How Hugo Chavez Became Irrelevant

[The War Report]

AS Hugo Chávez, the icon of Latin America’s left, struggles to hang on to his job, it’s tempting to read tomorrow’s closely contested election in Venezuela as a possible signal of the region’s return to the right. That would be a mistake, because the question that’s been roiling Latin America for a dozen years isn’t “left or right?” but “which left?”

Outsiders have often interpreted Latin America’s swing to the left over the last dozen years as a movement of leaders marching in ideological lock step. But within the region, the fault lines have always been clear.

Radical revolutionary regimes in Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia and Nicaragua joined Cuba, the granddaddy of the far left, in a bloc determined to confront the capitalist world, even if that meant increasingly authoritarian government.

A more moderate set of leaders in Brazil, Uruguay and Guatemala put forth an alternative: reducing poverty through major social reforms without turning their backs on democratic institutions or private property rights.

As Fidel Castro’s favorite son, Mr. Chávez has always been the leader of the radical wing. And Brazil’s size and economic power made it the natural leader of the reformist wing.

Outwardly, the two camps have been at pains to deny that any divisions exist. There have been many pious words of solidarity and lots of regional integration accords. But behind closed doors, each side is often viciously dismissive of the other, with Chávez supporters seeing the Brazilians as weak-kneed appeasers of the bourgeoisie while the Brazilians sneer at Mr. Chávez’s outdated radicalism and chronic incompetence.

As recently as five or six years ago, there was a real ideological contest. A wildly unpopular American president prone to military adventurism helped Mr. Chávez rally the continent against Washington. One country after the next joined the radical axis. First Bolivia, then Nicaragua, Honduras and Ecuador, joined a growing roll call of radicals in 2005 and 2006.

Now the political landscape is almost entirely transformed. Barack Obama’s 2008 victory badly undermined the radicals’ ability to rally opposition to gringo imperialism. Meanwhile, the alternative was becoming increasingly attractive.

Brazil’s remarkable success in reducing poverty speaks for itself. Building on a foundation of macroeconomic stability and stable democratic institutions, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who was Brazil’s president from 2003 to 2010, oversaw the most remarkable period of social mobility in Latin America’s living memory.

As millions of Brazilians rose into the middle class, Mr. Chávez’s autocratic excesses came to look unnecessary and inexcusable to Venezuelans. Mr. da Silva and his successor, Dilma Rousseff, have shown that a country does not need to stack the courts, purge the army and politicize the central bank to fight poverty. Brazil proves that point, quietly, day in and day out.

It isn’t just democratic institutions that have suffered from Mr. Chávez’s radicalism; it’s the economy, too. Venezuela’s traditional dependence on oil exports has deepened, with 96 percent of export revenue now coming from the oil industry, up from 67 percent just before Mr. Chávez took office. Nationalized steel mills produce a fraction of the steel they’re designed for, forcing the state to import the difference. And nationalized electric utilities plunge most of the country into darkness several times a week. The contrast with Brazil’s high-tech, entrepreneurial, export-oriented economy couldn’t be more stark.

For all of Mr. Chávez’s talk of radical transformation, Venezuela’s child mortality and adult literacy statistics have not improved any faster under his government than they did over the several decades before he rose to power.

With oversight institutions neutered, the president now runs the country as a personal fief: expropriating businesses on a whim and deciding who goes to jail. Judges who rule against the government’s wishes are routinely fired, and one has even been jailed. Chávez-style socialism looks like the worst of both worlds: both more authoritarian and less effective at reducing poverty than the Brazilian alternative.

And the region has noticed. The key moment came in April 2011, when Ollanta Humala won the Peruvian presidency. Long seen as the most radical of Latin America’s new breed of leaders, Mr. Humala had run on a Chávez-style platform in 2006 and lost. By last year, he’d seen the way the wind was blowing and remade himself into a Brazilian-style moderate, won and proceeded to govern — so far, successfully — in the Brazilian mold.

Now, in a final indignity, Mr. Chávez is facing a tight re-election race against Henrique Capriles Radonski, a 40-year-old progressive state governor who extols the virtues of the Brazilian model.

Although Mr. Chávez’s government has done its best to paint a caricature of Mr. Capriles as an old-style right-wing oligarch, he is unmistakably within the Brazilian center-left mold: Mr. Capriles pitches himself as an ambitious but pragmatic social reformer committed to ending the Chávez era’s authoritarian excesses.

The rest of Latin America has already been through the ideological battle in which Venezuela remains mired. By and large, other nations have made their choices. The real question in this election is whether Venezuela will join the hemispheric consensus now, or later.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/06/opinion/how-hugo-chavez-became-irrelevant.html?hp&_r=0


Brazil.

 

[Amare's Right Hook]

Caralho !!!

 

[No1]

 

[Dusty Bake Activate]

Nice read.

 

[newarkhiphop]

so irrelevant he deserves a article on his irrelevancy. Yankee propaganda at its finest.


Qué viva la revolución.

 

[Turenne]

Quality article.

 

[Turenne]

so irrelevant he deserves a article on his irrelevancy. Yankee propaganda at its finest.


Qué viva la revolución.

Its over dude. Plus after 20 or so years in charge dude has completely failed to improve the social and economic conditions in the country while he has one of the worst humanitarian records in the region.

 

[Dusty Bake Activate]

so irrelevant he deserves a article on his irrelevancy. Yankee propaganda at its finest.


Qué viva la revolución.

So what wasn't true about the article?

 

[newarkhiphop]

Its over dude. Plus after 20 or so years in charge dude has completely failed to improve the social and economic conditions in the country while he has one of the worst humanitarian records in the region.

Elections are tomorrow the PEOPLE will decide what's over or not.

 

[88m3]

Elections are tomorrow the PEOPLE will decide what's over or not.

 

[thekingsmen]

NYtimes never liked Chavez. Then again rich conglomerate media outlets never liked men of color who helped their people out.

Rockefeller owned newspapers have been irrelevant for decades.

 

[newarkhiphop]

So what wasn't true about the article?

where should I start ? The title? Saying Chavez is irrelevant and like I said he is irrelevant enough to write a article about two days before elections in his country. A article which on purpose gives a shocking title but provides little to no substance. That's American propaganda 101, but I'll do a break down nonetheless.

Paragraphs 1-2: Says nothing of importance

Paragraph 3 : Calls the sovereign governments of Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia and Nicaragua and Cuba "radicals revolutionaries" all this when the leaders of these countries where chosen by the people, but it just so happens that these governments want to take away the natural resources and wealth which the rich oligarchy's have been abusing for years and give some of that power and money back to average peasant , Hearts and Minds. This is all a setup for paragraph 4

Paragraph 4: This paragraph now names a whole other set of countries Brazil, Uruguay and Guatemala. It calls there leaders "moderate" . This is more of ploy to have the reader think that's its VS thing good Latin american countries vs bad ones , again all made on baseless claims no real facts provided. If you really look at it. It should be one list of countries that over the past 6-8 years have done right by there people by spreading the wealth, the movement is in its infancy , with Uruguay not even belonging there, Uruguay for the most part doesn't suffer from the same social and economic issues of the others.


This good vs evil thing is a good intro too , because the theme of the rest of the article is a Brazil vs Venezuela thing. The article itself though provides no solid facts of this but themselves admit defeat

Outwardly, the two camps have been at pains to deny that any divisions exist. There have been many pious words of solidarity and lots of regional integration accords.

Don't be fooled , there is no division with Brazil , Venezuela and the rest of Latin America , do different leaders have differences every once in a while? Sure but what world leaders agree on everything all the time? None. Brazil and Venezuela continue to lead the way in economic independence from the United States in Latin america, not only are they doing but there providing the blueprint for other countries to do it.

The rest of the article like i said earlier is nothing more than your standard anti Chavez rhetoric which has gotten old at this point , from the second half of the article you can literally take out the words Chavez and Venezuela and replace with it.

Cuba & Fidel Castro
Iraq & Saddam Hussein
Taliban & Afghanistan
Iran & Ahmadinejad
Libya & Qaddafi
Arafat & Palestine
Syria & al-Assad

ETC ETC ETC

 

[thekingsmen]

where should I start ? The title? Saying Chavez is irrelevant and like I said he is irrelevant enough to write a article about two days before elections in his country. A article which on purpose gives a shocking title but provides little to no substance. That's American propaganda 101, but I'll do a break down nonetheless.

Paragraphs 1-2: Says nothing of importance

Paragraph 3 : Calls the sovereign governments of Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia and Nicaragua and Cuba "radicals revolutionaries" all this when the leaders of these countries where chosen by the people, but it just so happens that these governments want to take away the natural resources and wealth which the rich oligarchy's have been abusing for years and give some of that power and money back to average peasant , Hearts and Minds. This is all a setup for paragraph 4

Paragraph 4: This paragraph now names a whole other set of countries Brazil, Uruguay and Guatemala. It calls there leaders "moderate" . This is more of ploy to have the reader think that's its VS thing good Latin american countries vs bad ones , again all made on baseless claims no real facts provided. If you really look at it. It should be one list of countries that over the past 6-8 years have done right by there people by spreading the wealth, the movement is in its infancy , with Uruguay not even belonging there, Uruguay for the most part doesn't suffer from the same social and economic issues of the others.


This good vs evil thing is a good intro too , because the theme of the rest of the article is a Brazil vs Venezuela thing. The article itself though provides no solid facts of this but themselves admit defeat



Don't be fooled , there is no division with Brazil , Venezuela and the rest of Latin America , do different leaders have differences every once in a while? Sure but what world leaders agree on everything all the time? None. Brazil and Venezuela continue to lead the way in economic independence from the United States in Latin america, not only are they doing but there providing the blueprint for other countries to do it.

The rest of the article like i said earlier is nothing more than your standard anti Chavez rhetoric which has gotten old at this point , from the second half of the article you can literally take out the words Chavez and Venezuela and replace with it.

Cuba & Fidel Castro
Iraq & Saddam Hussein
Taliban & Afghanistan
Iran & Ahmadinejad
Libya & Qaddafi
Arafat & Palestine
Syria & al-Assad

ETC ETC ETC

Post of the Week.

 

[Rice N Beans]

Pretty hard to take the article serious when it only serves the purpose to downplay any form of socialism.

 

[The Real]

where should I start ? The title? Saying Chavez is irrelevant and like I said he is irrelevant enough to write a article about two days before elections in his country. A article which on purpose gives a shocking title but provides little to no substance. That's American propaganda 101, but I'll do a break down nonetheless.

Paragraphs 1-2: Says nothing of importance

Paragraph 3 : Calls the sovereign governments of Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia and Nicaragua and Cuba "radicals revolutionaries" all this when the leaders of these countries where chosen by the people, but it just so happens that these governments want to take away the natural resources and wealth which the rich oligarchy's have been abusing for years and give some of that power and money back to average peasant , Hearts and Minds. This is all a setup for paragraph 4

Paragraph 4: This paragraph now names a whole other set of countries Brazil, Uruguay and Guatemala. It calls there leaders "moderate" . This is more of ploy to have the reader think that's its VS thing good Latin american countries vs bad ones , again all made on baseless claims no real facts provided. If you really look at it. It should be one list of countries that over the past 6-8 years have done right by there people by spreading the wealth, the movement is in its infancy , with Uruguay not even belonging there, Uruguay for the most part doesn't suffer from the same social and economic issues of the others.


This good vs evil thing is a good intro too , because the theme of the rest of the article is a Brazil vs Venezuela thing. The article itself though provides no solid facts of this but themselves admit defeat



Don't be fooled , there is no division with Brazil , Venezuela and the rest of Latin America , do different leaders have differences every once in a while? Sure but what world leaders agree on everything all the time? None. Brazil and Venezuela continue to lead the way in economic independence from the United States in Latin america, not only are they doing but there providing the blueprint for other countries to do it.

The rest of the article like i said earlier is nothing more than your standard anti Chavez rhetoric which has gotten old at this point , from the second half of the article you can literally take out the words Chavez and Venezuela and replace with it.

Cuba & Fidel Castro
Iraq & Saddam Hussein
Taliban & Afghanistan
Iran & Ahmadinejad
Libya & Qaddafi
Arafat & Palestine
Syria & al-Assad

ETC ETC ETC

Breh, other Latin American socialist leaders are laughing at Chavez. He has become a joke. He started out with a lot of promise and ended up a mediocre, authoritarian despot. The Left (the real Left, not moderates and liberals down there) doesn't unconditionally support him any more.