Video: Freed hostage calls FARC “terrorists with a capital T”
posted at 7:00 pm on July 7, 2008 by Ed Morrissey
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Marc Gonsalves didn’t spend more than five years as a FARC captive without understanding the nature of the so-called revolutionaries. At a welcoming ceremony in Fort Sam Houston, Gonsalves ripped FARC as a gang of “terrorists with a capital T”, scoffed at their pretense of speaking for the poor, and called the organization a criminal enterprise. And that was just the warm-up:
Marc Gonsalves said the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, which held him and two other U.S. military contractors in captivity for more than five years, were punishing others because he was rescued.
Gonsalves said, “I want to send a message to the FARC. FARC, you guys are terrorists.”
Gonsalves challenged his audience to imagine the reality of the hostages still being held by FARC. Their punishment for the successful rescue of Gonsalves will be to wear heavy chains around their neck and to carry heavy backpacks, as their captors force them through long marches. They will suffer for Gonsalves’ freedom, and he is not happy about it in the least.
Fellow freed hostage Ingrid Betancourt took another tack, saying that Colombia needed to end the “vocabulary of hate” against FARC. Gonsalves obviously did not get that memo.
This again points out the folly of negotiating with FARC’s sponsor, Hugo Chavez. Interpol has solid evidence of his financial support for the Marxist terrorists, and Chavez’ plot against the American ally Alvaro Uribe has been exposed for the world to see. The last step an American president should take would be to open direct, presidential contacts with Chavez — and yet Barack Obama claims he will do just that, without any preconditions.
Perhaps Obama should talk with Gonsalves first, if not instead.
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So um, Ingrid, did you want to be rescued or not? Is this Stockholm Syndrome?
Codec717 on July 7, 2008 at 7:07 PM
God bless this man. I hope he gets a bigger microphone.
wccawa on July 7, 2008 at 7:08 PM
Speaking truth to power!
Maybe Olberfraud will give him a special award for dissing his buds.
JammieWearingFool on July 7, 2008 at 7:13 PM
Like Obama is going to listen to Reason or the Public at large?
upinak on July 7, 2008 at 7:15 PM
“don’t tell us that you’re not terrorists, SHOW us that you’re not terrorists”
AMEN BROTHER.
Dr. Manhattan on July 7, 2008 at 7:18 PM
Me thinks this will confuse Liberal’s!
In the playbook of Liberals.
Marc Gonsalves is speaking truth to power!
In the Language of Libspeak!
Will Obama get a clue,or will the MSM
explain it Hopey and Changey that FARC
is Terrorist group!
And Hugo has that bright red shirt,boy
he’s got nerve at calling President Bush
the devil!
canopfor on July 7, 2008 at 7:22 PM
Eh, she’s part French…what’d you expect?
flipflop on July 7, 2008 at 7:25 PM
I am ashamed to admit it, but I wasn’t aware that FARC was holding any Americans hostage………
Welcome Home!
………. are there any other American hostages around the world that aren’t making the evening news?
Seven Percent Solution on July 7, 2008 at 7:25 PM
Fark on the fark. Useless bastards like the Al Queda.
docdave on July 7, 2008 at 7:30 PM
Speaking truth to power!
JammieWearingFool on July 7,2008 at 7:13PM.
JammieWearingFool: JWF,I haven’t read any comments yet
while posting,it seems were on the
same wave length,spooky,Eh!:)
canopfor on July 7, 2008 at 7:30 PM
I`m thinking she`s always been so dense, like most naive libs. How about instead of us dispensing with a “vocabulary of hate,” FARC loses there tendency for terrorism and kidnapping?
ThePrez on July 7, 2008 at 7:36 PM
I’m waiting for AP to find a way to blame FARC’s(Maoists) actions on religion. Lets see that consistency.
TBinSTL on July 7, 2008 at 7:43 PM
Lead by Hugo’s best friend in Congress, William Delahunt, D- Massachusetts, a “man” thrilled AQ got a good look at a fellow public servant.
TheBigOldDog on July 7, 2008 at 7:43 PM
What a great acronym for these animals. To call them just terrorists is too mild. They are monstruous human excrement, none greater than Chavez, and his other communist cronies in the region who support them.
Wait until those computer contents captured from FARC get released. He is a global criminal. Where’s the outrage?
Yah, Obama…not worth my effort.
Entelechy on July 7, 2008 at 7:44 PM
See, that’s the problem with libs. There’s this deep-seated need to be liked which in earlier, harsher times would have ensured they were weeded out of the gene pool. Which is why we see more of them with each generation, rather than less.
flipflop on July 7, 2008 at 7:45 PM
Where’s the outrage?
Entelechy on July 7,2008 at 7:44PM.
Entelechy: Good evening Entelechy,look the Lib MSM
have a presidential race to win,doncha
know!*
*(canopfor is being a tad sarcastic!):)
canopfor on July 7, 2008 at 7:51 PM
Whew! That really took it out of me.
I love that guy’s powerful yet softspoken message.
TheSitRep on July 7, 2008 at 7:58 PM
FARC has the DNC nomenklatura on speed dial, and vice versa. It’s the new patriotism, which just happens to look like the old treason.
Beagle on July 7, 2008 at 8:05 PM
Ah, as suggested by the top post at this website linking to Protein Wisdom… Doh.
Beagle on July 7, 2008 at 8:08 PM
Powerful. Should be required viewing in all civics, latin american studies, and current affairs classes.
NaCly dog on July 7, 2008 at 8:09 PM
True. Bush has been trying to get the bi-lateral
trade agreement worked out with Columbia and Nasty Nan is doing everything to block it. She wants FARC to win.
JonRoss on July 7, 2008 at 8:28 PM
A revolutionary group is just a group of people who are attempting to foment a revolution, whether it be good or evil.
FARC are a revolutionary group - their purpose is to a foment a socialist revolution in Colombia.
Do we have to pretend that because the American Revolutionaries fomented a revolution of liberty and Thomas Jefferson spoke favourably of revolutions - this being a few days after the celebration of Independence Day - that this word does not mean what it means?
A revolution means single turn of a wheel or, politically, an overthrow or repudiation and replacement of an established government or political system.
Just because this particular group are evil terrorists that does not change the meaning of the word.
aengus on July 7, 2008 at 9:07 PM
Yes. Iran. Unless they were freed and I just didn’t hear about it.
aengus on July 7, 2008 at 9:08 PM
vocabulary of hate
politics of meaning
hope
change
negotiate
whitetop on July 7, 2008 at 9:14 PM
And, yet, we still have the useful idiots of the liberal left, like Sean Penn and Daniel Glover, who fawn at the feet of Chavez, and who would probably have the audacity to denounce this poor man, saying he was being held for something that was his fault. They would apologize for FARC and the Venezuelan government, by saying that if these people hadn’t been there to represent ‘illegal’ American interests, or been attempting to ‘overthrow their government’, or something else stupid like that, the ‘freedom fighters’ of FARC would’ve left them alone. No evidence, audio or visual, of the atrocities of FARC and their patron saint, Hugo Chavez, would convince these idiots to let facts get in the way of their argument.
Virus-X on July 7, 2008 at 9:40 PM
Marc Gonsalves is an obvious provocateur. He needs to take his lead from Ingrid Betancourt who is more nuanced and has already had a private lunch with her mentor and internationally versed friend of the US Dominique deVillepin to work out the proper response.
Incidentally, “the No. 1 terrorist in the world, George Bush,” has just frozen the assets of a Venezuelan diplomat and a Venezuelan business man for helping those other freedom fighters Hezbollah.
burt on July 7, 2008 at 9:58 PM
I hate to have to jump in to defend anyone, but I think that she has also recognized that there were other hostages and did not want to exacerbate the situation for these folks by rubbing anyone’s face in their escape.
Mind you, that is not a shot at Gonsalves or his comment. Just an observation of motivation.
Kat_Mo on July 7, 2008 at 9:59 PM
FARC endorses Obama; Obama endorses FARC.
On FARC, Obama has not Barack-tracked;
something about Michelle’s children and liability issues.
maverick muse on July 7, 2008 at 10:07 PM
I believe that Mr. Penn is not a high school graduate. Therefore, he is well qualified to comment on public affairs.
burt on July 7, 2008 at 10:10 PM
They are funded with cocaine.
paulsur on July 7, 2008 at 10:20 PM
Seven percent solution:
If there is, we should give them 20 million and get them back, too.
dave742 on July 7, 2008 at 10:26 PM
Read this from Roger L Simon:
http://pajamasmedia.com/rogerlsimon/2008/07/07/dodds-worth-chris-dodd-in-the-news/
The complicity of our own Dem legislators with FARC is horrifying.
Please, anyone who is considering sitting out the election, look at the difference between McCain and Obama on this.
juliesa on July 7, 2008 at 10:46 PM
I would be happy to help with some other choice words for the terrorists but no matter what would come out the recesses of my mind would pale to what these freed souls would be able to articulate.
Mission well done. Praises seem so hollow for what the hostages and those who freed them did. Words fail.
Branch Rickey on July 7, 2008 at 11:37 PM
A ”reliable source” is not a source. How about Swiss Radio cites it’s source? Or would that be too much for the little propagandists?
Kane on July 8, 2008 at 2:54 AM
That he can speak with such composure and clarity after his horrific ordeal is nothing less than awesome.
There are still others out there being held by these gangsters. I’ve always thought they’re not in it for the Marxism they are in it for the cash, like any street thug. It’d be nice to see if we can’t seriously dent their funding - that’s what will get their attention and force them to the hallowed ‘negotiating table’.
Ares on July 8, 2008 at 6:45 AM
Virus-X on July 7, 2008 at 9:40 PM
Yep, those Hollywood tools such as Penn and Glover sucking up to Chavez while blasting America on foreign soil looks real good right about now. Idiots.
Keemo on July 8, 2008 at 8:02 AM
“They say that they want equality, they say that they just want to make Colombia a better place,” Gonsalves said. “But it’s all a lie.”
He’s right, of course. But some Americans seem remarkably oblivious to the evil that FARC, Hugo Chavez and other Latin American leftists represent. In today’s Wall Street Journal, Mary O’Grady writes about the fact that some “human rights” organizations are in fact allies of, and fronts for, terrorist groups. That’s a fair point, but I want to focus on the latter part of her column, in which she describes efforts by Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez to turn the hostages into “a public-relations coup that would give him and the FARC ‘continental and world renown.’”
O’Grady’s account is based on documents that were captured from a FARC laptop in a raid by the Colombian military that we wrote about here. Based on those documents, it appears that Chavez had a couple of schemes to set up prisoner exchanges involving the FARC hostages. This is the most interesting one:
That plan flopped, but Mr. Chavez had other cards up his sleeve. One involved Ms. Cordoba, who is currently under investigation by the Colombian attorney general for ties to the FARC. She figures prominently in the captured rebel documents, and is notoriously close to Mr. Chávez.
She met at the Venezuelan presidential palace with FARC leaders last fall. From that meeting the rebels reported that “Piedad [Cordoba] says that Chávez has Uribe going crazy. He doesn’t know what to do. That Nancy Pelosi helps and is ready to help in the swap [hostages in exchange for captured guerrillas]. That she has designated [U.S. Congressman Jim] McGovern for this.”
If the speaker of the House was working with Ms. Cordoba in this scheme, her judgment was more than a little misguided. The rebels write that on a trip to Argentina Ms. Cordoba told them, “It doesn’t matter to me the proposal that Sarkozy has made to free Ingrid. Above all, do not liberate Ingrid.”
If this report is correct, Nancy Pelosi was carrying on her own foreign policy in opposition to that of the United States, trying to work with the socialist Hugo Chavez and the Communist FARC terrorists to undermine America’s ally, Colombia. In normal times, this would be unthinkable. Given the crazed state of today’s Democratic party, I’m not so sure.
Further, the statement that Pelosi designated the outrageously left-wing Jim McGovern to head up her mission to the terrorists is also interesting. It may tie in with this document, which, as reported by the Associated Press, apparently records an attempt by Democrats to encourage FARC to hold on until Barack Obama becomes President:
In a Dec. 11 message to the secretariat, Marquez [FARC's contact with Chavez, who lives in Venezuela] writes: “If you are in agreement, I can receive Jim and Tucker to hear the proposal of the gringos.”
Writing two days before his death, Reyes [FARC's "foreign minister"] tells his comrades that “the gringos,” working through Ecuador’s government, are interested “in talking to us on various issues.”
“They say the new president of their country will be (Barack) Obama,” he writes, saying Obama rejects both the Bush administration’s free trade agreement with Colombia and the current military aid program.
Was “Jim” Jim McGovern? And, if so, was he really the emissary of Nancy Pelosi to a gang of South American terrorists, urging them to hold on until Barack Obama can sell out America’s ally and the terrorists’ nemesis, Uribe, by withdrawing from the Colombia free trade agreement and cutting off aid to Colombia’s government?
I don’t know the answers to these questions, but one would think that at least one reporter would be willing to ask Pelosi why her name pops up in the communications of South American terrorists. As their ally. (powerline)
Keemo on July 8, 2008 at 8:12 AM
Kane:
Since you only believe stories that are well sourced, could you tell me who the source is for the story that Chavez is funding the FARC?
dave742 on July 8, 2008 at 8:35 AM
Keemo:
The famous laptops! The ones that contained “2,110 files with creation dates ranging between 20 April 2009 to 27 August 2009,” and “1,434 files which show as having been last modified between 5 April 2009 and 16 October 2010”? (1)
Of course! I remember those! Those are the ones that even the US is skeptical of. Isn’t it amazing how Farc laptops can survive a bombing raid in the middle of the night, but laptops connected to the Columbian warlords get “lost” for no reason? Coincidence.
Give me a break with the stupid laptop stories.
1) “2.110 archivos cuyas fechas de creación oscilan entre el 20 de abril de 2009 y el 27 de agosto de 2009:
1.434 archivos cuyas fechas de última modificación varían ent2.110 archivos cuyas fechas de creación oscilan entre el 20 de abril de 2009 y el 27 de agosto de 2009″:
interpol.int/Public/ICPO/PressReleases/PR2008/pdfPR200817/ipPublicReportNoCoverES.pdf
dave742 on July 8, 2008 at 8:56 AM
Ever notice how Obama will talk with all the totalitarian dictators in the world but won’t talk with General Petraeus or other allies?
I guess he just feels better in the company of his own kind.
jukin on July 8, 2008 at 8:59 AM
dave742 on July 8, 2008 at 8:56 AM
Somehow I don’t think the “laptop stories” have anything to do with your rant dave… Probably the part where Nancy Pelosi is involved once again; or is it the part where Democrats are once again caught supporting those who hate America?
Keemo on July 8, 2008 at 9:10 AM
Keemo:
Did you see the news today? Al Qaeda found a US military laptop in Iraq that proves that Bush is responsible for 9/11! (The documents are all in Arabic). Now there’s proof!
dave742 on July 8, 2008 at 9:10 AM
Keemo:
Yes it does. That’s why I brought it up. Half the news that comes out about either Iran or Chavez originates with these ridiculous “stolen laptops”. The stories are a joke, and those who believe them are a joke. My post has nothing to do with Pelosi or Democrats. I hate them both.
dave742 on July 8, 2008 at 9:58 AM
This from yesterdays Wall Street Journal is very telling.
Read ‘The Last Centurion’ by John Ringo if you get the chance. Prophetic.
bcre8v on July 8, 2008 at 10:16 AM
Don’t know why the link didn’t show, but here it is.
http://online.wsj.com/article/the_americas.html
bcre8v on July 8, 2008 at 10:17 AM
Ingrid Betancourt doesn’t want to be a former Colombian presidential candidate. She wants to be president and as such, just like BHO, she needs to appeal to the nutroots of Columbia, maybe use them for a political coup with the “YES WE CAN” and “CHANGE YOU CAN BELIEVE IN” slogans…
PatriotPete on July 8, 2008 at 10:48 AM
So what does this say about FARC’s supporter in Chief, “Hugo Chavez”? When a government supports terrorists (verbally, and financially, then they themselves are terrorists.
byteshredder on July 8, 2008 at 12:36 PM
And the president of Columbia isn’t going after Chavez at our request, I would assume.
Yeesh.
HonestConservative on July 8, 2008 at 2:51 PM
Did anyone see this? >>
As Ingrid Betancourt emerged after six-and-a-half years – sunken and shrivelled but radiant with courage – one of the first people she thanked was Hugo Chavez…. Ingrid Betancourt sister, Astrid Betancourt, says it is plainly fake. The camp had been totally burned to pieces and the computers had clearly, she says, been “in the hands of the Colombian government for a very long time”.
Chimpy on July 8, 2008 at 4:32 PM
Chimpy - what happened to McHtler, or is that your last name?
I read the article in the Independent and found the comments far more interesting:
“I am quite impressed by this article: it is way more partisan than the main anti Chavez blogs in Venezuela. Partisan enough in fact that the author dispenses happily with checking some of the elemental dates, or racial composition, of Venezuelan history. I mean, suggesting that Zulia is “whiter” (false), that it is the most anti Chavez province (false) and that it holds the Venezuelan largest oil fields (false) to justify that the US is financing a separatist movement only demonstrates that either Mr. Hari is woefully uninformed, or that the US intelligence is really stupid (or both, which can never be ruled out).
I will suggest readers of this article, and Mr. Hari, to read the extraordinary debunking of this article by Caracas Chronicles blog. For the real finances and state of the oil industry they can visit The Devil’s Excrement. For historical, regional and electoral politics you can visit my own blog at Venezuela News and Views: 2008 election in blog search is a good start.
Complain about this comment
Posted by Daniel Duquenal | 08.07.08, 18:50 GMT”
Caracus Chronicles has a response to the Independent
davod on July 8, 2008 at 5:14 PM
It must be nice to be French in France. Now that she’s safely half way across the world, she can tap into her genetic predisposition towards appeasement.
Sultry Beauty on July 8, 2008 at 5:59 PM