Forero Returns from Caracas

Editorial Cartoonist Latuff Joins the Narco News Team as We Launch Our "Readers Comments" Pages

By Latuff
Narco News Editorial Cartoonist-in-Residence

April 23, 2003

Somewhere in a country called América…

Add Your Comments

Read What Others Have Written

En Español: Texto de la Caricatura: Forero regresa de la conferencia de prensa con Hugo Chávez… FORERO: Lo siento jefe, ¡fallé otra vez! GWB: ¡Howell! Mira, chico, ¿no tienes un mejor pistolero para mí en Venezuela? Haz un comentario

Em Português: Texto do cartum: Forero volta da coletiva de imprensa com Hugo Chávez… FORERO: Desculpa chefe, pisei na bola outra vez! GWB: Howell! Olha, garoto, você num tem um pistoleiro melhor para mim na Venezuela, não? A Comentar

Authentic Publishers: Download a .tif version of this cartoon for publication in your newspaper or magazine! (250K)

Read the Narco News report upon which this editorial cartoon comments:

Chávez Beats Forero (Again)
One Year After Venezuela’s Counter-Coup, a Winner and a Loser Duel
By Luis Gómez
Narco News Andean Bureau Chief

The Cartoon Characters:

Juan Forero is a New York Times “reporter” whose deeds and misdeeds throughout Latin America have been the subject of Narco News reports since the summer of 2001. As Luis Gómez reported this month from Caracas, Venezuela, Forero’s behavior at an April 11th presidential press conference there raised a lot of eyebrows, and a few chuckles.

George W. Bush is the Court Appointed “President” of the United States, who has failed on multiple occasions to topple the ELECTED government of President Hugo Chávez in Venezuela. Could it be jealousy? Maybe: Chávez and his allies have won six national elections in four years.

“Howell,” with whom Bush is portrayed as speaking with on the telephone, is Howell Raines, executive editor of the New York Times, the “newspaper of record” in the United States.

Raines, a “Democrat” to Bush’s “Republican” does a fine dance – like the leaders of the U.S. “opposition” political party he supports – of simulating “democracy” in the United States. But when push comes to shove, he stands as a shining example of how, as Narco News School of Authentic Journalism professor Barry Crimmins says, “the two party system just means that the corporations cut two checks instead of one.”

Raines, although certainly aware of Forero’s ethical lapses and knowingly untrue reports from Venezuela, Colombia, and our América, nonetheless sent Forero to Caracas, Venezuela, to cover the first anniversary of the April 2002 coup d’etat that Forero had called, at the time, a “resignation” by the then-kidnapped president of Venezuela.

Raines’ latest gamble, though, didn’t work out any better than his previous bets on Forero.

Kind Reader: Please join us in welcoming the internationally renowned Brazilian editorial cartoonist, Latuff, to the Narco News Team.

Offer your comments on Forero, Chavez, Bush, Raines, the report by Luis Gómez, and the editorial cartoon by Latuff, here:

(For advice on how to best get your comments, pro or con, posted on Narco News – the number one criteria is “do not bore the reader!” – see the instructions on our Reader Comments page.)

For more information on New York Timesman Juan Forero’s activities in our América see:

For more work by Latuff, see:

Lea Ud. el Artículo en Español
Leia este artigo em português

For more Narco News, click here.