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Question of the Day: Which compact crossover would you choose?
Can only be good things.
I like waking up to good news, good riddance to that piece of sht.
Azbubu
Honorary Master
Hat full of cancer, no thanks.
akescpt
Honorary Master
so when will the story come out that it was america? but now america must find a new enemy. who will the possible candidates be..
STS
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BBSA
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Good riddance..... Mugabe next?
No more trolling the US.
Oh yeah...
The United States on Tuesday rejected Venezuela's allegations of a conspiracy, saying it was "absurd" to assert Washington was somehow behind President Hugo Chavez's cancer.
...
"We completely reject the Venezuelan government's claim that the United States is involved in any type of conspiracy to destabilize the Venezuelan government," State Department spokesman Patrick Ventrell said in a statement.
...
Source: SAPA
Frigging idiots! And if the US was somehow behind his departure, then a huge kudos to them!
We can only hope. And that'd be news to party like there ain't no tomorrow
Jab
Expert Member
In the End, an Awful Manager
Published: March 5, 2013 NYTImes
Rory Carroll , a correspondent for The Guardian, is the author of “Comandante: Hugo Chávez’s Venezuela.”
IN Caracas, Venezuela , you could tell a summit meeting mattered to Hugo Chávez when government workers touched up the city’s rubble. Before dignitaries arrived, teams with buckets and brushes would paint bright yellow lines along the route from the airport into the capital, trying to compensate for the roads’ dilapidation with flashes of color.
For really big events — say, a visit by Russia’s president — workers would make an extra effort, by also painting the rocks and debris that filled potholes.
Seated in their armor-plated cars with tinted windows, the Russians might not have noticed the glistening golden nuggets, but they would surely have recognized the idea of the Potemkin village.
After oil wealth, theatrical flair was the greatest asset of Mr. Chávez, the president of Venezuela since 1999, who died Tuesday from cancer. His dramatic sense of his own significance helped bring him to power as the reincarnation of the liberator Simón Bolívar — he even renamed the country the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.
That same dramatic flair deeply divided Venezuelans as he postured on the world stage and talked of restoring equilibrium between the rich countries and the rest of the world. It now obscures his real legacy, which is far less dramatic than he would have hoped. In fact, it’s mundane. Mr. Chávez, in the final analysis, was an awful manager.
The legacy of his 14-year “socialist revolution” is apparent across Venezuela: the decay, dysfunction and blight that afflict the economy and every state institution.
The endless debate about whether Mr. Chávez was a dictator or democrat — he was in fact a hybrid, an elected autocrat — distracted attention, at home and abroad, from the more prosaic issue of competence. Mr. Chávez was a brilliant politician and a disastrous ruler. He leaves Venezuela a ruin, and his death plunges its roughly 30 million citizens into profound uncertainty.
Mr. Chávez’s failures did more damage than ideology, which was never as extremist as he or his detractors made out, something all too evident in the Venezuela he bequeaths.
The once mighty factories of Ciudad Guayana, an industrial hub by the Orinoco River that M.I.T. and Harvard architects planned in the 1960s, are rusting and wheezing, some shut, others at half-capacity. “The world economic crisis hit us,” Rada Gamluch, the director of the aluminum plant Venalum, and a loyal chavista, told me on his balcony overlooking the decay. He corrected himself. “The capitalist crisis hit us.”
Actually, it was bungling by Chávez-appointed business directors who tried to impose pseudo-Marxist principles, only to be later replaced by opportunists and crooks, that hit Ciudad Guayana.
Underinvestment and ineptitude hit hydropower stations and the electricity grid, causing weekly blackouts that continue to darken cities, fry electrical equipment, silence machinery and require de facto rationing. The government has no shortage of scapegoats: its own workers, the C.I.A. and even cable-gnawing possums.
Reckless money printing and fiscal policies triggered soaring inflation, so much so that the currency, the bolívar, lost 90 percent of its value since Mr. Chávez took office, and was devalued five times over a decade. In another delusion, the currency had been renamed “el bolívar fuerte,” the strong bolívar — an Orwellian touch.
Harassment of privately owned farms and chaotic administration of state-backed agricultural cooperatives hit food production, compelling extensive imports, which stacked up so fast thousands of tons rotted at the ports. Mr. Chávez called it “food sovereignty.”
Politicization and neglect crippled the state-run oil company PDVSA’s core task — drilling — so that production slumped. “It’s a pity no one took 20 minutes to explain macroeconomics to him with a pen and paper,” Baldo Sanso, a senior executive told me. “Chávez doesn’t know how to manage.”
Populist subsidies reduced the cost of gasoline to $1 a tank, perhaps the world’s lowest price of petrol, but cost the state untold billions in revenue while worsening traffic congestion and air pollution.
Bureaucratic malaise and corruption were so severe that murders tripled to nearly 20,000 a year, while gangs brazenly kidnapped victims from bus stops and highways.
A new elite with government connections, the “boligarchs,” manipulated government contracts and the web of price and currency controls to finance their lavish lifestyles. “It’s a big deal here when a girl turns 15,” a Caracas designer, Giovanni Scutaro, told me. “If the father is with the revolution, he doesn’t care about the fabric as long as it’s in red. Something simple, $3,000 — more elaborate, $250,000.”
Mr. Chávez summoned journalists to Miraflores, the presidential palace, to extol his achievements. But even the building betrayed the nation’s anomie, with its cracked facade, missing tiles, a whiff of urine from the gardens. The president’s private elevator, a minister confided, leaked when it rained.
Mr. Chávez’s political genius was to turn this record into a stage from which to mount four more election victories. An unprecedented oil bounty — $1 trillion — made him chief patron amid withering nongovernment alternatives.
He spent extravagantly on health clinics, schools, subsidies and giveaways, including entirely new houses. Those employed in multiplying bureaucracies — officials lost track of fleeting ministries — voted for him to secure their jobs.
His elections were not fair — Mr. Chávez rigged rules in his favor, hijacked state resources, disqualified some opponents, emasculated others — but they were free.
As Venezuela atrophied, he found some refuge in blaming others, notably the “squealing pigs” and “vampires” of the private sector whom he accused of hoarding and speculating. Soldiers arrested butchers for overpricing.
His own supporters increasingly blamed those around him: by 2011 you could see graffiti with the slogan “bajo el gobierno, viva Chávez” — “down with the government, long live Chávez.”
The comandante, as he was known to loyalists, used his extraordinary energy and charisma to dominate airwaves with marathon speeches (four hours was short). He might blow kisses, mobilize troops, denounce the United States, ride a bike, a tank, a helicopter — anything to keep attention focused on him, not his performance.
Distraction came in numerous forms: denouncing assassination plots; a farcical nuclear deal with Russia (eventually abandoned); exhuming Bolívar’s remains to see if he was murdered; praising or assailing guests.
I experienced the power of his performance firsthand in 2007 when, as The Guardian’s Latin America correspondent, I appeared on his weekly show, “Alo Presidente,” in an episode held on a beach. Invited to ask a question, I asked whether abolishing term limits risked authoritarianism.
The host paused and glowered before casting the impertinence out to sea and making it a pretext to lambaste European hypocrisy, media, monarchy, the Royal Navy, slavery, genocide and colonialism.
“In the name of the Latin American people I demand that the British government return the Malvinas Islands to the Argentine people,” he exclaimed. Then, after another riff on colonialism: “It is better to die fighting than to be a slave!”
On and on it went. Christopher Columbus. Queen Elizabeth. George Bush. In vain I responded that I was Irish and republican, and that European monarchy was irrelevant to my question, which he had dodged. This provoked another tirade.
It was theater. As the cameras were packed away, and we all prepared to return to Caracas, the president shook my hand, shrugged and smiled. I had been a useful fall guy. No hard feelings. It was just a show.
Published: March 5, 2013 NYTImes
Rory Carroll , a correspondent for The Guardian, is the author of “Comandante: Hugo Chávez’s Venezuela.”
IN Caracas, Venezuela , you could tell a summit meeting mattered to Hugo Chávez when government workers touched up the city’s rubble. Before dignitaries arrived, teams with buckets and brushes would paint bright yellow lines along the route from the airport into the capital, trying to compensate for the roads’ dilapidation with flashes of color.
For really big events — say, a visit by Russia’s president — workers would make an extra effort, by also painting the rocks and debris that filled potholes.
Seated in their armor-plated cars with tinted windows, the Russians might not have noticed the glistening golden nuggets, but they would surely have recognized the idea of the Potemkin village.
After oil wealth, theatrical flair was the greatest asset of Mr. Chávez, the president of Venezuela since 1999, who died Tuesday from cancer. His dramatic sense of his own significance helped bring him to power as the reincarnation of the liberator Simón Bolívar — he even renamed the country the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.
That same dramatic flair deeply divided Venezuelans as he postured on the world stage and talked of restoring equilibrium between the rich countries and the rest of the world. It now obscures his real legacy, which is far less dramatic than he would have hoped. In fact, it’s mundane. Mr. Chávez, in the final analysis, was an awful manager.
The legacy of his 14-year “socialist revolution” is apparent across Venezuela: the decay, dysfunction and blight that afflict the economy and every state institution.
The endless debate about whether Mr. Chávez was a dictator or democrat — he was in fact a hybrid, an elected autocrat — distracted attention, at home and abroad, from the more prosaic issue of competence. Mr. Chávez was a brilliant politician and a disastrous ruler. He leaves Venezuela a ruin, and his death plunges its roughly 30 million citizens into profound uncertainty.
Mr. Chávez’s failures did more damage than ideology, which was never as extremist as he or his detractors made out, something all too evident in the Venezuela he bequeaths.
The once mighty factories of Ciudad Guayana, an industrial hub by the Orinoco River that M.I.T. and Harvard architects planned in the 1960s, are rusting and wheezing, some shut, others at half-capacity. “The world economic crisis hit us,” Rada Gamluch, the director of the aluminum plant Venalum, and a loyal chavista, told me on his balcony overlooking the decay. He corrected himself. “The capitalist crisis hit us.”
Actually, it was bungling by Chávez-appointed business directors who tried to impose pseudo-Marxist principles, only to be later replaced by opportunists and crooks, that hit Ciudad Guayana.
Underinvestment and ineptitude hit hydropower stations and the electricity grid, causing weekly blackouts that continue to darken cities, fry electrical equipment, silence machinery and require de facto rationing. The government has no shortage of scapegoats: its own workers, the C.I.A. and even cable-gnawing possums.
Reckless money printing and fiscal policies triggered soaring inflation, so much so that the currency, the bolívar, lost 90 percent of its value since Mr. Chávez took office, and was devalued five times over a decade. In another delusion, the currency had been renamed “el bolívar fuerte,” the strong bolívar — an Orwellian touch.
Harassment of privately owned farms and chaotic administration of state-backed agricultural cooperatives hit food production, compelling extensive imports, which stacked up so fast thousands of tons rotted at the ports. Mr. Chávez called it “food sovereignty.”
Politicization and neglect crippled the state-run oil company PDVSA’s core task — drilling — so that production slumped. “It’s a pity no one took 20 minutes to explain macroeconomics to him with a pen and paper,” Baldo Sanso, a senior executive told me. “Chávez doesn’t know how to manage.”
Populist subsidies reduced the cost of gasoline to $1 a tank, perhaps the world’s lowest price of petrol, but cost the state untold billions in revenue while worsening traffic congestion and air pollution.
Bureaucratic malaise and corruption were so severe that murders tripled to nearly 20,000 a year, while gangs brazenly kidnapped victims from bus stops and highways.
A new elite with government connections, the “boligarchs,” manipulated government contracts and the web of price and currency controls to finance their lavish lifestyles. “It’s a big deal here when a girl turns 15,” a Caracas designer, Giovanni Scutaro, told me. “If the father is with the revolution, he doesn’t care about the fabric as long as it’s in red. Something simple, $3,000 — more elaborate, $250,000.”
Mr. Chávez summoned journalists to Miraflores, the presidential palace, to extol his achievements. But even the building betrayed the nation’s anomie, with its cracked facade, missing tiles, a whiff of urine from the gardens. The president’s private elevator, a minister confided, leaked when it rained.
Mr. Chávez’s political genius was to turn this record into a stage from which to mount four more election victories. An unprecedented oil bounty — $1 trillion — made him chief patron amid withering nongovernment alternatives.
He spent extravagantly on health clinics, schools, subsidies and giveaways, including entirely new houses. Those employed in multiplying bureaucracies — officials lost track of fleeting ministries — voted for him to secure their jobs.
His elections were not fair — Mr. Chávez rigged rules in his favor, hijacked state resources, disqualified some opponents, emasculated others — but they were free.
As Venezuela atrophied, he found some refuge in blaming others, notably the “squealing pigs” and “vampires” of the private sector whom he accused of hoarding and speculating. Soldiers arrested butchers for overpricing.
His own supporters increasingly blamed those around him: by 2011 you could see graffiti with the slogan “bajo el gobierno, viva Chávez” — “down with the government, long live Chávez.”
The comandante, as he was known to loyalists, used his extraordinary energy and charisma to dominate airwaves with marathon speeches (four hours was short). He might blow kisses, mobilize troops, denounce the United States, ride a bike, a tank, a helicopter — anything to keep attention focused on him, not his performance.
Distraction came in numerous forms: denouncing assassination plots; a farcical nuclear deal with Russia (eventually abandoned); exhuming Bolívar’s remains to see if he was murdered; praising or assailing guests.
I experienced the power of his performance firsthand in 2007 when, as The Guardian’s Latin America correspondent, I appeared on his weekly show, “Alo Presidente,” in an episode held on a beach. Invited to ask a question, I asked whether abolishing term limits risked authoritarianism.
The host paused and glowered before casting the impertinence out to sea and making it a pretext to lambaste European hypocrisy, media, monarchy, the Royal Navy, slavery, genocide and colonialism.
“In the name of the Latin American people I demand that the British government return the Malvinas Islands to the Argentine people,” he exclaimed. Then, after another riff on colonialism: “It is better to die fighting than to be a slave!”
On and on it went. Christopher Columbus. Queen Elizabeth. George Bush. In vain I responded that I was Irish and republican, and that European monarchy was irrelevant to my question, which he had dodged. This provoked another tirade.
It was theater. As the cameras were packed away, and we all prepared to return to Caracas, the president shook my hand, shrugged and smiled. I had been a useful fall guy. No hard feelings. It was just a show.
blunomore
Honorary Master
I can think of a few others whose departure will not be missed in certain quarters.
LazyLion
King of de Jungle
good riddance to the scumbag.
Vrotappel
Bulls fan
The cANCer will miss him. He was living their Utopia.
blunomore
Honorary Master
Online media has pictures showing citizens of Venezuela crying in the streets.
Maybe I am cold-hearted but I fail to understand how someone could have such feelings towards a president, a man you never met in real life?
Maybe I am cold-hearted but I fail to understand how someone could have such feelings towards a president, a man you never met in real life?
LazyLion
King of de Jungle
Press Release: Zuma - Condolences
SAPA PR WIRE SERVICE - SAPA PR WIRE SERVICE - SAPA PR WIRE SERVICE
SAPA PR--PRESIDENT ZUMA SENDS CONDOLENCES TO THE BOLIVARIAN REPUBLIC OF VENEZUELA
ISSUED BY: DIRCO
ATTENTION: NEWS EDITORS
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
PRESIDENT ZUMA SENDS CONDOLENCES TO THE BOLIVARIAN REPUBLIC OF VENEZUELA
On behalf of the Government and the people of South Africa, His Excellency President Jacob Zuma has sent his condolences to the Government and the people of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela following the passing on of President Hugo Chávez on Tuesday, 5 March 2013.
In expressing his condolences, President Zuma added: “Our hearts are with the family of President Chávez, as well as the Government and the people of Venezuela during this difficult time of mourning the departure of this respected revolutionary leader of Venezuela and indeed the entire progressive family of nations”.
President Zuma paid tribute to President Chávez' visionary leadership since he took office on 2 February 1999 and his commitment to the social struggles of the less fortunate in Venezuela.
In addition, President Zuma also said that Venezuela, under the leadership of President Chávez, instituted a dramatic change under the Government's ‘Bolivarian' approach in Latin America and beyond in promoting regional integration based on the principles of social justice”.
President Chavez paid a State Visit to South Africa in September 2008 that further strengthened the existing solid bilateral relations between the two countries. In addition, at a Senior Officials Meeting held in Venezuela in 2012, several key areas of bilateral cooperation were identified, primarily in the fields of energy and agriculture.
Enquiries, Mr Clayson Monyela: +27 82 884 5974
ISSUED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS AND COOPERATION
OR Tambo Building
460 Soutpansberg Road
Rietondale
Pretoria
Source : Ends /PEM
Date : 06 Mar 2013 10:14
SAPA PR WIRE SERVICE - SAPA PR WIRE SERVICE - SAPA PR WIRE SERVICE
SAPA PR--PRESIDENT ZUMA SENDS CONDOLENCES TO THE BOLIVARIAN REPUBLIC OF VENEZUELA
ISSUED BY: DIRCO
ATTENTION: NEWS EDITORS
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
PRESIDENT ZUMA SENDS CONDOLENCES TO THE BOLIVARIAN REPUBLIC OF VENEZUELA
On behalf of the Government and the people of South Africa, His Excellency President Jacob Zuma has sent his condolences to the Government and the people of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela following the passing on of President Hugo Chávez on Tuesday, 5 March 2013.
In expressing his condolences, President Zuma added: “Our hearts are with the family of President Chávez, as well as the Government and the people of Venezuela during this difficult time of mourning the departure of this respected revolutionary leader of Venezuela and indeed the entire progressive family of nations”.
President Zuma paid tribute to President Chávez' visionary leadership since he took office on 2 February 1999 and his commitment to the social struggles of the less fortunate in Venezuela.
In addition, President Zuma also said that Venezuela, under the leadership of President Chávez, instituted a dramatic change under the Government's ‘Bolivarian' approach in Latin America and beyond in promoting regional integration based on the principles of social justice”.
President Chavez paid a State Visit to South Africa in September 2008 that further strengthened the existing solid bilateral relations between the two countries. In addition, at a Senior Officials Meeting held in Venezuela in 2012, several key areas of bilateral cooperation were identified, primarily in the fields of energy and agriculture.
Enquiries, Mr Clayson Monyela: +27 82 884 5974
ISSUED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS AND COOPERATION
OR Tambo Building
460 Soutpansberg Road
Rietondale
Pretoria
Source : Ends /PEM
Date : 06 Mar 2013 10:14
LazyLion
King of de Jungle
Malema Mourns Chavez
Expelled ANC Youth League president Julius Malema joined leaders on Wednesday in mourning Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez.
"I join millions of progressive individuals... in sending my heartfelt condolences to the people of Venezuela for loosing a fearless, politically determined and ideologically steadfast leader in President Hugo Chavez," he said in a statement.
Malema said Chavez was among the few revolutionaries who challenged the dominance of imperialism in the world and exposed its weaknesses.
Chavez died on Tuesday after a two-year battle with cancer, ending 14 years of rule in Venezuela.
"Despite massive resistance from rented imperialist puppets, President Hugo Chavez was able to lead Venezuela into an era where the wealth of
Venezuela, particularly oil, was returned to the ownership of the people as a whole," Malema said.
The Young Communist League of SA said it was devastated at the news of Chavez's death.
"Comrade Chavez was an inspiration to all progressive forces around the world.... His defiance of imperialism and his insistence that Venezuela's vast oil reserves be used to uplift the masses of the people has changed the lives of millions of people," spokesman Khaya Xaba said.
Xaba said that while capitalists sneered at socialism, and major imperial forces disrupted it, Chavez had shown how socialism could benefit all.
Source : Sapa /pd/ma/th/clh
Date : 06 Mar 2013 10:20
Expelled ANC Youth League president Julius Malema joined leaders on Wednesday in mourning Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez.
"I join millions of progressive individuals... in sending my heartfelt condolences to the people of Venezuela for loosing a fearless, politically determined and ideologically steadfast leader in President Hugo Chavez," he said in a statement.
Malema said Chavez was among the few revolutionaries who challenged the dominance of imperialism in the world and exposed its weaknesses.
Chavez died on Tuesday after a two-year battle with cancer, ending 14 years of rule in Venezuela.
"Despite massive resistance from rented imperialist puppets, President Hugo Chavez was able to lead Venezuela into an era where the wealth of
Venezuela, particularly oil, was returned to the ownership of the people as a whole," Malema said.
The Young Communist League of SA said it was devastated at the news of Chavez's death.
"Comrade Chavez was an inspiration to all progressive forces around the world.... His defiance of imperialism and his insistence that Venezuela's vast oil reserves be used to uplift the masses of the people has changed the lives of millions of people," spokesman Khaya Xaba said.
Xaba said that while capitalists sneered at socialism, and major imperial forces disrupted it, Chavez had shown how socialism could benefit all.
Source : Sapa /pd/ma/th/clh
Date : 06 Mar 2013 10:20
grok
Honorary Master
It must be some sort of Stockhold syndrome where the abused develops positive feelings, empathy, love, towards their abusers.
I remember reading this and thinking the same thing ..
A lot of people are like that about monarchies as well. I can't understand it either.
Nerfherder
Honorary Master
The cANCer extolling the virtues of a man who f..cked up his country.
They consider that virtuous