Hugo Chavez’s economic miracle

[Dashinka 24,800]

This was published about 4.5 years ago, but it just shows the cluelessness of the left wing mainstream media.  Venezuela was already a mess even in 2013 to anyone that actually studied it, but Democratic Socialism is grand!

 

Wednesday, Mar 6, 2013 11:30 AM EST

 

David Sirota

 

For the last decade in American politics, Hugo Chavez became a potent political weapon – within a few years of his ascent, he was transformed from just a leader of a neighboring nation into a boogeyman synonymous with extremism. Regularly invoked in over-the-top political rhetoric, Chavez’s name became a decontextualized epithet to try to attach to a political opponent so as to make that opponent look like a radical. Because of this, America barely flinched upon hearing the news that the Bush administration tried to orchestrate a coup against the democratically elected Venezuelan leader.

 

Just to get it out of the way, I’ll state the obvious: with respect to many policies, Chavez was no saint. He, for instance, amassed a troubling record when it came to protecting human rights and basic democratic freedoms (though as Mark Weisbrot of the Center for Economic and Policy notes, “Venezuela is recognized by many scholars to be more democratic than it was in the pre-Chávez era”). His rein also coincided with a boom in violent crime.

That said, these serious problems, while certainly worthy of harsh criticism, were not the primary reason Chavez became the favorite effigy of American politicians and pundits. In an age marked by America’s drone assaults, civil liberties abuses, and war on voting, it is not as if this nation’s political establishment sees an assault on democratic freedoms as deplorable. Likewise, that same political establishment is more than friendly with leaders of countries like Mexico and Colombia – countries which are also periodically hotbeds of violent crime.

 

No, Chavez became the bugaboo of American politics because his full-throated advocacy of socialism and redistributionism at once represented a fundamental critique of neoliberal economics, and also delivered some indisputably positive results. Indeed, as shown by some of the most significant indicators, Chavez racked up an economic record that a legacy-obsessed American president could only dream of achieving.

 

For instance, according to data compiled by the UK Guardian, Chavez’s first decade in office saw Venezuelan GDP more than double and both infant mortality and unemployment almost halved. Then there is a remarkable graph from the World Bank that shows that under Chavez’s brand of socialism, poverty in Venezuela plummeted (the Guardian reports that its “extreme poverty” rate fell from 23.4 percent in 1999 to 8.5 percent just a decade later). In all, that left the country with the third lowest poverty rate in Latin America. Additionally, as Weisbrot points out, “college enrollment has more than doubled, millions of people have access to health care for the first time and the number of people eligible for public pensions has quadrupled.”

When a country goes socialist and it craters, it is laughed off as a harmless and forgettable cautionary tale about the perils of command economics. When, by contrast, a country goes socialist and its economy does what Venezuela’s did, it is not perceived to be a laughing matter – and it is not so easy to write off or to ignore. It suddenly looks like a threat to the corporate capitalism, especially when said country has valuable oil resources that global powerhouses like the United States rely on.

 

http://www.salon.com/2013/03/06/hugo_chavezs_economic_miracle/

[Ban Hammer 13,554]

i'm sure someone will blame the rich/capitalism/not high enough taxes.

[Dashinka 24,800]

1 hour ago, Ban Hammer said:

i'm sure someone will blame the rich/capitalism/not high enough taxes.

They will say there needs to be a wall to keep the rich people in.  I think NYC is doing something similar where they are proposing to raise the taxes of the rich to pay for the crumbling mass transit system.

[IAMX 3,055]

1 hour ago, Bill & Katya said:

They will say there needs to be a wall to keep the rich people in.  I think NYC is doing something similar where they are proposing to raise the taxes of the rich to pay for the crumbling mass transit system.

Can only wonder how much raising taxes on the rich is gonna work.

[Dashinka 24,800]

Aren't there already a lot of well off people leaving the city?  Eventually, the rich there will be the middle class.

[IAMX 3,055]

1 minute ago, Bill & Katya said:

Aren't there already a lot of well off people leaving the city?  Eventually, the rich there will be the middle class.

Ugh, so much greed. 

[Teddy B 17,252]

VJ should start it's own CEHST sub-forum just for Venezuela. I think some peeps here secretly have the hots Hugo Chavez, even if he is dead.

[smilesammich 10,727]

1 minute ago, Teddy B said:

VJ should start it's own CEHST sub-forum just for Venezuela. I think some peeps here secretly have the hots Hugo Chavez, even if he is dead.

seriously. 

[Dashinka 24,800]

11 minutes ago, Teddy B said:

VJ should start it's own CEHST sub-forum just for Venezuela. I think some peeps here secretly have the hots Hugo Chavez, even if he is dead.

Just trying to add balance to the forum.  I thought the MDL was all about fairness and balance?

[smilesammich 10,727]

Just now, Bill & Katya said:

Just trying to add balance to the forum.  I thought the MDL was all about fairness and balance?

doesn't come across that way, looks more like trump supporters are trying to keep the attention on anything other than the cnn watching lazy lump that is trump.

[Teddy B 17,252]

2 minutes ago, Bill & Katya said:

Just trying to add balance to the forum.  I thought the MDL was all about fairness and balance?

You'd have to ask the MDL that question, but us middle of the road guys have noticed a very heavy slant in threads about Venezuela from the MDR in this forum.

[Teddy B 17,252]

3 minutes ago, smilesammich said:

doesn't come across that way, looks more like trump supporters are trying to keep the attention on anything other than the cnn watching lazy lump that is trump.

It's love, anything else would be an obsession.

 

Looks like the VJ Chavez fan club even has their own line of clothing.

 

 

[Dashinka 24,800]

4 minutes ago, smilesammich said:

doesn't come across that way, looks more like trump supporters are trying to keep the attention on anything other than the cnn watching lazy lump that is trump.

I could care less what Trump is doing as long as he is not violating the constitution, and appointing conservative judges.  If the GDP gets into the 3% range, even better, but as with and president, they have little impact in the economy.  Personally, I see way too many young people that believe this DS stuff, just want to make sure the failures are also revealed.

3 minutes ago, Teddy B said:

You'd have to ask the MDL that question, but us middle of the road guys have noticed a very heavy slant in threads about Venezuela from the MDR in this forum.

Doesn't everyone claim MOR status?

[smilesammich 10,727]

Just now, Bill & Katya said:

I could care less what Trump is doing as long as he is not violating the constitution, and appointing conservative judges.  If the GDP gets into the 3% range, even better, but as with and president, they have little impact in the economy.  Personally, I see way too many young people that believe this DS stuff, just want to make sure the failures are also revealed.

i don't think you're going to get very far, attempting to equate bernie sanders with hugo chavez. but by all means, free country..post away

[Teddy B 17,252]

2 minutes ago, Bill & Katya said:

I could care less what Trump is doing as long as he is not violating the constitution, and appointing conservative judges.  If the GDP gets into the 3% range, even better, but as with and president, they have little impact in the economy.  Personally, I see way too many young people that believe this DS stuff, just want to make sure the failures are also revealed.

Doesn't everyone claim MOR status?

No.