Arming Venezuela
The U.S. is set to ban arms sales to Venezuela.
Which begs the question: The U.S. has been selling arms to Venezuela?!
Okay, okay, I know. The U.S. needs Venezuela's oil. Fine. But arms? Does the U.S. appreciate just what kind of a regime Hugo Chavez has set up for himself in Caracas?
And how's this for euphemism of the day: The State Department now lists Venezuela as "a country of concern".
Oh, really?
Which begs the question: The U.S. has been selling arms to Venezuela?!
Okay, okay, I know. The U.S. needs Venezuela's oil. Fine. But arms? Does the U.S. appreciate just what kind of a regime Hugo Chavez has set up for himself in Caracas?
And how's this for euphemism of the day: The State Department now lists Venezuela as "a country of concern".
Oh, really?
posted by Michael J.W. Stickings at
6:52 AM
5 Comments:
Thanks, Susan. It would be interesting to know the full extent of America's arms sales to Venezuela, both before and during Chavez's rule. It's troubling enough that he taunts the U.S. with American F-16s in his arsenal.
By
Michael J.W. Stickings, at 9:18 AM
Hey, can anyone explain what's WRONG with Chavez? Sounds like he has a lot of social programs and the like, is there anything concrete against him other than he's not giving exxon his oil?
--curious
By
Anonymous, at 4:47 PM
Do you know if the U.S. sells them anything else, Susan? Military-wise?
Anonymous: Are you kidding? Isn't Chevez's cult-of-personality authoritarianism (Venezuela's democracy is a sham, and he's eroding it) enough to worry you? How about his friendship with Iran and Cuba? How about his crackdown on dissidents? How about his attempts to prop up other anti-American regimes throughout Latin America (he's buying influence with oil money)?
For more, I highly recommend Franklin Foer's piece in the latest Atlantic.
By
Michael J.W. Stickings, at 12:59 AM
Hrm, not bothered by him talking with cuba, nor his opposition to "manifest destiny". He's rather anti-american, but can you honestly blame anyone in south/central america for that? He's not anti-american enough yet to warrant a plane/helicopter accident though.
I rather like that he's trying to use his nation's oil to help with social programs rather than sell it all off for huge personal profit to exxon and friends...
All I keep seeing in the press is unwarranted slander/name calling with nothing to back it up.
I read the start of Foer's piece, will have to pick up the magazine as I'm not a subscriber, but I will pick it up and read it.
--alex
By
Anonymous, at 2:25 PM
Why is Chavez oftened referred to as eroding democracy? He has won 9 referendums in 8 years through elections that have been certified by multiple independent election including ex-President Jimmy Carter's? He still holds a massive majority in public opinion polls, something that would be unlikely if there was electoral fraud. Also, exit polling for elections matched the results, which is an extremely accurate method most commonly used worldwide to authenticate the fairness of vote counting. It should also be stated that only the United States has this exit polling NOT indicated the vote count, suggesting either a statistical anomaly or election fraud. Even a small amount of research into actual verifiable facts will reveal absolutely no crackdown on dissidents. On the contrary, Venezuela's privately owned media attacks Chavez 24 hours a day and suffer no reprisal. This is in contrast to previous governments, in which human rights abuses were well known. (as existed in almost all of Latin America) We should ask ourselves, who benefits from this smear campaign of Chavez? Who will lose out if Chavez nationalises resources and spends money on alleviating poverty and improving the lives of his citizens? If they are the same people who control the media which constantly smears him, then we should at least be savvy enough to delve a little deeper and do our own research.
By
Anonymous, at 8:50 AM
Post a Comment
<< Home