The Man Who Could Save Venezuela
Throughout Latin America, autocrats and aspiring autocrats have long benefited from facing a divided opposition. Over the past decade, this phenomenon has helped semi-dictatorial leftists in Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. Back in 2006, for example, Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega captured the presidency in Nicaragua with only 38 percent of the vote, even though a majority of Nicaraguans (55 percent) voted for one of his two main conservative rivals, Eduardo Montealegre and José Rizo. That same year, Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chávez squared off against a fractured opposition and won reelection with 63 percent support.
All of which explains why Henrique Capriles is so important.
Earlier this month, Capriles secured the presidential nomination of Venezuela’s opposition alliance, known as the Coalition for Democratic Unity (its Spanish-language acronym is “MUD”). Currently serving as governor of Miranda, the country’s second most populous state, he garnered an impressive 64 percent of the vote, thereby receiving a strong mandate to represent MUD forces in the October 2012 national election. As former Venezuelan state oil official Pedro Burelli has written, it was the best-possible outcome for the opposition and the worst-possible outcome for Chávez.
Not surprisingly, the regime immediately set out to demonize the youthful Capriles, 39, with lies and ad hominem attacks. A pro-government journalist named Mario Silva alleged that Capriles was once arrested for having public sex with a man. Chávez himself called Capriles a “low-life,” a “pig,” and “the candidate of the bourgeois, of capitalism, of imperialism,” informing his rival that “the only place you’re going to govern is the land of Tarzan and his monkey Cheetah.” For good measure, he also referred to Capriles as “crappy one.”
Meanwhile, Venezuela’s state-run media have unleashed a torrent of anti-Semitic vitriol, at once labeling Capriles both a Zionist and a Nazi. These attacks are as ludicrous as they are offensive. The grandson of Polish Jews who fled their homeland to escape the Holocaust, Capriles is a practicing Catholic, yet the government propaganda machine has portrayed his ancestry as evidence of sinister ties to “international Zionism.” One pro-Chávez columnist described Zionism as “the most rotten sentiments represented by humanity.”
Such crude, vulgar anti-Semitism is worthy of Hamas or Hezbollah. Its publication on a state-run website highlights the ugly nature of the regime in Caracas, which has consistently used anti-Jewish and anti-Israeli rhetoric to demonize its domestic and foreign critics. “Nowhere does the Jewish community in Latin America feel more under attack than in Venezuela, as the country’s leader, his cabinet, and pro-government media have launched a steady barrage of condemnation toward Israel,” the Christian Science Monitor reported in August 2009. Seven months earlier, the capital city’s Mariperez Synagogue had been robbed and vandalized, “an act seen by many in the Jewish community as the greatest anti-Semitic attack in Venezuelan history.” The armed intruders defaced the synagogue with messages such as “Jews out of here” and “Israel assassins.” (For that matter, shortly before Venezuelan’s December 2007 constitutional referendum — in which Chávez suffered an embarrassing defeat — state police raided a prominent Jewish social club in Caracas.)
Either way, Chavez days are small in number. And it can’t happen soon enough. I’d like to see Chavez first defeated at the ballot box, though I doubt that will happen as the game rigged.
But this b*stard will be pushing thistles soon. If there’s justice this side of heaven, Chavez’s last day on earth will be the memory of his first day to be known as “former” President.
The good people of Venezuela, and I personally know a few, deserve no less for the crimes this pig has committed.
The Venezuelan people certainly did not vote to have Cuban Communists running key government institutions! It is a betrayal of the people that Chavez is enabling the take over of Venezuela by communist Cuba.
And as Caracas is now a global murder capital, amongst many other very severe problems, Venezuela is in urgent need of Mr. Capriles. For the sake of Venezuela, he must win!
The Cuban infiltration alone should be enough to convince Venezuelans that Chavez and his regime are not protecting their interests and should be ousted. I’d love to think that the United States would never allow itself to go the way of Venezuela but it’s easy for instance, to see the uncanny similarity between the ferocious personal attacks on Capriles leveled by Left-wing-controlled media in Venezuela and the attacks on Conservatives by Left-wing-controlled media in this country.
I wish Capriles well. Chavez’s hatred of George Bush and love of Ahmadinijad shows he is confuses good and evil.
As far as Lula in Brazil — he got lucky with the commodity boom. Brazil is an agri giant and higher incomes have resulted in better diets around the world. Higher incomes and expendable chinese goods have also drive a mining boom that has benefitted Brazil.
Nevertheless a democratic proponent of the welfare state like Caprilies is 1000% better than and anti american socialist with the goal of eroding every remaining democratic institution
Lula proffited on the market reforms of Cardozo , a social democrat and father of the dependency theory.
I did not know about Cardoza or Depend Theory. I will look them up. Thanks. Always learn something here in the comments section.
Latin America is tough. For generations almost all governments have tightly controlled the economy. Baked into that cake is massive corruption and crony capitalism. It is impossible to open a business making ladies dresses — goverment licenses, tax filings,… So the underground economy is huge.
Elites (left and right) looked out for their own and feathered their own nest. They leverage their connections to get govt. contracts, monopolies, and protection. All that goes on with Obama (LiteSquare, Solyndra), but it is worse in Latin America. If you are not connected you cannot get zoning permits, licenses,… Unless you pay massive bribes.
The poor in many cases are hardly are hardly entirely sympathetic. Murder rates in Caracas, San Salvador, San Pedro Sula lead the world. Drug dealing is rampant. Zero kids are born in wedlock. Afro pagan catholocism is the culture. Where the elites engage in corruption, the poor engage in a thug lifestyle spiced with the seductive pleasures of the flesh. The poor are not prepared for jobs that do not exist because of the perpetually bad economy. Think of the south Bronx or Pico Union without welfare, WIC, Section 8, or EBT Cards. At least the people in latin america are not fat like our underclass.
The exception would be Chile where conservative Pinochet established a free market economy. The Free people and free speech were soon to follow. Chavez has no intention of any of these freedoms.
Ditto!
And el Señor Post Chavez (whoever) inherits the Goebbels media propaganda machine and the Ministerio de Justícia goonsquad, either of which is just as powerful as those of ObamaSoros.
Capriles is a brave man, but just as in the USA, the commissars have generations yet to go before they’ve ground down civilization to the point it will no longer sustain them. The cycle may take a thousand years, as it did with Rome, but the pulp of humanity these tyrants leave behind will eventually germinate a new Enlightenment.
But you can’t wait for it. Go Galt.
I think God is ending the long reign of Oogoe.
And that he will no longer be physically viable when the October elections (or ‘selections’) roll around.
No. His main supporters ae the same left wing figures including the manager of a newspaper that recieved money from the URSS for decades. Plus left wing parties They are the same antiparty people that supported the Chavez´s coup in 92. And backed him in 1998. Many of them were part of Chavez´s goverment until recently. Some until three months ago. He was side by side with the Minister of defense in 1999, when the army suppresed the congres by decreeof the Constituional Assembly that lacked competency to disolve the Congress.
he present himself as a center left progressive. His model is supposed to be the PP from Spain but him and his consultans are more akin to the PSOE. He has said that he will keep the Misiones, handing out money to people because they have kids or are in jail or “studying”. He says the desregulation will be gradual.He like many of his entourage believe tha problem is no socialism( they think it works in Spain, Chile , Brasil and Sweeden)but the the people ap´lying it.
He could win . I will vote for him with a hankerchief in my nose.But he will fail managing the economy, expect a mix of crony capitalism with populism and socialism. Because he know nothing of economics and it is olnly a TV figure. Still the incumbent of his heir ( there is no way Chavez will be the candidate)is worst
NB:Murder rates in Caracas is caused by a penal system based on german rules . Felons have rights , victims not. And the supporters of Capriles are even more keeen on” human rights ” of felons. And the mentallity among lawyers is once they have a right , the constituion bar the correction( Rights are progressive, fiat ius, pereat mundi)