If you missed this story durring your Memorial Day Celebration:

[RMNIXON]

Venezuelans March for Third Day to Protest Chavez TV Decision

By Guillermo Parra-Bernal and Alex Kennedy

May 29 (Bloomberg) -- Venezuelans took to the streets for a third day, protesting what they say is President Hugo Chavez's attempt to curtail free speech and dissent by shutting down the country's most-watched television network.

University students gathered in eastern Caracas while Chavez supporters rallied downtown to back the May 27 closure of Radio Caracas Television. Communications and Information Minister William Lara yesterday asked for a probe of foreign and local media for allegedly inciting violence.

``Chavez has just gone too far this time,'' Ruben Briceno, 22, a Central University of Venezuela student majoring in social work, said in an interview.

``First it was the shutdown of Radio Caracas. What will come next?''

The protests in Caracas and other major cities, at three days, are the longest since March 2004, when opposition-led demonstrators demanded a recall vote on Chavez, leaving nine killed. Clashes across Venezuela between the police and marchers injured at least 25 yesterday, El Nacional newspaper said.

Supporters of Chavez accused opposition parties of organizing the protests in a bid to overthrow Chavez, National Assembly Vice President Roberto Hernandez said. Interior and Justice Minister Pedro Carreno said state intelligence and police services were prepared to quell any plan to destabilize politics in the country.

``What the opposition is trying to do is not appropriate,'' Hernandez told reporters in Caracas.

``They will not succeed in weakening this government.''

Chavez's government accuses RCTV executives of using the network to help incite a coup that ousted him from office for two days in 2002. While RCTV filled the airwaves with coverage of his ouster, it reportedly ran cartoon shows once Chavez was restored to office, declining to report his government's return to power.
Barricades

Globovision television station showed students putting up barricades on the streets of El Junquito, a town about 20 kilometers (12 miles) east of Caracas. Another group temporarily blocked traffic at some points of the Prados del Este highway in Caracas, creating logjams, it said.

Groups of Radio Caracas TV supporters are planning to hold a demonstration in front of the Organization of American States' local offices.
The police deployed 3,000 officers to protect the surroundings of the OAS offices and will be reinforced by an additional 700 later today, Globovision reported, citing a police commander who declined to give his name.

RCTV's shutdown, coupled with planned probes against Time Warner Inc.'s Cable News Network and Globovision, will intensify scrutiny by regional governments and international groups of Venezuela's approach to free speech, Miguel Henrique Otero, editor-president of Caracas-based El Nacional, the nation's second-most read newspaper, said in an interview yesterday.

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It makes us hope that we all had more to appreciate that just a good food and a sunny day off on Monday. Some people still struggle for their very basic rights our good soldiers protect. And don't think there are less than a few people in this country who think unregulated speech is dangerous to "their" kind of political authority and will never try to take action against it. They will make the same excuses you find above and then some!