The Cost Of Venezuela's Crony Socialism...

[paulitician]

This title could just as easily read, 'The Cost Of America's Crony Socialism.'

A recent Al Jazeera report suggests that one of the main culprits for the recent rash of spills by Venezuela's state oil company is the decision by Hugo Chavez in 2002 to hand 18,000 jobs to party loyalists. Call it crony socialism.

In the case of the most recent spill, the state oil company claimed the pipeline break was the result of "sabotage," but the locals weren't buying that excuse:

"We don't share the view that it was sabotage," Sair Martìnez, governor of the indigenous community of Tascabaña I, was quoted as saying in newspaper El Nacional...

Lawmaker Omar González Moreno visited with [secretary general of Venezuela's Oil Workers Federation José] Bodas to show that the pipelines included were "deteriorating" and "there was no maintenance on them for years" and the accusation that they were purposefully attacked is a "means to try to hide the inefficiency in the oil industry." He added that there were 12 oil spills between January 2011 and February 2012 in Anzoátegui.

Venezuela's oil company was sanctioned by the Obama administration for it's contacts with Iran in May 2011, but many observers considered the sanctions toothless. Reuters described them as "the least severe of a range of options available to Washington." Forbes called them "silly" and suggested they were counter-productive.

The Cost of Venezuela's Crony Socialism

 

[uscitizen]

Whaaa?

So we do not worry about spills here but do about those in VZ?

 

[paulitician]

Whaaa?

So we do not worry about spills here but do about those in VZ?

You don't have to worry about anything. That's up to you. It's a free country...Well, kind of.

 

[waltky]

Looks like he gonna get a 2nd chance...

Venezuela opposition leader Capriles to stand in election
10 March 2013 - Venezuelan opposition leader Henrique Capriles has confirmed that he will stand in presidential elections on 14 April.

In a televised address, Mr Capriles accused the governing PSUV party of manipulating the recent death of Hugo Chavez. Mr Chavez died on 5 March after a two-year battle against cancer. Mr Capriles will stand against Acting President Nicolas Maduro, whom Mr Chavez named as his favoured successor. Correspondents say the stage is now set for a bitter presidential campaign. The opposition boycotted Mr Maduro's swearing-in on Friday, claiming that - under the constitution - the speaker of the National Assembly, Diosdado Cabello, should be the one to take over as acting president. Mr Capriles - candidate for the umbrella opposition group Table for Democratic Unity (MUD) - called the move fraudulent.

Mr Capriles heads the umbrella opposition group Table for Democratic Unity

On Sunday, he again accused the socialist PSUV of violating the constitution. "My fight is not to be president, my fight is for Venezuela to move forward," he said. "You [the PSUV] are the ones who became sick by power. You fear losing it." He added: "I am going to fight. Nicolas, I am not going to give you a free pass. You will have to beat me with votes." Mr Capriles, 40, is a lawyer by training and governor of the state of Miranda. He describes his policies as "centrist" and "humanist". He and Mr Maduro must register their candidacies by Monday. Mr Chavez - who led Venezuela for 14 years - won last October's election against Mr Capriles, polling 54% of the vote to Mr Capriles's 44%. Mr Chavez named his 50-year-old vice-president and foreign minister as his preferred successor following the recurrence of cancer.

Nicolas Maduro, a former bus driver, entered politics as a trade unionist. His friendship with Hugo Chavez goes back to when the former president served time in prison for an attempted coup in 1992. Mr Maduro campaigned for Mr Chavez to be released - which happened two years later. He has vowed to carry on where the late leader left off but acknowledged that Mr Chavez had big shoes to fill. He told a crowd on Saturday: "I am not Chavez - speaking in terms of the intelligence, charisma, historical force, leadership capacity and spiritual grandeur of our comandante [commander]." Hugo Chavez's body is still lying in state at a military academy in the capital Caracas. Millions of Venezuelans have filed past to pay their respects. Mr Maduro says the former leader's body will be embalmed "like Lenin and Mao Zedong".

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-21737742

See also:

Venezuelan opposition leader to run for president
Mar 10,`13 -- Venezuelan opposition leader Henrique Capriles announced Sunday night that he will run in elections to replace Hugo Chavez, launching what many consider a doomed candidacy with a no-holds-barred attack against a government he said had coldly betrayed Venezuelans' trust.

Capriles slammed the government in his announcement for using Chavez's death to push the candidacy of Nicolas Maduro, who was sworn in as acting leader Friday. He also called top military brass an "embarrassment" for publicly supporting Maduro, although the constitution forbids the military from taking political sides. "Don't fool yourselves that you're the good and we're the bad," the 40-year-old candidate said to the government. "No, you're no better than us. I don't play with death. I don't play with pain."

With a picture of Chavez behind him, Maduro appeared on TV after the speech to respond to what he said was "the losing, miserable candidate" who had dishonored the late president. He called Capriles a "fascist" trying to provoke violence and a coup against the state. "We reject an infamy that you plan to hurl and the words you've said about the crystalline, pure image of Commander Chavez," Maduro said. "Enough of the offenses, sir!"

Capriles, who is governor of Venezuela's biggest state, acknowledged that he faces tough odds against an official candidate in control of vast public resources who he said has the backing of the country's electoral commission. "As one person said today, `Capriles, they are taking you to a slaughterhouse. Are you going to be lowered into its meat grinder?'" he said.

Capriles said, however, that he had to fight for the whole country. "How am I not going to fight?" he said. "How are we not going to fight? This is not Capriles' fight. This is everybody's fight." In some districts of the capital, people launched fireworks, shouted and honked horns as Capriles announced he would run. Capriles also laid out what could be main themes of his campaign, bemoaning high crime and poverty as well as the government's decision to devalue the currency by more than 30 percent.

MORE

 

[paulitician]

Looks like he gonna get a 2nd chance...

Venezuela opposition leader Capriles to stand in election
10 March 2013 - Venezuelan opposition leader Henrique Capriles has confirmed that he will stand in presidential elections on 14 April.

In a televised address, Mr Capriles accused the governing PSUV party of manipulating the recent death of Hugo Chavez. Mr Chavez died on 5 March after a two-year battle against cancer. Mr Capriles will stand against Acting President Nicolas Maduro, whom Mr Chavez named as his favoured successor. Correspondents say the stage is now set for a bitter presidential campaign. The opposition boycotted Mr Maduro's swearing-in on Friday, claiming that - under the constitution - the speaker of the National Assembly, Diosdado Cabello, should be the one to take over as acting president. Mr Capriles - candidate for the umbrella opposition group Table for Democratic Unity (MUD) - called the move fraudulent.

Mr Capriles heads the umbrella opposition group Table for Democratic Unity

On Sunday, he again accused the socialist PSUV of violating the constitution. "My fight is not to be president, my fight is for Venezuela to move forward," he said. "You [the PSUV] are the ones who became sick by power. You fear losing it." He added: "I am going to fight. Nicolas, I am not going to give you a free pass. You will have to beat me with votes." Mr Capriles, 40, is a lawyer by training and governor of the state of Miranda. He describes his policies as "centrist" and "humanist". He and Mr Maduro must register their candidacies by Monday. Mr Chavez - who led Venezuela for 14 years - won last October's election against Mr Capriles, polling 54% of the vote to Mr Capriles's 44%. Mr Chavez named his 50-year-old vice-president and foreign minister as his preferred successor following the recurrence of cancer.

Nicolas Maduro, a former bus driver, entered politics as a trade unionist. His friendship with Hugo Chavez goes back to when the former president served time in prison for an attempted coup in 1992. Mr Maduro campaigned for Mr Chavez to be released - which happened two years later. He has vowed to carry on where the late leader left off but acknowledged that Mr Chavez had big shoes to fill. He told a crowd on Saturday: "I am not Chavez - speaking in terms of the intelligence, charisma, historical force, leadership capacity and spiritual grandeur of our comandante [commander]." Hugo Chavez's body is still lying in state at a military academy in the capital Caracas. Millions of Venezuelans have filed past to pay their respects. Mr Maduro says the former leader's body will be embalmed "like Lenin and Mao Zedong".

BBC News - Venezuela opposition leader Capriles to stand in election

See also:

Venezuelan opposition leader to run for president
Mar 10,`13 -- Venezuelan opposition leader Henrique Capriles announced Sunday night that he will run in elections to replace Hugo Chavez, launching what many consider a doomed candidacy with a no-holds-barred attack against a government he said had coldly betrayed Venezuelans' trust.

Capriles slammed the government in his announcement for using Chavez's death to push the candidacy of Nicolas Maduro, who was sworn in as acting leader Friday. He also called top military brass an "embarrassment" for publicly supporting Maduro, although the constitution forbids the military from taking political sides. "Don't fool yourselves that you're the good and we're the bad," the 40-year-old candidate said to the government. "No, you're no better than us. I don't play with death. I don't play with pain."

With a picture of Chavez behind him, Maduro appeared on TV after the speech to respond to what he said was "the losing, miserable candidate" who had dishonored the late president. He called Capriles a "fascist" trying to provoke violence and a coup against the state. "We reject an infamy that you plan to hurl and the words you've said about the crystalline, pure image of Commander Chavez," Maduro said. "Enough of the offenses, sir!"

Capriles, who is governor of Venezuela's biggest state, acknowledged that he faces tough odds against an official candidate in control of vast public resources who he said has the backing of the country's electoral commission. "As one person said today, `Capriles, they are taking you to a slaughterhouse. Are you going to be lowered into its meat grinder?'" he said.

Capriles said, however, that he had to fight for the whole country. "How am I not going to fight?" he said. "How are we not going to fight? This is not Capriles' fight. This is everybody's fight." In some districts of the capital, people launched fireworks, shouted and honked horns as Capriles announced he would run. Capriles also laid out what could be main themes of his campaign, bemoaning high crime and poverty as well as the government's decision to devalue the currency by more than 30 percent.

MORE

We'll see. Things might just change. Who knows?