NationStates Jolt Archive

Given all the love for Chavez's extreme-socialist Venezuela in another poll topic... I've come up with my own:

IF given a choice, would you move to Venezuela?

Please vote and discuss.

Pssssssst...there's no poll.

Pssssssst...there's no poll.

there is now

I voted no, of course... why the hell would I move from the US to Venezuela? (snickers)

Nope. Life is really good for me and mine here in the United States.

if it didnt cost any money, sure...

also, seriously...

if you WOULD want to move, please explain where you currently live (if it's not obvious in your siggy) and why you'd want to move.

Danke.

Although I am a staunch supporter of venezuela, I would much rather live in Cuba.

I live in the US, and I would loev to move there. They are a socialist country,a nd I think it would be nice to live in a country that has the same economic and political beliefs as I. Not to mention, its in the tropics, and you have nice weather :cool:

Nope. Life is really good for me and mine here in the United States.

word

(high five)

Although I am a staunch supporter of venezuela, I would much rather live in Cuba.

do they put only mustard on their Cuban sandwiches? hehe

do they put only mustard on their Cuban sandwiches? hehe


Icky! I hate mustard, it's all sour and yelloe and disgusting!

A1 steak sauce FTW.

I am living in a socialist country right now, and let me say this: The swedish government stinks:mad: !!! We have an election this autum, I pray for the right side to win.

"Vladimir"? WTF?

Hell no; I like my freedom of speech and elections. Plus, I like to own the things I worked for and saved my money for.

Plus, I really wouldn't want to live in a nation with a lot of untapped oil wealth; I'd rather get away from that stuff as much as possible rather than be dependent on it for national economic well being.

I am living in a socialist country right now, and let me say this: The swedish government stinks:mad: !!! We have an election this autum, I pray for the right side to win.

sucks paying all those taxes, doesn't it?

I figure socialist economies best serve the non-working poor (of which Venezuela has a lot) -- if you work for a living, or are an entrepreneur, free enterprise is (or should be, I should say) the way to go. If business is happy, jobs are available, and the work force has positions in which to toil.

Hell no; I like my freedom of speech and elections. Plus, I like to own the things I worked for and saved my money for.

Plus, I really wouldn't want to live in a nation with a lot of untapped oil wealth; I'd rather get away from that stuff as much as possible rather than be dependent on it for national economic well being.

(an alterior motive for creating this poll/thread was to see if all the Chavez-lovers would show up. hehe)

I support the Chavez Socialist experiment, but I would rather live in the United States(If the choice was btwn US or Venezuela. )

"Vladimir"? WTF?

V. I. Lenin -- among the best known socialists (also a communist, but i'm focused on property/entrepreneurial rights and Chavez/Socialism's assault on them)

I support the Chavez Socialist experiment, but I would rather live in the United States(If the choice was btwn US or Venezuela. )

everyone's going to love you.

sucks paying all those taxes, doesn't it?

I figure socialist economies best serve the non-working poor (of which Venezuela has a lot) -- if you work for a living, or are an entrepreneur, free enterprise is (or should be, I should say) the way to go. If business is happy, jobs are available, and the work force has positions in which to toil.

Sweden has about a 30% tax rate. No look at the health system and the education system.

US is what? 15%-25%? Now compare the health and education systems.

V. I. Lenin -- among the best known socialists (also a communist, but i'm focused on property/entrepreneurial rights and Chavez/Socialism's assault on them)

What? No Joseph? :rolleyes:

No. I moved around a lot to find somewhere I liked, and now that I'm here, I'm not moving until I've had a chance to enjoy it.

sucks paying all those taxes, doesn't it?

I figure socialist economies best serve the non-working poor (of which Venezuela has a lot) -- if you work for a living, or are an entrepreneur, free enterprise is (or should be, I should say) the way to go. If business is happy, jobs are available, and the work force has positions in which to toil.

You hit the spot!! The only reason why the socialist allway win, is because the lazy poor(even the not so lazy) allways vote for dem, aswell as the old people. In my community we even has commies in the municipal council!1 Do I have to say more??

I do support socialism but I would not give up my personal freedoms and rights that the Canadian Dominion offers.

No thanks, Vladamir.

Hahahaha.....

To be frank, Hell No. I wouldn't leave the US or Italy to live in Venezuela even if I was a Socialist. Give up upper class US & Italy to live in the crap hole known as Venezuela, No Thanks.

Given all the love for Chavez's extreme-socialist Venezuela in another poll topic... I've come up with my own:

IF given a choice, would you move to Venezuela?

Please vote and discuss.

Bit of a stupid question really. "Would you rather live in (a) a superpower or one of the superpowers allies or (b) a third world country that has pissed off said superpower?"

Now, however much i may agree with Mr Chavez and however much i might decry the primacy of the US of A in geo-politics, i don't particularly have a death wish...

everyone's going to love you.
Wahoo! lol

Maybe I will move to Nashville, we can be roomies!

I've always been of the opinion that if Chavez really cared about his people he would be putting oil money towards oil independence rather than making them dependent on it by providing supercheap gasoline, crude and heating oil to his citizens. I think he's just pulling a "bread and circuses" approach to keep them in line and reap profits.

Any money left over could go towards healthcare and housing and everything else; if they consume little or no oil, then they can export all of it for money and make a lot more than they would using it in Venezuela. Plus, Venezuela could pursue its own goals without fearing reprisals from oil consuming nations.

"Vladimir"? WTF?

Vladimir as in Vladimir Lenin, socialist revolutinoary of Russia.

You hit the spot!! The only reason why the socialist allway win, is because the lazy poor(even the not so lazy) allways vote for dem, aswell as the old people. In my community we even has commies in the municipal council!1 Do I have to say more??

you've just realized the roots of the spread of socialism -- people don't want to be responsible for themselves.

(ducks)

Vladimir as in Vladimir Lenin, socialist revolutinoary of Russia.

I know that. I knew that anyway- I was pointing out that anyone who has a vague inclination of politics could not possibly draw a comparison between Lenin and anyone who has slightly Leftist economic policies.

Sweden has about a 30% tax rate. No look at the health system and the education system.

US is what? 15%-25%? Now compare the health and education systems.

The more you make, the more tax tou pay. When you get over a certain limit you pay 64%!!!
Sure, we only have to charge a most oh about 2000$ at the top for haelthcare, then the state pays the rest, no matter how much. And I go to school for free with free food and stuff. But the taxes!!!!! NO WAY!!

Wahoo! lol

Maybe I will move to Nashville, we can be roomies!

only if you're a chick

You hit the spot!! The only reason why the socialist allway win, is because the lazy poor(even the not so lazy) allways vote for dem, aswell as the old people. In my community we even has commies in the municipal council!1 Do I have to say more??

Doesn't democracy suck?

I agree with his policies a lot, but I'd rather live in my own rich Holland. If they were both in the same financial position, I'd definately move there.

you've just realized the roots of the spread of socialism -- people don't want to be responsible for themselves.

(ducks)

Word

I like living where I live. I don't see why I'd move to Venezuela, or anywhere else for that matter.

Montréal exempted, of course.

You hit the spot!! The only reason why the socialist allway win, is because the lazy poor(even the not so lazy) allways vote for dem, aswell as the old people. In my community we even has commies in the municipal council!1 Do I have to say more??

Åh, stackars liten. *skvätter världens minsta tår*

The more you make, the more tax tou pay. When you get over a certain limit you pay 64%!!!
Sure, we only have to charge a most oh about 2000$ at the top for haelthcare, then the state pays the rest, no matter how much. And I go to school for free with free food and stuff. But the taxes!!!!! NO WAY!!

State pays the rest.... *sigh*

Who pays the state? :rolleyes:

Åh, stackars liten. *skvätter världens minsta tår*

Vart fick du luft i från?:P:p

only if you're a chick
lol, nope...but I understand why you would think that. I did use a lot of exclamation marks. I am not usually that...eccentric.


Anyway, my support of Chavez will end if he really does start suppressing the media or fixing elections.

Vart fick du luft i från?:P:p

Knullandes din pappa, förstås. :)

Knullandes din pappa, förstås. :)

Moget:P
I brist på argument:P

Moget:P

Tja, hans röv var ju inte precis purung.

I brist på argument:P

Argumenterar vi här? Jag som bara trodde att jag avbröt din "tyck synd om mig snälla utlänningar för, gud, kommunister i min kommun"-patetism.

Sweden has about a 30% tax rate. No look at the health system and the education system.

US is what? 15%-25%? Now compare the health and education systems.

The average US tax burden is 31.6%. Of course different states have different rates.

link (http://www.taxfoundation.org/publications/show/335.html)

I'd prefer living in the USA under Bush than living in Venezuela under Chavez.

The average US tax burden is 31.6%. Of course different states have different rates.

link (http://www.taxfoundation.org/publications/show/335.html)

Ah! Thank you.

Where the hell are all your taxes spent then?!

Ah! Thank you.

Where the hell are all your taxes spent then?!

See that massive military invading random countries?

See that massive military invading random countries?

*slaps forehead*
D'oh!

If I spoke Spanish and didn't have all my family and friends in France, yes, I would like to go to Venezuela, and support the Bolivarian Revolution.

Well, not sure, because it's probably more useful to continue the struggle here, in France.

Hell no; I like my freedom of speech and elections.

You have much more of that in Venezuela than in USA.

I've always been of the opinion that if Chavez really cared about his people he would be putting oil money towards oil independence

That's exactly what he is doing. He is using the oil money to prepare the post-oil era. That's why he's seriously thinking about nuclear power, that's why he is doing his best to reduce the dependance of Venezuela to foreign food (before Chavez, Venezuela imported more than 70% of its food). Part of the agrarian reform (Law of Land) is to make use of the large amount of lands that were unusued. He's using oil money to pay for the infrastructure and tools needed to grow food on those lands, and therefore reduce the part of food coming from abroad.

That's exactly the same than he is doing with Cuba: he gives oil to Cuba, in exchange Cuba trains Venezuelian doctors and teachers, so that once the oil era is over, Venezuela will be self-sustanting, without the need of Cuban doctors anymore.

And he's doing the same on many other domains. A big part of his policy is _exactly_ to prepare Venezuela for the "end of oil", something previous presidents never tried to do.

you've just realized the roots of the spread of socialism -- people don't want to be responsible for themselves.

That's the root of civlisation. Organising the society to protect people from external problems, and to allow them to live their lives in security.

With a second thought, I understand why I felt so weird about this thread: it tries to judge Chavez on a situation while the Bolivarian Revolution is a process. Very few people will chose a country because it's "better than it used to be", they'll judge on the situation.

Chavez came to power in a very poor country (60% below the poverty line, millions of illiterate people, ...), and he only had 8 years to fix the situation, that's very short.

So, by comparing situations, you make Chavez guilty of the disastrous policies followed by the ones previous him, and for the consequences of colonization.

lol, nope...but I understand why you would think that. I did use a lot of exclamation marks. I am not usually that...eccentric.


Anyway, my support of Chavez will end if he really does start suppressing the media or fixing elections.

i actually didn't think you were a chikc... just hoping. hehe

That's the root of civlisation. Organising the society to protect people from external problems, and to allow them to live their lives in security.

sure... inside the big house are many individual tasks. And if you don't work, you don't eat.

hehe

With a second thought, I understand why I felt so weird about this thread: it tries to judge Chavez on a situation while the Bolivarian Revolution is a process. Very few people will chose a country because it's "better than it used to be", they'll judge on the situation.

Chavez came to power in a very poor country (60% below the poverty line, millions of illiterate people, ...), and he only had 8 years to fix the situation, that's very short.

So, by comparing situations, you make Chavez guilty of the disastrous policies followed by the ones previous him, and for the consequences of colonization.

I started the thread with no such pretense...

I simply wanted to know (well, this was the first thing in mind) if the Chavez voters over in the Bush vs. Chavez thread actually like Chavez so much that they'd pack up and move to his country.

The average US tax burden is 31.6%. Of course different states have different rates.

link (http://www.taxfoundation.org/publications/show/335.html)

does that take federal plus state taxes? Because there's no way the AVERAGE person's federal tax rate is 31.6

(some people pay 0%... a great many pay between about 15%-25%... and the highest bracket is maybe something like 36%... so 31.6% as an average seems quite high)

tennessee has no state income tax... and i don't pay any in Davidson County either.

Given all the love for Chavez's extreme-socialist Venezuela in another poll topic... I've come up with my own:

IF given a choice, would you move to Venezuela?

Please vote and discuss.

Chavez must be Stalin or Venezuala is utopia. There is no middle ground?

I started the thread with no such pretense...

I simply wanted to know (well, this was the first thing in mind) if the Chavez voters over in the Bush vs. Chavez thread actually like Chavez so much that they'd pack up and move to his country.


I like Chavez and applaud all the improvements he is making - he has seen great sucess with some of his policies, but that doesnt mean I want to go live there. Besides the Republicans are going down!!!!!!!!! muwahahahaha

I like Chavez and applaud all the improvements he is making - he has seen great sucess with some of his policies, but that doesnt mean I want to go live there. Besides the Republicans are going down!!!!!!!!! muwahahahaha

...only if the Left can mobilize the welfare vote.

hehe

I started the thread with no such pretense...

I simply wanted to know (well, this was the first thing in mind) if the Chavez voters over in the Bush vs. Chavez thread actually like Chavez so much that they'd pack up and move to his country.

That's exactly the problem I was denouncing: you can like the changes Chavez did better without liking the current situation better, because the situation was very different (and much worse) when Chavez came to power.

I'm a citizen of a more succesful socialist country.

I'll pass.

You have much more of that in Venezuela than in USA.

...just plain wrong...

one party to vote for in Venezuela... (effectively one party, anyway)

increased freedom of speech/press concerns building in Venezuela (Americans can pretty much say or write whatever they want to).

With a second thought, I understand why I felt so weird about this thread: it tries to judge Chavez on a situation while the Bolivarian Revolution is a process. Very few people will chose a country because it's "better than it used to be", they'll judge on the situation.

Chavez came to power in a very poor country (60% below the poverty line, millions of illiterate people, ...), and he only had 8 years to fix the situation, that's very short.

So, by comparing situations, you make Chavez guilty of the disastrous policies followed by the ones previous him, and for the consequences of colonization.

Exactly. Thank you.

The false dichotomy presented by the OP ignores the context and history of Latin America and the continuing effects of colonialism, imperialism andfeudalism.

...just plain wrong...

one party to vote for in Venezuela... (effectively one party, anyway)

increased freedom of speech/press concerns building in Venezuela (Americans can pretty much say or write whatever they want to).

Again I ask you...

PROOF?

That's exactly the problem I was denouncing: you can like the changes Chavez did better without liking the current situation better, because the situation was very different (and much worse) when Chavez came to power.

...worse for the poor.

now it's much worse for the middle class and rich.

...which is traditionally how it breaks down:

Poor favor robbing Peter to pay themselves

Middle class and rich are far more likely to favor free enterprise.

Again I ask you...

PROOF?

...as soon as you provide PROOF that people are being jailed in America for non-terror-related speech or publishing...

...as soon as you provide PROOF that people are being jailed in America for speaking or publishing...

I never claimed they were.

You claimed there was only one party to vote for in Venezuala.

You back up your own statements.

...worse for the poor.


Got any eveidence to back up that the poor are now worse off then they were 10 years ago?

No?

I never claimed they were.

You claimed there was only one party to vote for in Venezuala.

You back up your own statements.


His claim was that Venezuelans "effectively" have one party to vote for, I assumed this is because the others are so shit.

Venezuela: Curbs on Free Expression Tightened
(Santiago, March 24, 2005) — Amendments to Venezuela’s Criminal Code that entered into force last week may stifle press criticism of government authorities and restrict the public’s ability to monitor government actions, Human Rights Watch said today.

By broadening laws that punish disrespect for government authorities, the Venezuelan government has flouted international human rights principles that protect free expression.

“By broadening laws that punish disrespect for government authorities, the Venezuelan government has flouted international human rights principles that protect free expression,” said José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at Human Rights Watch. “While countries across Latin America are moving to repeal such laws, Venezuela has enacted further restrictions on the press that will shield officials from public scrutiny.”

The amendments extend the scope of existing provisions that make it a criminal offense to insult or show disrespect for the president and other government authorities. Venezuela’s measures run counter to a continent-wide trend to repeal such “disrespect” (or “desacato”) laws. In recent years, Argentina, Costa Rica, Paraguay, and Peru have already repealed such laws, and other countries like Chile and Panama are currently considering legislation that would do so.

The human rights bodies of the United Nations and of the Organization of American States have repeatedly urged states to repeal such provisions.

The president, vice-president, government ministers, state governors and members of the Supreme Court are already protected from disrespect under the law. The new provisions extend this protection to legislators of the National Assembly, members of the National Electoral Council, the attorney general, the public prosecutor, the human rights ombudsman, the treasury inspector, and members of the high military command.

Anyone convicted of offending these authorities could go to prison for up to 20 months. Anyone who gravely offends the president, on the other hand, can incur a penalty of up to 40 months in prison.

Other amendments increase the penalties for defamation and libel. Penalties for defamation have been increased from a maximum of 30 months of imprisonment to a new maximum of four years if the statement is made in a document distributed to the public. Those convicted would also have to pay a fine of up to 2,000 tax units (currently equivalent to more than US$ 27,000). The penalty for libel rises from a maximum jail term of three months to a new maximum of two years.

These changes to the criminal code follow a Law on the Social Responsibility of Radio and Television, which entered force in November and imposes wide-ranging administrative restrictions on radio and television broadcasting.

“These new provisions add to the arsenal of press restrictions already at the government’s disposal,” Vivanco said. “By further criminalizing criticism of government authorities, these laws will restrict the public’s ability to monitor abuse by those in power.”

------------------------------------------------------------------

(Washington, November 24, 2004) — A draft law to increase state control of television and radio broadcasting in Venezuela threatens to undermine the media’s freedom of expression, Human Rights Watch said today. Venezuela’s National Assembly, which has been voting article by article on the law, known as the Law of Social Responsibility in Radio and Television, is expected to approve it today.

“This legislation severely threatens press freedom in Venezuela,” said José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at Human Rights Watch. “Its vaguely worded restrictions and heavy penalties are a recipe for self-censorship by the press and arbitrariness by government authorities.”

Human Rights Watch is concerned that the proposed law contains loosely worded rules on incitement of breaches of public order that could penalize broadcasters’ legitimate expression of political views. If found responsible for the infractions, a television or radio station could be ordered to suspend transmissions for up to 72 hours, and have its broadcasting license revoked on a second offense.

These provisions violate international standards protecting free expression. Because of the importance of allowing a full and free public debate, the government must only impose restrictions on grounds of incitement where there is a clear relation between the speech in question and a specific criminal act.

Under the guise of protecting children from crude language, sexual content, and violence, the proposed law would also subject adults to restrictive and puritanical viewing standards. Several of the norms are ill-defined and subjective, and stations that infringe them would be subject to tough penalties.

For example, a station that broadcasts material considered to be “an affront to the integral education of children or adolescents” could face a fine of between 0.5 and 1 percent of its gross income in the previous tax year, a penalty that would apply for failure to comply with other regulations under the law. A combination of ill-defined norms and onerous fines would encourage pervasive self-censorship.

Television and radio stations would be obliged to transmit the government’s educational, informative or public safety broadcasts for up to 60 minutes a week. This is in addition to the president’s powers under article 192 of the Telecommunications Act (introduced in 2000 by the government of President Hugo

Chávez) to order stations to transmit in full his speeches and other political messages. Such an obligation is an illegitimate interference in editorial freedom.

The law establishes an 11-person Directorate of Social Responsibility, part of whose mandate is to enforce the law and punish infringements. Seven members of the directorate are government appointees. Its president, the Director General of the National Telecommunications Commission (CONATEL), is appointed by the president and does not enjoy fixed tenure.

Until now, the Chávez government has largely respected press freedom even in the face of a strident and well-resourced opposition press. Indeed, as part of the often heated and acrimonious debate between supporters of the government and its opponents, the press has been able to express strong views without restriction. Private television companies have often adopted a blatantly partisan position, and their news and debate programs have been extremely hostile to the Chávez government.

At the same time, however, many journalists working for the primarily private media that support the opposition have been victims of aggression and intimidation by government supporters. And, to a lesser degree, journalists working for the primarily state media sympathetic to the government have also been subject to acts of intimidation.

Human Rights Watch supports legislation designed to encourage radio and television stations to promote a diverse and vibrant public debate. Any restrictions introduced by law, however, must be reasonable, necessary and proportionate to the public interest served. Broad or vaguely-defined restrictions, which if applied rigorously could lead to severe sanctions against broadcasters, only encourage self-censorship.

“Imposing a straitjacket on the media is not the way to promote democracy,” said Vivanco.


More (same site):

http://hrw.org/english/docs/2005/07/08/venezu11299.htm

http://hrw.org/english/docs/2005/04/05/venezu10423.htm

Got any eveidence to back up that the poor are now worse off then they were 10 years ago?

No?

no, I worded that poorly.

The first phrase was meant to imply that the poor were perhaps worse-off before Chavez took power.

snip

Nice, random collection of articles which I was already aware of.

Now, could you actually provide proof of what you were asked? Hmm?

Namely, showing that the poor are worse of now then before the election of Hugo Chavez?

And secondly, the 'fact' that there is
one party to vote for in Venezuela... (effectively one party, anyway)

Much obliged.

Edit:
Ok, so the poor are perhaps worse off now. Any links or articles? I'd like to read them.

The more you make, the more tax tou pay. When you get over a certain limit you pay 64%!!!
Sure, we only have to charge a most oh about 2000$ at the top for haelthcare, then the state pays the rest, no matter how much. And I go to school for free with free food and stuff. But the taxes!!!!! NO WAY!!

Yeah, because who cares about public health or the education of the nation's children or their well-being in general - Don't tax me for it because I need that money for a new flat-screen TV!

Right. So much more important than what the taxes go towards.

lol, check out some of the pics... along the right-hand side of the page:

http://caracaschronicles.blogspot.com/

Given all the love for Chavez's extreme-socialist Venezuela in another poll topic... I've come up with my own:

IF given a choice, would you move to Venezuela?

Please vote and discuss.

I'd stay here in the US, this is my home. If I were Venezuelan I would prefer Hugo Chavez to a US-backed plutocratic junta. Actual elected governments are at kind of a premium in the Americas. I would also probably vote for Chavez over any of the twits that were running against him in the last election.

from that site... I suppose this'd be the opposition voice in Venezuela:

Chavez FAQ

Who is Hugo Chavez?
He's the charismatic leftist/populist/autocratic president of Venezuela. A career army officer, Chavez tried to overthrow Venezuela's democratically elected government in a bloody coup d'etat in 1992. First jailed and later pardoned, he ran for president in 1998 and won with 57% of the vote. Two years later, he was re-elected with 59% of the vote. Here's Wikipedia's biography of the guy...


What's your beef with him, basically?
Chavez is destroying Venezuela's constitutional system. He has seriously undermined the institutions and values that underpin a real democracy.


But you just said he won two elections! how can you say he's undermining Venezuelan democracy?
Real democracy means more than just elections. Real democracy means elections in the context of working democratic institutions, like a vibrant legislature and an independent judiciary. And real democracy means respect for basic democratic values like the separation of powers, tolerance of different points of view and respect for civil and political rights.

Under Chavez, we have elections, but we don't have working democratic institutions and we don't have respect for basic constitutional rules. Chavez has worked hard to take control of all state institutions, so no checks and balances operate. At best, you could call it an "illiberal democracy," but whatever you want to call it, it's not real democracy.


So he's a dictator, then?
Actually, I don't think he's a real dictator either, though many people would disagree with me. Under Chavez, Venezuela is is in a strange gray area somewhere between democracy and dictatorship...


Why won't you call him a dictator?
At this point, it's too strong a word. Though there is less and less space for dissent, Venezuela still has lots of anti-Chavez political parties, NGOs, media outlets and activists.

A dictator would close down the parties and NGOs, censor the newspapers and jail the activists. Chavez has allowed the parties and NGOs to carry on, though more and more often he has used the police, the prosecutors, the tax authorities and the courts - all of which he controls - to harrass and intimidate them.

He hasn't directly censored the media, but he has imposed a new Media Law designed to induce them to censor themselves. He has jailed a few activists, but mostly he has relied on intimidation to cow the others.

So Chavez isn't quite a dictator, but he sure isn't a democrat either.

What's really worrying is that he has turned more and more authoritarian over time. We may be in a gray area between democracy and dictatorship, but the tendency is towards dictatorship, not democracy.


If it's not democracy and it's not dictatorship, what is it then?
It's a government in which one person possesses unlimited power, so I think we should call it autocracy.


You say Chavez has undermined democratic institutions, why?
Chavez has worked hard to put die-hard followers in key positions of authority all over the state. I'm not just talking about the government, but - much more perniciously - all of the institutions that are supposed to oversee the government. At this point, all the courts, all the prosecutors, the human rights ombudsman, the anti-corruption inspectorate, the National Electoral Council, every institution in the state is run by unconditional, die-hard chavistas.


Sure, but all politicians put their friends in powerful jobs. What's the big deal?
Under Chavez, this process has gone much further than anything you could consider business-as-usual. No institution can stand up to the president. Judges who dare to rule against the government are unceremoniously sacked. Entire apellate courts have been shut down for disagreeing with him. The Electoral Council is controlled by chavistas and never makes a decision that doesn't favor the government.

By now, Chavez and his government are totally above the law. His supporters can steal as much as they want knowing that they won't get in trouble, because he controls the prosecutors and the courts. His opponents, meanwhile, face prosecution on the flimsiest of pretexts. Under such circumstances, corruption has mushroomed, and the basic right to dissent has been severely curtailed.

It's true that Venezuela has always had weak institutions. But, before Chavez, our institutions had some independence. In fact, the president Chavez tried to overthrow by force in 1992 was eventually impeached over a minor corruption charge and booted from office.


You keep saying Chavez controls the elections authorities, so are the elections clean?
This is one of the most controversial topics in Venezuela today.

Elections are organized by a 5-member National Electoral Council. Four of the current members are chavistas. Every major decision the council has made since 2003 has favored the government.

Most Chavez opponents in Venezuela are convinced there was fraud in the 2004 referendum on whether Chavez should stay in office. However, international observers monitoring the election, including the Carter Center and the Organization of American States, noted several irregularities in the run-up to the referendum but said there was no clear evidence of fraud. Few people outside Venezuela believe the fraud theories.

The opposition counters that the observers had no experience monitoring electronic voting, and the elections council pulled the wool over their eyes.

The evidence the opposition has produced for fraud is complex, and hinges on the interpretation of strange patterns of electronic communications between electronic machines and their headquarters, together with complex statistical techniques for detecting fraudulent data. I'm not really qualified to evaluate it. However, most credible polls on the eve of the referendum had Chavez comfortably ahead.

So it's hard to say.

Independently of whether there was fraud in the actual vote tallying, however, there are clear signs of irregularities in several other parts of the process, including huge numbers of suspicious new voters in the electoral registry, and a general lack of transparency. Worse still, though the voting machines we use produce a "paper trail", the elections authorities have steadfastly refused repeated requests to tally all the paper ballots they generate, further fueling distrust in the setup. Opposition observers describe the electronic voting system as a "black box" - with good reason.


Still, Chavez says Venezuela is one of the most democratic countries in the world...
He does, but he has a strange understanding of democracy. Chavez has consistently said he opposes "representative democracy" - which is the way most people understand the word - and supports "participatory democracy." At a hemispheric meeting in Quebec in 2001, Chavez was the only leader who refused to sign a document supporting "representative democracy." So when Chavez talks about democracy, he's talking about something different from what most people understand the word to mean.


What does Chavez mean by "participatory democracy"?
I wish I knew! His statements about it have been very vague. Certainly, he uses the term to differentiate his idea of democracy from what most people understand the word to mean. You can get a flavor of what he means, though, from his repeated, fawning praise of Fidel Castro, as well as Libyan dictator Mohammar Khadaffi and the Iranian revolution.

So I don't really know what "participatory democracy" means, but it doesn't seem very democratic to me. One thing's for sure, there's a long history of non-democratic and anti-democratic movements that have claimed the word for themselves. Remember, the old communist East Germany was officially the "German Democratic Republic."


If he's so terrible, how come he keeps winning elections?
Chavez is a deeply charismatic leader, who has built lasting emotional bonds with his supporters. Many of his followers are devoted to him with a kind of religious fervor. Most of them are very poor and don't care much about abstractions like the separation of powers.


Isn't he at least helping his poor supporters?
Venezuela is a major oil exporters, and oil prices have been very high recently. Chavez has spent huge sums of windfall oil dollars on social programs aimed at the poor, which has made him very popular.


So that's a good thing, right?
Every Venezuelan government since the early 70s has spent huge sums on the poor when oil prices rise, only to see that spending collapse when oil prices inevitably fall again. Like most Chavez opponents, I don't think you can solve the problem of poverty in our country by throwing oil boom dollars at the poor. It's been tried many times, and has always resulted in more and deeper poverty in the end. Deep reforms to diversify the economy are needed for long-term development and poverty alleviation. Under Chavez, Venezuela's dependence on oil has only deepened.


Didn't the US orchestrate a coup against him?
The US government indirectly funded a number of anti-Chavez organizations that were later involved in his brief overthrow in April 2002. And the White House press secretary welcomed his overthrow when it happened. But that's a lot different from saying "the US did it." The April 2002 crisis was very complex and driven mostly by domestic political conflict. There is no evidence that the key generals who decided to oust Chavez had any connection with the US, and plenty of evidence that they were acting to prevent a massacre of government opponents. The story is very complex, and lots is still not known. You can read a detailed description of what happened here.


I dunno...can anybody who pisses off George W. Bush so much really be all that bad?
Chavez uses anti-US and anti-Bush rhetoric cynically, with two purposes in mind. First, to get people like you to sympathize with him and overlook everything else about his government. Second, to justify moves to militarize Venezuelan society (to counter a hypothetical American invasion that will never happen) in order to maintain control of society. On both counts, he closely mimics a tactic honed over many years by his mentor and close ally, Fidel Castro.


What is Chavez's relationship with Fidel Castro, anyway?
Chavez is Fidel Castro's number one fan. Venezuela and Cuba have signed 49 treaties since Chavez came to power, covering every aspect of social life. Thousands of Cuban doctors and sports trainers now work in Venezuela as part of an oil-for-services deal. It is universally believed that a good number of them are G2 (Cuban CIA) security agents. Venezuela is now Cuba's number one trade partner, and Chavez has repeatedly spoken of the Cuban Revolution in adoring terms, pledging to "fuse" the Venezuelan and Cuban revolutions. Chavez has often come to Fidel's defense in international fora, has championed Cuban interests to third countries, and often turns to Fidel for advice. It is believed that Chavez's personal security detail is made up of Cuban security agents.


How long is Chavez likely to remain in power?
Who knows? At this point, though, he remains popular with his key constituency. The political opposition in Caracas is deeply fragmented, and discredited after years of failed attempts to get Chavez out of power. Moreover, his control over all state institution puts him in a strong position to stay in power even if the opposition gets its act together. Nobody really expects him to lose power anytime soon.

...worse for the poor.

now it's much worse for the middle class and rich.

...which is traditionally how it breaks down:

Poor favor robbing Peter to pay themselves

Middle class and rich are far more likely to favor free enterprise.

please explain to us in your own words the system and patterns of land ownership and political power in venezuela (and latin america more generally), how they arose, and how they are maintained.

Yeah, because who cares about public health or the education of the nation's children or their well-being in general - Don't tax me for it because I need that money for a new flat-screen TV!

Right. So much more important than what the taxes go towards.

In the United States, if my (hypothetical) wife and I had a child, we'd make sure that the child had access to education, health care, etc.

How could we best help ensure this?

By work-ing

:)

of course some cannot work... but everyone who is able should be expected to provide for himself.

lol, check out some of the pics... along the right-hand side of the page:

http://caracaschronicles.blogspot.com/

*shakes head*

I'll wait for someone else to bring out the photos of Rummy and Saddam. Proves nothing. You know it does. Leave it.

And its a blog of all things.

Tsk, tsk. I expected better.

In the United States, if my (hypothetical) wife and I had a child, we'd make sure that the child had access to education, health care, etc.

How could we best help ensure this?

By work-ing

:)

of course some cannot work... but everyone who is able should be expected to provide for himself.

What if you were in a car crah, broke both your legs and were unable to work/ no one would hire you? You be fucked then

*I hope that doesn't happen to you.

please explain to us in your own words the system and patterns of land ownership and political power in venezuela (and latin america more generally), how they arose, and how they are maintained.

I'm finished writing papers...

Regardless of whether land owners "deserve" to own the land that they own (some probably deserve it more than others -- for instance, those who worked for it and bought it themselves), it's wrong to simply steal land from people. And if you insist on taking people's property away from them, then they should at least be compensated.

What if you were in a car crah, broke both your legs and were unable to work/ no one would hire you? You be fucked then

*I hope that doesn't happen to you.

that would be a case of being unable to work. People who cannot work should be helped by Joe Taxpayer, imo.

Venezeula is a joke of a country

And for all those who say they would like to live in Venezeula, then GO ALREADY. GO NOW. Stop wasting time! It's not that expensive to live in a third world country! Get the hell out! If you don't like Capitalism, then don't live here. I doubt you'll find happiness there.

*shakes head*

I'll wait for someone else to bring out the photos of Rummy and Saddam. Proves nothing. You know it does. Leave it.

And its a blog of all things.

Tsk, tsk. I expected better.

well we supported Saddam back in the day, when they were fighting IRan.

The pic of Vladimir (hehe) Chavez with Saddam was after Saddam generally became known as a criminal (or at least not an harmonious fellow).

;)

Venezeula is a joke of a country

And for all those who say they would like to live in Venezeula, then GO ALREADY. GO NOW. Stop wasting time! It's not that expensive to live in a third world country! Get the hell out! If you don't like Capitalism, then don't live here. I doubt you'll find happiness there.

But then we wouldn't be able to make your life hell by implementing socalism here.

that would be a case of being unable to work. People who cannot work should be helped by Joe Taxpayer, imo.

Oh well if you mean people who merely won't work then I completely agree with you. :)

but I find it hard that you feel that any vaguely Socialist country accepts 'baggage' like: "Uh-uh. Shan't work." *stomps foot*

Its bad for the economy.

People who are unable to work (via injury, economic downturn etc etc) should be supported by the State/society until they can contribute back to the state/society. Living on 'welfare' in most countries is not a desirable thing.

My husband has been looking for work in the mining or oil/gas industry in Cuba and Venezuela for some time now. We have always wanted to move to either country, and my husband's career in the trades has been wholly focused on gaining the experience to make that possible.

It's not necessarily a case of RATHER living in Venezuela, but it's certainly somewhere we'd like to live. My roots in Canada are thousands of years deep, so I don't think I'd every completely leave it...but a couple of years, even a decade is not too long.

...just plain wrong...

one party to vote for in Venezuela... (effectively one party, anyway)

Because the ohers are discredited ? Yeah, but before you had 0 party to vote for ;)

Seriously, there are plenty of parties in Venezuela, and you can vote for whoever you like. That Chavez wins a 60% majority doesn't mean you can't vote for anyone else.

increased freedom of speech/press concerns building in Venezuela (Americans can pretty much say or write whatever they want to).

Sure, try to speak bad of Monsato for example. The last journalists who tried to got fired - and their documentary never was broadcasted anywhere.

For Venezuela, I remind you that no long ago, in 1989, the army OPENED FIRE on protests, killing thousands. That's definitely much, much better under Chavez.

I'm finished writing papers...

Regardless of whether land owners "deserve" to own the land that they own (some probably deserve it more than others -- for instance, those who worked for it and bought it themselves), it's wrong to simply steal land from people. And if you insist on taking people's property away from them, then they should at least be compensated.

so you would hold, for example, that overthrowing the manorial and feudal system in europe was wrong?

Venezuela: Curbs on Free Expression Tightened
(Santiago, March 24, 2005) — Amendments to Venezuela’s Criminal Code that entered into force last week may stifle press criticism of government authorities and restrict the public’s ability to monitor government actions, Human Rights Watch said today.

Human Rights Watch is an organisation of USA, and has very, very few credit outside of USA, where it is seen as a puppet of the Democratic Party of USA (which is, while less worse than the Republican Party, still supporting US imperialism and ideologically opposes everything too far to the left).

http://web.inter.nl.net/users/Paul.Treanor/HRW.html for example is full of informations on HRW, and if you trust them, you see that HRW is in fact controlled by wealthy persons, most of them being CEOs, who have INTEREST in opposing Chavez.

I don't know how much this is true, and how much HRW is honest, but I wouldn't blindly trust them anyway.

For the law on press recently passed in Venezuela, it doesn't forbid any critism of the governement, it forbids broad insults and threats, something which is already forbidden in most places of the western world. Even in USA, there are laws about threatening the President, or about lacking of respect to justice. That's not something uncommon at all, and that's not comparable to a real control of the press.

Seeing how the media acted in 2002 (and before/above), openly calling to murder the President, openly supporting and helping the coup, openly lying about critical stuff, this law is just a sanity act. I always wondered why Chavez was so nice, so tolerant, while his ennemies are so reckless. You can't allow everything. You can't allow people to call for murder, you can't allow the media to claim the President resigned when he didn't, and so on. There are to be limits, and there are limits nearly everywhere. Chavez is just fixing that, he's not, at all, controlling the freedom of speach.

Btw, do you know about community media ? It's local newspapers/radio stations/TV stations, directly controlled by local volunteers. Any group of person can start one, and diffuse whatever they want - as long as most of it is produced locally, which is the only limit. That's something Chavez is openly promoting, and financing. That's a very clever way to both promote freedom of speach and lower the control of big companies on information (in Venezuela, the 6 private national TV chanels are owned by just two corporations, both having many interests in global economy).

In what world is Chávez an "extreme socialist"? He is not a socialist at all, except maybe in theory; he certainly has not embraced socialist policies. At most, he is a left social democrat.

If the quality of life was as good there as it is in Britain, then yes. Otherwise, I will have to say no.

Chavez is making life better for his people, but he has a way to go yet.

I don't know how much this is true, and how much HRW is honest, but I wouldn't blindly trust them anyway.

HRW is pretty good. But like many other human rights organizations they take an absolutist viewpoint on these things, and don't consider context. That is beneficial, as far as providing decent information goes - it provides for more or less objective content. However, it means that you actually have to think about what they say, instead of blindly saying that if HRW complains about it, whoever's doing it must be a vile authoritarian tyrant with blood pouring from his hands.

It's interesting, too, that many of the rightists who cite HRW for Venezuelan human rights abuses totally ignore it as far as US human rights abuses go.

I'd say no because I like it here in Montreal.

but if given the choice between the US and Venezuela? !Viva Chavez!

HRW is pretty good. But like many other human rights organizations they take an absolutist viewpoint on these things, and don't consider context. That is beneficial, as far as providing decent information goes - it provides for more or less objective content. However, it means that you actually have to think about what they say, instead of blindly saying that if HRW complains about it, whoever's doing it must be a vile authoritarian tyrant with blood pouring from his hands.

It's interesting, too, that many of the rightists who cite HRW for Venezuelan human rights abuses totally ignore it as far as US human rights abuses go.

I agree. I would normally give HRW the benefit of the doubt in these situations. Also, IRC, Amnesty and the UNHCR et al.

work-ing[/B]

:)

of course some cannot work... but everyone who is able should be expected to provide for himself.

You know what ? 4% of USA is unemployed. 25% of USA doesn't have healthcare. In USA, you can work AND live in poverty.

So, stop your rant about people who refuse to work. No one prefers to live in poverty than to work. But capitalism is a system that CAN'T grant a work to everyone who want one, and that CAN'T make every worker to have decent living condition.

Nope, not even to kill him. At least Venezuela is stable. IMO, killing dictators is in general a good thing, but you have to consider the consequences. Killing Kim Jong-Il (and his cronies) would be a good thing, as the South/US could quickly move in to preserve order, and prepare the North for the transition to democracy. Killing Chavez sends Venezuela into anarchy, and opens the possibility of Colombian drug lords moving in.

Oh, and if you don't like capitalism, but you do like press freedom and high-quality medical care, I recommend an Israeli kibbutz.

Oh, and if you don't like capitalism, but you do like press freedom and high-quality medical care, I recommend an Israeli kibbutz.

Which have adapted quite eagerly to capitalist norms of exploitation. No, thank you.

I agree. I would normally give HRW the benefit of the doubt in these situations. Also, IRC, Amnesty and the UNHCR et al.

The facts they present tend to be accurate. The rhetoric and the interpretations can be questioned.

please explain to us in your own words the system and patterns of land ownership and political power in venezuela (and latin america more generally), how they arose, and how they are maintained.

Can I answer too?
White Europeans came to Latin America in the 1500s, 1600s, 1700s, 1800s. and 1900s. They just kept coming and coming and coming. There was one slight problem: Latin America was already populated by millions of indigenous people and they certainly weren't about to give up all their land. Well the Europeans would have none of that! Disease, torture, forced conversions to Christianity, and wholesale slaughter solved that Indian problem real good. Those indigenous people who survived this 400 year assault on their culture were marginalised, disenfranchised, and "shown their place". The Europeans created European-style nation-states in Latin America and ruled with no regard for the indigenous population at all. While the (varying depending on the country) 40% + White Europeans largely enjoyed the good life, the indians, creoles, brown and black peoples of latin America were left behind.
Unhappy with only killing Latin American indians, Europeans then went to Canada, the United States, Australia, New Zealand and started killing there too! Although in those the 4 countries previously mentioned, Europeans succeeded in reducing the indigenous people to a very small minority of the overall population. Still not satisfied, Europeans decided to bring this pattern of civilisation over to Subsaharan Africa. But Africa was too hot, and too rich in natural resources. And there were as many people residing in Africa as were residing in Europe. Surely, the Europeans couldn't kill them all? So Europeans settled on the next best thing: using African labour to loot the continent of all its resources and enrich Europe. King Leopold II of Belgium was indisputably the Grand Ayatollah of Work-them-to-death-till-I'm-RICH-BIATCH!

Sorry, I'm not in a good mood today.

Who is Hugo Chavez?
He's the charismatic leftist/populist/autocratic president of Venezuela.

Charismatic and leftist, sure.

Populist ? Let's see.


populist
n : an advocate of democratic principles [syn: {democrat}]


Hum. Is that wrong ? Sure, "populist" nowadays means more "who appeal to things the people want to hear in order to be elected, without really standing for them", but in this meaning, it definetly doesn't apply to Chavez: he does what he says he'll do.

Autocratic ? Prove it.

A career army officer, Chavez tried to overthrow Venezuela's democratically elected government in a bloody coup d'etat in 1992.

Which was done because the "caracazo" (massive protest of the population against CAF neoliberal reforms) was repressed by the army, doing thousands of death. Seeing that CAF used the army against the people, Chavez and many other officers decided they needed to remove CAF from power, to prevent another bloodbath from occuring. I don't agree with it, but I prefectly understand it.

First jailed and later pardoned

Pardoned because of the strong popular pressure to release him.

he ran for president in 1998 and won with 57% of the vote. Two years later, he was re-elected with 59% of the vote.

Yes, nearly 60% of Venezuela supports him.

What's your beef with him, basically?

Chavez is destroying Venezuela's constitutional system.

More exactly, as he promised he will do, he started the construction of new constitutional system, because the old one, from the Punto Fijo pact (in which the two main parties agreed to do more or less the same, taking power each in turn) was crumbling, and was rejected by the population.

The new Constitution was wrote by a Constituional Assembly elected for this purpose, and validated by 70% of votes.

He has seriously undermined the institutions and values that underpin a real democracy.

Facts ? Proofs ?


But you just said he won two elections! how can you say he's undermining Venezuelan democracy?
Real democracy means more than just elections. Real democracy means elections in the context of working democratic institutions, like a vibrant legislature and an independent judiciary. And real democracy means respect for basic democratic values like the separation of powers, tolerance of different points of view and respect for civil and political rights.

Something that never existed in Venezuela before Chavez, with the two main parties bound together with the Punto Fijo pact, the labor union controlled by one of them, all the media controlled by big transnation corporations, ...

Under Chavez, we have elections, but we don't have working democratic institutions and we don't have respect for basic constitutional rules.

Chavez never broke the Constitution of 1999, the one which is legitime since it was validated by a referendum with a 70% score. He always called the opposition to respect it too, something they never accepted to do.

Chavez also did his possible to have the Constitution wide-spread and well-known, so the citizen can know their rights, something which is very rare in the world. Most citizen in most "democratic" countries do not even know their own Constitution, while most Venezuelian do.

Chavez has worked hard to take control of all state institutions, so no checks and balances operate. At best, you could call it an "illiberal democracy," but whatever you want to call it, it's not real democracy.

Because AD and COPEI didn't do that before ? Because Bush doesn't do that in USA ? Because Chirac doesn't do that in France ?


So he's a dictator, then?
Actually, I don't think he's a real dictator either, though many people would disagree with me. Under Chavez, Venezuela is is in a strange gray area somewhere between democracy and dictatorship...

Facts ? Proofs ?

Why won't you call him a dictator?
At this point, it's too strong a word. Though there is less and less space for dissent, Venezuela still has lots of anti-Chavez political parties, NGOs, media outlets and activists.

Sure, the opposition still control 6 of the 7 national TV channels, most of the radio stations and newspapers, can do demonstrations and strikes without problem, ...

A dictator would close down the parties and NGOs, censor the newspapers and jail the activists. Chavez has allowed the parties and NGOs to carry on, though more and more often he has used the police, the prosecutors, the tax authorities and the courts - all of which he controls - to harrass and intimidate them.

If Chavez controlled the courts, why did they refuse to judge the tiny few people Chavez sent to trial after the coup attempt ? No, Chavez does not control the justice.

He hasn't directly censored the media, but he has imposed a new Media Law designed to induce them to censor themselves.

I already answered about this media law. It's designed to stop call for murders, outright lies, and outright insults, not to prevent critism.

He has jailed a few activists, but mostly he has relied on intimidation to cow the others.

Facts ? Proofs ?

What's really worrying is that he has turned more and more authoritarian over time. We may be in a gray area between democracy and dictatorship, but the tendency is towards dictatorship, not democracy.

Facts ? Proofs ?


If it's not democracy and it's not dictatorship, what is it then?
It's a government in which one person possesses unlimited power, so I think we should call it autocracy.


False. Chavez has no power to pass a law without approval by the Parliament. Sure, his party has the majority in it, because that's how Venezuelian voted.

Is Bush an autocrat because the GOP has majority in both Houses ?

By now, Chavez and his government are totally above the law. His supporters can steal as much as they want knowing that they won't get in trouble, because he controls the prosecutors and the courts.

That's utterly ridiculous. Chavez is the first one to fire his closest friends when they are proven to be guilty of corruption.

His opponents, meanwhile, face prosecution on the flimsiest of pretexts. Under such circumstances, corruption has mushroomed, and the basic right to dissent has been severely curtailed.

Did you know that after the gun fires of April 11, 2002, in which 7 pro-Chavez and 2 opponents were killed, even if it's absolutely sure now that it was the metropilitan police, controlled by the opposition, which opened fire, the only people to have staid in jail more than a few hours were... chavistas, who opened fire back to defend themselves !

Because Chavez made it clear that everyone, including his supporters, have to respect the law and face trial if they don't.

It's true that Venezuela has always had weak institutions. But, before Chavez, our institutions had some independence. In fact, the president Chavez tried to overthrow by force in 1992 was eventually impeached over a minor corruption charge and booted from office.

Minor corruption charge ? He stole more than $17 millions of public money. But if CAF was fired, it's because of the strong popular discontent after the repression of the "caracazo", and the strong popular support to Hugo Chavez, the rebel. His party, AD, prefered to sacrifice CAF to save their chances of winning a future election; like the GOP did with Nixon after Watergate.


You keep saying Chavez controls the elections authorities, so are the elections clean?
This is one of the most controversial topics in Venezuela today.

But only in Venezuela, all international observers saying the elections were clean.

Elections are organized by a 5-member National Electoral Council. Four of the current members are chavistas. Every major decision the council has made since 2003 has favored the government.

So validating the petition for the recall referendum "favored the governement" ? Then why did the opposition made the petition at all ?


The opposition counters that the observers had no experience monitoring electronic voting, and the elections council pulled the wool over their eyes.


Unlike USA, Venezuela elections are done with a paper trail, and it's the paper trails, not the electronic votes, which are checked. The opposition and the observers can chose, at random, which ballot they check. All the checked ballots were the same than the official results.


Still, Chavez says Venezuela is one of the most democratic countries in the world...
He does, but he has a strange understanding of democracy. Chavez has consistently said he opposes "representative democracy" - which is the way most people understand the word - and supports "participatory democracy."


What's wrong in that ? Participatory democracy is much closer to real democracy than representative democracy is.

The words "participatory democracy" are so common and generally accepted nowadays that even the very right-wing european "constitution" was speaking about it (without implementing it, of course). Participative democracy is something most of the people are now promoting.

At a hemispheric meeting in Quebec in 2001, Chavez was the only leader who refused to sign a document supporting "representative democracy." So when Chavez talks about democracy, he's talking about something different from what most people understand the word to mean.

He's speaking about what democracy means: power to the people.

What does Chavez mean by "participatory democracy"?
I wish I knew! His statements about it have been very vague. Certainly, he uses the term to differentiate his idea of democracy from what most people understand the word to mean.

You want a real example of it ? The recall referendum. People are unhappy about an elected representative, whoever he is, fine, they do a petition, and a referendum is held to know if he can keep his power or not. That's participative democracy.

You want another real example of it ? People in a village gather and speak together, and decide they dearly need a new water pump, because the old one is dying. Fine, they ask the governement for funding to repare it, and the governement gives it - because they trust the people to know what they really need. Sure, there are checks to avoid abuses and wastes, but that's the idea.

If he's so terrible, how come he keeps winning elections?
Chavez is a deeply charismatic leader, who has built lasting emotional bonds with his supporters. Many of his followers are devoted to him with a kind of religious fervor.

That's not totally false, but that something Chavez himself always denounced and fought against. But having a strong emotional bond to a leader who really helps your country is not uncommon. Didn't many of the first US citizen had a strong emotional bond with Washington or Franklin ?

Most of them are very poor and don't care much about abstractions like the separation of powers.

Well, when you are hungry, illetterate and sick, I understand you care more about food, education and healthcare than about the equilibrum of powers. But that doesn't mean Chavez is threatening them.

Isn't he at least helping his poor supporters?
Venezuela is a major oil exporters, and oil prices have been very high recently. Chavez has spent huge sums of windfall oil dollars on social programs aimed at the poor, which has made him very popular.

Something the previous presidents never did.


So that's a good thing, right?
Every Venezuelan government since the early 70s has spent huge sums on the poor when oil prices rise, only to see that spending collapse when oil prices inevitably fall again.

That's false. No single previous governement did even a tiny fraction of what Chavez did for the poor. He reduced illetterracy by more than ONE MILLION. He made the right to go to school true for EVERY children. He granted healthcare to nearly everyone. And so on.

Like most Chavez opponents, I don't think you can solve the problem of poverty in our country by throwing oil boom dollars at the poor. It's been tried many times, and has always resulted in more and deeper poverty in the end. Deep reforms to diversify the economy are needed for long-term development and poverty alleviation. Under Chavez, Venezuela's dependence on oil has only deepened.

That's utterly false. Chavez is trying, since the beginning, to lower the dependance on oil, to do "make oil to germinate" as he says, that is, to use oil money to prepare the post-oil era. Something no previous presidents ever tried to do.

When Chavez came to power, Venezuela imported more than 70% of its food, while a huge amount of lands were unused. Chavez, with the agrarian reform, and with the microloans to peasants, is making use of this land to lower the dependance on external food.

The same way, Chavez invests a lot in education, because in the XXIest century more than ever, education and knowledge is the key for the future. So yes, Chavez use the oil money to pay for education... which will be the wealth ot tomorrow.

He is also seeking nuclear power, in order to provide energy to his country for after the oil era - something that he can do now, using the oil money to acquire the technology and build the plants.

No previous president of Venezuela ever did that.


Didn't the US orchestrate a coup against him?
The US government indirectly funded a number of anti-Chavez organizations that were later involved in his brief overthrow in April 2002.

No, they directly dunded them.

And the White House press secretary welcomed his overthrow when it happened. But that's a lot different from saying "the US did it."

The leaders of coup had frequent meeting in the White House in the months/weeks before the coup. USA founded the organisations that created it. Only USA and Aznar's Spain recognized the putschist governement.

The April 2002 crisis was very complex and driven mostly by domestic political conflict. There is no evidence that the key generals who decided to oust Chavez had any connection with the US,

Except that they visited the White House no long before...

and plenty of evidence that they were acting to prevent a massacre of government opponents.

That is an utter lie, once again. I'll explain what happened on April 11st, 2002 in another post, since so many lies are still spread about this day.


What is Chavez's relationship with Fidel Castro, anyway?
Chavez is Fidel Castro's number one fan. Venezuela and Cuba have signed 49 treaties since Chavez came to power, covering every aspect of social life. Thousands of Cuban doctors and sports trainers now work in Venezuela as part of an oil-for-services deal. It is universally believed that a good number of them are G2 (Cuban CIA) security agents. Venezuela is now Cuba's number one trade partner, and Chavez has repeatedly spoken of the Cuban Revolution in adoring terms, pledging to "fuse" the Venezuelan and Cuban revolutions. Chavez has often come to Fidel's defense in international fora, has championed Cuban interests to third countries, and often turns to Fidel for advice. It is believed that Chavez's personal security detail is made up of Cuban security agents.

And ?


How long is Chavez likely to remain in power?
Who knows? At this point, though, he remains popular with his key constituency. The political opposition in Caracas is deeply fragmented, and discredited after years of failed attempts to get Chavez out of power. Moreover, his control over all state institution puts him in a strong position to stay in power even if the opposition gets its act together. Nobody really expects him to lose power anytime soon.

Sure, because his people loves him.

well we supported Saddam back in the day, when they were fighting IRan.

The pic of Vladimir (hehe) Chavez with Saddam was after Saddam generally became known as a criminal (or at least not an harmonious fellow).

;)

Saddam was already known as a criminal, and he already slaughtered Kurds, before USA stopped to be his friend.

Venezuela, under Chavez, became the president of OPEC. He could barely avoid to meet other OPEC leaders. Would you prefer Saddam or the Saudi or Iran to be president of OPEC ? I'm glad it's Venezuela, but this has a cost: Chavez has to accept to speak with all OPEC leaders.

Killing Chavez sends Venezuela into anarchy, and opens the possibility of Colombian drug lords moving in.

As Hugo Chavez said, when asked if he feared a murder attempt: "In 1948, Jorge Eliecer Gaitan should have been president of Columbia. Oligarchy hated him, but the people loved him. A few days before he was murdered, he was asked the same question than you just asked. He answered, but he was twice wrong. He said: 'No, they won't kill me. They know that if they do, a bloodbath will start in Columbia, and the country will need 50 years to recover.' Yes, he was twice wrong, that day. First because they murdered him with for bullets, in a street of Bogota. And then, because if a bloodbath actually started in Columbia, it lasted more than 50 years. It is still not over yet."

I find this quote very wise, and very appropriate. Those who try to murder Chavez or remove by force are playing with the fate of people. Because they can't accept democracy, they are ready to sacrifice a country to 50 years of civil war, like the Columbia oligarchy was in 1948.

No way Vladimir.

Stupid Leftist drug peddling bastards.

Although I am a staunch supporter of venezuela, I would much rather live in Cuba.

I live in the US, and I would loev to move there. They are a socialist country,a nd I think it would be nice to live in a country that has the same economic and political beliefs as I. Not to mention, its in the tropics, and you have nice weather :cool:

I wonder how long you would survive there. Its easy to speak of socialism from the comfort of your cushy American existence.

And for the record, Cuba is not socialist. It is a DICTATORSHIP. :D

Would you really want to live in a country where AIDS patients are sent to secret prison hospitals? Where some families are so desperate they sell their children to wealthy tourists so they can support them from abroad? Where travel ANYWHERE is restricted? Cuba is a prison state. And as much as I disagree with the US embargo, thats not the only cause for their exreme 3rd world poverty.

http://therealcuba.com/index.htm

Unless I got to be one of Chavez's cabinet ministers, no. Because those boys are livin' awesome. They've got private yachts, beachhouses and the rest of the pleasant acoutrements the close supporters of a populist, hypocritical demagouge always seem to get. Then I'd gladly move to Venezuela.

Otherwise, fuck no.

As Hugo Chavez said, when asked if he feared a murder attempt: "In 1948, Jorge Eliecer Gaitan should have been president of Columbia. Oligarchy hated him, but the people loved him. A few days before he was murdered, he was asked the same question than you just asked. He answered, but he was twice wrong. He said: 'No, they won't kill me. They know that if they do, a bloodbath will start in Columbia, and the country will need 50 years to recover.' Yes, he was twice wrong, that day. First because they murdered him with for bullets, in a street of Bogota. And then, because if a bloodbath actually started in Columbia, it lasted more than 50 years. It is still not over yet."

I find this quote very wise, and very appropriate. Those who try to murder Chavez or remove by force are playing with the fate of people. Because they can't accept democracy, they are ready to sacrifice a country to 50 years of civil war, like the Columbia oligarchy was in 1948.
I love how Chavez talks about the sanctity of democracy, because it seems that it's only sacrosanct when he's in control. After all, he led a serious coup d'etat attempt in the mid-late nineties. I will continue to maintain that Hugo Chavez is little more than a populist demagouge who's primary goal is to make his own life comfortable, and exercise power indiscriminately.

Because the ohers are discredited ? Yeah, but before you had 0 party to vote for ;)

Seriously, there are plenty of parties in Venezuela, and you can vote for whoever you like. That Chavez wins a 60% majority doesn't mean you can't vote for anyone else.



Sure, try to speak bad of Monsato for example. The last journalists who tried to got fired - and their documentary never was broadcasted anywhere.

For Venezuela, I remind you that no long ago, in 1989, the army OPENED FIRE on protests, killing thousands. That's definitely much, much better under Chavez.

well hopefully he'll keep the army from shooting people.

as for having 0 parties to choose from... now that's a smart dictator or regime. hehe

Given all the love for Chavez's extreme-socialist Venezuela in another poll topic... I've come up with my own:

IF given a choice, would you move to Venezuela?

Please vote and discuss.

Great Thread Frangland, I should start one on, would you move to Cuba under Fidel for life.

LOL.

You should have made it a Public Poll.

Great Thread.

As promised, the events that happened on April 11, and the few days before/after: http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=478744

I love how Chavez talks about the sanctity of democracy, because it seems that it's only sacrosanct when he's in control. After all, he led a serious coup d'etat attempt in the mid-late nineties.

He did so in 1992, after the president, CAF, ordered the army to open fire on protesters, killing thousands.

well hopefully he'll keep the army from shooting people.

That's why he did his coup attempt in 1992, because he couldn't whistand the thought that the army opened fire against the people.

And I should also remind you that the new Constitution of 1999 contains a very explicit article forbidding soldiers to obey to such an order (that's something that exists only in Germany too, AFAIK).

IF given a choice, would you move to Venezuela?
Not only no, but HELL no! Chavez is a dick!

... the new Constitution of 1999 contains a very explicit article forbidding soldiers to obey to such an order (that's something that exists only in Germany too, AFAIK).
Utter bullshit.

Great Thread Frangland, I should start one on, would you move to Cuba under Fidel for life.

LOL.

You should have made it a Public Poll.

Great Thread.

cool, thanks

Although I am a staunch supporter of venezuela, I would much rather live in Cuba.

I live in the US, and I would loev to move there. They are a socialist country,a nd I think it would be nice to live in a country that has the same economic and political beliefs as I. Not to mention, its in the tropics, and you have nice weather :cool:
I have a feeling you are thinking of a few nice islands in the Pacific. The Caribbean is one giant humid sweat bowl.

I wonder how long you would survive there. Its easy to speak of socialism from the comfort of your cushy American existence.

And for the record, Cuba is not socialist. It is a DICTATORSHIP. :D

Would you really want to live in a country where AIDS patients are sent to secret prison hospitals? What a heap of stinking crap. Secret prison hospitals? I saw a number of AIDS wards in Cuba. They are actually usually across from the hospital, and composed of homes and gardens for AIDS patients, and family members who come to be with them. THEY ARE PROVIDED WITH HOMES FOR FREE so they can continue to receive the medical treatment they need, rather than travel constantly. Jesus Christ. Twist it a little more, why don't you?


Where some families are so desperate they sell their children to wealthy tourists so they can support them from abroad? Proof? Yeah. I thought not. Why the hell would you sell your kid to a foreigner to go live in a country where basic things like healthcare, education, a home, and food are NOT guarantees, as they are in Cuba?

Where travel ANYWHERE is restricted? Utter bullshit. Cubans are free to travel anywhere, except for the US army base in Guantanamo. ANYWHERE. That includes resort beaches and so forth.

Cuba is a prison state. And as much as I disagree with the US embargo, thats not the only cause for their exreme 3rd world poverty. Extreme 3rd world poverty? Where no one starves to death, or goes without and education, or access to healthcare? Wow. You have a crazy concept of poverty. And prison state? Try not to talk out of your lower orifice, please.

Utter bullshit.
Stunning retort.

Why don't you lay out what is false, and prove it false? That would be nice.

I have a feeling you are thinking of a few nice islands in the Pacific. The Caribbean is one giant humid sweat bowl.
Venezuela is both Carribean and Pacific. Check it out on a map.

Stunning retort.

Why don't you lay out what is false, and prove it false? That would be nice.
No thank you. I've discovered that if I lay things out in logical detail, those who already believe will simply continue to do so; those who don't agree, never will and just pick at nits.

Europe or the USA is where I plan to stay. No Venezuela, no Cuba, no nothing. Maybe Canada though.

No thank you. I've discovered that if I lay things out in logical detail, those who already believe will simply continue to do so; those who don't agree, never will and just pick at nits.
Then refraining from commenting at all is probably the best.

No way Vladimir.

Stupid Leftist drug peddling bastards.
My sentiments expressed with less eloquence :)

Although I am a staunch supporter of venezuela, I would much rather live in Cuba.

I live in the US, and I would loev to move there. They are a socialist country,a nd I think it would be nice to live in a country that has the same economic and political beliefs as I. Not to mention, its in the tropics, and you have nice weather :cool:
Monaco has nice weather too. I'd rather live there.

Utter bullshit.


Article 25: Any act on the part of the Public Power that violates or encroaches upon the rights guaranteed by this Constitution and by law is null and void, and the public employees ordering or implementing the same shall incur criminal, civil and administrative liability, as applicable in each case, with no defense on grounds of having followed the orders of a superior.

Article 29: The State is obliged to investigate and legally punish offenses against human rights committed by its authorities.

Actions to punish the offense of violating humanity rights, serious violations of human rights and war crimes shall not be subject to statute of limitation. Human rights violations and the offense of violating humanity rights shall be investigated and adjudicated by the courts of ordinary competence. These offenses are excluded from any benefit that might render the offenders immune from punishment, including pardons and amnesty.

Article 45: The public authorities, whether military, civilian or of any other kind, even during a state of emergency, exception or restriction or guarantees, are prohibited from effecting, permitting or tolerating the forced disappearance of persons. An officer receiving an order or instruction to carry it out, has the obligation not to obey, and to report the order or instruction to the competent authorities.

Article 46: Everyone is entitled to respect for his or her physical, mental and moral integrity, therefore: [...]

(4) Any public official who, by reason of his official position, inflicts mistreatment or physical or mental suffering on any person or instigates or tolerates such treatment, shall be punished in accordance with law.

Article 350: The people of Venezuela, true to their republican tradition and their struggle for independence, peace and freedom, shall disown any regime, legislation or authority that violates democratic values, principles and guarantees or encroaches upon human rights.


Is this enough ?

What a heap of stinking crap. Secret prison hospitals? I saw a number of AIDS wards in Cuba. They are actually usually across from the hospital, and composed of homes and gardens for AIDS patients, and family members who come to be with them. THEY ARE PROVIDED WITH HOMES FOR FREE so they can continue to receive the medical treatment they need, rather than travel constantly. Jesus Christ. Twist it a little more, why don't you?

These prison hospitals exist in the rural mountain communities. They are more like hospices, where they are sent to die. And mostly populated my homosexuals. Wow, I would love that "free" healthcare.
Proof? Yeah. I thought not. Why the hell would you sell your kid to a foreigner to go live in a country where basic things like healthcare, education, a home, and food are NOT guarantees, as they are in Cuba?

My neighbor in Miami went through this when her sister sold her daughter to a wealthy Italian toruist so she could work in Italy and send money back to Cuba. She never saw her daughter again.


Utter bullshit. Cubans are free to travel anywhere, except for the US army base in Guantanamo. ANYWHERE. That includes resort beaches and so forth.


Cuban are NOT free to travel anywhere outside of Cuba. Cubans are NOT ALLOWED to enter the resorts, those are only for tourists.

Extreme 3rd world poverty? Where no one starves to death, or goes without and education, or access to healthcare? Wow. You have a crazy concept of poverty. And prison state? Try not to talk out of your lower orifice, please.

Sure no one starves to death, they are kept just on the cusp. Why do you think so many Cubans risk their lives on the high seas every year toe scape? Free healthcare? Sure, in some of the most sub-standard conditions. Free Education? Of what? There is no cultural enrichment education of any kind in Cuba, no literature (except Cuban), no history (except 20 century Cuba) and no chance to study what YOU want to study, there is no choice.

Again, Cuba is not Socialist, it is a DICTATORSHIP.

Sure no one starves to death, they are kept just on the cusp. Why do you think so many Cubans risk their lives on the high seas every year toe scape? Because the grass is always greener...and 'so many' isn't an accurate description.

Free healthcare? Sure, in some of the most sub-standard conditions. Those 'sub-standard conditions' are some of the best in Latin America, which is what you need to compare Cuba to....comparing it to hospitals in the US is just silly.

Free Education? Of what? There is no cultural enrichment education of any kind in Cuba, no literature (except Cuban), no history (except 20 century Cuba) and no chance to study what YOU want to study, there is no choice.

Again, Cuba is not Socialist, it is a DICTATORSHIP.*sigh* And the last time you were there was????

Cuban literature is far from the only literature studied. You will Pablo Neruda, Gabriel Garcia Marquez...you will find Hugo, Whitman, Elliot...any literature you could study in any other nation. You absolutely have a choice as to what you want to study.

Tell me...do you make this stuff up yourself, or get others to do it for you?

Rather than spend the time necessary to educate you read this:http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=467363

Your little myth about Cubans being barred from the resorts is dealt with in detail there.

Rather than spend the time necessary to educate you read this:http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=467363

Your little myth about Cubans being barred from the resorts is dealt with in detail there.

let me guess... they're allowed into the resorts to be thrown to the sharks?

hehe

No thank you. I've discovered that if I lay things out in logical detail, those who already believe will simply continue to do so; those who don't agree, never will and just pick at nits.

Now we're rationalizing little more than trolling. How sad.

Utter bullshit.

And yet he proved you wrong. How's that crow taste?

Is this enough ?

You know, you have done an awful amount of research on this topic (and on several threads too) and you always back up your points with links and stats, you refute other arguments with facts and stats and each of your posts has been delightful to read.... kudos to you Kilobugya.

You deserve a cookie

*gives cookie* :)

You deserve a cookie

*gives cookie* :)

Thanks :D