Hugo Chavez? Hipolito? Brothers in crime? Public scorn?

Mej?a could carry Casttro's or Guevara's jockstrap. Bush & Co. have covertly caused much of Venezuela's problems.

-Jose?to

jose?to said:

Mej?a could carry Casttro's or Guevara's jockstrap. Bush & Co. have covertly caused much of Venezuela's problems.

-Jose?to

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Every problem in the world is America's fault!!!!
The US did not force the Venezualen people to vote for Chavez. They voted out of their own ignoranceand stupididty. The Same goes with the DR and Hippo. Castro on the other hand, was never elected in a free and open election. Che guevara is irrelevant. All he was is a Poster Boy. He never had any political power in Cuba. Fidel saw to that.

jose?to - Your posts lately are wondering all over the place. Do me a favor, try and keep on topic and drop your own agenda for a while. Don't bother replying to this post, I will just delete it.

Opps, let me re-phrase that "I'll ask the moderators to consider removing your post". Too many forums in this place!!!

Ever notice how aall the problems in the world,

....are never caused by the people who have the problems???? I wish I could get away with that logic,it would make life very simple!!!!CRIS COLON

Sometimes I wonder if we Latin Americans would not have a genetical condition that prevent us from voting for honest politicians. Then I slap myself for that thought is too close to reverse racism.

Both the Venezuelans and Dominicans brought all this on to the themselves. And yes, it is fair to say that there are common points to these two politicians, namely a complete inability to engage their brain before opening their mouths.

Venezuela is going through a class struggle right now. I'm not sure if Chavez is the best representative for this kind of political movement. Lula in Brazil, and Equator and Argentina are moving more to the left. Those people out in the street in Venezuela are the blancitos and those being paid by the right. Chavez still holds quite a bit of popular support with the poor and those not associated with the oil industry. Kind of like the cocolos wearing red Reformista shirts during the campaigns in the DR. Chavez is trying to wrestle control of the "state" run oil industry from the elites in the country. The government in the DR is nothing but corruption and everyone trying to figure out how they can get "their's". I have met a few honest hardworking people in the government, but they are few. Doesn't look like raising salaries in the legislature didn't reduce the need for other revenue streams off the books. I really don't know how you are going to change this part of the culture. I guess we can give the Spanish and Trujillo credit for that one. Both the PRD and the PLD claim to represent the working stiff and neither did/are doing a very good job of it. It is a bit scattered but sort of in a hurry.

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Both seem to have lost the popular support of the vast majority of their citizens?
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Thats not true. Chavez still hold the support of the majority lower class.

When Chavez came to power, interest rates were coming off 60% peaks. The economy was shrinking by 8, external debt was very high inflation was over 30%. Up until January of 2002, all of those economic numbers had improved.

When Mejia took power, the DR economy was the best performing in nearly all of the Americas. Debt was low, inflation was falling to single digits, things were good. Since he took power, well, we know the rest of that story.

SO, if you want to discuss the facts, there is no comparison. Mejia is much worse to the DR than Chavez is to Venezuela.

In 2002, Chavez' politics came to a head with the wealthy Venezuelans...and we know what happened.

What can happen in the DR is that a populist candidate can emerge to challenge the PRD. If conditions continue to detiorate, this condidate could rightfully run on a platform of taking back the money the PRD has stolen. I would back such a candidate. Go to Mejia's circle of evil and charge them with crimes against the nation. Take the money back, or improson them.

I agree with Mondongo in that Chavez has a real political philosophy, sophomoric to be sure, but genuine and class based. Mejia is simply greed and corruption personified.

I also agree with Pib about the nature of Latin Americans. While also wanting to avoid self-hate, it occurs to me that stereotypes are not offensive when they are true.

It was once pointed out to me that the Spanish language by its structure discourages taking personal responsibility for errors. For example, in English you would say: "I dropped the glass". Whereas in Spanish you would say: "Me callo el vaso", or to translate, "the glass fell from me." Accordingly, in Spanish, you didn't actually drop the glass, so you are not responsible for it.

So, Joseito, it's not the Americans' fault, but rather the Spaniards. But don't write that in your Latin American History exam, because your leftist professor won't like it (but your Linguistics professor will love it).

it's not the Americans' fault, but rather the Spaniards

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Ha! Now that's a point I make with some of my Latin American leftist friends: the blind spot they have when it comes to the United States. I am not uncritical of US foreign policy at the best of times but I am tired of hearing people like these say 'well I never could learn English because I can't bring myself to speak the language of the enemy' or words to that effect. Now, I try to argue that although the US has not got a clean record when it comes to policy in Latin America why not extend that logic to Spain as well? What about the horrors inflicted by the conquistadores on the indigenous populations? Should we reject Spanish as our language and insist on speaking Taino or whatever? I think not!

On the linguistic question, I read something by Julia Alvarez where she makes a similar point - how easy it is as a Spanish- speaking child to say the cookies had been eaten whereas in English you'd have to admit that you ate them, as there is no easy way of saying it any other way.

Chirimoya