US To Keep Latin America In Check With War On Terror

To start please note the following negative analysis on Venezuela in the following report from the US State Department

Country Reports: Western Hemisphere Overview

and of big interest

Notice here that Venezuela is being demonized along with Iran.

Now look at the following report from the Jewish Policy Center

Latin American Challenges

And particularly strong

Notice that like Iran, Chavez is being accused of seeking nuclear weapons. Rather interesting.

 

Add to this, the US has quietly passed a new law

ZOA commends Congress on passage of “Countering Iran in the Western Hemisphere Act”

 

And related

Move to Improve Relations With Iran Angers Jews in Argentina

 

Why can we afford a War on Drugs if the wealthiest are not paying wartime tax rates?

 

Taking up were I left off, here's a page from the Israel Project on Lanny Davis

Lanny Davis Spokesperson for the Israel Project

It turns out that Manuel Zelaya, got to close to Hugo Chavez, so he was ousted in a coup. Lanny Davis became a leading figure in the effort to keep Zelaya from being restored to office. Here's a link on that subject:

The high-powered hidden support for Honduras' coup

Powerful special interests have flexed their muscles and confronted President Obama on the most important legislative priorities of his domestic agenda. But this kind of politics-by-influence-peddling doesn't stop at the water's edge. And in foreign policy, the consequences can be more immediate, violent and deadly.

Meet Lanny Davis, Washington lawyer and lobbyist, former legal counsel to President Clinton and avid campaigner for Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential bid. He has been hired by a coalition of Latin American business interests to represent the dictatorship that ousted elected President Manuel Zelaya of Honduras in a military coup and removed him to Costa Rica on June 28.

 

Obama is president. Don't expect the progressives to rail against him in this thread.

 

We should take issue with any government that supports the FARC, and Chavez generally had a very poor foreign relations policy that was meant to be deliberately antagonistic to the US so I'm not sure why you would find it surprising that we weren't partial to it.

 

Why does the right not practice the free market they preach?

 

Perhaps you missed this:

Chavez calls for FARC to end fight

Excerpt

"The Venezuelan President, Hugo Chavez, has called on the Colombian rebel group, FARC, to end its decades long rebellion and free the hundreds of hostages it's holding. This report from the BBC's Emilio San Pedro"

I find it rather surprising that you don't realize that the US supported a coup to overthrow Chavez. The problem is that Chavez used the power of the Venezuela government to take the natural resources of Venezuela and use them for the benefit, of the poor of Venezuela, Latin America, and even some here in the United States. Rich people have a problem with such a concept, because they feel that everything in the world is made for their benefit. So they have constructed vicious propaganda to destroy Chavez and his legacy.

 

Why should the least wealthy be burdened with a War on Drugs, if the wealthiest are not willing to pay wartime tax rates for it?

 

The wealthy don't want to pay taxes for anything. They want the lower classes to slave for as little as possible so that they can enjoy the profits. Then they want those same people to pay the taxes to support a worldwide security apparatus that protects that wealth. That's the game.

The point here is that Latin America has gotten a bit to uppity for these people, they have a plan to counteract all that.

 

Any war sufficient to require a common offense must require wartime tax rates on the wealthiest as a form of due diligence on their part and that they have confidence in our elected representatives to government to distinguish between real times of war and those times which merely require Commerce, well regulated among the several States.

 

Are you really this limited in your thinking? It all goes well beyond Obama. FFS, we'd have the exact same agenda if it were a Republican president. The president doesn't even have that much to do with it all! He just signs the papers like a good little stooge.

 

He only did that in 2008 when it became public knowledge that Venezuela had been supporting the FARC and even allowing them to use their territory. We found this out from seized documents from the FARC and that was Chavez's response. There wasn't much more he could do. The same thing happened to Ecuador. He also distanced himself from the group because the FARC tried to sue him. It broke their relations. That doesn't mean that he didn't actively support the FARC for years and willingly allow a well established terrorist organization to seek harbor and refuge within his country.

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Chavez didn't actually do that good of a job with regards to economic development within Venezuela. He was a populist politician sure and a charismatic one at that, but that doesn't translate into good economic policy (in fact populist policies tend to be horrible for economic growth). He never really diversified Venezuela's economy away from oil revenues, and some of the growth that we have seen simply stems from an upswing in oil prices, just like the devastating economic down swing that was around before he took office was largely caused by a drop in the prices. Venezuela's economy is largely still a slave to oil prices, and the government hasn't done a good job at preventing Dutch disease effects resulting from a heavy reliance on extractive industries which is, a large part, due to weak internal institutions. It's easy to throw money around when oil prices are up, but that doesn't lead to a sustainable long run economic system. Runaway inflation and increased resultant nationalization of industries (particularly in the agriculture sector) is very economically concerning. Venezuela is at real risk of significant capital flight.

A lot of people say the same thing about Robert Mugabe. Truth is, they are simply poor leaders, popular due to charisma and populist policies, but it doesn't really do much good for their country. Chavez especially lost any semblance of support from me when he abolished term limits and engaged in voter irregularities in order to stay in power. That was a major red flag that crossed a line. It's probably good for both his legacy and Venezuela that he ended up dying before he could become more like Mugabe.

 

The US engaged and and supported the institution of slavery of black people for hundreds of years. So by your logic we should not consider that the US abolished slavery and instead consider it a nation that supports slavery. The point is that Chavez publicly stated that the FARC should renounce violent rebellion. He should be commended for that, not labeled as supporting the FARC as you are attempting to do.

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OK, let's talk about that. Look at Venezuela before Chavez took office, inflation got up to 40 percent in 1998. Under Chavez it went down to around 20 percent. And if you go back to 1994 inflation was over 100 percent. So that's for inflation. THE POVERTY RATE FELL FROM 48.6 PERCENT IN 2002 to 29.5 IN 2011! WOW!!! What a substantial accomplishment!!! Way to go Chavez. Not only that but illiteracy fell under Chavez. Health care improved under Chavez. The guy did a great job.

Like I said, the problem is that rich people don't like leaders that try to help poor people. That's why they got rid of Aristide in Haiti. For the rich, the poor are no more that slaves to be exploited. So yeah, they will do anything to try to paint people like Chavez in a negative light.

 

This is a fairly poor comparison. For one, our current administration didn't endorse, nor actively support slavery, for another, Chavez literally broke with the FARC only when he got caught helping them and when they tried to sue him. It didn't really have much to do with a moral decision on his part. It was HIS administration and HE directly sponsored and supported terrorism and actively harbored them while they were carrying out operations against civilians in Colombia and against the Colombian government.

He was essentially forced to do so.

But he did support for FARC, directly, and for years.

Big difference in income rates for government expenditure projects: a large upswing in oil prices. Not really any sort of good economic policy courtesy of Chavez. The depression that you are claiming he "rescued" Venezuela from was also caused by oil prices (only it was due to their collapse). As I said, he never really diversified the Venezuelan economy and it is still a slave to oil prices (particularly the government is a slave to oil prices for its revenue. Not a veary economically healthy development model.

Literacy and healthcare increased under the socialist rule of Julius Nyerere of Tanzania, that doesn't mean that he had good economic policies.

This is an absurd claim. What are you even basing this on?

If people are poor then who the heck is going to buy the crap that the rich people make? It isn't in the best interest of rich people for the poor to remain destitute that is an economic fallacy.

 

It's a great comparison because the US was forced to abolish slavery only because it was tearing the country apart and it had to make a decision which way to go. Lincoln did not go to war because of his sympathy for blacks suffering under the curse of slavery. There's plenty white people, right here in this forum, that would be ecstatic if the institution of the slavery of blacks was re-established. So yeah, it's a great comparison.

Yeah and people like you would have us to believe that the policies of people like Alan Greenspan, Robert Rubin, Larry Summers, and Hank Paulson are good economics. That policy that giving rich people control of the resources of society will result in everyone's best interests being served has been shown to be totally baloney. They sold that crap to the people of the world. And what was the result? Despite having a mechanism for being able to print unlimited amounts of money, they still drove the world economy in the ground. Great economic minds indeed!!! What crap and total BS. And what could Greenspan offer as an explanation?

""Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholder's equity (myself especially) are in a state of shocked disbelief."

And there's more from the great maestro

"Well, remember that what an ideology is, is a conceptual framework with the way people deal with reality. Everyone has one. You have to -- to exist, you need an ideology. The question is whether it is accurate or not.

And what I'm saying to you is, yes, I found a flaw. I don't know how significant or permanent it is, but I've been very distressed by that fact."

"Flaw in the model that I perceived is the critical functioning structure that defines how the world works, so to speak."

"that's precisely the reason I was shocked, because I had been going for 40 years or more with very considerable evidence that it was working exceptionally well."

So I don't want to hear that garbage about good economics. It's just a smokescreen for rich people to rob everyone else blind. It's false.

It is not absurd. You only have to look at what they have done to see this. Look at Aristide in Haiti. Devoted to helping the poor. What do they do? Overthrow him. Look at Chavez in Venezuela. Devoted to helping the poor. What do they do? Support a coup to overthrow him. Time and time again they do it. Do I have to draw pictures for you to understand??

No, what they want to do is give them just enough money to buy the goods that are produced and have some left over to meet basic necessities. That's it. They don't want them to have anything more than that. Why? So that they will fear being unemployed so that they will work harder. Don't believe me? We only need to look to that demoniac disciple of the satanic Ayn Rand, Alan Greenspan to see this:

"The performance of the U.S. economy over the past year has been quite favorable. Atypical restraint on compensation
increases has been evident for a few years now and appears to be mainly the consequence of greater worker insecurity.
The willingness of workers in recent years to trade off smaller increases in wages for greater job security seems to
be reasonably well documented."

So there you have it. Keep em scared so that they will work hard so the rich can profit more. If they were rich, there would be nothing for them to be scared of.

 

In less than 40 years there will be an ethnic/Latino majority in North America. Anybody who wants to maintain majority white christian power is fast running out of time to act to prevent that. We should all be alert to any efforts they might make- particularly those with neoZionist connivances - and act accordingly to thwart their schemes.

 

I believe we may be better off with a federal UN modeled after our own Constitution.

 

Indeed. I urge all posters to read this brilliant piece by Owen Jones of the Independent which outlines critically, accurately and concisely the legacy of Chavez

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices...ism-is-both-possible-and-popular-8522329.html

 

it's a poor comparison for a couple of reasons:

1.) You are pointing to something that happened a long time ago and has no connection to our current administration; whereas support of the FARC has direct connections to the specific administration in question (Chavez). So I'm not sure why you are so pleased with your example.

2.) We recognize that the institution of slavery was a bad time in our history and morally wrong. Just like we recognize that support for terrorist groups is morally wrong. Obama didn't own slaves, but Chavez did support terrorism.

3.) The abolition of slavery was not forced upon us due to some external political shock as was what happened in Venezuela with the FARC, rather, it was an internal decision that ended up causing a civil war and which we had to struggle and fight for. Comparing the anti-slavery movement to Chavez getting caught with his hand in the cookie jar is simply absurd and quite insulting.

4.) Our president at the time was an abolitionist and didn't support the institution of slavery unlike Chavez who did directly support the FARC and did so for most of his administration.

People like me?

I'm a developmental economist. I specialize in economic development with a regional focus on Sub-Saharan Africa. I'm not wealthy and I'm not a conservative; but socialism is simply generally a very poor economic policy. It devastated Africa in the 80's and Latin and South America as well. Populism also generally leads to poor fiscal policy. It was popular for Mugabe to engage in land reform and give farm land back to the indigenous peoples, but it played a role in causing capital flight (which is what Venezuela is in trouble of) and it caused and maintained high levels of inflation and eventually hyperinflation. Mugabe responded by nationalizing industries to prevent capital flight as Chavez was starting to do and it caused the complete collapse of the Zimbabwean economy despite the fact that Mugabe was well liked as a hero for being a charismatic populist. He still destroyed his country. Now Venezuela is a little more robust than Zimbabwe, but it was still probably for the best that Chavez left power before he became more like Mugabe (and that was the path he was heading down) and before he damaged his country more. Chavez was heavily reliant on oil prices for government revenues (which isn't economically healthy and leads to massive government corruption in states like Venezuela. Economically we call them resource curses). The lack of diversification away from oil, has hindered the development of Venezuela's manufacturing export markets, etc. Venezuela is still not sitting very pretty and it will take a better leader than Chavez to lead the country through it and into better times.

And we also sit at the head of the single largest economy in the world and have an average standard of living well above any South American country, let alone Venezuela. But it is unfair to compare developed and developing countries like that, so I'll refrain.

You and I are defining good economics differently here. I'm talking about sustainable economics that works to build good institutions and create long run stability. I'm not talking about the US model, I'm not talking about pure capitalism, I'm talking about creating just and healthy growth. Simply put: reliance on resource revenue coupled with weak central institutions is not healthy at all; and that's what Venezuela is doing. Nationalization of things like agricultural sectors is not healthy at all, and that's what Chavez started doing, weakening your political institutions through things like the abolition of term limits and engaging in vote rigging is not healthy at all, and that is what Chavez did. I'm not asserting that he was a terrible leader, just not a terribly good one outside of his ability to promote a stronger sense of national identity and independence for the Venezuelan people.

It is absurd because it is mathematically false.

No I don't believe you. I've seen my fair share of populist leaders like Chavez and even the most well intentioned of them can lead their country into economic hardship, and more often than not: do.

 

It can't be a real time of war if the wealthiest are not paying wartime tax rates, even for a war on drugs, when it comes to fiscal policy decisions.

 

The Dylith's of this world hate the fact that Chavez won election after election fairly and squarely as even Jimmy Carter was forced to concede.

 

You just love to troll all over the place with this don't you?

 

I think he won the first very fairly. It was the last election that I disagreed with and his abolition of office terms that I disagreed with. I find that very dangerous to any society that values democratic institutions. I feel the same way about Putin in Russia's politics and you can absolutely believe that I would feel the same way if ANY US president tried to do the same to our current term limits; especially when such moves are coupled with an enhancement of government reach and power as through nationalization which Chavez was engaging in. Not a good path. I look at Venezuela and I ask myself how I would feel as a citizen of Venezuela who loves his country: and my answer was and is: concerned.