A very valid point, even if not quite what you meant! 
It ain’t the time to fight this Frank, but that joke is not funny.
Pop culture stink-bombs won’t wash away the fact that Mr Chávez is a puppet of somebody. And by somebody I mean us and by us I mean the US. One day we’ll milk Venezuela like the fattest goat in the yard.
If I’m not overreaching, there needs to be a union of American states and an expression of states’ rights. Possibly a constitutional framework. I don’t think a nut like Chávez can tolerate that.
I’d love to fight it with you over a beer next time I’m on the western slope. I’ll let you know - probably March or April.
Yeah, if we can’t take your word for it, just ask Hugo
Just to inject a question - is there provision in the Venezuelan constitution for such a rule-by-decree decision, does anybody know? If so, I’d have no problem with it, if not, I’d be a bit worried.
Also note the decision is time limited. 18 months. And with the coup-friendly opposition having boycotted elections they can hardly complain if the democratically elected congress granted him these powers.
It’s a shame there isn’t another choice between Chavez and a bunch of self-serving traitors who don’t give a shit for the poverty of the people who voted Chavez in.
Violence and dictatorship needed say the opposition
Damn that beastly Chavez.
And Saddam has WMD! Lots of them; I know because they said so!
You know, just because some of the opposition are shits doesn’t make Chavez any better. I realise you’re probably creaming yourself over the emergence of a socialist “revolution”, but would it be too much trouble to step back and actually notice that democracy is being erased in an entire country? Do you have that much perspective?
It is a funny joke, as all jokes with surprising punch lines are funny. But it does paint the Indian as a savage who cannot comprehend Western values like loyalty. Funny, yes. Insulting, condescending, and racist — also yes.
That, or he’s a intelligent pragmatist rather than an ignorant honor-obsessed savage.
Interesting that you consider loyalty a “Western value”. What’s that say about you?
-Joe
It was meant sarcastically. Western thought has always been Westcentric — thinking like the Soviet Union, that it invented everything and that everything significant eminated from it. That’s why there wasn’t even a “discovery” of this whole side of the world until the Europeans got here.
Curiously (or not) the Ley Habilitante or Enabling Act is part of the legal political process of Venezuela and has been used in the past by Chávez and other Venezuelan presidents. Curiously enough (not) I can’t recall any outrage by the world’s keeper of democracy (by decree) when past Venezuelan presidents utilized this legislative tool.
Wikipedia:
There is a saying in German - “the soup is never served as hot as when it is made”. Peole used it a lot early in the 1930’s.
Less and less as time went on.
Let’s see what happens when the oil revenue starts to drop, and Chavez needs a scapegoat to distract the people.
So far, we have the Fuhrerprinzip. Can the Dolchstosstheorie be far behind?
Regards,
Shodan
The opposition led a friggin’ coup with Chilian junta style erasure of democracy on their mind. I know full well who I see as the bigger threat to democracy here. On the one hand - your hysterical and paranoid blatherings and on the other a failed coup attempt. Unsupported fantasy vs historical fact.
Here we have no evidence whatsoever of democracy being erased - just a democratically elected leader being constitutionally given temporary powers to carry out a program he was elected to carry out. And in due course he and his party will face the electorate. If you have proof that the elections won’t be held please share it with us. ‘Proof’ does not equal ‘the voices in my head’.
Maybe he’s everything his enemies say - but like with Castro - the alternatives are just as corrupt, brutal and evil and the way to ensure the people of Venezuela have only a Devil-Deep Blue Sea choice is for America to continue its traditional latin american policy of arming brutal dictators and setting them on their hapless populations the instant they try and shake off their poverty and threaten American/corporate interests.
Venezuelan politics are their business. The people re-elected Chavez with a mandate that would stain the trousers of any other politician. The USA and the hysterical right-wing blogosphere should just learn to live with it.
This is a country where in 2001 the poorest 30% share 3.6% of the income/consumption according to The Human Development Index while the top 30% get the 90% lion’s share.
Where 47% live on $3 a day or less.
Of course the ‘haves’ hate Chavez. He wants to do something about it. The Opposition clearly don’t, or couldn’t be bothered.
So yes - if Chavez can make a difference with a few decrees then good bloody luck to him. Someone needs to do something and I know full well it won’t be the would-be Pinochet’s of the anti-democratic and murderous Opposition.
Well, I do apologise for failing to express my outrage over those previous incidents; at those times I was engaged in (chronologically) practical nihilism, kindergarten and puberty.
I confess I’m at a loss, however, as to how a tradition of usurption of power in a nominal democracy makes it any more palatable. I believe Venezuela has undergone numerous coups in its history; are these, too, part of a healthy executive and legislative tradition?
Congratulations, however, on finding an actually moderately relevant cite. I should just point out one little sentence from it:
It’s a bit like the poverty line again, isn’t it? Now, I went looking for specifically what powers were granted to Chavez’s predecessors, and haven’t had much luck; the best I can find is this pro-Chavez news item, which would seem to indicate that the powers granted in earlier years were rather less sweeping. Not that this makes it any better, of course; I find any wholesale transfer of legislative power to the executive branch to be a worrying thing, particularly when enacted by an unrepresentative legislature. “Because we can” is never the most appealing of justifications.
Oops. There you go with your binary politics again. Why do I need to excuse the failings and crimes of the opposition in order to point out anti-democratic action by the incumbent? And what’s this? Did Chavez lead a failed coup, too? Say it ain’t so! But that’s probably just my paranoid ranting, right?
As you say: good bloody luck to him! Just the sort of guy that deserves power of decree.
I would assume that to someone who feels knowledgeable enough to rant and froth about Venezuelan politics Chavez political history would not be news. Politics isn’t about saints and sinners it’s about the lesser of multiple evils and at the moment Chavez is the lesser evil by a country mile.
And you seem to be labouring under the misapprehension that temporarily delegating authority to the executive is undemocratic.
No doubt therefore, you are chewing the carpet in outrage at the US Constitution in general, what with all those powers the President has. Not to mention Executive Orders - which have the binding force of law upon federal agencies but do not require congressional approval. And further not to mention President Gump’s own unique intepretation of executive authority and his ability to ignore any law he chooses.
Yet laudibly you still find time to get excised about some pissant little Latin American country.
Perhaps later I’ll google all your outraged posts concerning the anti-democratic nature of the USA and the evil despotism of Gump. I mean, there’s bound to be scads of them right?
And plenty more on Crown Prerogative in the UK Parliamentary system I’m sure. The latter meaning the PM can go to war without legislative approval.
And the decree powers of the Presidents of Mexico and France? And Indonesia I mean - you are in need of oxygen to counter-act the effects of apoplexy over those?
Can there be any carpet left to chew in the Badger household?.
Or could this just be another example of the selective outrage that so afflicts a part of the political spectrum?
You do realise, do you not, that this “well why haven’t you complained about THIS” attempt at a gotcha is possibly the lamest debate tactic found outside the playground, right? I mean, I realise you want to avoid answering any actual points addressed to you (that coup cockup of yours must really have hurt; gave me a laugh, though), but this is just truly tragic.
Meanwhile, why don’t you give me another giggle and tell me which part of the political spectrum you think I’m from?
More likely it is a selective apologia that afflicts another part of it.
As you have confected outrage at this subject I do expect you to have similar outrage. Unless of course you were blithely unaware that preesidential executive powers are as common as flies on shit of course. Which is the rub I expect.
‘A President I don’t like has decree powers! Oh noes!’
So you tell me - why is it so evuul for Chavez to have them when they are a common feature of current and damn sight more important democracies? Why has Chavez got your knickers twisted up your crack? Tell me - what unique threat is he, as opposed to - to pluck a dangerous democratically elected madman or three off the top of my head - say - oh Bush, Blair and Putin - to the world?
You have of course read the The Venezuelan Constitution?
You do a very good impression of being just another can’t think for themselves right-winger, or if not you are a fellow traveller, conscious or not as you buy into their propaganda.
Either that or you are too ignorant of politics and democratic theory and practice to have an opinion on the matter unless you can come up with some rational reason why Chavez as opposed to all the other executive-powered Presidents upsets you so much.
Is it you don’t like what he does with his constitutional powers? All that unrelenting alleviating of the poverty of his electorate? An allergy to cut price fuel for the poor? His attempts to discharge the social guarantees for health, employement etc embodied in the constitution?
What is it? What ‘liberty’ has he deprived anyone of? The freedom to be destitute? The freedom of a few to be obscenely wealthy and screw everyone else? The freedom for foreign corporations to screw everyone? The freedom of newspapers to partake in coups?
The Constitution of his country guarantees people all sorts of social and economic rights and it is his duty to uphold that constitution.
What is it that is so much more important than what Blair and Bush have done with their constitutional executive powers that leads you and your fellow travellers to parrot the wild and unsubstantiated rantings of the right blogosphere when the world is full of demonstrably evil leaders (mostly allied to the West)?
Until someone demonstrates Chavez has done anything wrong nothing I say is ‘apologising’ - it is fighting hysterical ignorance.
I see. So he acts like America’s worst enemy, makes alliances with our other enemies, and calls W (with some justice) “the Devil” because those are his orders from Washington; and those are his orders because . . . because the Bohemian Grove/Skull & Bones string-pullers want to keep us confused. We’re getting into Illuminatus! territory here . . .
Tolerate it?! Haven’t you been following the news?! The South American countries have been working for a few years now to put together an economic union modeled on the European Union. Chavez has been actively engaged in that process. OTOH, he has also been something of a stumbling block to it because he is very determined such a union should exclude the U.S. – which makes eminently good sense from a Latin American POV, and Chavez is not the only SA leader who thinks that way. I expect they’ll get all these differences ironed out eventually. See this thread.