, priceless)

• Rayma v. El Universal

The media crisis in Venezuela is just like any other Telenovela. You watch it, knowing that at some point the protagonist will go blind or end up in a wheel chair. Or both. Then, you act all surprised anyway.

Well, it happened. Rayma, one of the country’s most respected cartoonists was fired from El Universal, Venezuela’s hundred-year-old paper, was recently bought by a shell company owned by a brake-repair shop or whatever. Apparently she crossed the “line.” Read Gustavo’s post to know which line.

There is yet another version to the Rayma story. Arturo Casado, former VP of sales and marketing (he took over in JULY), resigned from his position in El Universal a day after Rayma was fired. He wrote a post in his Facebook page to inform his friends and family of his decision, and to rant on Rayma’s attitude for the past months, implying saying that she was trying hard to get fired so she could get double pay. He failed to explain why he resigned. The post is worth a read. It gives a clear notion of what the new administration of the paper understands for (quote) Freedom of Expression (unquote).

• The devil you know

On Monday, which —thanks to the Chronosynclastic Infundibulum where Venezuela is stuck— was ages ago, Henry Ramos Allup said that the opposition should have no primaries for the upcoming elections. Nope, no primaries, just stick with whatever crap the parties throw your way and shut it.

If you speak Spanish, and have some fondness for AD, please do yourself a favor and follow @DLaraF on Twitter. A true adeco and the most sincere Ramos Allup ranter.

• Asymmetric War, Media War, Economic War, Psychological War, and now, of course, Bacteriological War, or something like that.

Perhaps in an attempt to restock on political prisoners, Central Government has ordered the imprisonment of Angel Sarmiento, President of the Physicians Association of Maracay. The reason? His statement regarding the outbreak of an unknown disease on a Maracay Hospital. You know, exercising freedom of speech to do his job. The dumberment has been all over the place trying to explain whether he lied because there was no outbreak, or it was an outbreak but the disease was not unknown, or people just die because that is what people do, or because the CIA infected Chávez with cancer. (The last one was actually retweeted by Nicmer Evans).

• Freedom-novis

Most relevant news this week? Iván Simonovis’ release. One can be nothing but happy that the man is home. However, we’ve hardly seen the end of this story.The imprisonment of Simonovis was the backbone of chavista mythology. Just go ahead and check out the timeline of dirtbags such as the head of the Chavismo Unplugged Movement, Nicmer Evans. Irate is an understatement.

Juan just wrote a piece on what might be behind the release of one of Chávez’s first political prisoners. Right now, the only certainty we can have in Venezuela is that there’s a whole lot of smoke in our eyes.

• Great Sunday reading

Just off the presse… um, Internet! Leopoldo speaks to Boris Muñoz. Lots to chew here. Will be posting about it this week.

• For whatever it’s worth

The oil barrel closed at its lowest since june 2012: $ 88.39

Llévatelo @janabadi