You too can be a LatAm reporter for a major international newspaper

It's easy! Follow the bouncing ball:

1) Read IKN

2) Rolodex!

3) Get assistant to do gruntwork

4) Insert anti-Chávez bias

5) Hey Presto!

Does Simone Rosemary read IKN? Bet yer sweet bippy, dude.

Riddle me ree

So, this month a journalist gets murdered in cold blood in Colombia and nobody hears about it up North.

Five journalists are murdered in the month of March 2010 in Honduras, but word doesn't make it to the outside world via MSM.

But one journalist is arrested and then freed a few hours later in Venezuela and Simone Rosemary thinks it's the most important story of the week and worthy of publication in The New York Times. No mention of reporters getting their lives abruptly ended in US-friendly countries, but hey....this guy opposes Chávez and was held for...like...seven hours.

Why is that? Really, why the f*** do you report LatAm like this, you piece of crap hack?

Hot news! Simon Romero loses all influence on LatAm opinion

Look mom, I'm on TV

It's the future of free speech, dudettes and dudes. Bloomie reports the New York Times wants to charge $5 a month for online access to their musings. Now I might miss reading Krugman's blog every day (though knowing him he'll start publishing somewhere free-access immediately) and Dealbook is worth my wonky while, but the good news is that the dross of the Americas page will become instantly unread forever. Hooray and hip and hip, no more having to refute the idiocies of Simon Romero every week and explaining why he's 1) talking crap or 2) lifting other people's stories wholesale. Amen. Here's a better link to a blog with screenshot of the survey the NYT is conducting.

Whatever gets you thinking that capitalism makes people like Rupert Murdoch greedy, anyway?

Wowsers: Rosemary gets the Bagua Peru story right

Credit where due; Simon Romero has actually filed a report that tells people what's really going on this time. He kinda reminds me of the Ancient Mariner (he naileth one in three), but no complaints and a round of applause deserved; tomorrow morning readers of the NYT will have a good grasp of the situation in Peru thanks to the below (here's the first part, click through to read it all):

IQUITOS, Peru — Faced with a simmering crisis over dozens of deaths in the quelling of indigenous protests last week, Peru’s Congress this week suspended the decrees that had set off the protests over plans to open large parts of the Peruvian Amazon to investment. Senior officials said they hoped this would calm nerves and ease the way for oil drillers and loggers to pursue their projects.

But instead, indigenous groups are digging in for a protracted fight, revealing an increasingly well-organized movement that could be a tinderbox for President Alan García. The movement appears to be fueled by a deep popular resistance to the government’s policies, which focused on luring foreign investment, while parts of the Peruvian Amazon have been left behind.

The broadening influence of the indigenous movement was on display Thursday in a general strike that drew thousands of protesters here to the streets of Iquitos, the largest Peruvian city in the Amazon, and to cities and towns elsewhere in jungle areas. Protests over Mr. García’s handling of the violence in the northern Bagua Province last Friday also took place in highland regions like Puno, near the Bolivian border, and in Lima and Arequipa on the Pacific coast.

“The government made the situation worse with its condescending depiction of us as gangs of savages in the forest,” said Wagner Musoline Acho, 24, an Awajún Indian and an indigenous leader. “They think we can be tricked by a maneuver like suspending a couple of decrees for a few weeks and then reintroducing them, and they are wrong.”

continues here

Simon Romero does it again

This long note covering the run-up to next weekend's referendum vote in Venezuela written by Simon Romero of the NYT is once again a good, balanced piece of journalism. It gathers opinion from the people that really matter, i.e. Venezuelans, and gives every view a shot. It even pots a shot at the laughable Goicochea on its way through, scoring significant bonus points chez Otto.

It also follows on from this note dated January 22nd when Romero wrote fairly and in a balanced way ('know, just like what reporters are supposed to do) about the Luis Posada Carriles terrorist/plane bombing/extradition case.

What's come over Rosemary all of a sudden? Heaven knows I'm no fan of the guy, but credit where it's due. These two reports are good stuff indeed. So go read the Venezuela election note today as it's a fair snapshot, far better than most of the tosh being written in the English language about Venezuela's situation and well worth your time.

Three things to read (and why you need to read them)

This link to Econometrica. This is because these smart people have just released their first 2009 quarterly Argentina macroeconomics review and you can get your copy of this extremely useful PDF for free. It is in Spanish, but as nearly all the info is in chart form even a basic understanding is enough. Excellent source material on the country and highly recommended.

This link to the New York Times. This is because Simon Rosemary has actually gone and done a wonderful thing; he's actually gone and done written us all a balanced report on Venezuelan issues. Yup, I gone done read it thru twice to check, so go do see for yourself who this Posadas creep is. Hat tip to the magnificent Borev bitches.

This link to an article written by John Lee entitled "Gold up to $893: Finally, the wait is over." This is because the dumbass who pretends to know about precious metals wrote it on September 18th 2008. He actually runs a fund and charges his clients commission, y'know. The P.T Barnum school of investment advice still going strong.

Ironic? Surely not

So run this by me again, yeah? When 29 people are tortured and held illegally by police and security forces for three days, including one person shot dead, the NYT's Latin American asshole reporter-in-chief doesn't think it newsworthy and so doesn't bother covering it. Because it's Peru. And because Peru is the USA's new-best-friend. And we can't go round upsetting foreign investors, can we? But when four Venezuelan students are arrested by police for protests that include throwing molotov cocktails hither and thither it's immediate front page material of the highest "let's forget the details of what the attackers were doing and only talk about the tear gas" order.

Sounds perfectly logical to me. By the way, El Chiguire Bipolar reports Vzla far better than that twat Romero who prefers to get lawyers molesting bloggers rather than do some actual work. Case in point here, and another is that the NYT has to rely on AP for stories these days. More FruityRumPunch, Rosemary?

Simon Romero Watch (quite literally)

Otto's spies bring news from the highlands of Peru, where NYT hack and Latin America's worst journalist, Simon Romero, was spotted in Cusco's swanky restaurant "Fallen Angel" over the weekend.

Not an eatery for the thin-of-wallet (U$12 for a Bloody Mary, when 40% of the country lives on U$2 per day...get the picture?), Romero apparently enjoyed his steak (the tables are glass topped fishtanks, which is kind of trippy), the ceiling decorations (that celebrate the day when Romero actually writes a factually correct report about Latin America)......

....and particularly the live cabaret put on by the restaurant owners.

From there Otto's spies lost track of the wordsmith, but it is assumed he sallied forth to one of the many local nightclubs where free samples of local produce are readily available.

Confirmed: Simon Romero reads Abiding in Bolivia

You say potato, I say potahto

You say Falange, I say Falange too
You say tomato, I say tomahto
You see a nazi salute, I see a nazi salute

Here's the article that catches the region's worst journalist red-handed. Now compare the content to Abiding in Bolivia's last few days' worth of content....YOU BE THE JUDGE!

And a big round of applause to the blog "Down South" that caught the fascists on video and posted the footage up for all to see. This was important work, because not even the apologists can ignore it any more.

Ever needed proof that humble bloggers can make a difference to public opinion? See above.