This one’s for all those dreamers who think their idol Hugo Chavez’s socialism is different from the old Soviet variety.
From Novosti
MOSCOW, June 8 – Russian Communist lawmakers suggested Friday that Venezuela’s left-wing president speak in Russia’s parliament about his ambitious reform program.
Konstantin Kosachev, head of the State Duma’s international relations committee, said the normal practice in parliament’s lower house had so far been to invite foreign parliamentary speakers, not heads of state, but that an exception could be made for Chavez, given his high popularity with Russian legislators.
Viktor Ilyukhin, of the State Duma Communist Party faction, said many Russian MPs would like to learn firsthand about the socialist reforms Hugo Chavez is carrying out in his country.
The committee has passed the proposal to the Venezuelan ambassador to Russia, Kosachev said.
In a drive to nationalize industries, Chavez decreed earlier this year that foreign companies hand over control of four multibillion-dollar oil projects in the Orinoco basin, and took over the telephone operator CANTV and other major utilities.
The recent closure of the RCTV channel May 27 sparked mass public protests in Venezuela, after Chavez refused to renew its license replacing it with a new state-owned channel, Tves, aimed at promoting socialist ideology. The move was widely seen as a crackdown on the freedom of speech in the media and condemned by many countries, including the U.S.
Remember though…Chavez hates religious freedom: He kicked missionaries with ties to Pat Robertson out of the country what the good and godly man of piety advocated the assasination of Venezuela’s evil satanic commie butcher.
He also hates freedom of the press: He banned a TV station from use the air waves for its involvement in a coup against him, and everyone knows that the CRTC would never ban a TV station for advocating a violent against Stephen Harper, for instace…The fact that TV station in question has been the most flagrant violator of Venezuela’s content and ownership regulations years before Chavez was anything more than a two-bit failed revolutionary rotting away in a jail cell somewhere and that pro-U.S. leader in Peru failed to renew two stations for violating similar Peruvian regulations are hardless relevant considerations…Nope, Chavez is a dictator…A dictator openly opposed by 9 of Venezuela’s 10 largest dailies and a dictator whose government still allows the aforementioned network to broadcast on cable and satellite TV in spite of being banned from the airwaves.
“What Venezuela is doing is not that unique; it is just interesting because the guy is openly red at a time when people can’t even see the difference any more.”
Is that why Chavez is being best buds with Fidel Castro, Gaddafi, Mugabe, Ahmadinejad the Islamo-Nazi leader of Iran, his buddy Ortega aligning himself with Kim Jong-Il, leader of the brutal Stalinist state? How about being friendly toward the folks in the Kremlin and having his buddies in Beijing training his security forces?
What a real line-up of “freedom-lovinig followers” Chavez has on his back. Can’t imagine why people would accuse him of Sovietizating Venezuela into a Soviet-style dictatorship, oh wait, he already praised Vladimir Lenin who turned Czarist Russia into an even more brutal dictatorship Soviet-style. It’s the same path Chavez has plans for Venezuela too.
“When someone sticks up to the Washington consensus, people such as yourselves feel the need to vilify that person.”
I wonder if the likes of Osama bin Laden or Ayman Al-Zawahiri or their friends in the Taliban can take that same complaint? Never mind about the 3000 lives lost on 9/11. No wonder your boy William Blum was praised by bin Laden and his horrible ilk. He’s friends with not just bin Laden, but also those in the PLO-affiliated terror networks.
I wonder how those 3000 innocent people lost on 9/11 or other terror atrocities bin Laden or the PLO took responsible feel about your comments.
Please anonymous, don’t give me this excuse. Chavez is praised by one of the most totalitarian Communist parties in the world and now you tell me that there’s no big deal to be concerned?
Now let’s say if these weren’t Communists but let’s say on the lines of Chavez’s buddy-Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who was praised by neo-Nazis in Germany and the rest of Europe for his rabidly anti-Israel comments along with denying the holocaust.
Would you be concern about Ahmadinejad when he’s praised by the followers of Adolf Hitler? Why does it seem that Chavez often gets a free pass when the most totalitarian Communist party in the world supports him?
being had says “Just wait a bit, Chavez might just turn out to be a real hero when the history books finally get written.”
The chance of that happening are virtually zero. Chavez is driving capital and capitalists out of his nation. The result of such actions is easily predictable using history as a guide. Look at Zimbabwe if you want to see what the future holds for Venezuela.
I think there is a far cry between a regime like that in North Korea, which has ruled that country with an iron fist, has not allowed elections in 50 years, maintains a gulag holding 250,000 people, and whose economic policies have led to famine, and that of Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela. Chevez has won multiple elections. Now, given the chance, I would rather live in somewhere like Hong Kong than in somewhere like Venezuela, but you people look like right idiots when you demonize a guy who has done nothing wrong other than be a leftist. When someone sticks up to the Washington consensus, people such as yourselves feel the need to vilify that person.
I am coming to the idea that this is not a socialist issue as it is a peek at the future for everyone. Hilary is talking wider liberalization (read: government provides), and the WTO and its globalization is another word for this same ideology. What Venezuela is doing is not that unique; it is just interesting because the guy is openly red at a time when people can’t even see the difference any more. I think if you were to go back to the turn of the century, you would see the sort of division of wealth we have right now. And for sure things are not getting better. Just wait a bit, Chavez might just turn out to be a real hero when the history books finally get written.
No surprise about that. Oleg Shenin supports the likes of Hugo Chavez and also believes America is the “Great Satan” just like fellow Comrade Hugo.
Wonder how long before Chavistas can justify the Sovietization of Venezuela, now that one of the most totalitarian Communist parties in the world is openly embracing Chavez?