Hugo Chavez

As Venezuela's socialism-driven disaster deepens, the press's unwillingness to recognize its cause has gone from being "merely" negligent and outrageous to absolutely disgusting. This obvious failure, which is almost certainly conscious and deliberate, is present even when a journalist's work portraying the human element of the crisis is otherwise compelling. Such is the case with Ernesto Londoño…

The New York Times’ abject refusal to pin the socialism label on the failed and starving state of Venezuela is well-documented (as is the paper’s whitewashing of that and other tyrannical left-wing regimes). In the newest Times Sunday Magazine, writer Wil S. Hylton devoted nearly 9,000 words to fiery, often-imprisoned opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez, “Can Venezuela Be Saved?” yet managed to…

As Venezuela plunges deeper into humanitarian crisis, the broadcast and cable networks barely recognize its existence, while the print press, which during relatively tolerable times routinely celebrated the country's socialist government, is more reluctant than ever to use the S-word. Of six articles I found Friday afternoon about the horrid, deteriorating situation in that country, only one used…

Any list of the year's most ignored news stories has to include Venezuela's frightening deterioration. This once reasonably prosperous South American nation is now in the grips of a brutal socialist de facto dictatorship which is moving inexorably to consolidate its control, accompanied by an utterly wrecked economy. Families cannot feed their children, and many are dying. The New York Times…

On Thursday, Vox’s Carlos Meza released a Video on its YouTube channel comparing President Trump to Latin American dictator Hugo Chavez. This in addition to flatly calling the President a “Threat to democracy” in the same video.

On Thursday, an Investor's Business Daily editorial cited a long list of news outlets which have recently covered the calamitous events in Venezuela, but which, in IBD's words, "continue to obfuscate, if not totally ignore" the fact that the country's implosion can be laid at the feet of one simple cause: "Socialism." One particularly appalling example exemplifying the paper's complaint came…

As Nicholas Fondacaro at NewsBusters noted on Friday, MSNBC's Rachel Maddow's obsession with the money raised for President Donald Trump's inauguration went into overdrive the previous evening. During the same show, Maddow combined that obsession with another one shared by most of the news media — the absolute necessity to avoid blaming Venezuela's dire economic circumstances on its Bolivarian…

Even in the face of obvious failure, the liberal media deflect blame for Venezuela’s economic collapse away from socialism. On April 1, New York Times columnists Max Fisher and Amanda Taub blamed “populism” for Venezuela's issues, using the economic crisis there to explain the dangers of populism while essentially ignoring socialism’s impact. “Socialism” was mentioned just once in the entire…

Almost fifteen years ago, South Park paid tribute to a trailblazing animated TV series by calling an episode “The Simpsons Already Did It.” According to Columbia Journalism Review columnist Joel Simon, regardless of the current hubbub over President Trump’s media-bashing, several “Latin American populist” heads of state, including the late Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez, already did it, or…

Is the United States doomed to become the latest global victim of a dangerous strongman, a la Venezuela under Hugo Chavez? That's what economics reporter turned left-wing columnist Eduardo Porter thinks in Wednesday’s New York Times: “How Dysfunction Threatens U.S. Democracy.” What led to this dramatic conclusion? Trump’s election. Porter made a rare Times admission of the “authoritarian” nature…

The New York Times and The Washington Post demonstrated again Sunday their warm feelings about communist dictators when they die.  The Times headline was “A Revolutionary Who Defied the U.S. and Held Cuba In His Thrall.” The Post headline was slightly more balanced: “Revolutionary remade Cuba: Dictator who defied U.S. was loathed, beloved.” For the Times, Anthony DePalma found a “fiery apostle…

William Finnegan's lengthy report from Venezuela in the November 14 edition of the New Yorker begs two obvious questions: Where have you guys been? And why did you wait until the wee hours on November 7, the day before Election Day in the U.S., when almost everyone's attention was on the presidential and other contests, to post it online? The report's headline asks a question: "How did this…

While a guest on CBS's Late Show With Stephen Colbert on Tuesday night, liberal actor/activist Sean Penn asserted that Americans have two options on November 8: “stick it out” under a Hillary Clinton presidency or “masturbate our way into hell” with Donald Trump. According to an article posted by Jessica Chasmar -- a continuous news writer for the Washington Times -- Penn was on the program to…

The absurd headline at a September 20 story at the New York Times is a sight to behold: "How Bad Off Is Oil-Rich Venezuela? It’s Buying U.S. Oil." As formulated, the headline is clearly meant to communicate something that is supposedly a surprising new development in that country, which, thanks to 17 years of Bolivarian socialist rule, has turned into a financially destitute humanitarian…