Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  I interviewed two military strategists, two highly respected professors who were critical of Chavez. I asked them, do you think the United States was involved in the 2002 coup? The answer was absolutely yes; they were off the coast with intelligence and they co-directed the situation.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  I find it very important when the vice-president of the party declines and calls him a megalomaniac and says there isn't enough internal discussion and that this revolution has become more about him than the people. I'm concerned about that. I think when any government stays in power for 11 years, it gets a little rusty, and people are--

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Right. Forgive me. I think some of these economic policies that were mentioned previously, the high inflation rate, the policies that don't work in the agricultural sector, the bureaucratic red tape.... I didn't have time to go into those, but although there's more access to health care and social programs, there's just a lot of red tape.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  It is true. What's true is that Colombia and Venezuela depend on each other economically. If you go to the border region of Venezuela and Colombia, you will see more clandestine trade than you can shake a stick at. You see food coming over clandestinely from Colombia. You see cheap gasoline.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  He's critical of Israeli foreign policy.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  I regret I'm not aware of that case.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Let me give you some facts. We're talking about Globovision. That's the TV station owned by Mr. Zuloaga, who was arrested briefly over the weekend and who claims he is a victim of free speech. In a major journalists' conference in Aruba in March, Mr. Zuloaga said publicly—and it was recorded—that he had wished the 2002 coup against Chavez had succeeded.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Right.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  To build on that, though, I honestly believe there is a difference between free speech and subversion. I've given you cases where there are. But there are scores of cases where journalists have been attacked by unknown assailants. There are a lot of these cases.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  That's a hypothetical case, and I think in any situation we could find loose cannons, where people take things into their own hands. There have certainly been enough of those cases that I personally believe there is some kind of intimidation happening. If I could just build on what I was saying once more, in looking at some of the cases where reporters were being hassled or the 32 radio stations were shut down, I pressed the gentleman about this, the one who was a representative of Public Space and a defender of free speech.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Fifteen thousand.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  To my knowledge, there's only been one publicized case, and that was reported within the last couple of years.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  The government has taken a very critical policy toward the official positions of the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church officially, not Catholic people, but the political position of the church itself, has been highly critical of the government. That's typically what we have seen over the years in Latin America.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  The opposition is participating in the upcoming September legislative election. They have already fielded candidates in the primaries and they recognize their failure to participate in past elections as a very serious error. What we're witnessing now is that the opposition was concentrated in one party, Acción Democrática.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  The Cuban presence in Venezuela is highly positive. When we're looking at the aspect of health care, there are approximately 20,000 to 30,000 Cuban paramedics or doctors there, which has had a huge impact on support for President Chavez. We're talking about people in the countryside who may not have any access at all to doctors and so forth and now have access to a doctor.