Slashdot Mirror
YouTube Video Sends Guatemala Into Crisis
Several have sent word that a YouTube video of recently assassinated lawyer Rodrigo Rosenberg has sent Guatemala into a tailspin. The video of Rosenberg claims that if you are watching, he has been murdered by President Alvaro Colom with help from presidential secretary Gustavo Alejos. "The video spread across the Internet after family members handed it out during Rosenberg's funeral on Monday. In the 18-minute tape, a seemingly calm Rosenberg, sitting behind a desk and microphone, alleges that Colom, the First Lady and two associates were involved in murder, corruption and money laundering. The group, he says, filtered public funds through a state-owned bank for personal gain and to finance drug traffickers. Rosenberg then claims that after Khalil Musa, a prominent businessman and bank board member, had learned of the Coloms' scheme, Musa and his daughter were shot to death in front of a shopping center in April. Rosenberg says the President signed off on the killings."
The medium may not be the message; but without the medium, the message is going nowhere.
I'm guessing that el presidente might have just a teensy bit of "editorial discretion"(even if its only the killing people kind) over major news outlets in the country.
Youtube is nothing special in terms of broadcasting, except that everyone and his brother can use it, with relatively little control(if this poor lawyer had used a copyrighted soundtrack, this probably never would have come to light).
In México, last wensday the electoral institute called for a takedown of a Youtube video that criticizes a governor.
It was ultimatly taken down by DMCA notice from EMI since the video contained a song owned by them.
Im trying to build up some noise arround this cause im sick and fucking tired of people just not caring.
Im going to take this one to the last consequences, so help me god.
NO SIG
Youtube should have a feature: Upload and store a video, and it requires a weekly password confirmation in order to NOT go public.
That would be a fun channel to watch.
Any student of Latin American history automatically thinks of the CIA whenever a leftist leader is being taken down. Especially since the last leftist leader of Guatemala was ousted by a CIA coup in 1954 in Operation PBFORTUNE, which is now declassified.
According to Kate Doyle, director of the Mexico Project of National Security Archives and a regular contributor to Americas Program of the Interhemispheric Resource Center, most historians now agree that the military coup in 1954 was the definitive blow to Guatemala's young democracy. Over the next four decades, the succession of military rulers would wage counter-insurgency warfare, destabilizing Guatemalan society. The violence caused the deaths and disappearances of more than 140,000 Guatemalans, and some human rights activists put the death toll as high as 250,000.[15] At the later stages of this conflict the CIA tried with some success to lessen the human rights violations and in 1993 stopped a coup and helped restore the democratic government.
Prepare for some hilarious hypocrisy in the US media. When an enemy of US interests is on the chopping block, outlandish conspiracies are taken at face value. When US allies are accused of such crimes, there are calls for calm and due process. An investigation, a trial, and a fair sentencing are vitally important, at least when it's convenient for us. He may or may not be guilty of these crimes, but the only way to find out is to have a trial. I'll bet I can count on one hand how many news pundits ask for a trial.
It's the magic of propaganda. Saddam never shredded anyone (though he did use American biological weapons to kill Kurds). Iraqi troops never placed babies on the hospital floor during their invasion of Kuwait. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. But to someone who just watches the news, these are all accepted as fact.
The results of that should be interesting, given that the president has already stated that anyone who even suggests he's guilty is themselves guilty of sedition.
The UN typically pushes for due process. America typically avoids it, at least in international situations.
Plus, murder is a relative term. Every president since WWII has ordered military strikes that have killed innocent people, including Obama. Is that murder? Or do you prefer the term "collateral damage"? It's a stupefying moral perspective when killing one innocent man is murder, but killing tens of thousands is not.
No, you're right -- it is nothing like video games. It's more like illegal drugs. The market exists and will always exist, and outlawing it doesn't reduce demand so much as it does drive up the price and makes it more profitable to produce for those who aren't detered, if in fact they're doing it for the money.
That is a profoundly brilliant idea. You could run a service that hooks into youtube to provide this capability.
How do you kill that which has no life?
Hmmm, absence of jackboots you say?
And that's before you reach the army of clipboard Hitlers who can enter your property with impunity.
My problem is not the information gathering powers of the police, but that the police are becoming a wing of the Labour party, and innocent people who object to Labour policy are increasingly subject to police action.
All intents and purposes. Not intensive purposes.