TVes is a publically owned Venezuelan telly station which took the frequency of the previous "Radio Caracas Televisión" channel whose license wasn't renewed by Chavez. Thus this story is not anti-Chavez nor particularly anti-Venezuelan square eyed telly viewer, for less than 10% of the previous channel's viewers continue to watch (according to "The Economist").
the story -
Willie Oviedo the Sports commentator of TVes confidently told Olympic fans that Hitler had refused to present the gold medals Michael Phelps won, in the 1972 Olympics in Munich.
the story -
Willie Oviedo the Sports commentator of TVes confidently told Olympic fans that Hitler had refused to present the gold medals Michael Phelps won, in the 1972 Olympics in Munich.
exactly what he said was :-
"Jamás en unos Juegos Olímpicos, ningún mortal, ningún ser viviente ha podido colgarse la cifra de ocho medallas doradas. Únicamente lo logró Michael Phelps en los Olímpicos de Múnich en el año de 1972, allá en la Alemania de Hitler, donde ni siquiera él mismo quiso darle las medallas"
= Never in the Olympic Games has any mortal, no human being been able to achieve the figure of 8 gold medals. Only Michael Phelps acheived it in the Munich Olympics of the year 1972, there in the Germany of Hitler, where not even he wanted to give him the medals.
The man obviously wouldn't deserve a GCSE in modern history let alone to be chosen to represent a decent pubquiz team for Sporting knowledge. But sectors loyal to anything anti-Chavez are already trying to justify the sports commentary. a US citizen did win medals at the Olympics in Munich. Munich is in Germany. Hitler ruled Germany. Hitler refused to give medals to black people from the USA.
But there is another way to approach this story - Maybe Willie Oviedo the sports commentator of TVes suspects Phelps has been the lucky recipient of groundbreaking genetic therapies which have in some way allowed him to attain a level of athletic excellence starkly at odds with the nature of his sticky-out-ears.
Whichever - this story illustrates well why nobody should ever take TV seriously. & in another obtuse way might help us appreciate how the continent to which the Nazi's fleed, was also the continent of neutral states in the "world war" and the continent which least connects culturally to the legacies we mostly think ought be taken for granted.
Our reaction is one of disbelief - who could think Hitler was alive in 1972 and refusing medals?
Rather than for example the critically stronger starting point of - why should a Venezuelan telly presenter know about Munich or care when Hitler died & what happened to his swimming genes?
gibberish leads only to gibberish.
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spanish coverage from the Latin American press which includes a video of the gaff :
http://www.elcomercio.com.pe/ediciononline/html/2008-08-22/locutor-venezolano-afirma-que-hitler-nego-entregar-medallas-phelps-1972.html Reuters
http://about.reuters.com/dynamic/countrypages/venezuela/1219425100nN21321484.ASP the station -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TVES 
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