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AP: VP of Venezuela Has Announced Hugo Chavez has Died

Through great effort Chavez was able to single handedly boost world oil prices by 500% during his tenure, hugely boosting Venezuela's only real export, raising many Venezuelans to just above international poverty line, limiting real poverty to only his political rivals and only keeping $2 billion in state revenue for himself. Such a trooper!

Source that oil prices went up 500% and that it is CAUSED by Chavez.

Also that his economic policies actually pick out political rivals? lor that he has personally embezzled 2 billion dollars ....

Do you have ANY sources for that?
 
What corruption? How is Venezuelan corruption anymore than any other latin american country .... the poor benefited A LOT, and so did the middle class ... that is what a good economic policy does.

Well his failure to diversify has led to their stagnation. All their inlays comes thru Petroleum Products and considering the Price of Oil is not the same when Chavez first came in he could have done more. Plus Rueters did a piece on the state corruption with Fonden which runs 1/3rd of all Venezuela's Investments.

The waste is everywhere. Just like when Chavez tried to work out his massive housing deal.
 
Source that oil prices went up 500% and that it is CAUSED by Chavez.


Well, first, the price of a barrel of crude was $22 in 1997, it is currently $111.00.

Second, the rest of the joke zoomed over your head.


Also that his economic policies actually pick out political rivals? lor that he has personally embezzled 2 billion dollars ....


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And...

Chavez worth $2 billion


Do you have ANY sources for that?


Yep.
 
perhaps that has something to do with reducing poverty by 66% and extreme
poverty by more, increasing education and healthcare significnatly, bringing democracy into communities and starting a vibrant cooperative economy, as well as keeping the oil wealth FOR the country and actually bettering the country significantly.

I love you how assume Latin Americans are stupid and only respont to rhetoric, maybe its the actual outcomes of policies that make hiim popular.

Oh BS.

You people on the left need to STOP LYING. At least to Americans.

Venezuela was a backwards Socialist crime ridden hell hole under Chavez who devalued their currency making everything more expensive and nationalized the oil industry as Venezuelas neighbors were expanding their free markets and actually HELPING the poor.

His manipulation of the his nationalized oil companies drove fuel prices up all over the world.

Socialism guarantees evrryone, not just the poor suffer
 
Here's what a Venezuelan says about him:

10 reasons why I will not miss Chavez - CNN iReport

And here's CNN's fact-check.

Fact check: 10 reasons I won

Chavez defenders aren't going to like it much.



Hah, I like how CNN chose to believe "official government figures" from the Chavez regime on poverty while accepting that Chavez has lied and swindled and ruined every other aspect of Venezuelan life. The poor must have gotten better treatment under Chavez... because Chavez said so! :roll:

Oh, I'll also admit that I was wrong above. I misread the crude oil price chart I had. The price of Crude oil was $9.30 when Chavez took office, and $90.00 now. So more like 967% increase in the cost of crude oil, not 500%...

And yet this Socialist paradise managed an international standard 30% poverty rate, well below average income disparity and a whopping 20% inflation.

I can see why the Hollywood Elites only visit....
 
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Hugo Chavez leaves Venezuela in economic muddle.....

That habit of impromptu policymaking was integral to Mr Chavez's style, right from the start of his 14 years in power.

Time and again, the president would make major decisions on an ad hoc basis, often during the course of his rambling and unscripted weekly TV broadcast to the nation, known as Alo Presidente.

He was particularly prone to quick-fix solutions in economic policy, resorting to regular currency devaluations, expropriations of private firms and inflation-busting public-sector pay rises rather than tackling the economy's underlying structural problems.

This fire-fighting approach continued even as Mr Chavez lingered on his Cuban sickbed, with Vice-President Nicolas Maduro implementing a 32% devaluation of the bolivar in February.

As a result, Mr Chavez bequeaths a nation beset by crumbling infrastructure, unsustainable public spending and underperforming industry.....snip~

That's what Chavez is leaving behind. So going as far left as he could. He failed!
 
RIP Mr. Chavez. Thanks for reversing failed neo-liberal policies, reducing poverty and illiteracy. You can judge his success by the hysterical attacks on him by the mainstream media that supported the coup in 2002. If you stand up to thugs like Bush and Obama you can expect such cowardly attacks.
 
Looks Like we will be sending our Condolences.

U.S. officials expected to attend Chavez funeral....

Delegation to be announced by White House.
No plans to reciprocate after U.S. diplomats expelled.

(Reuters) - The United States is expected to send a delegation to Hugo Chavez's funeral later this week in a move that could send a conciliatory message to Venezuela now that its stridently anti-American leader has died.

A senior State Department official said the United States was reviewing its response to Venezuela's expulsion of the two military officials and said it had the right to reciprocate in kind but for now it would not be doing so.

The U.S. Embassy in Caracas has been without an ambassador since 2010, when Chavez rejected the U.S. appointee. That led Washington to revoke the credentials of Venezuela's ambassador.

U.S. President Barack Obama issued a statement shortly after Chavez's death was announced, expressing an interest in a "constructive relationship" in the post-Chavez era. But analysts said Washington would be challenged to figure out a way to engage with Venezuelan leaders and the opposition without appearing to meddle in the South American oil-producing nation.

The senior State Department official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the United States would like a "more functional" relationship with the Venezuelan government going forward.....snip~

U.S. officials expected to attend Chavez funeral | Reuters

I was going to suggest sending Dennis Rodman as our official representative.
 
RIP Mr. Chavez. Thanks for reversing failed neo-liberal policies, reducing poverty and illiteracy. You can judge his success by the hysterical attacks on him by the mainstream media that supported the coup in 2002. If you stand up to thugs like Bush and Obama you can expect such cowardly attacks.

And of course, attacks from that noted right wing rag 'The Guardian'.

You guys on the Far Left continue to amuse. No authoritarian dictator is beyond your admiration as long as he is virulently anti-American.
 
And of course, attacks from that noted right wing rag 'The Guardian'.

You guys on the Far Left continue to amuse. No authoritarian dictator is beyond your admiration as long as he is virulently anti-American.

3 lies. In one post.

I said "mainstream, not right-wing. Virtually all mainstream rags are establishment lapdogs, even the Guardian, which is better than most. Chavez was elected four times by the Venezuelan people in an election much more fair the 2000 US election. The people of Latin America have every right to be anti american given the CIA supported coups against Chile, Argentina, Venezuela etc and the death squads in El Salvador. Unlike spoiled Americans they have felt the full brunt of US interference in South America. But Chavez isn't anti-american. He rightly condemns the actions of thugs like Obama and Bush who are extremely anti-american.
 
In September 2012, Reuters news agency published a special report into a state corporation, Fonden, that now accounts for one-third of all investment in Venezuela.

It found a string of abandoned or half-built facilities, including a paper factory, an aluminium mill and a fleet of unused buses - all of which apparently received money from Fonden.

Fonden has absorbed $100bn of Venezuela's oil revenues since it was founded in 2005.

At the end of January, the government cut PDVSA's contribution to Fonden by 19%, a move which seems to presage a round of public spending cuts. But until the post-Chavez political landscape is clearly established, the president's successors can hardly afford to alienate the people with austerity programmes.

The housing drive fuelled big increases in public spending - and big expectations among those yet to be housed under the programme.
According to Bank of America-Merrill Lynch, government expenditure rose 30% in real terms as a result over the 12 months leading up to the election.
But all that largesse took its toll on the public finances. Capital Economics, a research company, estimates that Venezuela's fiscal deficit widened to 9% of GDP in 2012, while Morgan Stanley reckons it could have reached 12% by now.

High inflation, still nudging 20% a year, doesn't help either.

As survey organisation Consensus Economics says: "Soaring inflation and government spending - coupled with currency and capital controls - have created a widening fiscal deficit.

"The authorities are increasingly reliant on external debt to finance this."

For "external debt", read loans from China. According to Bloomberg news agency, the state-run China Development Bank has lent Venezuela $42.5bn over a five-year period.

Oil Minister Rafael Ramirez said in September 2012 that of the 640,000 barrels of oil a day that Venezuela exports to China, 200,000 went towards servicing the country's debt to Beijing.

Unless PDVSA's underperformance can be remedied, those debts will remain and will probably grow as the country's gap between spending and income widens.

It certainly doesn't seem hard to uncover evidence of waste in government expenditure during the Chavez years.

But the overspending doesn't stop at home. In an effort to spread the influence of his Bolivarian revolution, Mr Chavez allowed Cuba and other countries in the region to benefit from cheap deals and soft loans under the Alba and Petrocaribe programmes.

The next administration will have to decide whether or not to continue funding that extensive network of petro-diplomacy.....snip~

BBC News - Hugo Chavez leaves Venezuela in economic muddle

Note the gap in spending is ever widening with that of income. Chavez was Never was to much of a business man. Hows that wealth distribution looking now? :lol:

Government spending that is Unsustainable.....pretty much says it all. ;)
 
You can judge his success by the hysterical attacks on him by the mainstream media that supported the coup in 2002.

And all these people who gleefully parrot "Coup! Coup! Coup!" seem to be blissfully unaware of his own history of coup attempts. I guess it was OK for him to do it, as long he was against the right people.
 
3 lies. In one post.

I said "mainstream, not right-wing. Virtually all mainstream rags are establishment lapdogs, even the Guardian, which is better than most. Chavez was elected four times by the Venezuelan people in an election much more fair the 2000 US election. The people of Latin America have every right to be anti american given the CIA supported coups against Chile, Argentina, Venezuela etc and the death squads in El Salvador. Unlike spoiled Americans they have felt the full brunt of US interference in South America. But Chavez isn't anti-american. He rightly condemns the actions of thugs like Obama and Bush who are extremely anti-american.

Sigh. More anti-american bull**** from the Far Left. Only the loony left consider people like Obama and Bush thugs and yet worship demagogues and authoritarian crackpots like Chavez and Castro. It's why nobody takes you seriously.
 
Sigh. More anti-american bull**** from the Far Left. Only the loony left consider people like Obama and Bush thugs and yet worship demagogues and authoritarian crackpots like Chavez and Castro. It's why nobody takes you seriously.

"far left" "looney left" What devastating arguments. I see this webboard is a cut above the others!
 
And all these people who gleefully parrot "Coup! Coup! Coup!" seem to be blissfully unaware of his own history of coup attempts. I guess it was OK for him to do it, as long he was against the right people.

I was aware of the coup. Another lazy assumption by the Chavez haters. The coup was in response to President Pérez putting neoliberal policies into effect, as instructed to by the IMF and the US. As usual these 'reforms" ruined the economy (as they always do) and Perez threatened to kill the people who protesting his policies. Also inflation was running at 50% when Perez was president.
 
I was aware of the coup. Another lazy assumption by the Chavez haters. The coup was in response to President Pérez putting neoliberal policies into effect, as instructed to by the IMF and the US. As usual these 'reforms" ruined the economy (as they always do) and Perez threatened to kill the people who protesting his policies. Also inflation was running at 50% when Perez was president.

Right, and the coup attempts against Chavez didn't have a thing to do with his own illiberal policies. No, that was 100% nefarious, and Chavez's coup was only about standing up for what's right.

So, tell me how he died a billionaire after a lifetime dedicated to "serving the people"?
 
Right, and the coup attempts against Chavez didn't have a thing to do with his own illiberal policies. No, that was 100% nefarious, and Chavez's coup was only about standing up for what's right.

So, tell me how he died a billionaire after a lifetime dedicated to "serving the people"?


What part of what the people of South America do is none of your business don't you understand? There are plenty of real dictators obedient to the US who are far worse than Chavez. But there is no hysteria generated against them because Chavez haters are as obedient to the establishment as are the dictators.
 
I was aware of the coup. Another lazy assumption by the Chavez haters. The coup was in response to President Pérez putting neoliberal policies into effect, as instructed to by the IMF and the US. As usual these 'reforms" ruined the economy (as they always do) and Perez threatened to kill the people who protesting his policies. Also inflation was running at 50% when Perez was president.

So let's see. What year is it? Hmmm. 2013.

What is it with Latin America? Have you ever asked that question? What common thread seems to carry through such a vast section of the worlds population and geography?

What political/cultural ideology has dominated the governments of Latin America over the last 100 plus years? How have the people faired as a result?

With such a political/cultural history, what can be expected in the future for Venezuela, and other Latin American countries?
 
What part of what the people of South America do is none of your business don't you understand? There are plenty of real dictators obedient to the US who are far worse than Chavez. But there is no hysteria generated against them because Chavez haters are as obedient to the establishment as are the dictators.

Ah. Trying to avoid inconvenient details. :lamo
 
Right, and the coup attempts against Chavez didn't have a thing to do with his own illiberal policies. No, that was 100% nefarious, and Chavez's coup was only about standing up for what's right.

So, tell me how he died a billionaire after a lifetime dedicated to "serving the people"?

Well, we notice how they could hang with the Cut above the rest.....do you think that they figured out Utopia and Economics just don't go to together. :doh
 
Ah. Trying to avoid inconvenient details. :lamo

Like increasing the minimum wage, pensions and remunerating domestic work, all of which resulted in a significant reduction in poverty and income inequality. And stopping the oil companies from stealing their oil. And starting a surge of left wing victories in South America. And succeeding where conservative policies had failed dismally before, often at the point of a gun. Details like that?
 
Then why is the country left in an economic turmoil? Sure maybe the poor benefited from Chavez diminishing the income inequality. Yet not only have they counted the corruption but the sheer waste. Which would mean incompetence.

Plenty of countries are currently in economic turmoil: Greece, Italy, Spain, Japan etc.
Not sure why you think Venezuela would be immune from global economic policies.
 
Like increasing the minimum wage, pensions and remunerating domestic work, all of which resulted in a significant reduction in poverty and income inequality. And stopping the oil companies from stealing their oil. And starting a surge of left wing victories in South America. And succeeding where conservative policies had failed dismally before, often at the point of a gun. Details like that?

No, details (among others) like his somehow becoming a billionaire in the process. How did he do that? Enlighten us.
 
Plenty of countries are currently in economic turmoil: Greece, Italy, Spain, Japan etc.
Not sure why you think Venezuela would be immune from global economic policies.

Well, if you read all the articles I put up then you would see that it was just more than economical turmoil. As like all others when coming into power. It corrupts. There is no getting round it.....is there?
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