Chavez once again porves he's a tin pot dictator in the making.

[Zoid]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
Smashing the imperialists and their running dogs!

Viva Chavez!

[Saras]

Commie circlejerks over an essentially cleptocratic crypto-fascist - Priceless!

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
Even if it means Venezuala loses access to all that nice US capital and expertise since everyone knows he'll never pay them back?

Everyone but the actual capitalists. Their assets aren't seized, they're bought. There's a reason the capitalists continued to come to Venezuela after Chavez took over and made his first nationalizations.

[Ned]

No, I just want you to detail how the US was involved in the last coup and to what extent you believe the US would be involved in any future coup.

The linked article contains only rank speculation that the US must have been involved because the CIA knew that the Venezualan military was "planning" a coup. But the way it went down may have been unplanned. Chavez's private army fired on demonstrators who had gathered in protest by the hundreds of thousands. Hundreds were killed. Chavez ordered the army to fire as well. They refused and instead forced Chavez to resign and flee, which, under the circumstances, was more than justified regardless of prior planning.

Now how could the army know that Chavez would order his private army to fire?

And how do the peace-loving commies of the world justify such a travesty?

http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/articles.php?artno=1321

[Wernazuma III]

Originally posted by Ned
No, I just want you to detail how the US was involved in the last coup and to what extent you believe the US would be involved in any future coup.

The linked article contains only rank speculation that the US must have been involved because the CIA knew that the Venezualan military was "planning" a coup. But the way it went down may have been unplanned. Chavez's private army fired on demonstrators who had gathered in protest by the hundreds of thousands. Hundreds were killed. Chavez ordered the army to fire as well. They refused and instead forced Chavez to resign and flee, which, under the circumstances, was more than justified regardless of prior planning.

Now how could the army know that Chavez would order his private army to fire?

And how do the peace-loving commies of the world justify such a travesty?

http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/articles.php?artno=1321

Unsurprisingly, this perception of things is off reality. In 2002, not hundreds were killed, but about a dozen. Also, the causes of these deaths are not clear, I couldn't yet make my mind up about it. However, Chavez didn't act in a way that helps clarifying the incident, (part of the reason I gave him 3 thumbs down) but evidence is far too fuzzy for a claim that "Chavez ordered the police to fire". That leaves us with: The respoinsability is not clear, the number of dead demonstrators is 12 instead of hundreds...

And however it has really been, the coup had serious support from the US and Spain, and badly hidden too.

[Last Conformist]

I don't get what Ned is trying to argue. Because the last coup wasn't supported by the US, Chavez should fear an American invasion? Or what?

[Ned]

W, support? In what way? What did we do or not do to cause the coup?

It seems to me that anyone who would ask the police or the army to fire on demonstrators does not deserve to be president of a democracy. His instant deposal by the military was more than justified.

Communism fell in the USSR when the commies kidnapped Gorby and ordered the army to fire on demonstrators. When they refused to do so, commie authority vanished.

While I am sure that the US "supported" the final fall of the commie regime in Russia, I am not sure we had anything to do with the army refusing to fire on the Russian people.

Ditto Venezuela. Chavez left after the military refused to cooperate in his assault on his own people. That was an act of patriotism, not a plan by the CIA or Spain.

[Ned]

LC, if you want to know how the US would have planned a coup, look at how we handled Noriega.

Again, I fail to see how the Venezuelan army's refusal to fire on its own people had anything to do with prior planning by the US.

[Last Conformist]

If that's supposed to be a clarification, it's a failure.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by DanS
Chavez has done a lot of stupid things, these acts among them. But he is being kept in power by paying off the underclass. For Venezuela, unfortunately, that is not bad politics.

which is why democratic social change a la Lula, may be the best way to head off this kind incipient tyrrany. The Venezualan opposition didnt figure that out till it was too late, and Chavez could use the power of the state against them. They also suffered from the oil curse, thinking that with oil they didnt have to reform.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Wernazuma III
Castro q:
Chavez.
Morales

"Bolivians set fire to state capitol By DAN KEANE, Associated Press Writer
Tue Jan 9, 1:05 AM ET
LA PAZ, Bolivia - Backers of leftist Bolivian President Evo Morales set fire to a state capitol Monday in a protest to demand the resignation of a governor allied with the conservative opposition.

The thousands of protesters, including Indian groups, labor unions and coca farmers, also vowed in television interviews to begin a blockade Tuesday morning of highways leading into Cochabamba, 140 miles southeast of La Paz.

On Monday, the protesters set fire to the heavy wooden doors of the state's historic capitol and took control of its first floor offices as the blaze spread, charring furniture and destroying some government records. They also set fire to two cars parked on the plaza outside. The images were broadcast on Bolivian television.

Earlier Monday, state police tried to dislodge the protesters from the plaza by firing tear gas grenades into the crowd. Protesters responded by throwing rocks.

Local media reported at least 22 were injured in the clash, several of whom were journalists covering the event.

Morales' administration immediately deemed the response excessive, firing the newly appointed state police commander two hours after he had assumed the post.

Government Minister Alicia Munoz, whose office oversees law enforcement throughout Bolivia's nine states, said the violence was an indication that the central government must keep tighter reins on local police.

"From this moment on, there will be control," Munoz said in a radio interview. "There will be control because we will not permit any more acts of violence or acts of repression against the social sectors who, in this case, were demonstrating peacefully."

It was the third time in recent weeks that demonstrators have packed Cochabamba's tree-lined central plaza to demand the resignation of state Gov. Manfred Reyes Villa, a former presidential candidate still widely considered to harbor national political ambitions.

Last month, Reyes publicly denounced Morales' handling of an assembly rewriting Bolivia's constitution, siding with opposition leaders who say each of the new charter's articles should be written by two-thirds of the assembly's delegates.

Morales, whose Movement Toward Socialism party, or MAS, holds just over half of the assembly's seats, says the charter should be written by a simple majority, with only a final draft facing a two-thirds vote.

In December, Reyes also called for Cochabamba to hold a second vote on a referendum to give Bolivia's nine states greater autonomy from Morales' central government.

The referendum was defeated in a nationwide election in July but the autonomy issue still divides Bolivia. Cochabamba, in the Andean foothills at the center of the country, joined four western highland states in rejecting the measure, while Bolivia's four eastern lowland states favored it.

[Last Conformist]

Tear-gas is an excessive response to setting fire to gov't buildings? Morales is a bleeding heart liberal

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Last Conformist
Tear-gas is an excessive response to setting fire to gov't buildings? Morales is a bleeding heart liberal

It is excessive, when the fires are being set to the buildings of a state govt that is defying the federal govt, and when the folks setting the fires are supporters of the federal govt. Liberalism, bleeding heart or otherwise, this aint.

[Last Conformist]

LOTM's obliviousness to sarcasm strikes again!

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Last Conformist
LOTM's obliviousness to sarcasm strikes again!

SDNWONTN