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10 points to whomever can identify the actual beer referred to in the above song, without googling.
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"A person cannot approach the divine by reaching beyond the human. To become human, is what this individual person, has been created for.” Martin Buber -
Chavez is making drastic changes. It's his plan. Why would you want someone else to take over?Originally posted by Kontiki
So it's absolutely inconceivable that someone with similar ideas as Chavez could run for office after his terms are up and continue running the country in the same way?I drank beer. I like beer. I still like beer. ... Do you like beer Senator?
- Justice Brett KavanaughComment
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And put a monkey in front of a typewriter and he will eventually rewrite the complete works of Shakespeare. So what? That's not a compeling argument. To ask him to step down now is ridiculous.Originally posted by Arrian
It won't end well, Kid. It never does.
The thing is, he could ride off into the sunset like Cincinatus and be a hero of the Venezuelan poor. As you say, he's done some things. But he'll undo them (or be undone by other things, like oil prices) if he keeps power too long.
-ArrianI drank beer. I like beer. I still like beer. ... Do you like beer Senator?
- Justice Brett KavanaughComment
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Yeah, his plan involves power for life. This is a man who tried to take over via coup d'etat first. Then he won the election.
Now, if I were the sort of guy to make questionable analogies based on such things...
-Arriangrog want tank...Grog Want Tank... GROG WANT TANK!
The trick isn't to break some eggs to make an omelette, it's convincing the eggs to break themselves in order to aspire to omelettehood.Comment
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Like Chavez?Originally posted by Kidicious
He was mentally ill perhaps?
Oh wait... Chavez is more power mad and a wanna be dictator for life. I'm sure Pinochet would have approved
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“I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
- John 13:34-35 (NRSV)Comment
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There's nothing wrong with trying to replace a corrupt regime by any means.Originally posted by Arrian
Yeah, his plan involves power for life. This is a man who tried to take over via coup d'etat first. Then he won the election.
Now, if I were the sort of guy to make questionable analogies based on such things...
-ArrianI drank beer. I like beer. I still like beer. ... Do you like beer Senator?
- Justice Brett KavanaughComment
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That is one of the stranger analogies I've ever seen.Originally posted by Kidicious
And put a monkey in front of a typewriter and he will eventually rewrite the complete works of Shakespeare. So what? That's not a compeling argument. To ask him to step down now is ridiculous.
No, it's not ridiculous to hope he would step down once his terms were up. I expected Bill Clinton to do it. Was that ridiculous?
-Arriangrog want tank...Grog Want Tank... GROG WANT TANK!
The trick isn't to break some eggs to make an omelette, it's convincing the eggs to break themselves in order to aspire to omelettehood.Comment
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People said those things about FDR you know.Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
Like Chavez?
Oh wait... Chavez is more power mad and a wanna be dictator for life. I'm sure Pinochet would have approved.
I drank beer. I like beer. I still like beer. ... Do you like beer Senator?
- Justice Brett KavanaughComment
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And that may very well be how Chavez's rule will ultimately end. I hope not.Originally posted by Kidicious
There's nothing wrong with trying to replace a corrupt regime by any means.
-Arriangrog want tank...Grog Want Tank... GROG WANT TANK!
The trick isn't to break some eggs to make an omelette, it's convincing the eggs to break themselves in order to aspire to omelettehood.Comment
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It's your analogy that is strange. If you can't see the difference between Bill Clinton stepping down and Chavez stepping down I question whether you have any knowledge of the type of situation that Venezueala is in and has been in in recent history.Originally posted by Arrian
That is one of the stranger analogies I've ever seen.
No, it's not ridiculous to hope he would step down once his terms were up. I expected Bill Clinton to do it. Was that ridiculous?
-ArrianI drank beer. I like beer. I still like beer. ... Do you like beer Senator?
- Justice Brett KavanaughComment
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Yes. 4 terms were more than enough. Granted, he died anyway.Originally posted by Kidicious
People said those things about FDR you know.
-Arriangrog want tank...Grog Want Tank... GROG WANT TANK!
The trick isn't to break some eggs to make an omelette, it's convincing the eggs to break themselves in order to aspire to omelettehood.Comment
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Can you imagine a different president all 4 terms, each with a different plan?Originally posted by Arrian
Yes. 4 terms were more than enough. Granted, he died anyway.
-ArrianI drank beer. I like beer. I still like beer. ... Do you like beer Senator?
- Justice Brett KavanaughComment
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I will grant you that Venezuela =! the USA. Sure. But the analogy works a heckuva lot better than whatever you were trying to say about monkeys and Shakespeare.Originally posted by Kidicious
It's your analogy that is strange. If you can't see the difference between Bill Clinton stepping down and Chavez stepping down I question whether you have any knowledge of the type of situation that Venezueala is in and has been in in recent history.
Clinton and Chavez were both elected Presidents whose country's laws limited the number of terms they could serve. That, at least, works.
Anyway, only time will tell. I think it's pretty clear what's going on here. We shall see.
-Arriangrog want tank...Grog Want Tank... GROG WANT TANK!
The trick isn't to break some eggs to make an omelette, it's convincing the eggs to break themselves in order to aspire to omelettehood.Comment
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Originally posted by Kidicious
Things are going very well actually in Venezuela. The economy is booming despite lower oil production. Poverty continues to be reduced also. So why shouldn't he extend term limits?The rise of the “Boligarchs”
Aug 9th 2007 | CARACAS
From The Economist print edition
Under Hugo Chávez, the right political connections are a passport to wealth, whisky and a Hummer
Illustration by Claudio Munoz
“PETROLEUM socialism” is how Hugo Chávez, Venezuela's president, recently dubbed the blend of military populism and neo-Marxist statism to which he is subjecting his country. Its prime objective, he insists, is to improve the lot of the country's poor majority. Mr Chávez proclaims that “being rich is bad”. He frequently lashes out at what he calls “the oligarchy”. Strange, then, that the streets of Caracas are clogged with big new 4x4s (Hummers are especially favoured), it is hard to get a table at the best restaurants, and art dealers and whisky importers have never had it so good. A new oligarchy seems to be rising in Venezuela on the back of the “Bolivarian Revolution”, named for the country's independence hero.
“Some of Chávez's speeches are for the gallery,” says Alberto Muller Rojas, a retired army general who was until recently the president's chief of staff. “And I'll give you an example: the attack on the bourgeoisie.” As evidence, General Muller singles out the banks: “the most extreme expression of the bourgeoisie” but “the most favoured sector” of the economy since Mr Chávez came to power in 1999.
Their prosperity owes much to an oil windfall: the price of Venezuela's main export has increased almost eightfold since 1999 and the economy has been growing at 10% a year. But government policies, too, have favoured the bankers and other intermediaries: inflation is close to 20% and the official value of the currency is twice its black-market exchange rate. So the savvy investor looks for access to cheap dollars, import opportunities and government contracts, all of which are largely conditional on political obedience. By contrast, manufacturers and farmers face price controls and risk sporadic official harassment. The result has been the rise of what is known, in obeisance to Bol�*var, as the “Boli-bourgeoisie”.
Thanks to economic growth and social programmes, the government claims that only 30% of Venezuelan families now live in poverty, down from 55% at the peak in 2003. But according to a new report by the central bank, income inequality has widened slightly under Mr Chávez: the Gini coefficient—a statistical measure of inequality—has gone from 0.44 in 2000 to 0.48 in 2005.
Typical of the new “Boligarchy” is Wilmer Ruperti, a shipping broker who was once a merchant seaman. His ascent was helped by a two-month strike against Mr Chávez by workers at Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA), the state oil company. Mr Ruperti chartered ships to help the government break the strike. Another is Arné Chacón, whose brother Jesse is the communications minister. Arné now owns half of Baninvest, a bank. He acquired it with loans for which his main apparent collateral was his official connections.
Mr Chávez claims to be pursuing economic nationalism and “endogenous development”. But farmers and manufacturers struggle against cheap imports. Though local dairy products are often missing from the supermarket shelves, Gouda and Emmenthal cheeses nestle beside Irish butter. The frozen chickens at Mercal, a government chain of subsidised grocery shops, are Brazilian. The importers who supply Mercal have grown rich. But Venezuela's ranchers are becoming extinct, threatened by expropriations, land invasions and price controls, as well as by extortion and kidnappings by criminal gangs.
Officials stress that two-thirds of the poor have benefited directly from government social policies. As well as Mercal, these include the “missions”, which offer education and health care. Up to 2m people get a small cash stipend. But despite hefty increases in the minimum wage and price controls on basic goods, inflation is eating away at the gains.
For those with connections, however, the rewards are great. The World Bank recently ranked Venezuela as the second-worst country in the Americas for the control of corruption, above only Haiti. Others confirm this perception. “We usually ask for 10%,” a foreign diplomat reports one government official admitting. “But some get greedy and want 15-20%.”
Since his re-election in December, Mr Chávez has frequently suggested capping the salaries of the highest-paid public officials. He also called on those with “excess” wealth to donate part of it to worthy causes. The response has been meagre. If he really tries to make socialism more than a slogan, some of the fiercest resistance may come from the new bourgeoisie his own policies have created.THEY!!111 OMG WTF LOL LET DA NOMADS AND TEH S3D3NTARY PEOPLA BOTH MAEK BITER AXP3REINCES
AND TEH GRAAT SINS OF THERE [DOCTRINAL] INOVATIONS BQU3ATH3D SMAL
AND!!1!11!!! LOL JUST IN CAES A DISPUTANT CALS U 2 DISPUT3 ABOUT THEYRE CLAMES
DO NOT THAN DISPUT3 ON THEM 3XCAPT BY WAY OF AN 3XTARNAL DISPUTA!!!!11!! WTFComment
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That's what you can say in 1998, not now though. It's 2007 and time is already telling.Originally posted by Arrian
Anyway, only time will tell. I think it's pretty clear what's going on here. We shall see.I drank beer. I like beer. I still like beer. ... Do you like beer Senator?
- Justice Brett KavanaughComment
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