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-- Venezuela like totally rocks!

Venezuela like totally rocks!

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PAIN IN SLUMS OF CHAVEZ CARACAS KIDS LIVE IN FEAR By DOUGLAS MONTERO Slideshow image Venezuelan youths pick through garbage in order to make money by collecting recyclables. PreviousPauseNext PrintEmailEmail October 3, 2006 -- I'D LIKE Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez to meet one of his countrymen, 15-year-old Manuel Gonzalez. Manuel, who's never been to school, lives in a tin-roofed shack with walls made of slabs of half-inch-thick wood, cardboard and flattened oil drums. His "house" clings precariously to La Vega, one of hundreds of hillside slums that dot Chavez's oil-rich capital. Each day, Manuel lugs buckets of water or propane tanks so his pregnant mother, 12-year-old sister and 1-year-old brother can eat, bathe and flush the toilet. "I'm scared. I don't want to live here, but I have to take care of my family," Manuel told me. Chavez should come here, as I did, to see firsthand his country's horrific underbelly - the worsening poverty that he neglects even as he pretends to be a champion of the poor. It'd be a better use of his time than trips abroad and to New York, where Chavez created an uproar last month by denouncing President Bush as "sick," an "alcoholic" and the "devil." Here, it seems the devil is closer to home. At night, Manuel's mother loops a thick chain through a hole in their shanty's thin metal door to barricade her family from murderous teen thieves who roam with impunity. "Three kids under the age of 18 are murdered in Venezuela every day," said Fernando Pereira, a coordinator for CECODAP, a nonprofit human-rights group trying to save children. "We don't know of any government program that exists to combat this phenomenon." The astounding youth death rate belies the public persona Chavez exhibits whenever he comes to New York and eagerly embraces, and sometimes kisses, every little kid he sees. Chavez recently proclaimed during a ceremony announcing a $16 million plan to rehabilitate 704 homes in a shantytown that extreme poverty has dropped from 21 to 10 percent. But critics say 50 percent of the county's 26 million inhabitants earn less than $2 a day. Luis Pedro Espana, director of the Economic and Social Research Institute at the Andres Bello Catholic University, said poverty has remained constant since Chavez was elected president in 1998 - despite the country's oil wealth.

Well it's only a single case and it doesn't really say a lot. In the short run the poor are probably better off under him than under anyone else, but in the long run hell no - his economic policies are ruining his country!

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Originally posted by St_Andrew Well it's only a single case and it doesn't really say a lot. In the short run the poor are probably better off under him than under anyone else, but in the long run hell no - his economic policies are ruining his country!

If that's "better off," I'd hate to see what "worse" looks like.

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Originally posted by NeoPhono If that's "better off," I'd hate to see what "worse" looks like.

For example, a good economic policy would be to spend his oil money on more long term projects, like infrastructure, an oil profit fund (to avoid "dutch disease" and still have good economic possibilites when the oil runs out), etc. But he spent his money on building free medical centers for poor people, food and housing subsidaires etc. Or to make more reasonble policies, fighting inflation instead of price control, letting private buisnesses invest instead of taking all the money for short term spending etc.

So surely someone is better off under Chavez right now if you are poor, compared to someone with more reasonble economic policies, but in 10 years time you sure wouldn't be.

He's too busy flying around trying to tell the West how evil we are.

Sounds like your a-typical autocratic dictatorship to me...

stogies with Castro stunt your brain....

Invade, Damnit Rummy! INVADE!!!!!!!

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Originally posted by MisterOpus1 Invade, Damnit Rummy! INVADE!!!!!!!

I am soooo ready for isolationism again.

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Originally posted by Fir3start3r He's too busy flying around trying to tell the West how evil we are.

Latin America IS part of the WEST. Albeit an extreme version as a frenchman said, but still part of the west.

Still, I do agree he is the typical "caudillo," a dictator-like larva.

>Mass demonstrations yesterday opposing Chavez<


viva'la revolucion'!!!!!!!

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Originally posted by KaNoS Latin America IS part of the WEST. Albeit an extreme version as a frenchman said, but still part of the west.

Not really. Chile is very Western. Uruguay, Argentina, and southern Brazil are fairly western as well. The problem is that the rest of Latin America is much poorer then western Europe, the US, Canada, Australia, and Japan. In fact, most of the countries of eastern Europe have a higher GDP then Latin America, and even Chile's GDP doesn't compare with the Czech Republic or Slovenia.
In Brazil's biggest cities the problem is the lack of a large Middle Class base. You've oftentimes got two thirds poor, and a third that are rich/wealthy. From what I've read the poorest parts of Brazil are in the north, while the 3 most southern states are the most prosperous with a good Middle and upper class base.
Colombia? Peru? Bolivia? Panama? Venezuela? Take your pick - unstable governments, mass poverty, and in many countries there it's even hard to find dairy products. Things might not be nearly as bad as parts of Africa (where in some countries 30 percent of the population has Aids) or Bangledesh, but they're not as good as in the West.

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