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Topic: Venezuelan blog day
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Macario SakayPerson was signed in when posted  12
01-23-2003 03:19 PM ET (US)
“Yesterday I read on the newspaper that a dangerous criminal was caught by police in ths very crime scene, and hours later was liberated because he carried an id issued by the political police. The political police said that he was a "patriot in a mission for the revolution".
Go figure.”

Independent, aggressive and critical media are essential to an informed democracy. But mainstream media are increasingly cozy with the economic and political powers they should be watchdogging. With media outlets overwhelmingly owned by conglomerates and supported by corporate advertisers, independent journalism is compromised. Structural reform is needed to break up the dominant media conglomerates, establish independent public broadcasting, and promote strong, alternative sources of information.
TiananmenPerson was signed in when posted  13
01-23-2003 05:37 PM ET (US)
"Independent, aggressive and critical media are essential to an informed democracy. But mainstream media are increasingly cozy with the economic and political powers they should be watchdogging. With media outlets overwhelmingly owned by conglomerates and supported by corporate advertisers, independent journalism is compromised. Structural reform is needed to break up the dominant media conglomerates, establish independent public broadcasting, and promote strong, alternative sources of information."

Okay Macario, I could not agree more with you on this. The only thing I need now is you to define what is that you call "independent public broadcasting" and "strong, alternative sources of information". Do you knew that in Venezuela the airwaves are owned by the State? The right to broadcast is granted or taken by the State, so there could not be a real "independent" media. Also, the paper sued to print newspapers is imported from abroad, so, giving dollars in a foreign currency exchange control like the one we have now, has been a way for governments like Lusinchi´s to blackmail written media.
Now, the government promotes illegal broadcasters, like "TV Catia", located in the west side of the city. And what do they broadcast? Educational tv shows? Wel, mmm, not exactly. They are used to call the "Circulos" to go somewhere to "protect" the "revolution".
There are also radio stations in that particular style, one of those, one in Maracaibo, asks "circulos" to go and destroy a ranch ("hacienda", "hato", "finca"), or to threat some TV station. The other I have learned exists, broadcasts every single thing that happens on Plaza Francia in Altamira.
The first one is operated by "chavstas", the second one by opposition.
None of them are right on this, illegal is illegal, and THAT is what the government is promoting. Of course the like the one that promotes the "circulos", and do not like the ones that promotes the opposition. But the two of them are the same: illegal broadcasters, "community stations" they call it.
By the way, I think the only media we will find in Venezuela on the future, is this one you are reading now. I really hope not, but it just seems like that.
TiananmenPerson was signed in when posted  14
01-24-2003 07:56 AM ET (US)
Oh, by the way, there is a link the news I mentioned before:

http://archivo.eluniversal.com/2003/01/22/22214AA.shtml
Macario SakayPerson was signed in when posted  15
01-24-2003 12:43 PM ET (US)
Imagine the owners of The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and NBC, ABC, CBS, and CNN meeting at the home of Times publisher Arthur Ochs Sulzberger Jr. with the head of the Joints Chiefs of Staff and assorted military top brass to plot to bring down U.S. President John Doe, a blowhard populist who has been elected by a landslide.
The plan is wickedly simple. Organize a massive march to the Washington, D.C. headquarters of Omnicom, the behemoth conglomerate that generates most of the country's riches, ostensibly to show support for their valiant struggle against the meddlesome, regulation-crazy Doe. Then, suddenly, turn the march around and head to the White House, which, your military co-conspirators tell you, will be left unguarded, to demand that Doe resign, or else ... Marchers will be recruited among the wealthiest 20 percent of the population, including members of Jimmy Hoffa's new AFL-CIO, which only unionizes top wage earners. Hoffa, however, will be dumped the moment Doe is removed from the White House. He knows about the coup to dump Doe, but not about the coup within the coup now being hatched in Sulzberger's parlor to disband Congress, suspend the Constitution, fire all Supreme Court judges, kick out all state governors, and dismantle not just the entire Doe administration, but any and all aspects of the federal and state government structure the conspirators dislike. The day before the march, the networks and hundreds of radio stations the conspiring media barons control, broadcast free ads for the march every 10 minutes. The march itself gets lavish live media coverage. So does the coup, er ... the democratic action by civil society. And the coup within the coup (which, officially, doesn't even exist). One highlight is the live coverage of the arrest and near-lynching of a Doe cabinet member by angry 20 percenters. The whole country also sees and hears a Sulzberger minion, who also happens to be the Fortune 400 association's boss of bosses, proclaim himself interim President and destroy the U.S. constitutional structure with the stroke of a pen, to the thundering applause of a bunch of billionaires and four-star generals jockeying to get in the picture with him.
All this, naturally, creates a bad impression among the remaining 80 percent of Americans, who are abjectly poor and who voted overwhelmingly for President Doe. They take to the streets as well. When the coup begins to unravel, the networks enact a total, self-imposed news blackout. As poor Americans march in turn to the White House demanding, and finally getting, the imprisoned Doe's return, the networks broadcast reruns of "Pretty Woman" and cartoons, or show over and over footage of Doe's ouster and advise people to stay home.

Hard to believe? Not in Venezuela, where something along these lines happened. And, in a small, but perverse way, not even in the U.S., where the networks turned off the information faucet during the Bush inauguration to enforce our rulers' consensus that it was time for the country to stop bickering about judicial coups and to move on. Conspirators are said to have met many times at the home of Miguel Henrique Otero, publisher of El Nacional, one of Venezuela's two main dailies, and other newspapers. Among them was Alberto Ravell, CEO of Globovisión, a CNN affiliate which is the country's main all-news TV station, Marcel Granier, of RCTV, another leading station, and Gustavo Cisneros, Venezuela's wealthiest man and a friend and fishing partner of former President Bush. The Cisneros Group owns Venevisión, one of the country's main networks, and is part owner of the local Direct TV franchise, Caracol Television, and the U.S. Spanish-language network Univisión. Venezuela's media establishment, closely aligned with a local oligarchy that has the receptive ear of the Bush administration, almost unanimously abhors Chávez' populist policies, big-mouth authoritarian style, friendship with media buster, Fidel Castro, and intolerance of criticism. Chávez hates them back. Led by Cisneros, the media group, which also included Andrews Mata, owner of El Universal, Venezuela's other major daily, met with self-proclaimed interim President and big business mouthpiece Pedro Carmona on Saturday April 14, 2002 as demonstrators were pouring out on the streets of Caracas demanding Chávez' return. Flanked by one of the generals who had installed him in the presidential palace only a day earlier, Carmona asked the media bosses for help. They obliged: shortly thereafter, the news blackout, which had started the night before, became total. Neither El Universal nor El Nacional published their Sunday editions. Globovisión's Ravell reportedly even called CNN's Atlanta headquarters to ask, in vain, that the U.S. network join the news blackout. Venezuelans with access to cable and satellite — mostly the rabidly anti-Chávez middle and upper classes, the 20 percent not living in abject poverty — were thus able to find out that the coup was failing without leaving their homes. The poor had to go out on the streets to find out, which made them angrier — some attacked TV stations and newspapers — and probably accelerated Chávez' restoration.
The first Latin America media coup collapsed about 48 hours after it began, doomed by popular rage and, for the first time, the almost universal condemnation of the region's governments, who, in another first, forced a prematurely gleeful U.S. to tone down and back off on Chávez, at least for now.
Macario SakayPerson was signed in when posted  16
01-24-2003 01:17 PM ET (US)
Correspondents in Venezuela attempt to portray Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez as an unpopular leader. The basis for this has been the recitation of “polls”. The the source of their polls– Datanalisis and Keller and Associates, are headed by anti-Chavez figures, Jose Antonio Gil Yepes of Datanalisis and Alfredo Keller of Keller and Associates. Gil Yepes had said that Chavez “has to be killed.” and saw an assassination as the only way out of the “political crisis surrounding President Hugo Chavez.” It is an demonstration of the deep-seated class hatred by a large segment of Venezuela’s business-led opposition, which prefers to pretend that thousands of poor and working-class Chavez supporters do not exist. When a massive pro-government demonstration in Caracas on October 13, 2002 showed that a good portion of “the rest of the country” supported Chavez, the editorial board of Venezuela’s elite-controlled newspaper El Nacional was incensed. El Nacional, which commissions and publishes polls by Datanalisis, disparagingly referred to Chavez’s supporters as “lumpen” who were lured from the country’s interior with “a piece of bread and some rum” to “come and cheer the great con man of the nation.” Thus, from the warped perspective of much of the opposition, Datanalisis’ contention that "the rest of the country" opposes Chavez makes sense. Since elites are the people that “matter,” and those of less privilege can be reduced to virtual sub-human status, poor and working-class Chavez supporters do not qualify as part of “the rest of the country.” Also, Keller and Gil Yepes do not poll rural inhabitants. Thus, landless peasants who may benefit from Chavez’s agrarian reform are also excluded from polling samples.
Justin DelacourPerson was signed in when posted  17
01-24-2003 01:55 PM ET (US)
Tiananmen:

You're a bold-faced liar, and you know it. You and your anti-Chavez cohorts in the commercial media in Venezuela have created your own virtual reality, a virtual reality that is comforting to your class, which has exploited the Venezuelan people for a century.

I don't have the time to address your every lie, but I invite folks to take a look at a piece that I just wrote for Narco News that exposes some of the lies of the Venezuelan opposition: http://www.narconews.com/Issue27/article594.html

For folks who are interested, you can check out a debate on Venezuela that featured myself, Narco News editor Al Giordano, and two academic "experts" on Venezuela. It's at: http://www.zmag.org/lam/delacour-debate.htm

So long. - Justin Delacour (jdelac@unm.edu)
TiananmenPerson was signed in when posted  18
01-25-2003 11:52 AM ET (US)
Mr. delacour,

This is so very familiar to me, you came here from nowhere, insult, try to disqualify, and then leave.
It is not that you do not have TIME to address my "lies", you do not WANT to, because thre are no lies. As a matter of fact, probably "Us", you know, the "stablishment", (haha), do not have the time to address your every lie. You are well-paid people, working day and night for this. Grabbing yourselves to even a little of bit of power remaining in Chavez´ government. You want to show your loyalty to the regime, and, well, that´s okay for me. It is better that throwing stones to the people :-)
You know I am not telling lies here, I just live here and see what is happening. I just know that every day that passes by I have less and less money to buy goods. Goods like food and insurance. I am not talking about a plane or a boat. I do not talk about a Mercedes Benz. I just want to live quietly in my country, that my children could grow up in a terror-free enviroment. I just want to buy not a BMW, but a dog for my children to play.
And all of that could only be possible in a free country, not in a terrorized one.
Again, you know what is the truth here, I am not trying to convince you. A friend of mine once said that "when in an argue with someone, if you convince me, I won. Because I learned something new".

I am not trying to disqualify you and your colleagues, but you are.
TiananmenPerson was signed in when posted  19
01-25-2003 12:09 PM ET (US)
Oh, I forgot to address Mr. Sakay.

So, what you are saying in your two page views-long posting, is that we must trust Fidel Castro over Globovision? I do not have to trust any media in Venezuela. They are the ones that promoted Chavez´ rise to power. Then I thought, how comes that someone would vote for a militar coup leader? A militar coup that left so many Venezuelans dead, so many civilians, so many militar staff, so many workers from Venezolana de Television, (state-owned tv network). Yes, you may come now and tell me that in the past, the fouth republic governments did the same and worst. Well, I did not like them either. They corrupted the armed forces to an extreme that now Chavez is only following their principles, in a radical way, but it is just an improving of the old way of corrupt people.

Maybe he is popular or not. But facts have proven that he is not able to run the country.

And talking again about trusting Fidel Castro, a guy that only has taken advantage of Venezuela every time he could, call it help, call it oil, call it whatever you want to call it. A guy that promoted a guerrilla that killed so many Venezuelans in the sixties. A guy that now is presented to the army as "a friend", when "a foe" it is just an euphemism of what he is...mmm, I surely think it twice before giving him the opportunity stick a dager in our backs.

So, you trust Castro over national media, I respect the right you have to be suicidal.
tagabukidPerson was signed in when posted  20
01-26-2003 06:18 AM ET (US)
Venezuela has experienced the largest decline in average standard of living, as measured by a two-thirds decrease in average real income, and the largest increase in poverty levels of any country in Latin America over the past twenty years. Chavez been able to slow down the decline (during his second and third year in office GNP increased slightly) and to distribute the decline more evenly among the population by focusing state resources on the poorer sectors of the population through large increases in spending on education, health, and housing and through large-scale rural and urban land redistribution and micro-credit programs. Venezuela now allows for popular referenda, for recall votes, and for minority rights. This is a battle over a shrinking pie. Chavez is attempting develop an economic program which would diversify the economy and end Venezuela's dependency on oil.
TiananmenPerson was signed in when posted  21
01-26-2003 03:08 PM ET (US)
Well Mr Tagabukid, that is not true. You know, as every single individual that lives in Venezuela, that right now we have so many more people living in extreme poverty that ever in the republic´s life.

You said that "Venezuela now allows for popular referenda, for recall votes, and for minority rights". Mmmm, "popular referenda"? You mean the one that has been recently cancelled by the electoral hall of the supreme court? "Minority rights"? Where?

"Chavez is attempting develop an economic program which would diversify the economy and end Venezuela's dependency on oil."
Okay, I suppose you really think that we are a bunch of majordomo programs here, yous automaticaly repliying to every single post of you with a couple of insults and four-pageviews postings.

Venezuela is an oil producer country. 80% of Venezuela´s economy is based on oil. I think it is a great idea, the one that the late Uslar Pietri had once, when he said that we must "seed the oil" in order to be a great country, etc, making investments in the people, the social thing and the infrastructure. But buying jets like the president´s Airbus, enhanced with the luxury package it was enhanced, and all the expenditures he likes to do, does not look to me like to be "seeding the oil".

Even if what you are saying is the truth, you guys do not have any idea on how to run a country. I do not either, but I am not running it :-)
What you are saying is that, for instance, if someone has a job that gives the everyday bread to his family, when the rest of the family wants to be independent of that guy, instead of finding jobs first and be independent afterwards, you kill the guy and find the way to survive, even f you have to be hungry and naked on the streets.
Okay, you do not know what it is that you are saying. Please read your own post before submitting it.
tagabukidPerson was signed in when posted  22
01-26-2003 03:47 PM ET (US)
Oil wealth has never impacted the lives of Venezuela's working class. 80% live in poverty. One percent of the population owns 60% of the arable land. Economic troubles have affected the rich. Currency devaluation has greater negative economic impact on the rich, they tend to buy more products that are denominated in dollars: real estate, vacations to the U.S. They can no longer afford these purchases because their income is worth half as much. Most government reforms: new constitution, education, health care, land reform, benefit the poor more. For the first time in history, universal health care is more accessible to the poor. With education, thousands of schools have been introduced throughout the country, providing meals to poor students. There are one million new students in schools who were never part of the school system before. The new constitution enables participation of large sectors of society that were excluded from government before: women, indigenous peoples, and homosexuals. The government has introduced land reform programs designed to put idle land into production and to redistribute idle land to landless peasants to create greater social justice and increase the country's agricultural production. It is also supplemented by agricultural credit and training programs. There is democratization of property and local governance through participatory planning processes for local projects, public housing program and the micro-credit programs that support workplace democracy and creation of cooperatives. There is government's effort to collect income taxes for the first time in Venezuelan history. Only those with incomes in the top 20% or so are required to pay income taxes.
TiananmenPerson was signed in when posted  23
01-27-2003 01:00 PM ET (US)
Tagabukid, now you are talking like a piece of propaganda. Oil wealth has ALWAYS impacted the lives of Venezuela´s working class. Where do you think the infraestructure money comes from? From trees? How do you think the government manages to find the money to build hospitals, highways, medical doctor´s salary and everything else? 80% of the government´s earnings come, still comes from the oil wealth, as you call it.

"Currency devaluation has greater negative economic impact on the rich, they tend to buy more products that are denominated in dollars: real estate, vacations to the U.S. They can no longer afford these purchases because their income is worth half as much" (!)

If you really think that, I am spending my time here writing to you. The government is purposedly devaluating the currency, so he can manage to pay his debts with less dollars. With currency devaluation the economic impcat is suffered by everyone: maybe "the rich" could no longer spend two weeks on his "vacations in the US", he will spend only one. But the poor, could no longer afford four glasses of ilk and two pieces of bread for his family, he could only afford a glass of milk and a single piece of bread.
Is THAT fair? Do you really think that when a country gets poorer and poorer the only people that gets impacted are "the rich"?
Why do not you say that almost everything we use and eat in Venezuela came from abroad, or at the very least its raw material?
Taxes? Why don´t you say thata verything in this country is taxed by the so called "IVA", that taxates with the 16% every single good we can buy, and now they even tax food, cheese, milk, meat, etc. Oh, I almost forgot to tell that the medical services are now taxated with an 8%, even if we are talking about an emergency. And by the way, that´s sepparate from the income taxes almost everyone pays. And now they are talking about a new tax called "monotribute", an income tax that will be payed by everyone, poor or rich, wealthy or not.

"The government has introduced land reform programs designed to put idle land into production and to redistribute idle land to landless peasants to create greater social justice and increase the country's agricultural production." That´s your way to say that the government has promoted and encouraged illegal invations on private properties.

Finally, you mentioned that there is "democratization of property and local governance", that´s your way to say "comunism"? How come that a property owned by a private, which is idle because no one wants to make an investment in a country where the military burps in the face of the owner of a Coca-Cola depot while he confiscates the soda bottles? And then the very president congratulates that general in a national television broadcast?

Oh, please.
Justin DelacourPerson was signed in when posted  24
01-27-2003 02:32 PM ET (US)
"The government is purposedly devaluating the currency, so he can manage to pay his debts with less dollars."

Tiananmen, you're just ignorant. The debt is dollar-denominated. It increases with devaluation. This is elementary.

Chavez has no interest in this kind of drastic devaluation.
Chavez has just thrown up currency controls because Venezuela's rich have been running to the banks to cash in their currency for dollars, which drives down the value of the currency. It's Venezuela's rich that are responsible for the devaluation, and everybody with a little sense knows this.

"With currency devaluation the economic impcat is suffered by everyone: maybe 'the rich' could no longer spend two weeks on his 'vacations in the US,' he will spend only one. But the poor, could no longer afford four glasses of ilk and two pieces of bread for his family, he could only afford a glass of milk and a single piece of bread."

Look, everybody with half a brain knows that the rich and the middle class are more dependent on imported goods, and that it is the price of imported goods that accelerates the most with devalation. Please spare all this nonsense about how all Venezuelans are in this together, as if the interests of different classes are not divergent.

"Is THAT fair? Do you really think that when a country gets poorer and poorer the only people that gets impacted are 'the rich'?"

No, the poor take a hit too, but the reason the economy is in such dire straits is that Venezuela's rich have been sabotaging the economy for some time now, through disinvestment, capital flight and now capital strike. The rich are so incredibly greedy that they'll do whatever they can to oust a president who seeks a more equitable distribution of wealth. If you want to point your finger at folks who are destroying Venezuela's economy, point it at your own class.

"Why do not you say that almost everything we use and eat in Venezuela came from abroad, or at the very least its raw material?"

Historically, Venezuela's currency is overvalued, which causes an overdependence on imported goods, particularly among the rich. There mutually-reinforcing problem of dependence on oil revenue and overvaluation. Large oil revenue is the source of overvaluation, while overvaluation reinforces Venezuela's dependence on oil revenue. Overvaluation makes it impossible for the Venezuelan economy to diversify and become more competitive internationally, since the products that it produces are so expensive on the international market. Thus, many Venezuelans rely on imported goods, which is not good for the long-term development of Venezuela's economy.

"Taxes? Why don´t you say thata verything in this country is taxed by the so called 'IVA,' that taxates with the 16% every single good we can buy, and now they even tax food, cheese, milk, meat, etc. Oh, I almost forgot to tell that the medical services are now taxated with an 8%, even if we are talking about an emergency. And by the way, that´s sepparate from the income taxes almost everyone pays. And now they are talking about a new tax called 'monotribute,' an income tax that will be payed by everyone, poor or rich, wealthy or not."

So what? Pity the rich Venezuelan who finally has to pay some taxes once in his or her life. Get a grip, buddy! It's about time that Latin America's rich pay some damn taxes. Venezuela's rich can't stand the fact that Chavez seeks to use this tax revenue on, God forbid, social spending for the country's poor. So the rich and their media networks invent every kind of ridiculous argument they can imagine to try to evade their responsibility to society, particularly to the poor. Go to hell, you greedy assholes! Welcome to the real world, where the rich -- as in every first world country -- are supposed to pay some taxes to ameliorate society's inequities.

"That´s your way to say that the government has promoted and encouraged illegal invations on private properties."

Illegal invasions, my ass! You know good and well that Venezuela is a horribly inequitable country. Chavez has every right and reason to redistribute some land to the landless, just as the South Koreans and the Taiwanese did after World War II. When you wake the fuck up to the fact that the values of the rich in your society are rotten to the core, and that your society will never undergo meaningful social development until the rich take some responsibility to assist that development, you'll be a much better person.

"How come that a property owned by a private, which is idle because no one wants to make an investment in a country where the military burps in the face of the owner of a Coca-Cola depot while he confiscates the soda bottles? And then the very president congratulates that general in a national television broadcast?"

Right, Chavez and everybody else are just supposed to kiss the asses of the rich in Venezuela and elsewhere so that the rich will throw a few crumbs to the rest of society with their "investment." This is what we call neoliberalism, folks; it's not any kind of road to development. Latin American governments have been kissing the neoliberal asses of global finance and domestic oligarchies for the last twenty years, and all it has brought the region is more poverty and inequality.

The long and arduous road to a new and more equitable model of development has begun with Chavez, and Venezuela's rich will go on kicking and screaming for one simple reason: Chavez is not subservient to them. All the remaining arguments spewed by the Venezuelan right are pure subterfuge.
TiananmenPerson was signed in when posted  25
01-28-2003 11:04 PM ET (US)
Mr Delacour,

You know that the debts that I am talking about are the internal debts, public employee´s salary, etc. You must know we use Bolivars as our legal currency.

Chavez is trying to stop the massive money runaway, but the worst way. You know it, and if you do not know that, please stop bullshitting here. You know the government and its dullness is what´s making this country burn and fall into pieces.

Everyone is dependent from imported goods, and there is no discussion about that. If you don´t know where every single stupid thing came from in Venezuela, it is not my fault.

About repeatedly pointing at me as a "media-paid agent" or that I am rich, white and anglosaxon, I just think you guys are to brain-weak. You have what the psicologysts call a "rough brain". And to answer that question, yes, I write here because the English Crown papid me to do so. My real name is Bond, James Bond. (!)

All the rest you wrote is nonsense. Well, it´s really comunist propaganda, and I am very happy about the fact that you guys finally accepted you are nothing but a bunch of comunists that want to take every single structure in our beloved country and say you are "revolutionary". You are just plain thiefs. And if you are not, even worst, you are a thief wannabe.

Go and work someday and please do not wait until the day some crazy adventurer want to "take from the rich to give to the poor". In our own version of that tale, when the poor receives the money, then he becomes rich...and then Chavez come again and "take from the rich..."

So long, nice try.
Justin DelacourPerson was signed in when posted  26
01-30-2003 11:37 AM ET (US)
What a sorry old ploy it is to label anybody who calls for social reform a "communist." Hugo Chavez came to power calling for "capitalism with a human face." That's exactly what he's tried to implement by extending primary education, providing poor school children with breakfast and lunch, and embarking upon moderate land reform. But people like you, the people of Venezuela's elite, won't even accept "capitalism with a human face" because you see even moderate social reform as a threat to your interests and your economic domination of the rest of Venezuelan society. You only accept savage neoliberalism (neoliberalismo salvaje).

You and your class are really quite a shameful spectacle to behold. You care about nobody but yourselves.

It is Venezuela's elites who are thieves, thieves who have thrived off of the exploitation of Venezuelan workers and the country's national oil patrimony, while most of the country lives in poverty.

And by the way, asshole, I do work. And I don't have some poor exploited maid make my meals or clean up after me as you rancid oligarchs of Venezuela are so accustomed to having.

One day you might wake up to the fact that even economically successful capitalist countries, like those of Western Europe or South Korea and Taiwan, understand the importance of limiting levels of inequality. Unfortunately, Latin America's elites are still wedded to the notion that any kind of social reform designed to ameliorate gross inequalities is "communism." As long as people like you and your elite Venezuelan cohorts wed yourselves to such retrograde beliefs, you will inevitably bring violence and social conflict to your societies.
TiananmenPerson was signed in when posted  27
01-30-2003 09:57 PM ET (US)
Just look at yourselves, insulting and insulting, when you wear all your propaganda out. Oh, I forgot, your communist propaganda.

Okey, let´s not call it communism, let´s call ir "democracy", as Fidel Castro calls its communism there in Cuba. Or it is that you are so blindfolded to call what´s happening in Cuba "capitalism with a human face"?

And let´s face it, "capitalism with a human face" as you call Chavez´s communism-wannabe, has done nothing for humans.
Let´s not call it "the poor" or "the rich". He has done NOTHING to ease the hunger, childs on the streets begging for money to eat, millions and millions of workers WITHOUT a job. Yes, millions, more than 3 million people without a job. More than EVER.

YEs, I have to say the the elites that governed the country before Chavez destroyed and salvaged the country. I do not want to get back to that time. But with Chavez I don´t see any improving, I just see that the country is poorer and poorer. Chavez is rich now, and he asks people to starve in order to defend "his revolution". This week he just threatened everyone saying that his "revolution" was armed with tanks, guns, cannons, jets and bullets. Which ones? Our armed forces weapons? And WHO gave him the right to use those? The constitution? The same one that he shows every time that he commit a crime?

The fact is that Chavez is taking private depots by assault to take away beer and cokes, having parties like in the ancient rome, and is doing everything a communist does.

But in one thing you are right my friend, this could not be called communism, this is to dumb to be called that. And something else, this statement is also right:
"It is Venezuela's elites who are thieves, thieves who have thrived off of the exploitation of Venezuelan workers and the country's national oil patrimony, while most of the country lives in poverty."

And Venezuela´s elites are now the chavistas, the ones that have Mercedes Benz, BMW´s, boats, private planes. The ones that uses the national treasury to pay people to march.

Continue talking about your so-called "social reform" while Chavez destroys the country. Continue talking about "capitalism with a face" while Chavez does nothing to ease the hunger, the people´s hunger. As you say before, rich people have enough money to go through this without any pain or suffering. In the meantime, while Chavez goes to Brazil with a bunch of his OWN 2000 people crowd to cheer him up, people here does not have anything to eat.
And you, connecting to the Internet at working hours, claiming to be a "poor", dominated worker, chained in that plantation while the master rests peacefully on his mansion.
You are nothing but someone that need to pay a visit to a psiquiatrist, so he can manage your inferiority complex.

And again, don´t say that the violence and social conflict are the sons of "our retrograde beliefs". Those are the goals of the "bolivarian revolution", not mines.

Poor Simon Bolivar, fight all his life to libetare the continent and in his name his own country is becoming an slave again.

Good bye my friend, I hope some day we could discuss our differences peacefully, without fear of revenge.
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