Hugo Chavez depicted as tyrant for challenging western oil domination: McQuaig
Hugo Chavez depicted as tyrant for challenging western oil domination: McQuaig
Venezuelan leader redirected vast sums of national wealth to the swollen ranks of Venezuela’s poor.
/ PHOTO COURTESY OF LINDA MCQUAIG
Columnist Linda McQuaig with Venezuela's Hugo Chavez after she interviewed him at the presidential palace in Caracas for her 2004 book on the oil industry, 'It’s the Crude, Dude: War, Big Oil and the Fight for the Planet.'
Had Hugo Chavez followed the pattern of many Third World leaders and concentrated on siphoning off his nation’s wealth for personal gain, he would have attracted little attention or animosity in the West.
Instead, he did virtually the opposite — redirecting vast sums of national wealth to the swollen ranks of Venezuela’s poor, along with free health care and education. No wonder he alienated local elites, who are used to being first in line at the national trough.
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He was accused of muzzling the press, although anyone who’s ever turned on a TV in Caracas knows there’s no shortage of Fox News-style media outlets carrying a frothy mix of celebrities, U.S. sitcoms and anti-Chavez tirades.
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What actually appears to have infuriated the western establishment was Chavez’s audacity in challenging — and scoring some victories against — western dominance of the world economy.
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Up until the 1970s, the major western oil companies, known as the Seven Sisters, controlled the world oil market through a cartel established at a secret retreat at Achnacarry Castle in Scotland in 1928. The Achnacarry agreement set out in detail how the companies would maintain their lucrative control of oil markets into the future, setting quotas among themselves, never competing with each other and preventing competitors from getting in on the action. (Page 41)
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http://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2013/03/12/hugo_chavez_depicted_as_tyrant_for_challenging_western_oil_domination_mcquaig.html
= new reply since forum marked as read
but I can kick important threads.
The part that makes me CRAZY, is that out Foreign Policy toward Latin America NEVER changes,
Democrat or Republican, it doesn't matter.
We WILL support Right Wing Police States,
and condemn emerging true Populist Democracies.
You would think that in a country that pays so much Lip Service to "DEMOCRACY", our Foreign Policy would reflect this "love" for open Democracy,
but that OPPOSITE is true,
again, Democrat/Republican doesn't matter.
There is absolute bi-partisan agreement in demonizing these democracies.
I was unpleasantly surprised to find that Hillary and John Kerry were a couple of Chavez' harshest critics. 
VIVA Democracy!
I PRAY we get some here soon!
WE outnumber THEM.
You will know them by their WORKS,
not by their excuses.
[font size=5 color=green]Solidarity99![/font][font size=2 color=green]
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WWII, how many had leaders in the Chavez mold who tried to use the nation's wealth/resources to provide better lives for its people, especially the poor, and how many of those leaders were essentially in bed with big oil and the like. With our national policies largely driven by right-wing priorities/agenda since WWII, the U.S., imo, has been unwilling to tolerate the impertinence of a leader/government that strives to promote the general welfare of their own citizens rather than the welfare of big oil et al. 
