Chavez dictator vs. liberator

[Soulful]

I've seen as many opinions online arguing for Chavez's supposed greatness as I've seen ones denouncing his as a tyrant.
Is anyone informed about South American politics -- can you comment with your opinion?
What are the reasons why some call him a tyrant and some call him a liberator?
How did he impact his country? What state was Venezuela in when he came into power and how has it changed overtime? How did he shape these changes?

 

[muir]

He cut absolute poverty to nearly a third, he halved unemployment, increased GDP by 150%, he nationalised the oil and increased oil exports by more than 400% and nearly halved infant mortality

He increased the number of voting ballots around the country so that poor people could vote as well and they kept him in power. He basically included them into the democratic process and pursued their interests which angered the rich in the country who want all the wealth for themselves and want to dominate the politics of the country

The US economic model is one where the top 1% own most of a countries wealth and where everything is privatised so that the top 1% can own it and control it. This is called 'neoliberalism'. The corporate elite who control the US and its money supply through the federal reserve have moved all the wealth into their hands and they push the same economic model onto other countries through a variety of means

I'll discuss those means but here is a video explaining the current wealth distribution in the US to illustrate what i'm saying:

[video=youtube;oOwjN9qV2ls]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOwjN9qV2ls[/video]

The US has brought other countries under its economic control through a variety of means. Sometimes it uses the IMF and World Bank to give loans to the leaders of poor countries that they will never be able to pay off to get them into debt; to get the leaders to agree to this they will bribe them with money and if they refuse to take the bribe they will assassinate them.

The other method they will use is to stage a coup in a country and then they will replace the leader with a leader who is in on the neo-liberal agenda ie he will help the rich get rich and make the poor poorer

They did this to chavez when the CIA staged a coup that kidnapped Chavez. The Venezualan people marched down in their hundreds of thousands and demanded that their leader be handed back over to them and he was

Here's a good documentary by the journalist John Pilger that has interviews with Chavez and explains about the coup called 'The War on Democracy': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdUwkxhsjKk

This is the reason there is often anger towards the US around the world because the US government often blocks democracy in countries and helps to prop up plutocracys where the top 1% steal all the nations resources and wealth

Chavez opposed neoliberalism so this angered the corporate elites of the US and any people within Venezuala who wanted to get rich by working with the corporate elite

He often became allies with any people who stood against neoliberalism for example Castro in Cuba, Ghaddafi in Libya (who was in the process of creating a pan african bank that would help develop africa using african resources and without the involvement of the US eg by not using the dollar, when he was assassinated) and Assad in Syria who is an ally of Iran who the US hates because it does not trade its oil in dollars

The US benefits massively by having the dollar as the worlds reserve currency. Many countries hold billions in dollars and the federal reserve can keep printing more money so it basically grows a massive military which it uses to bully everyone else around the world

Many countries have grown tired of US bullying so they have opposed it and are beginning to trade in other currencies. Saddam Hussein was also looking to sell Iraqi oil in non dollar currencies so he too was taken out

Chavez nationalised his nations oil so that he could use the money to help his nations poor. thats why he is demonised in the corporate media because he has stopped private individuals from increasing their personal fortunes and has instead helped regular people. He also repatriated Venezualas gold from the central banks which is an indication that the world may well be moving to a gold standard when the fiat currency collapses. Russia and China are also opposed to neoliberalism and they too are boosting their gold reserves

I believe he has been assassinated by the US for making a stand against them

 

[Stu]

I have not followed Latin American events as close as I should. Last night on msnbc there was a woman from some institute laying out how poorly the Venezuelan economy is doing and how oil production is down by a million barrels a day since the industry was nationalized.

This morning on NPR there was report on how Venezuela has increased inter Latin American trade by subsidizing oil sales to various nations to the extent that now the trade among them is greater than the trade that was between them and the US.

I can only imagine that Nationalizing the oil industry virtually cut Venezuela off from any technological innovations in oil production.

I also thought about how selling less oil was actually a good thing as far a global warming goes.

I have also read and heard many news stories over the years that indicate a general rise in living standards for the generational poor in Venezuela.

 

[muir]

Yeah Chavez helped set up ALBA which is the Bolivarian Alliance for the americas which is designed to help trade between the different american countries outwith the control of the US

It is based on the original vision of Simon Bolivar to unite the countries of south america:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolivarian_Alliance_for_the_Americas

 

[problemz]

Wealthy Venezuelans were crushed and killed by Chavez. Chavez held all power.

 

[Soulful]

Would you mind elaborating on your point?
I'm genuinely interested in the dynamics and politics of the Chavez era and the contrasting opinions held about him.

 

[Soulful]

@muir what leads you to believe Chavez was assassinated?

Also,with so much multi-level lying and convoluted secrecy, in combination with human bias, taking place, how comfortable are you with the accuracy of the opinions/beliefs/knowledge which you hold? How possible is it for any of us to really know what's going on, when everything we hear and learn is filtered and even those with the most honest of intentions can allow their perceptions and convictions colour their reports. And I'm speaking generally, here, with no intended reference to John Pilger.

 

[Apone]

@muir what leads you to believe Chavez was assassinated?

Have you met muir, Soulful?

 

[gd65h8as7]

@muir what leads you to believe Chavez was assassinated?

Also,with so much multi-level lying and convoluted secrecy, in combination with human bias, taking place, how comfortable are you with the accuracy of the opinions/beliefs/knowledge which you hold? How possible is it for any of us to really know what's going on, when everything we hear and learn is filtered and even those with the most honest of intentions can allow their perceptions and convictions colour their reports. And I'm speaking generally, here, with no intended reference to John Pilger.

Wondering whether or not Chavez was assassinated isn't really that far-fetched, the President of Bolivia has come forth and stated that he is "almost certain" that Chavez was poisoned and that the US was responsible. Obviously there is no way we'll ever know and you made a great point when you mentioned so many layers of secrecy and it being virtually impossible for us to know anything, but his death really did come out of the blue, it was really strange.

Have you met [MENTION=1871]muir[/MENTION], Soulful?

don't be quick to dismiss muir as a nutcase, truth really is stranger than fiction. I mention 9/11 all the time but it really is key, once you understand that it was an inside job and who was REALLY behind it, muir's posts begin to make a lot more sense.

 

[Apone]

don't be quick to dismiss muir as a nutcase, truth really is stranger than fiction. I mention 9/11 all the time but it really is key, once you understand that it was an inside and who was REALLY behind it, muir's posts begin to make a lot more sense.

I'm not doubting that it's possible, I'm just saying...

 

[Soulful]

Have you met muir, Soulful?

I've read a number of @muir's posts, and I appreciate the difference in opinion s/he/zhe brings to the table. (@Izan also) The way I look at it is that I really don't have any reason to agree or disagree with muir's convictions; they might seem a little far fetched or paranoid to some people (no offense, muir), but there is a significant amount of detail and information that is withheld from the public. The truth is that we simply don't know what's true when it comes to public broadcasting, journalism, and corporate media. I wouldn't be surprised if even the majority, if not all, of the things proposed by truthers and alternative media specialists are an accurate representation of what goes on and what took place.

Izan, I don't understand the point about his death being out of the blue. He died after a heart attack following several (2 or 4?) years of cancer struggle... Many people die of heart attacks every day, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if the cancer (or rather, cancer treatment) put an even greater toll on his cardiovascular system. Forgive me, but I don't see a heart attack as an unusual source of death. There is, however, an argument going around the net provoking suspicion due to (I believe) the fact that 6 Latin American leaders have been diagnosed with cancer within a relatively brief time span, all of whom were involved with Chavez's attempts to unite the South American economy. That is one I do find interesting.

 

[Faye]

I have yet to see a single source of information on him that was not grossly biased. According to typical American media, he seems to have been a brutal dictator. According to left-wing sources, he was a hero of the poor and spearheaded the socialist revival in South America.


I think he was somewhere in between. If he truly supported democracy, he would likely have tried to keep it in tact. He didn't, suggesting that his policies were less than democratic.

He did take action to help the poor of his country, and he was very showy about it (I think he actually had his own T.V. show).

However, in the long run, given the inflation that is going on there and whatnot with their economy, it might have hurt them. It would be hard to know if they would have been better off with a less left-wing government.

 

[muir]

I have yet to see a single source of information on him that was not grossly biased. According to typical American media, he seems to have been a brutal dictator. According to left-wing sources, he was a hero of the poor and spearheaded the socialist revival in South America.


I think he was somewhere in between. If he truly supported democracy, he would likely have tried to keep it in tact. He didn't, suggesting that his policies were less than democratic.

He did take action to help the poor of his country, and he was very showy about it (I think he actually had his own T.V. show).

However, in the long run, given the inflation that is going on there and whatnot with their economy, it might have hurt them. It would be hard to know if they would have been better off with a less left-wing government.

I think things have gotten tougher there since Chavez's influence has waned

There is a divide in the country between the poor and the bourgeousie. There are also high crime levels, but i guess an argument could be made that the country is in a transitional phase where it is attempting to raise an entire section of the community out of poverty and into better health and education

Its also worth baring in mind that the wealthy land owning class who side with the corporations and of course the US will and do do anything they can to sabotage any moves to raise the poor from their position in society

Concerning the democracy issue that actually is one area that no one can criticise. venezualan democracy is actually pretty functional. its so functional in fact that when Chavez has lost on a vote he stood aside and did not dispute it and when the opposition have lost they have not disputed it either

Outside regulators saw the system as fair

Chavez actually increased democracy in the country by allowing more people to vote

In the New Statesman the following point was made:

"Chavez wasted his money on social programmes when he should have built vanity projects"


http://www.newstatesman.com/economy/2011/08/chavez-gold-venezuelan

In a story headlined "Little Reaction In Oil Market To Chavez Death", Pamela Sampson, a business reporter for the Associated Press, offers her take on the legacy of the Venezuelan president:

Chavez invested Venezuela's oil wealth into social programs including state-run food markets, cash benefits for poor families, free health clinics and education programs. But those gains were meager compared with the spectacular construction projects that oil riches spurred in glittering Middle Eastern cities, including the world's tallest building in Dubai and plans for branches of the Louvre and Guggenheim museums in Abu Dhabi.
​

Fair's Jim Naureck, who pointed out the bizarre angle, has this to say:

That's right: Chavez squandered his nation's oil money on healthcare, education and nutrition when he could have been building the world's tallest building or his own branch of the Louvre. What kind of monster has priorities like that?
​

Going through the coverage of Chavez's death, one of the starkest things to my eyes is how few people have been prepared to admit that they didn't like him simply because he was a Marxist. Even the right-wing press chooses to attack him on whether his massive social programs, up to and including nationalisation of the country's oil stock, worked, and on the extent of his commitment to liberal democracy. It seems likely that in earlier years they would have just taken it for granted that he was on the far left and therefore bad.

Of course, at times, those attacks fall flat. Regardless of the efficacy of Chavez's social programs—and it remains to be seen how their long-term effect compares to the increase in living standards other Latin American countries saw from simple growth alone—they were probably better for the Venezuelan poor than building the Burj Khalifa was for poor people in the UAE.

 

[Gaze]

This news article provides some information:

http://news.yahoo.com/hugo-chavez-fiery-venezuelan-leader-dies-58-220210262.html

During more than 14 years in office, his leftist politics and grandiose style polarized Venezuelans. The barrel-chested leader electrified crowds with his booming voice, and won admiration among the poor with government social programs and a folksy, nationalistic style.
Opponents seethed at the larger-than-life character who demonized them on television and ordered the expropriation of farms and businesses. Many in the middle class cringed at his bombast and complained about rising crime, soaring inflation and government economic controls.
Chavez used his country's oil wealth to launch social programs that included state-run food markets, new public housing, free health clinics and education programs. While poverty declined during his presidency amid a historic boom in oil earnings, critics said he failed to use the windfall of hundreds of billions of dollars to develop the country's economy.
______________________________________

Critics saw Chavez as a typical Latin American caudillo, a strongman who ruled through force of personality and showed disdain for democratic rules. Chavez concentrated power in his hands with allies who dominated the congress and justices who controlled the Supreme Court.
"El Comandante," as he was known, insisted Venezuela remained a vibrant democracy and denied charges that he sought to restrict free speech. But some opponents faced criminal charges and were driven into exile. His government forced the opposition-aligned television channel, RCTV, off the air by refusing to renew its license.

While Chavez trumpeted plans for communes and an egalitarian society, his rhetoric regularly conflicted with reality. Despite government seizures of companies and farmland, the balance between Venezuela's public and private sectors changed little during his presidency.

___________________________


By 2000, his increasingly confrontational style and close ties to Cuba disenchanted many of the middle-class supporters who voted for him, and the next several years saw bold attempts by opponents to dislodge him from power.
In 2002, he survived a short-lived coup, which began after large anti-Chavez street protests ended in shootings and bloodshed. Dissident military officers detained the president and announced he had resigned. But within two days, he returned to power with the help of military loyalists amid massive protests by his supporters.
Chavez emerged a stronger president.
He defeated an opposition-led strike that paralyzed the country's oil industry and fired thousands of state oil company employees.
The coup also turned Chavez more decidedly against the U.S. government, which had swiftly recognized the provisional leader who briefly replaced him. He created political and trade alliances that excluded the U.S., and he cozied up to Iran and Syria in large part, it seemed, due to their shared antagonism toward the U.S. government. Despite the souring relationship, Chavez kept selling the bulk of Venezuela's oil to the United States.

By 2005, Chavez was espousing a new, vaguely defined "21st-century socialism." Yet the agenda didn't involve a sudden overhaul to the country's economic order, and some businesspeople continued to prosper. Those with lucrative ties to the government came to be known as the "Bolivarian bourgeoisie."

After easily winning re-election in 2006, Chavez began calling for a "multi-polar world" free of U.S. domination, part of an expanded international agenda. He boosted oil shipments to China, set up joint factories with Iran to produce tractors and cars, and sealed arms deals with Russia for assault rifles, helicopters and fighter jets. He focused on building alliances throughout Latin America and injected new energy into the region's left. Allies were elected in Bolivia, Ecuador, Argentina and other countries.

Chavez also cemented relationships with island countries in the Caribbean by selling them oil on preferential terms while severing ties with Israel, supporting the Palestinian cause and backing Iran's right to a nuclear energy program.

From this article, it's evident there were conflicting views about him even within Venezuela or in South America. It's a matter of perspective.

 

[muir]

@muir what leads you to believe Chavez was assassinated?

Also,with so much multi-level lying and convoluted secrecy, in combination with human bias, taking place, how comfortable are you with the accuracy of the opinions/beliefs/knowledge which you hold? How possible is it for any of us to really know what's going on, when everything we hear and learn is filtered and even those with the most honest of intentions can allow their perceptions and convictions colour their reports. And I'm speaking generally, here, with no intended reference to John Pilger.

I think that because of their intuition INFJ's can often see the reality train coming before many others. Warnings of the impending danger is sometimes met with disbelief, ridicule and sometimes even with hostility

How can an INFJ explain to someone how they have an impression of something when that impression is created from the process of intuition which works with everything they have ever heard, seen, learned or experienced? They can't unless they had a lifetime to do it, let alone in a small post on the internet. This means that what happens is an inadequate reply is given with perhaps a youtube clip, or a quote or docuemntary or some such other piece of evidence to try and show that what the INFJ is saying isn't just a figment of their imagination but is actually built on a whole range of things and that they aren't the only one who can see the train coming (many people feel safer when they feel the information they have is 'conventional wisdom'...i think its the whole herd mentality thing which is a problem because conventional wisdom is often wrong...so the herd seeks shelter in a false perception and the reality train keeps speeding towards them)

Often the best that can be hoped for is to peak someones interest enough that you can get them to walk down the tracks with you a little so that you can point out the smoke on the horizon coming from the approaching train!

I think that's just the cross that INFJ's have to bare that sometimes they have to stand back and watch the train wreck happen before the person(s) begin to listen to them. Its frustrating because so much could be achieved if people would.....anyway....rant over

But i see you have already walked down the tracks under your own steam (so to speak) as you have already found out that many other south american leaders have got cancer.

Its not just insidious cancer there is a whole spate of clear cut assassinations of south american leaders as well.

My current perception on cancer is that the technology exists to give someone cancer. Whether this is done by polonium poisoning (see for example the assassination of Litvinenko in London) ingestion of a tainted food or drink, inhilation or through injection (see for example the bulgarian diplomat who was murdered in London through an injection of ricin into his calf through the spike on an umbrella) or whether it is done through directed energy weapons (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directed_energy_weapons), or nanotechnology (which can be sprayed onto the skin) or some other means it is the perfect weapon as it can always be dismissed to the public as simply an act of nature

Many assassinations in south america prior to this were carried out by plane crash through getting someone to carry an item for example a tape recorder that was loaded with explosives (this is most likely what happened with the Panam flight that crashed into Lockerbie) and althoguh many of the public will not get suspicious at a plane crash the people who are already alert will definately notice it and if there are too many plane crashes then they can begin to use these to point out to those that aren't yet suspicious how many people who have opposed the neoliberal agenda have died in plane (or car) crashes!

I think the current conventional wisdom about cancer is wrong. I believe that cancer is a form of fungus of the body. I believe that fruits and vegetables have a natural agent in them that they have evolved to protect themselves from fungal attack; this is called salvestrol. Modern farming methods however which have been cultivated by corporations like monsanto so that their products can be used use pesticides and herbicides that destroy the salvestrol in fruit and vegetables

Salvestrol is the key cancer fighting agent that we get from eating fruit and vegetables but we aren't getting it from fruit and vegetables that have been sprayed with chemicals (which is most of the products in the supermarkets). Not to mention the fact that the chemicals themselves are carcinogenic (cancer causing) which is why the packets they come in recommend in the small print to 'wash before use'

Organically grown fruit and vegetables on the other hand still have their salvestrol and will help your body to fight cancer if you eat them. Yes organic food costs more but it is worth more because it is effective; if more people buy it it should in theory drive the price of it down

Monsanto who supply a lot of the agricultural farming chemicals also supplied the US military with a chemical that was sprayed across vietnam in the vietnam war called 'agent orange'

Agent orange it was claimed was a 'defoliant' supposedly designed to kill back the tree cover so that the US airforce could more effectively shoot people on the ground. However agent orange was sprayed over crops, villages and water courses. It got into the food supply and into the water supply. It was found to contain dioxins which are cancer causing agents and which also distort DNA. Monsanto claim that they did not know that their product was contaminated...but i know what i think about that

Agent orange caused birth defects in many children and gave many people cancer:

man who was exposed to agent orange

babies affected in the womb by agent orange

I'm sorry to show those horrible images but i think they can bring the reality home. I think some people are caught up in nationalistic feelings where they feel a loyalty to their government because it is from the same country as them. But the truth about government is that it is run by corporate elements who don't give a fuck about anyone but themselves. They don't care about you or anyone else from their own country. That's why they allowed 55,000 US servicepeople to die in vietnam

The elites don't care about regular americans and they don't care vietnamese...they don't give fuck so why should anyone feel a loyalty to their government?

I think these pictures give an insight into the heartlessness of the corporate elite that they would knowingly use weapons like that against human beings....and these are not people who were threatening the US...these were people who were having their own struggles within their own country thousands of miles from the US that the US corporate elites wanted to interfere in and were willing to sacrifice tens of thousands of american lives to do it

The war was even started on a lie....a supposed incident that didn't actually happen called the 'gulf of tonkin incident' was used as a justification for US involvement in vietnam....its just the same patterns repeated again and again by these people

So yes i think Chavez was infected with cancer. I think that the corporate elite know about the true nature of cancer and use it as a weapon. I would recommend everyone to eat organic food, to read the food labels on anything they buy and to avoid certain corporate manufactured chemicals such as monosodium glutomate or aspartame (nutrasweet) which have been found to be nuero-toxins and to basically stop blindly trusting the corporate controlled government. The so called regulators set up to control standards are corrupt and do not protect us....our only protection is our own research...we have to be pro-active in protecting ourselves and others because the government will not do it for you

This fact should be very apparent to people in the UK at the moment because it is being found that many beef products being sold in supermarkets are actually made of horse, pig and donkey meat. The supermarkets have been buying cheap meat form around the world and no one is checking what it is or where it has come from! No one knows what those animals might have been exposed to or what antibiotics or other drugs they may have been given in their lifetime....the regulators are an illusion!

The shorter the list of ingrediants on the back of food stuffs the better and E numbers are bad news. Genetically modified foods (often made by monsanto) are often not declared as such on their labelling but that's another thing to avoid. Also some geographical areas have flouride added to the water supply when fluoride is an active ingrediant in rat poison (you can probably find out if flouride is put into your areas water supply online). They are poisoning us in a number of ways. One reason is to dull peoples minds to make us more easy to control and the other is as part of a population control program to keep numbers down

So the mindset of the people who were opposed to Chavez is a totally ruthless one that has no value for human life and which uses all sorts of dirty weapons against its enemies. I don't like to use the word 'evil' but these guys are certainly heartless (psychopaths and sociopaths)

Part 1 of a documentary about the 638 ways the CIA tried to kill castro:

[video=youtube;sA6MA6TZ5E4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sA6MA6TZ5E4[/video]

 

[muir]

There are currency wars going on around the world at the moment and these are some of the underlying causes of world events that are often overlooked in the mainstream media

Government advisor Jim Rickards has written a book called 'currency wars' for anyone who is interested and he is widely seen as someone with insider information

[video=youtube;oZkNSfh2oz0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZkNSfh2oz0[/video]

Below is an article about how Chavez nationalised the countries gold....one more reason for the US corporations to hate him:

http://www.newstatesman.com/economy/2011/08/chavez-gold-venezuelan

Chávez to nationalise gold reserves

The Venezuelan President, Hugo Chávez, has announced plans to renationalise the country's gold.

By Sophie FitzMaurice Published 18 August 2011




The Venezuelan President, Hugo Chávez, has said he will nationalise the country's gold mines and convert gold into international currency reserves. As the US and European currencies founder, many investors are turning towards gold as a "safe haven". Gold is now valued at $1,795, or £1,084, an ounce.

Chávez's moves also have an ideological aspect: the socialist president wishes to invest his country's reserves in some of the so-called 'BRIC' economies - Brazil, Russia and China - that he considers friendly to his regime. He has criticised global dependency on the dollar in the past, and his nationalisation of the gold industry will be seen as a step away from reliance on the US currency. The move will make China, in particular, happy.


Next month, Venezuelans will see a ten per cent wage increase, after a raise increase of 15 per cent in May. The average monthly salary in Venezuela is now £220. Although the Venezuelan economy is suffering from extremely high inflation, at 25 per cent a year, the rising price of oil has benefitted South America's largest exporter of oil.


Venezuela has recently introduced price controls in an effort to curb inflation and ensure affordable healthcare, passing a Law for Fair Costs and Prices. Private healthcare facilities earlier this week agreed to a three-week price freeze, as the government seeks to shore up its stretched public health system.

Chávez, who is seeking re-election next year, announced the plans for the renationalisation of gold on state television, upsetting the Canadian-based, Russian-owned company Rusoro - the only foreign firm involved in the Venezuelan gold industry.

 

[Apone]

The person whom Chavez chose to replace him:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolas_Maduro

He sounds like Chavez part II-- not so sure what the US has to gain by poisoning Chavez and allowing him to step up.

 

[muir]

The person whom Chavez chose to replace him:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolas_Maduro

He sounds like Chavez part II-- not so sure what the US has to gain by poisoning Chavez and allowing him to step up.

There are elections coming up and the opposition is putting forward a young lawyer who is fully onboard with the US neo-liberal agenda

Its a numbers game. Chavez had the popular support to win elections. Will that same enthusiasm be there for his replacement? (i hope so)

Chavez was not only shrewd but was also a fantastic showman...he swept people along with him on a tide of inspiring charisma. I'd be lying if i said there wasn't an element of the cult of personality at work ('chavismo') but the love the people had for him wasn't without foundation; put yourself in their shoes and its all easy to understand

If the corporations get their representative into power Venezuala will see wealth move upwards again to the top 1% and poverty will rise again. The Bolivarian revolution is not complete yet and i hope it is given an opportunity

The other thing to consider is the modus operandi of the corporate elements. If they don't like how things look on the ground they just shake up the kaleidoscope and create a new picture. If they don't like the new picture then they shake it again. They keep doing that until they get a picture they like. Its all about creating order from chaos and they are powerful enough to do that not just militarily but also financially; it doesn't matter to them if there is chaos in other countries as they are safe in their own countries behind armed guards and to make themselves safer they will disarm the population around them as well.

 

[Lerxst]

I have yet to see a single source of information on him that was not grossly biased. According to typical American media, he seems to have been a brutal dictator. According to left-wing sources, he was a hero of the poor and spearheaded the socialist revival in South America.


I think he was somewhere in between. If he truly supported democracy, he would likely have tried to keep it in tact. He didn't, suggesting that his policies were less than democratic.

He did take action to help the poor of his country, and he was very showy about it (I think he actually had his own T.V. show).

However, in the long run, given the inflation that is going on there and whatnot with their economy, it might have hurt them. It would be hard to know if they would have been better off with a less left-wing government.

He was elected democratically. He repeatedly won elections through the democratic process he also helped and supported. You hear about "Red" states making it more and more difficult for the poor and disabled to vote in this past election, Chavez did the exact opposite, making it increasingly easier for the poor to cast their votes. Any meaning taken from that might be biased, but the action itself is fact and the repeated results from it, speak for themselves.

 

[muir]

Here's an article that sets out well the situtaion the US dollar is in:

At odds on Iran: US doesn’t share Israeli zeal for military solution

Adrian Salbuchi is a political analyst, author, speaker and radio/TV commentator in Argentina.
http://rt.com/op-edge/irans-weapon-o...struction-084/

When Israel invaded Southern Lebanon in 2006 they were ignominiously expelled by Iran-backed Hezbollah. Since then, the Jewish State has gone into 'we-have-to-take-out-Iran' mode, doing everything it can to drag America to war against Iran.
Almost seven years later, Israel’s window of opportunity is closing fast.
‘My big brother America is gonna beat you up...!’

That’s been Israel’s implicit message to Iran ever since. When George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Condoleeza Rice and the NeoCons ran America, bringing the US on board this war-mongering effort against Iran did not seem a daunting task. Especially considering that inside the US, Israel can rely on a little help from its 'friends': the powerful pro-Israel lobby led by AIPAC – American Israeli Public Affairs Committee.

But in 2008 Bush was replaced by Barack Obama whose brand of Democrats are not all knee-jerking 'Israel First' fanatics. Add to that the US Military’s growing resistance to a foreign policy that has been led astray by the Israeli lobby, particularly after successive fiascos in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the growing “Arab Spring” mess.

Even more, large sectors of US and global public opinion are becoming aware of the dangers of America’s Israel addiction; of Israel’s use and abuse of the US as a proxy power fighting its wars, something clearly not in America’s national interest. In his message to the UN General Assembly last September, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu produced a cute bomb-shaped graph to show the world just how close 'big bad Iran' is to having a nuclear bomb which he says they will use to obliterate 'good little Israel'.

Netanyahu would have certainly loved to see staunch Zionist Mitt Romney make it to the White House in November’s elections but – Alas! – he didn’t, and Obama’s still living there, and even had the nerve of naming non-Zionist moderate Chuck Hagel as head the Pentagon.

It seems the US is taking an increasingly arm’s length approach to the 'Iran Problem' given the very serious geopolitical perils and overtones that any unilateral US/Israeli/NATO military attack on Iran would spell, which might even lead to direct confrontation with Russia.

Meanwhile Iran will not back down on its nuclear program, an issue the Obama Administration is taking an oddly calm view on. Significantly, the US even gave Argentina a subtle nod to negotiate with Iran over the 1994 AMIA terror bombing in Buenos Aires.

Since, theories have arisen that Bush, the US president at the time, coaxed Argentina’s President Kirchner into falsely accusing Iran, solely based on CIA/Mossad “evidence” delivered in October 2006, right after Israel’s fiasco in Lebanon.

So in light of all this what, exactly, is going on here? Why are the US and Israel at loggerheads over Iran?

Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel, uses a diagram of a bomb to describe Iran's nuclear program while delivering his address to the 67th United Nations General Assembly meeting September 27, 2012 at the United Nations in New York. (AFP Photo/Don Emmert)

America’s Worst Nightmare

Today the US and Israel have increasingly divergent interests and objectives regarding Iran. Israel’s are easy to grasp: Iran is Israel’s geopolitical arch-enemy, and one of the few countries that is up to the task of becoming a strong and credible leader in the Muslim World, especially since one of Iran’s key objectives is to do away with Israel's hardline rule in Palestine.

Mainstream Western media have continually and falsely noted that “Iran wants to wipe Israel off the map”, rather than Iran merely wanting an end to the Israeli occupation of Palestine. America, however, has a different cause for concern.

Nothing to do with Iran’s nuclear program but rather with the US Dollar. For many decades the US, through its Federal Reserve Bank, has abusively printed huge quantities of unbacked 'Fiat money' to finance its huge deficit, which today has ballooned to over 15 trillion. All’s well as long as that money circulates and ends up somewhere far away, such as the vaults of the central banks of friendly countries like Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, and even of some not so friendly countries like China. Even if it is kept going around and around in the global financial merry-go-rounds of the bonds markets or... the huge global oil market.

“Just keep it flowing and busy in all those markets”, Washington seems to be saying, “...so that we can continue printing more and more of it!” Of course, none dare call it inflation, technocrats have nice buzz-words for things like, “Quantitative Easing I, II and III”, “TARP Funding” and “too-big-to-fail-megabank bailouts...” But call it what you may, inflation by any other name smells just as rotten...
Public Enemies

The US knows only too well that, to a great extent, it is a superpower without much power, because if China decided to sell their almost 2 trillion in US-Dollar treasury bills, bonds and other financial instruments, quickly changing them into Euros, it would spell inflationary disaster for America. Such eventualities however, are unlikely to occur given the complexities of global financial markets; thus, neither China nor any other major US-dollar-holder appears ready to do that – not just now, anyway.

However, there is another much more physical, concrete and strategically complex threat that keeps US leaders awake at night- the oil market. To better understand why America’s joy-ride is fast coming to an end as people’s political awareness grows, let me give you a simple example: Every time Argentina, South Africa or Japan need to buy a barrel of crude oil, its people must work to earn those 100 dollars oil costs in international markets.

The US, however, only needs to print US$100. The same goes if they need money to overrun Iraq, Libya or drone-bomb Afghanistan to smithereens: just print the money and keep the oil flowing and the bombs falling. Get the picture? It’s easy to be a “superpower” that way!

But the picture becomes clearer when you join the dots. Imagine what would happen if those trillions upon trillions of Petro-Dollars spinning and gurgling globally were to suddenly slip from the control of the three – and only three – New York, London and Dubai-based global oil markets solely trading in Dollars?

For instance, if a major oil-producing country or group of countries were to create a fourth global oil market trading not in Dollars but in Euros, say Yens, Rubles, Yuans...? Given the volumes of oil that countries like China, India and Japan gobble up, if successful, such a market would displace very sizeable shares of Petro-Dollar volumes, which would mean fast declining mega-sums of Petro-dollars spinning away from global markets and flowing back towards US-centered financial circuits. Can you imagine what hundreds of billions of freed up Petro-Dollars flowing back to the US in a short period of time would mean?

Reuters/Lee Jae-Won

Weapons of mass destruction

Well, like the proverbial cat playing with a mouse under its paws, since at least 2005 Iran has been openly toying with the idea of opening up a such fourth non-US$ global oil market. China would probably support them as they get a sizeable share of their oil from Iran, so perhaps would India. If the followers of Hugo Chavez hold on to power, Venezuela too might tag along (now do we understand why the US needs to get a strong grip on Venezuela?).

Even Russia, which does not really need Iranian oil, might support Iran for its own geopolitical reasons, considering its growing conflicts with the West. Last year, we even heard strong rumors about Iran selling oil to India payable in gold... Iran fully understands this issue so they are cautiously biding their time. Remember, their Persian forefathers invented chess... So, wouldn’t the US just love to take out Iran to thwart such a threat? I mean, it already happened twice in the last decade:
IRAQ: As part of UN sanctions after the first Gulf War, every year Saddam Hussein was allowed to trade one billion dollars of Iraqi oil for medicines and food. But then, starting in 2000 Saddam started to switch over to the Euro. Suddenly, the world learned from Bush’s NeoCons that Iraq had arsenals of nasty “weapons of mass destruction”; that Saddam had to be “taken out” otherwise mushroom clouds would explode over London, Washington and New York! And so, a decade ago in March 2003, the US, UK and NATO promptly ransacked Iraq and had Saddam Hussein murdered. WMD’s? Ooopss, sorry... didn’t find any!...but: Iraq continues selling its oil in dollars.
LIBYA: In 2010 Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi was planning to introduce a new currency to trade North African oil: the “Gold Dinar” in lieu of the dollar. Suddenly, the world learned from the US, France and Britain that Gaddafi was a formidable monster so...in October 2011 he too was taken out and murdered on live TV to the laughter of Hillary “We-came-we-saw-he-died” Clinton. Now Libya lies in shambles but its new pro-Exxon/BP “authorities” trade their oil solely in dollars...
Turning points

The key question now is which shall prevail in the US in the weeks and months to come: American national interest or Israeli national interest?

This is really top level Machtpolitik so, just to be sure everything’s in order, the most obedient Western mainstream media are keeping “all options on the table” running all sorts of headlines to remind us how nasty Iran is, its nuke ambitions, poor Little Israel and its security issues (which is why they’re allowed to keep the sole nuclear arsenal in the Middle East, right?), the delicate state of the global financial system and why no one should be allowed to rock the boat and, of course, the never-ending “War on Terror...”, But now we know.

It is all about oil; it is all about the US-Dollar; it is all about a global financial system being kept artificially alive for mega-banker profit; it is about Israel... The flip-side of that coin gets even worse: It’s not about the interest of the working masses in the US, Europe and worldwide; and it definitely is not about Democracy or Human Rights.
Adrian Salbuchi for RT​