Four Things You Need to Know about Venezuela
(2). The regime is run partly by Cubans.
In early 2010, several former Chávez loyalists published a letter denouncing the “incursion of outside elements” into key Venezuelan institutions, including the armed forces. As if to demonstrate their point, Cuban Gen. Ramiro Valdés, founder of the notorious G2 intelligence service, arrived in Venezuela to help Chávez consolidate his burgeoning autocracy. (Valdés was supposedly visiting the South American country as an energy consultant, but the real purpose of his trip was easy to discern.) The cash-strapped Castro government desperately needs Venezuelan oil subsidies, so it is desperate to keep Chávez in power. Hence the influx of Cuban “advisers” working to strengthen his Bolivarian revolution. Caracas is now persecuting retired Gen. Antonio Rivero for decrying the Cubanization of the Venezuelan military.
By giving Cuban officials such important roles in Venezuela’s security apparatus, Chávez has done two things: First, he has brought in trained Communists with a wealth of experience running a dictatorship. Second, he has given Havana significant influence over Venezuelan government operations — as long as he remains in power. A non-Chávez government, whether democratic or not, might well seek to reverse the process of Cubanization, which has inflamed nationalist passions and angered senior members of the Venezuelan armed forces, not to mention many other Venezuelan authorities. “In some ministries, such as health and agriculture, Cuban advisers appear to wield more power than Venezuelan officials,” The Economist reported last year. “The health ministry is often unable to provide statistics — on primary health-care or epidemiology for instance — because the information is sent back to Havana instead.”
(3). The regime’s senior military allies are complicit in the drug trade.
To date, the U.S. Treasury Department has sanctioned three top Venezuelan generals for having links to drug trafficking: Cliver Alcalá, a prominent army commander; Hugo Carvajal, the military intelligence chief; and Henry Rangel Silva, the defense minister. All three are devoted chavistas, whereas many other Venezuelan military officials have grown estranged from Chávez. When Alcalá was added to the Treasury blacklist a few months ago, Univision reporter Casto Ocando noted that he stood out as “one of the few military figures that still has the confidence of the Venezuelan president.”
Both Alcalá and Venezuelan intelligence official Ramón Isidro Madriz Moreno — along with two pro-Chávez legislators — were accused of collaborating with Colombian narco-terrorists belonging to the FARC. These charges came on the heels of explosive allegations by imprisoned cocaine kingpin Walid Makled, who has claimed that dozens of Venezuelan generals and government officials were involved in his lucrative drug business. The Chávez government is effectively a military regime, and the generals implicated by Makled and Treasury include some of the highest-ranking members of that regime.
(4). The regime has trained thousands of pro-government paramilitary fighters, who represent a serious long-term threat to domestic peace and stability.
Call them the Venezuelan Revolutionary Guards: Chávez has established a militia comparable to the famous Iranian outfit that is sworn to defend theocratic rule. Earlier this year, a presidential decree brought these Venezuelan paramilitary fighters under Chávez’s direct command; it also gave them officers who are independent of the army. According to an analysis of captured FARC computer files by the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London, the Venezuelan paramilitaries have received direct training from Colombia’s biggest terror group. “FARC communications also discussed providing training in urban terrorism methods for representatives of the Venezuelan Communist Party and several radical cells from 23 de Enero, a Caracas slum that has long been a hive of pro-Chávez activity,” as the New York Times has reported.
While the exact size of the pro-Chávez militia remains disputed, there is no question that it has grown disturbingly large. (There is also no question that Caracas has purchased massive amounts of sophisticated Russian weaponry.) The militia represents “a personal army, a Praetorian Guard,” retired Venezuelan Adm. Elias Buchszer told the Associated Press last year. Its true raison d’être, he said, is to perpetuate the Bolivarian revolution. If Chávez died of cancer, or if he were in real danger of losing the 2012 election, the militia could conceivably be called out to squash political unrest. That could lead to bloody street violence, and possibly something much worse.
Can somebody out there please tell me whatever happened to the Monroe Doctrine? Did we just toss it away because it was just too hard to enforce? This situation in Venezuela would never, EVER, be going on if Reagan or George H.W. Bush were in office. Look at what H.W. Bush did to Panama when he thought its leader was getting out of line. And things have only been getting much worse since Obama has been president. Now the new Republican president that gets elected in 2012 will have a disaster on his hands with Venezuela, especially after Chavez dies. There will be a huge power struggle in that country, with countries like China and Iran sticking their noses in it as well. Great going, champ! Obama keeps thinking up new ways to make this country weaker, especially in its own neighborhood.
James Monroe is a dead white male, as is John Quincy Adams (the real architect of the Monroe Doctrine). Barky’s puppeteers have neither interest in nor respect for them.
These are underworld gangster mentalities, in charge of militarily equipped soldiers.
What’s the problem?
These vipers don’t even pretend to be legitimate, sanctioned as a country, they bask under the shield of diplomacy.
Do they pretend to be the opposite? What if they are feigning belligerence and corruption, while covertly developing the region to improve it?
Panama is ours- Noriega ensured we’d have reasons to invade. Nicaragua is ours- the Sandinistas and Contras were secretly allied in support of our guy, Daniel Ortega. Venezuela is ours- google “hugo chavez cia agent”.
Cuba too, and several more….
I am an American gringo who is married to a very cultured Venezuelan woman. She was front and center during the Chavez take over. She worked for the government and saw it all in real time, up close and personal. She tried to wait it out but it got so bad that she eventually had to leave. She left behind a career, a country, a culture and her condo has been absonded with by a Chavista (without recompense).
She went back a few months ago and, after 9 years, despite all of the stuff she had seen in the media, she was still horrified at the condition of the place. She was there for a week and was twice the victim of governmental abuse and one kidnapping attempt. Lickiliy here sister, who still lives there, ws on top of the situation and thwarted it through aggressive action. They live like this every day in VZ (and this isn’t even Caracas).
This is VZ’s reward for ignoring a vast poo populatin for too many years. Communism looks good to those who live in grinding poverty. Cavez has so many supporters because they ony see that he gives them something more than they had, even if it costs them thier liberty and anything resembling justice.
I left Vzla in 97′. I have followed the movement of Vzla since.
There are many Chavezian (not a real word) tactics that Obama has used. We still have an opportunity here in the US to turn back what Obama has started.
For Vzla it may be to late.
I am genuinely sad for Venezuela under the dictatorship of this bombastic peasant, Chavez.
Reportedly, Oogoe is misrepresenting the true state of his health as he misrepresents most everything.
He may not make it to next year’s elections, but there will be a huge mess to clean up in the aftermath.
Venezuela is merely a showcase example of all of Latin America’s swing to the left. Name any Latin American country and below the surface percolates marxist/ leninist practices. Why, just look at Latin America’s largest country, Brazil.
In Brazil, endemic corruption permeates all of brazilian society.A 1988 Constitution, meant to correct last Constitution’s mistakes(one of 6), merely exacerbated them, compounding lawlessness in the Administrative branch of government, legislative and judicial.
Brazil’s administrative branch has been dominated by a radicalized Worker Party (Partido Trabalhista). It’s legislative branch is inoperable by nature of having usered in some 32-odd differing political parties slicing and dicing Brazilians collected taxes into “earmarks,” cozy business deals and general graft and corruption. And lastly, Brazil’s paragon of probity – the judicial branch of government. This is the worst offender of every corrupt legal practice there is in all it’s manifestations. 60% of judges are corrupt. Delegados/as in every precinct of Brazil, interpret laws for personal benefit. Lawyers are the worst, they’ll throw their mothers under the bus for personal profit.
So goes the rest of Latin America. Chavez is just one of many corrupt governments on the Latin American continent.
Troubling omen, for the USA. Without MORAL CLARITY, the USA could quite easily become a marxist/socialist top down, command economy too. Vote massively this 2012 election for massive fraud is already around We The People. Vote – Moral Clarity. God Bless America.
I have never met a person from South America who wasn’t a socialist romantic. That’s just the way they roll.
Your first sentence may be true, for all I know.
Your second sentence is false — and painfully ignorant.
Colombians dislike communists. They have suffered from the FARC and ELN — Communist Guerilla Groups.
“…he is using the loans to fund projects “that are likely to help him at the ballot box.”
Just for a second there I thought you were talking about Obama.
Great post & comments.
This is what should be on our primetime news and a subject for ‘current events’ in our schools.
You have found one, nice to meet you, JL!
This is just another dangerous failed state which we should avoid like the plague.
Ignore/avoid my foot! These regimes are actively influencing events and elections in other nearby countries. Avoid them at your own peril, they should be actively repelled. The “ostrich policy” has never worked. Evil must be confronted.
That is a really high murder rate. Much higher than even Mexican drug hotspots like Juarez, Culiacan, Durango. Leftism destroys character.
We are in a battle of civilization vs. barbaism. Chavez is a barbarian who uses the force of the state to take what he wants and maintain power.
Look how they tried to create their own institutions like the Bolivarian Cirlces. Creepy.
Break-ups and Splits, One Marital, One Philosophical
It is with a heavy heart that I report on a recent marital break-up amongst America’s celebrities and with an even heavier heart the dissolution of ties that once bound philosophical allies.
Actually, I’m not experiencing any compassion at all for either the celeb in question, L.A. Laker shooting guard Kobe Bean Bryant or for America’s president since both are getting their just desserts. Bryant’s dessert is especially sweet and Obama’s specially ironic.
Let’s start with the ironic rift which is pertinent to the upcoming election year and which must represent a crushing blow to President Barack Hussein Obama.
The bloom is off the Hugo-Barack rose.
As if he hadn’t noticed before, playing to America’s center-right electorate Obama dared criticize President Hugo Chavez’ dismal human rights record in Venezuela and the dictator’s chumminess with Cuba and Iran. An audacious attack made in a Caracas newspaper, his well-founded criticism proved incendiary and evoked a spirited rejoinder from the South American leader.
With both presidents up for re-election in 2012, Chavez shot back by characterizing his North American counterpart as a “clown,” admonishing his fellow socialist, “Now you want to win votes by attacking Venezuela. Don’t be irresponsible. You are a clown, a clown. Leave us in peace . . . Go after your votes by fulfilling that which you promised your people.”
As if that put-down were not harsh enough, Chavez added, “Focus on governing your country, which you’ve turned into a disaster.”
Of course, for those of us who have closely followed Obama’s meteoric, inexplicable rise to political stardom, the clown reference, the failed promises, and the national disaster comment aren’t revelations but, still, it’s awkward to witness birds of a feather getting so ruffled.
Chavez also threw in, “If I could be a candidate there in the United States, I’d sweep you away.”
How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to be trashed by one of your own kind!
In less earth-shaking but more titillating news, accused rapist and notorious man-about-town Kobe Bryant will probably be taken to the financial cleaners by his estranged wife, Vanessa. . .
(Read more at http://www.genelalor.com/blog1/?p=11508.)
Every nation’s economy in Latin America is growing – Venezuela included
The most violent nation in South America is Colombia, the most violent states in Venezuela are bordering Colombia and have Right wing controlled legislatures.
The most dangerous nations in Latin America are Guatemal and Honduras – both with right wing presidents.