By Gregory Wilpert – Venezuelanalysis.com
Jun 02, 2007
As far as world public opinion is concerned, as reflected in the international media, the pronouncements of freedom of expression groups, and of miscellaneous governments, Venezuela has finally taken the ultimate step to prove its opposition right: that Venezuela is heading towards a dictatorship. Judging by these pronouncements, freedom of speech is becoming ever more restricted in Venezuela as a result of the non-renewal of the broadcast license of the oppositional TV network RCTV. With RCTV going off the air at midnight of May 27th, the country’s most powerful opposition voice has supposedly been silenced.
Continue reading RCTV and Freedom of Speech in Venezuela
Russell Defreitas, the elderly and hapless patsy ensnared by the FBI for the crime of dreaming up a fantastical plot to blow up Kennedy Airport, “may have been inspired by Osama bin Laden,” however “was not an al-Qaida wannabe, according to authorities. He told an FBI informant that he and other non-Arab Muslims in Trinidad and Tobago and Guyana wanted to do their part in the global jihad,” 
If there is anything shocking about our outrage over the horrendous road accidents we have experienced within recent times, it is our expression of shock. Ruthlessness on the road is symptomatic of the lawlessness that pervades the society. Basic manners and common courtesy have degenerated to the point where they hardly exist even among our elders. Terms like “good day”, “hello”, “please” and “thank you”, to mention a few courtesies that were standard yesterday, are aberrations today. Does the Traffic Chief seriously think the average motorist of today takes him on when he appeals to all to drive carefully? He would be more successful addressing pigs in a pen.
MINUTES after leaving her south Trinidad home on Thursday to attend classes at a nearby secondary school, a 17-year-old girl was attacked and raped by two men. 
Good Morning,
The genuine way forward to nation building for the Indian Community is identifying the challenges to be faced in forging a New Arrival in which entrepreneurship and professionalism (social and economic mobility) must go hand in hand with programmes designed to increase and promote human welfare and progress notably in the rural communities.
As I watch with amusement the pseudo-religious shenanigans of our leaders, I cannot help but thank my semi-literate parents for steering me away from superstition for as long as I can remember. That, in turn, led me to later rely on reason rather than religion for my spiritual sustenance. I know my mother would be happy had I embraced Islam the way the rest of my family did. But I am not sure my long-deceased father would have been too disappointed in me. He was religious to the extent that he believed in God and he attended mosque at least twice a year. But he was irreverent, and maybe smart, too, in that he never judged an imam by his purported knowledge of the Qu’ran or pronouncements from the pulpit, but by his every deed.