It is a mistake for the US to try to overthrow the democratic government in Venezuela.

Exactly. FranchiseBlade just doesn't get it. According to his definition, Nazi Germany would have been a democracy because Hitler was elected .

 

glynch, spend some time in Venezuela and talk to the people there who have a bit of an education. I spoke to working class people with an education and they hated the Chavez regime. That country has gone down the drain so badly since your leftist comrades took over there.

 

No, I wouldn't because of what he did after he got into power. You do a really poor job when you try and speak for what I would or wouldn't think about things. Maybe you should just give that up, and stick to something you're a little more familiar with.

 

Too many people think unmonitored elections are the same as monitored elections by respected agencies.

Also too many people confuse having the kind of govt. they want win the elections with democracy.

 

Elections are crap. Choices are not binary, publicity is bought, people lie, public character criteria do not relate to sincerity of service, hot button issues can be actually low priority low impact issues that decide elections for the wrong reasons.

No one has "democracy", people have at best a representative republic. We in the US could switch to a direct vote of the people in the next 5 years where people can vote directly on issues electronically, but the "haves" won't want the "have not's" to have that power. Only millionaires can hold high office.

Venezuela seems like just another example of the standard class war.

 

Oil wealth in a country rarely serves the country well. An interesting read on the the topic is "The Oil Curse," which talks not only about oil but natural resource booms of all kinds.

 

Can there truly be a free and fair election if there is No freedom of press..or if that press is manipulated and controlled by the government?

 

Bottom line is this. Chavez was elected legitimately. He was elected legitimately multiple times.

That being said, he began making authoritarian moves and trying to consolidate power. It's just my opinion that had Chavez stayed healthy, he'd be a full fledged dictator with in one or two more election cycles.

Chavez also made a mistake in not doing enough to keep the educated in Venezuela and have them build a sustainable economy there. That hurt Venezuela and made it unlikely for them to sustain something that would work ofr the nation as a whole.

However, despite all of his shortcomings, Chavez was a huge improvement over what preceded him, and most of this political opponents. He did follow through on his promises to help the large part of the population that was impoverished. He reduced the poverty rate, made all sorts of improvements for those that were the worst off in Venezuela. He helped with their standard of living, their education, their health care. He did all of that, and he did it for a population that had been neglected, oppressed and taken advantage of for a long time in the nation.

 

Interesting video here:

<iframe width="420" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/EFS6cP9auDc?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

 

There is a fine line for Socialists to walk between doing what they must to hold off the Plutocrats and redistribute wealth and becoming a dictator. One antidote to the subversion of the free press, buying up the outlets, is to develop a cult of personality.There aren't many other ways to do it.

(that's probably why we always elect actors instead of academics)

 

The demagogue is dead. We should sit back and see what the Venezuelans want to do with their country. Perhaps now that Chavez is gone, they can find a good middle ground and concentrate on building their country, not creating a cult of personality.

 

Could happen, but I don't think people organize without a galvanizing charismatic focus.
Hell, the founding father would have made George Washington king.

 

That certainly has some truth. I don't remember how many of the Founding Fathers wanted George to become King, but I recall that a significant number did. Not only was Washington not interested, he stepped aside to allow others to run for President, when he could have been President as long as he liked, probably for life. Truly a great man. Where did they all go?

 

back to the slave plantation?

see, it's a lot harder to maintain a myth in a world of ubiquitous information. You can't even get 'good' people elected when all their average human weaknesses are known. JFK would never be elected after TMZ.

 

Is this a serious post? You can have physical courts; just put a sign in front of a building. Chavez (and now Maduro) have harassed the opposition (for example, accusing Leopoldo Lopez of inciting "terrorism"), shut down/denied licenses to critical media, changed the constitution to allow Chavez to run for a 3rd term, etc.

Please provide a link or some backing to the wild claim (only supported by countries like say, Cuba) that Venezuela has strong protections of individual freedom and expression.

Here are two links (took 3 seconds to find) showing the damage to the Venezuelan economy as a result of Chavez's antics and policies, and the dictatorial tendencies of the government (if you question the source, then post your opposing links in response).

http://www.economist.com/blogs/americasview/2013/03/venezuela-after-chávez

http://www.cnbc.com/id/101219760

 

This was in your first post:

His first act was to call a Constituent Assembly, which wrote a new constitution, approved by referendum. It enshrined respect for private property, human rights and an independent judiciary.

And remember, Chavez and Venezuela do not exist in a vacuum. Venezuela's oil is a very heavy crude that is difficult to refine. Their primary customers were Gulf Coast USA refineries especially set up to handle it. It's not a stretch to think American Industrialist might cause a slowdown in an elected socialist's crowd pleasing income. Or that executive that are used to the perks of running a nationalized industry might resist profits being diverted from them to the people.

I don't know anything really, but it would be in the interest of the world's 1% for the Bolivarian revolution to fail.

 

You might as well at least finish the paragraph.

But it also expanded the powers of the presidency and the armed forces. It gave Mr Chávez a chance to appoint loyalists to the supreme court and other nominally independent institutions.

If the standard is simply "establishing" courts or "enshrining" something in the constitution, well, kangaroo courts are "courts," aren't they? Here are a few more snippets:

Everything Mr Chávez did was calculated to shore up his support among a majority of Venezuelans, while ignoring or harassing the rest. His original base was those people who laboured in the informal economy, which had blossomed in the 1980s after the end of the previous oil boom. To this he added a growing army of public-sector workers: under him, the public payroll almost doubled, to 2.4m.

Behind the propaganda, the Bolivarian revolution was a corrupt, mismanaged affair. The economy became ever more dependent on oil and imports. State takeovers of farms cut agricultural output. Controls of prices and foreign exchange could not prevent persistent inflation and engendered shortages of staple goods. Infrastructure crumbled: most of the country has suffered frequent power cuts for years. Hospitals rotted: even many of the missions languished. Crime soared: Caracas is one of the world’s most violent capitals. Venezuela has become a conduit for the drug trade, with the involvement of segments of the security forces.

He cowed the opposition. He harassed its media outlets: today, most free-to-air television channels spout government propaganda. The names of the 3.6m who signed the petition calling for the recall referendum were published; some were sacked from state jobs or denied passports or other official services.

 

I'm not going to go too far defending Mr. Chavez, because I'm disappointed in the way it went after his first election, but an entrenched plutocracy and a for-profit corporate world press is a tough nut to crack. If you don't maintain the full support of the masses they will crush you, defile you and overthrow you on every front.

(Castro wanted US help to overthrow a dictator but the money said no, so his only choice was to go full socialist and cozy up to the Soviet Union. Chavez faced a full on US supported coup-de-tat in 2002.)