Goddamn socialists

November 22, 2005 7:09 PM

Cheap oil for the masses. "Officials from Venezuela and Massachusetts have signed a deal providing cheap heating oil to low-income homes in the US state. The fuel will be sold at some 40% below market prices to thousands of homes over the winter months. Local congressman William Delahunt described the deal as "an expression of humanitarianism at its very best". [Newsfilter] Why do you hate America, Hugo?
posted by wilful (135 comments total)

Total PR coup (at least w.r.t the American population's perception of Chavez). Great for MA residents. Two great tastes that go great together.
posted by breath at 7:22 PM on November 22, 2005

Citgo.

I've been waiting for this to finally happen.
posted by mrgrimm at 7:22 PM on November 22, 2005

Give's a new take on the "RED" Sox. That's it Cheyney when do we invade Boston!
posted by Mr Bluesky at 7:29 PM on November 22, 2005

Did you say "Huey Long" was buying off the public with oil money?
posted by dand at 7:35 PM on November 22, 2005

Maybe if the GOP/Christian Coalition threatens to assassinate him again, he'll give America more cheap oil.
posted by Rothko at 7:36 PM on November 22, 2005

Excellent! This is perhaps the first case of globalization benefiting people other than owners and employers, and not the last. Hopefully the deal is open to all states in the north--it's going to be a very rough winter--in all sorts of ways..
posted by amberglow at 7:42 PM on November 22, 2005

Aww geez, here come the taxachusetts / commie pinko / birds of a feather jokes ...

Can't we get another couple news cycles out of the Bush Door Grimace instead?
posted by intermod at 7:45 PM on November 22, 2005

Y'all gonna be throwing a Texas Tea party this time?
posted by WolfDaddy at 7:46 PM on November 22, 2005

Top doogs! Can't wait to see how this pans out.
posted by uncanny hengeman at 7:48 PM on November 22, 2005

I didn't think that individual states had the authority to negotiate trade with foreign nations, but maybe I didn't understand that chapter on Federalism all those years ago.
posted by spock at 7:50 PM on November 22, 2005

dand really wowed us with that link.
posted by papakwanz at 7:50 PM on November 22, 2005

So Socialism is about sharing our natural resources and Capitalism is about allowing the richest among us to hoard the resources and charge the poor and middle class as much as possible for it. Why do we like Capitalism so much in this country? Oh yeah I remember why - because the rich tell us that one day - if we work hard enough - we will be just like them. Just keep working hard my fellow Americans. Heh, Carlin was right, they call it the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it!
posted by any major dude at 7:51 PM on November 22, 2005

Spock: I think it's actually a deal b/t MA and Citgo, a corporation that happens to be a subsidiary of the Venezuelan national oil co.

The BBC article says they might also do a deal to supply cheap heating oil to Bronx residents.

I love watching Chavez' hammy political theatrics, esp. b/c they piss off the Bush administration so much.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 7:58 PM on November 22, 2005

This really is free trade in action, and needs to be expanded.

Some 40+ million Americans don't have healthcare--why can't they join together and create a cheap HMO? Why can't local neighborhood associations get bids from around the world for cheap heating oil? Why can't people do as corporations have been doing?--to our detriment. Why can't we as groups of people act as companies have--going to where things are cheaper, and getting stuff that way?
posted by amberglow at 8:02 PM on November 22, 2005

hugo's grandstanding ... it's something else that he's willing to spend his country's resources scoring political points off of the usa instead of helping the poor and oppressed of his own country he supposedly champions

he strikes me as a phony ... that doesn't mean he's as bad as his enemies would be if they were running the country
posted by pyramid termite at 8:02 PM on November 22, 2005

This is as altruistic as it comes, Chavez is benefiting himself the same way Bush benefits himself whenever he sends aid to other nations. It says nothing about socialism is the way to go, it does say that a country with abundant natural resources can donate those to other countries. We give aid somewhat selectively to those who will distribute it and make us look good, Chavez does the same. If anything this demonstrates the similarities between the two political systems.
posted by geoff. at 8:02 PM on November 22, 2005

Amberglow it's because people are like the people I saw outside of the local soup kitchen where I live today. They were handing out free turkeys and other food. People rolled up in their brand new SUVs, walking in with their $100 stickers, entire families, walking away with that free food that the truly needy could have used. I am still confused as to how they got away with it but then again it was total chaos. The lone cop they had there stood around wandering what was going on.

See - you have to look out for yourself because it's human nature to horde and take care of yourself, at the expense of others.
posted by evilelvis at 8:08 PM on November 22, 2005

pyramid -

Of course he's a phony - he's a politician. But can you provide some evidence that this is at the expense of his own poor?
posted by iamck at 8:12 PM on November 22, 2005

Durr...stickers should be sneakers. And SUVS should be SUVS and and other cars (lest one thinks this was an anti SUV chomp). If you can afford to drive your car to this free turkey handout then you can afford to BUY A TURKEY or something else to feed your family. Makes me sad. The modern civilized male in me desperately wants to believe that people are better than what they show but the realistic just knows better. I am not sure how this pertains to oil but things are done for well...on preview...what geoff said.
posted by evilelvis at 8:12 PM on November 22, 2005

instead of helping the poor and oppressed of his own country he supposedly champions

he strikes me as a phony ...

Do you know anything about Chavez' attempts at reformation of Venezuela or are you just being cynical? This is just from Wikipedia, but demonstrates far more than 'grandstanding' in anyone's language. Genuine reform (within the institutions he's having to negotiate with).
posted by wilful at 8:13 PM on November 22, 2005

So as a low-income Massachusetts resident who needs to buy heating oil for her furnace, how do I sign up for this? Where can I find the eligibility requirements and the "Count me in" form?
posted by duck at 8:17 PM on November 22, 2005

Reason on Chavez.

The man is a litmus test.
posted by Kwantsar at 8:18 PM on November 22, 2005

Do you know anything about Chavez' attempts at reformation of Venezuela or are you just being cynical?

i'm thinking for myself, instead of blindly following the consensus

this site, which may be slanted, does have some interesting facts and figures, which have linked references

you are welcome to refute the logic or the numbers if you want to dispute it
posted by pyramid termite at 8:21 PM on November 22, 2005

"the Venezualean strongman" puh-leeze. This is not your father's Noriega.
posted by crunchburger at 8:22 PM on November 22, 2005

I was surprised Romney let this happen (assuming he has a say). Anybody know if he took a stand on this?
posted by rob511 at 8:25 PM on November 22, 2005

Amberglow wrote:

Some 40+ million Americans don't have healthcare--why can't they join together and create a cheap HMO?

Maybe we should think about creating a congress that actually lobbies for the interests of individuals to compete with the congress that exists now which represents the interests of corporations? It boggles my mind how anyone can vote for a representative when they know full well how much money they have accepted from corporations who's main reason for existence is to make as much money as possible regardless of legality or morality.
posted by any major dude at 8:25 PM on November 22, 2005

duck, try the Citizens Energy page on how to apply for heating oil assistance.
posted by jesourie at 8:29 PM on November 22, 2005

well, maybe we don't have to. why not get together ourselves (as unions did) and create alternative institutions that will actually do the job? why wait for Congress? why rely on others instead of joining together ourselves?
posted by amberglow at 8:30 PM on November 22, 2005

and evilelvis: i would have made those people prove their need, but as long as everyone who really needed got, then it's ok.
posted by amberglow at 8:31 PM on November 22, 2005

I think I'll try and atone for my flip humor earlier. Chavez's actions could be interpreted in a 1000 ways, but at the end he is still giving to the poor. Bush's tax break to the oil moguls could also be interpreted a 1000 ways, but in the end he is still diverting tax payer $ to the filthy rich.

No offense, but who cares if he's a phony. Rev. MLK. JR slept around so is he a phony too or did those affairs negate his actions?
posted by Mr Bluesky at 8:33 PM on November 22, 2005

The US federal government has not provided discount heating oil programs to the chilly states in their hoiur of need, so I don't see why they can object to those states purchasing oil abroad. It is a free market solution.
posted by crunchburger at 8:34 PM on November 22, 2005

It's time to think Solidarnosc, instead of waiting for a wholly-nonresponsive government, i think. Why not reverse what Chavez did and solicit bids? We have the power and the money--and together are much stronger and able to actually make things happen. If deregulation and globalization and the breaking up of monopolies means anything, then it should mean that we can play too.
posted by amberglow at 8:34 PM on November 22, 2005

For instance, why not take Chavez at his word--he's providing to Mass, but why can't Michigan get together and go to him? Vermont? New Hampshire? Minnesota? etc...
posted by amberglow at 8:36 PM on November 22, 2005

Doesn't Citgo gas go into every 7-11?
OK, just wondering...
posted by Balisong at 8:36 PM on November 22, 2005

duck, try the Citizens Energy page on how to apply for heating oil assistance.

Thanks...hard to tell, but it looks like a charity to get oil to people who otherwise would go cold. I am low-income, but the fact is that one way or another, I wouldn't go cold (I have a space heater running in my room right now). I wouldn't want to take charity meant for people who are worse off than I am. But cheap oil from Venezuela for anyone "low-income" I would definitely take.
posted by duck at 8:38 PM on November 22, 2005

Chavez is a totalitarian despot in the making and he is using his petrodollars to subjugate his own population. Unchecked, he will be one more in the long line of tin pot South American dictators.
posted by Falconetti at 8:38 PM on November 22, 2005

But can you provide some evidence that this is at the expense of his own poor?

If the market will pay more for the nationalized resources that he's providing, he is accepting less money than would otherwise be possible on behalf of the people of Venezuela in order to complete this transaction. If I were a Venezuelan, I would be pissed off that people in a country far richer than my own were being given my oil at less than market prices to prove whatever point Chavez is trying to make.
posted by loquax at 8:39 PM on November 22, 2005

No offense, but who cares if he's a phony.

millions of poor people in hugo's own country who need the help worse than people in the u s do

if this was a rich arab oil state doing this, i'd look at it a lot differently

it's not my reading of history that mlk jr was crusading for chasity ...
posted by pyramid termite at 8:39 PM on November 22, 2005

Why can't we as groups of people act as companies have--going to where things are cheaper, and getting stuff that way?

We can...it's called The Park Slope Food Co-Op. And there are plenty more like it around the country. I see no reason why that idea cannot be expanded to work with healthcare. Make 20,000 people (current membership size of PSFC) pay a one time 25 dollar fee, plus a 100 dollar investment and work x number of hours per month in the 'doctor's office' or whatever and get cheaper access to prescriptions, doctors, etc. Probably wouldn't work with surgery, hospitalization, but why not with general care?
posted by spicynuts at 8:41 PM on November 22, 2005

Excellent! This is perhaps the first case of globalization benefiting people other than owners and employers...

Globalization me be on averevage be worse for the workers (I'm not saying that it is, just that it could be) but you can't be serious in believing that this is the first time it's benefited anyone beyond owners employers... That's just ridiculous. Look at China's economy. You think all that growth would have been possible without global trade? Of course there have been problems, but the average Chinese citizen is much better off now then they were 10 years ago, or 20.

Plus, how is a communist dictator giving cheap stuff to poor people 'globalization'? This is a political stunt, pure and simple. And I'm totally for it, by the way, since it makes bush look like a complete ass.
posted by delmoi at 8:42 PM on November 22, 2005

From the Citgo link

"Despite their denials that politics played any part in this deal, Kennedy admitted this donation and the oil assistance program in this state barely make a dent.

Two-thirds of the families qualifying for assistance won't receive it this winter and those who do, will likely use up their allotment by Jan.1."

Sigh.
posted by zeoslap at 8:45 PM on November 22, 2005

Who cares what Saddam Hugo does in his own country. He's fighting communism giving us cheap oil.
posted by gyc at 8:45 PM on November 22, 2005

If the market will pay more for the nationalized resources that he's providing, he is accepting less money than would otherwise be possible on behalf of the people of Venezuela in order to complete this transaction. If I were a Venezuelan, I would be pissed off that people in a country far richer than my own were being given my oil at less than market prices to prove whatever point Chavez is trying to make.

Chavez provides programs like this all over south America. The people don't seem to mind.
posted by delmoi at 8:46 PM on November 22, 2005

Chavez is a totalitarian despot in the making and he is using his petrodollars to subjugate his own population. Unchecked, he will be one more in the long line of tin pot South American dictators.

Half of whome we kept in power...
posted by delmoi at 8:47 PM on November 22, 2005

er, 'whom'
posted by delmoi at 8:48 PM on November 22, 2005

Half of whome we kept in power...

No doubt about that, I didn't mean to imply otherwise. I just don't want to be one of those leftists who supported Stalinist Russia as a worker's paradise or Pol Pot's Kampuchea because I was blinded by my ideology or dislike of my own country's policies.
posted by Falconetti at 8:51 PM on November 22, 2005

Pyramid termite, that Vcrisis site is a notorious anti-Chavez site. If you did a single Google search on it you'd know, but I suspect you do know and were just being coy.

Here's a quote from your linked article:


He could double the income of 25% of his population by selling the oil to Americans at market price, and improve their lives vastly. Imagine how miserable these people's lives are. Unbelievable.

As if a capitalist dictator of Venezuela would share that wealth with his people? He would sell out in two seconds to ExxonMobil for below market prices and all of that wealth would be funneled to America. And people wonder why the terrorists hate us. For decades the Saudis sold, and still sell us oil for below market while the average yearly salary of a Saudi fell from $28k in 1980 to $7k in 2000. The royal family got rich, American oil companies got rich and the Saudis got nothing.
posted by any major dude at 8:51 PM on November 22, 2005

i'm thinking for myself, instead of blindly following the consensus

this site, which may be slanted, does have some interesting facts and figures, which have linked references

you are welcome to refute the logic or the numbers if you want to dispute it

I'm not going to dispute the actual numbers because I'm none of a) venezuelan poor b) American poor c) an accountant or d) an oil economist, so I'd be talking through my hat.

While this specific instance may be a misallocation of resources (I think that's right, if I was a poor Venezuelan I'd prefer the money spent on me), any general comment that all Chavez does is grandstand and he's done nothing for the poor of his own country would seem to me to be way off beam.
posted by wilful at 8:53 PM on November 22, 2005

Chavez provides programs like this all over south America. The people don't seem to mind.

Well, their ability to complain or do anything about it is subject to some debate.
posted by loquax at 8:54 PM on November 22, 2005

Small point "it's not my reading of history that mlk jr was crusading for charity ... That would be "Rev" and thus inherent in his doctrine. "millions of poor people in hugo's own country who need the help worse than people in the u s do" As stated, that's an interpretation of his action, if he was a Buddhist vs. a socialist would you question giving to another nation when your own as so little?

Socialism is a romantic ideology and the reality is Fidel sold out Che, so I'm sure Chavez in the end is as honorable as Castro or Bush. But ain't it ironic watching poor people in MA get support from a socialist Govt while these people reside inside the "wealthiest" nation in the world.
posted by Mr Bluesky at 8:55 PM on November 22, 2005

any major dude - you're welcome to refute the logic or the numbers cited in that article

i note that no one has done so ... i'm not being coy, i'm stating an obvious objection ... that his charity is much more desperately needed in his own country ... i don't need an anti-chavez site to tell me that ... anyone can figure out that a poor country has no business giving charity to a rich country

like the poor of venezuela are going to care how much bush is embarrassed by this

i'll be the first to say that chavez is better than who his enemies would put in his place ... but that's not saying a great deal, is it?

the real problem is people are getting caught up in binary thinking in a 3d world
posted by pyramid termite at 8:59 PM on November 22, 2005

Boy, just reading up Chavez struck a nerve..wonder how Bush feels?
posted by Mr Bluesky at 8:59 PM on November 22, 2005

any general comment that all Chavez does is grandstand and he's done nothing for the poor of his own country would seem to me to be way off beam.

You're right, we forgot to mention his clamping down on free expression, his support of terrorizing militias, and his destruction of the rule of law. He does a lot to help the poor in other countries as well.
posted by Falconetti at 8:59 PM on November 22, 2005

Oops, that last bit should be "other countries."
posted by Falconetti at 9:01 PM on November 22, 2005

"anyone can figure out that a poor country has no business giving charity to a rich country"

Thats why its called charity. Charity is not giving enough until you reach your tax right off, its giving when you have nothing.
posted by Mr Bluesky at 9:02 PM on November 22, 2005

Thats why its called charity.

You can't seriously believe he is doing this out of the goodness of his own heart? If his ploy was any more transparent it would disappear.

Granted it is a clever and amusing ploy and it is fun to see Bush backed into a corner, but it is ploy nonetheless.
posted by Falconetti at 9:05 PM on November 22, 2005

Thats why its called charity. Charity is not giving enough until you reach your tax right off, its giving when you have nothing.

That's well and good for me and you. It's not so cool when you're making that choice for millions of people who have little to no say in how you govern their lives, and who can generally ill afford to be generous in subsidizing the people of a country that could choose to subsidize them instead, but doesn't for whatever reasons. That is, if anyone actually believes this gesture to be born of altruism.
posted by loquax at 9:06 PM on November 22, 2005

As long as America is willing to help oust popularly elected leaders like Chavez it is unreasonable to criticize him for being a strongman. As long as this situation remains the case any leader of the country will have to be a strongman to remain leader. If Hugo wasn't in charge of Venezuela whoever was in charge, right, left, or center would be a strongman. Considering he must be a strongman he really isn't that bad.
posted by I Foody at 9:08 PM on November 22, 2005

I think I gave a definition of charity, you can interpret what you wish as to what is the right thing to do as a nation. However, I do think he made a point as we are now discussing his actions.

Chavez = Viral Socialist Marketing

Whose with me comrades!!!
posted by Mr Bluesky at 9:15 PM on November 22, 2005

Having defended Chavez above, this particular thing is stupid grandstanding on Chavez's part. On a really base level I kind of like it, I like the idea of Bush looking stupid, and the man biting dog vibe of it all. Honestly it's a pretty big misallocation of resources for the sake of an insult.
posted by I Foody at 9:16 PM on November 22, 2005

Ha, the concept of viral socialist marketing is kind of accurate.
posted by Falconetti at 9:19 PM on November 22, 2005

Falconetti, those links are somewhat bogus, or at the very least need serious context. "Clamping down on free expression" needs the following lines (from the article) highlighted:

"Under the guise of protecting children from crude language, sexual content, and violence, the proposed law would also subject adults to restrictive and puritanical viewing standards."

" Until now, the Chávez government has largely respected press freedom even in the face of a strident and well-resourced opposition press. Indeed, as part of the often heated and acrimonious debate between supporters of the government and its opponents, the press has been able to express strong views without restriction. Private television companies have often adopted a blatantly partisan position, and their news and debate programs have been extremely hostile to the Chávez government. "

So it's catholic moralising rather than murdering journalists that's going on here.

"Support of terrorising militias":
"Two months after April's short-lived coup..." i.e. three years ago following massive internal upheaval, with no direct link to Chavez.

"Destruction of the rule of law". You must be joking. Hyperbole, much? No more the destruction of the rule of law than, oh, I don't know...

Some have called Chavez a dictator. Based on what? His democratic popularity?
posted by wilful at 9:26 PM on November 22, 2005

"The issues are much too important for the [Venezuelan] voters to be left to decide for themselves."
posted by iamck at 9:33 PM on November 22, 2005

The arguement that the United States is bad doesn't mean that Chavez isn't bad. I am very happy to criticize the United States and do so all the time.

The United States used Criminal Syndicalism statutes to fight free expression (communist and socialist phampleteers) and FDR tried to pack the Supreme Court. So most charges against Chavez can be turned around and applied to the United States at some point in its history (although it should be noted that the democratic process and its ideals eventually rectify these sort of problems).

As for the Catholic moralising (which is bad in and of itself), there is more to the story, according to Reporters without Borders.
posted by Falconetti at 9:34 PM on November 22, 2005

I don't want to sound like some blinkered Chavez cheer squad - I'm sure he's imperfect and has some significant shortcomings. He's not the socialist messiah or any such rubbish, and he probably ahs used a bit of violence and the trappings of state to maintain power.

However he is not an ogre - he is involved in a desparate and dirty struggle with the elites of the class-ridden Venezuelan society and it gets dirty. From our comfortable perspective it's easy to point out his failings, but I'd prefer to look at the bigger picure of what he has already achieved for the poor of Venezuela and South America and what he hopes to continue with.

His crack down on the media is dangerous, but needs to be within the context of the fact that the media is spouting propaganda that is entirely anti his government, and supported the coup. It would be like the only news channel is FoxNews, and the US Democratic party gets in and starts demanding some accountability from the fourth estate. If they dont deliver responsibly, then he'll act, which as an ex-paratrooper in a typically 'robust' political environment, he has with considerable restraint.
posted by wilful at 9:42 PM on November 22, 2005

I agree with you wilful that the situation is more complicated than my jeering. It is hard to know where to stand in these situations because it is so easy to imagine this going down a terrible future path, but there is no obvious alternatives to the current situation either.
posted by Falconetti at 9:45 PM on November 22, 2005

Anyone wanna nominate a really good leader leading right now?
posted by hackly_fracture at 10:01 PM on November 22, 2005

You want to talk misallocation of funds, how about the billions spent financing a quagmire of a war while your citizens can't afford to heat their homes or get their meds.
posted by zeoslap at 10:08 PM on November 22, 2005

zeoslap ... certainly can't argue with that
posted by pyramid termite at 10:25 PM on November 22, 2005

zeoslap: I do talk about the Iraq War. I'm against any number of uses of money. My failure to enumerate them individually is based on their lack of relevance to the situation at hand and not their magnitude.
posted by I Foody at 10:26 PM on November 22, 2005

Worth noting: (reg link, Wash Post)

The plea came in a letter from a group of U.S. senators to nine big oil companies: With huge increases in winter heating bills expected, the letter read, we want you to donate some of your record profits to help low-income people cover those costs.

But the lawmakers received only one response. It came from Citgo Petroleum Corp., a company controlled by the Venezuelan government of President Hugo Chavez [...]

I think that says that Hugo Chavez cares more how he's regarded by the American people than American oil companies do. Regardless of his true motivation, that says a lot right there.

What sort of conditions exist where big oil's quarterly profits are greater than the annual GDP of most countries, and yet they are outdone in their own country by a foreign socialist who is buddies with Fidel Castro, who has begun to reject American arms and has begun to buy weapons from China, who meets with Iran's Ahmadinejad, who seeks a Latin American NATO-like alliance which rejects US influence, etc?

Where is the love, ExxonMobil?

And...just thinking out loud here... just an unlikely scenario for consideration...how much would it take before popular dissatisfaction in our own system could give rise to a socialist strongman to nationalize industries, subjugate the kept press, and unite the poor masses against the elite? Hmmm? OK, it would take quite a lot, but nevertheless...

Consider the conditions which gave rise to Chavez -- rampant corruption within an insular two-party system funded by crony corporations and foreign money with strings attached, resulting in massive disparities between rich and poor, giving rise to a ruling elite which controls the media and leverages concentrated wealth to create a permanent overclass at the expense of the mass of people.

It's not so alien a scenario to the US when you think about it. Unlikely? Sure, but it's only a matter of degrees between TR style trustbusting, and Chavez-style nationalizing. Both are pendulum shifts back from the excesses of unchecked capitalism. I'd prefer the former, myself.
posted by edverb at 10:50 PM on November 22, 2005

Chavez investing resources to improve his image in America is not a waste of his people's money. It is a legitimate thing for a state to do. Chavez can not continue helping his people if he is ousted from office by foreign influence.

If people are so damn afraid of a 'communist' leader, perhaps they should change their habits which give rise to such leaders. Communism is only more than a lost cause when it is brought out as a defense against the false caplitalism of elitist thugs.
posted by Goofyy at 10:57 PM on November 22, 2005

"This really is free trade in action, and needs to be expanded.

Some 40+ million Americans don't have healthcare--why can't they join together and create a cheap HMO? "

Cuban medical coverage anyone? Would probably work better than our system...
posted by muppetboy at 11:02 PM on November 22, 2005

Chavez investing resources to improve his image in America is not a waste of his people's money. It is a legitimate thing for a state to do. Chavez can not continue helping his people if he is ousted from office by foreign influence.

Interesting way of putting it. So the choice is to either give oil to the Americans or deal with some CIA backed Pinochet clone running the country?
posted by bobo123 at 11:43 PM on November 22, 2005

"This is perhaps the first case of globalization benefiting people other than owners and employers, and not the last."

I cannot believe you wrote that sentence.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 12:58 AM on November 23, 2005

No, its not really grand standing. geoff is right, its as altruistic as nations gets.

Its probably a smart move though: It makes it politically hard for the U.S. to impeded Venezuela's sale of oil. It makes state politicians more favorable towards Venezuela. And it might provide strategic advantages to Venezuela's oil company.
posted by jeffburdges at 1:04 AM on November 23, 2005

I think this is a brilliant move on the part of Chavez. Global Politics is about spin these days.

This looks good not only to the Americans who get the discounted heating but also to Hugos own citizens (The richest country in the world refuses to help it's own, but look how generous our leader is).

Whether it's political posturing or not is irrelevant. When Capitalist nations get on the way they do how do you expect the socialists to respond. Gotta fight fire with fire, you know!
posted by twistedonion at 4:48 AM on November 23, 2005

ike the poor of venezuela are going to care how much bush is embarrassed by this

The Venezueleans know much more than the American people how much Bush is out to destroy Chavez. His administration actively participated in the attempted overthrow of Chavez in 2002. Chavez is doing this to raise his profile and portray himself to average FOX watching Americans as a leader who actually cares about something other than creating massive corporate wealth. Name one other leader of a significant country that is doing that today. The higher his profile the harder it will be for Bush to overthrow him. This is the smartest thing he can do.
posted by any major dude at 6:48 AM on November 23, 2005

I cannot believe you wrote that sentence.

I cannot believe that a lot of the sentences here were written seriously, and without irony.
posted by loquax at 6:54 AM on November 23, 2005

Bush: Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.

the real problem is people are getting caught up in binary thinking in a 3d world

Agreed.

Whose doing that in this thread though?
posted by juiceCake at 7:15 AM on November 23, 2005

I cannot believe you wrote that sentence.

Why?
posted by juiceCake at 7:20 AM on November 23, 2005

I can't speak for EB, but to assert that globalization only helps the moneyed is to reject widely accepted theory and a mountain of empirical evidence.

Just another case of an ideologue running his mouth about things he doesn't understand and looking like an idiot.
posted by Kwantsar at 8:01 AM on November 23, 2005

Talking about socialism in America is like talking about interior design in the locker room, one just doesn't do it. Our culture has too many negative media and political images for it to be discussed openly. We are shackled by decades of indoctrination and a labor force whose castration is complete (30K at GM..not a whimper)

What is a real shame is that Socialism is indeed hitched with a few of the last century's ideologues. Can we not talk about supporting our labor force, distributing wealth, and seeking cultural change without having to see Stalin at our door.

As stated, regardless of Chavez's intent Citgo's action shows another side to how large Corps can choose to behave.
posted by Mr Bluesky at 8:13 AM on November 23, 2005

Talking about socialism in America

Hmm? There's plenty of discussion of socialism, and there are plenty of examples of socialism in action in the US, however you want to define it. Maybe the term you're looking for is "Communism" or "Autonomist Marxism".
posted by loquax at 8:19 AM on November 23, 2005

Some 40+ million Americans don't have healthcare--why can't they join together and create a cheap HMO? I have a wacky Idea, Why don't we pool our a percentage of our incomes and create some kind of national organization that represents the interests of all the citizens and states and disburses that money to build bridges to nowhere instead? like the Congress.
posted by Megafly at 8:58 AM on November 23, 2005

Considering his flagrant populist style bordering on a cult of personality - I like this Chavez more and more every day.

Notice not one US Government official has urged a US company to attempt such a proposal? Aid the poor us citizen in hard times? Never. Shouldn't THAT be the US response to Chavez?

"Oh. Yeah. Well, we love our poor too. So. Free food for the poor! Take THAT Chavez."
posted by tkchrist at 9:21 AM on November 23, 2005

Talking about socialism in America is like talking about interior design in the locker room, one just doesn't do it. Our culture has too many negative media and political images for it to be discussed openly. We are shackled by decades of indoctrination and a labor force whose castration is complete

So thought the robber barons of late 19th century America...who could never have envisioned labor laws, overtime and safety regulations, a Securities Exchange board, etc.

Hunger and neglect are greater motivators than propaganda. Economic depression and a dustbowl are not the kind of things people can be fooled into not seeing.

Stranger things have happened Mr. Bluesky...it wouldn't have been at all controversial to say five years ago that "talking about America engaging in torture is like talking about interior design in the locker room", or you could substitute "round after round of tax cuts during wartime" or "abandoning a US city after a disaster" or "impuging the patriotism of decorated veterans" or "secret warrantless searches" or "pre-emptive war".

A catalyst like Katrina just lifted up the edge of the carpet so we could see what had been swept under it. As catalysts go, and given the trends that exist...I don't think we can overestimate the possibility of sea changes of opinion.

I could think of several catalysts that aren't even unlikely, but quite likely. Bird flu. Natural or environmental disasters. An economic crisis. All of the above.

Every country is the product of it's circumstances. The indoctrination you speak of can only take root as it has in a country that's largely comfortable. When circumstances make things uncomfortable...all bets are off.

If, for example in 2000, at the height of America's peace and prosperity, imagine someone had told you within the next five years the Supreme Court would choose our president (and it wouldn't be the one who'd won the popular vote), and that those towers in NYC would be attacked by suicide hijackers and collapse with 2800 people in them. They told you that bioterrorism would close the Congress, that a PATRIOT Act would challenge long held notions of what rights we enjoyed, that we'd go to war with the wrong country over it all, while the actual masterminds of the attacks went free. They told you that we'd discard the Geneva Conventions and habeus corpus, engage in an official policy of torture, and that the gov't surpluses would turn to historic deficits not based on national sacrifice, but tax cuts for the wealthy. That American policy would be despised around the world, and our President would need to bring a small army to shut down London any time he visited. That American taxpayers wold be barred from townhall meetings on the basis of bumperstickers on their cars.

I'm guessing you would not have believed that. I wouldn't have believed that either.

Yet here we are.
posted by edverb at 9:21 AM on November 23, 2005

I can't speak for EB, but to assert that globalization only helps the moneyed is to reject widely accepted theory and a mountain of empirical evidence.

I hear Mexico's poor are doing pretty good after NAFTA.
posted by iamck at 9:50 AM on November 23, 2005

..wonder how Bush feels?

Bluesky, that will be the enduring image of this presidency. What a legacy, and what an argument against a strong military.
posted by mrgrimm at 9:52 AM on November 23, 2005

Or to put it more correctly:

"I can't speak for EB, but to assert that globalization only helps the moneyed is to reject widely accepted theory and a mountain of empirical evidence.

/ Just another case of an ideologue running his mouth about things he doesn't understand and looking like an idiot."
posted by iamck at 9:53 AM on November 23, 2005

pyramid termite writes "hugo's grandstanding ... it's something else that he's willing to spend his country's resources scoring political points off of the usa instead of helping the poor and oppressed of his own country he supposedly champions"

It would seem that generating a little good will in the USofA is a good way to help prevent his country and citizen's from becoming the next Iraq.
posted by Mitheral at 10:03 AM on November 23, 2005

I can't speak for EB, but to assert that globalization only helps the moneyed is to reject widely accepted theory and a mountain of empirical evidence.

Yes, that's obvious. But why the disbelief about it being said? I was just curious.
posted by juiceCake at 10:09 AM on November 23, 2005

And to add, I think the statement was meant to convey the overall effect of globalization (most particularly who it benefits most) rather than be a specific statement that applies to all cases. Globalization suffers from the look at all the positives and ignore the negatives phenom, unless it's negative criticism.

Some clarification might work better than I can't believe you said that. Could be just a misunderstanding. Or maybe it's because of amberglow's politics.

He did say perhaps afterall.
posted by juiceCake at 10:16 AM on November 23, 2005

Didn't they say something about free med school for US poor as well? Sign me up, Hugo & Fidel!
posted by blendor at 10:33 AM on November 23, 2005

The "perhaps" makes it worse, not better. But it's just a flat-out untrue statement.

"I hear Mexico's poor are doing pretty good after NAFTA."

They are. Want to drive down there with me and ask some of them? But juiceCake is right, of course, about it being a mixed bag. But to say that there's bad along with the hyped good implicitly says that there's good along with the hyped bad. Anyone who makes an extreme statement in either direction is saying something that is as false as it could be.

I didn't clarify because I'd rather stay out of this argument because I oppose anti-globalization sentiment for the same sets of reasons that the anti-globalization support their point of view. To me, it's a liberal and leftist issue, it's a moral issue and I get really mad about it. I'm breathing heavier just typing this comment.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 10:37 AM on November 23, 2005

Sign me up, Hugo & Fidel!

Limited time offer! Every med school scholarship comes with a free visit to a reeducation camp of your choice! Learn to organize your own proletarian revolution and denounce friends and loved ones as counter-revolutionaries, bourgeois scum and Trotskyites!
posted by loquax at 10:40 AM on November 23, 2005

It would seem that generating a little good will in the USofA is a good way to help prevent his country and citizen's from becoming the next Iraq.

it would seem that you think we have a president that actually listens to what the people want ...
posted by pyramid termite at 10:42 AM on November 23, 2005

I lived in Venezuela in the mid-1980's, when it was viewed as a bastion of stability in Latin America. I've been back numerous times, and I just returned from a visit a few days ago.

To put it bluntly, it freaked me out. There are elections coming up in a few weeks, but the only posters I saw were for pro-Chavez candidates, most of whom were pictured with Chavez in their posters. There are images of Chavez everywhere. The cedula, the national identitiy card, must be presented in order to make any purchase, and it's recorded. The ostensible reason is to avoid tax evasion, but the result is that the government knows not only whether you prefer Coke or Pepsi and how much you spend on beer, but also what books you buy.

The general feeling on the ground is distinctly more oppressive and Big Brother-ish than it was 20 years ago. The independence of the judiciary and the press have been distinctly curtailed. I'm not saying that pre-Chavez Venezuela was any sort of paradise. But I do not believe that Hugo Chavez will do any favors for his country over the long run.
posted by ambrosia at 10:57 AM on November 23, 2005

It's a moral issue for more than concern about people in other places, EB. We don't have a manufacturing base anymore, which used to lift millions into the middle class.
posted by amberglow at 11:02 AM on November 23, 2005

"We don't have a manufacturing base anymore, which used to lift millions into the middle class."

I do want to answer this but otherwise stay away. I am not concerned for lost jobs here because I think we're filthy rich, even the poor. And, especially in the case of Latin America, a lot of the USA'a wealth was basically stolen from people who didn't have gunboats.

From a macro standpoint, jobs aren't lost, net. Certain kinds of jobs are lost, but those that are lost are those that we shouldn't be doing anyway. I really don't understand what seems to me to be people's fetish about manufacturing as opposed to service. But, anyway, even if lots of jobs were lost in the wealthy nations because of trade, I'd still support it because we have no moral right to all of this vast wealth we've accumulated when just across a borderline there's terrible poverty and sickness.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 11:11 AM on November 23, 2005

Loquax,

I hear that kind of strict adherence to doctrine coming from Capitalist Fundies these days. You should be more worried about them than any socialists. Most of the countries of Europe practice socialism, do you fear any of them? Your problem is that you are using the extremist to define the center. Stalin was a criminal who bastardized the doctrines of Lenin, Marx and Trotsky to serve his own glory. American capitalists just lumped socialism in with communism when what Stalin practices was neither - it was a totalitarian dictatorship.
posted by any major dude at 11:20 AM on November 23, 2005

Yeah yeah, I was kidding. I just think it's funny when people take "generous offers" from Castro and Chavez at face value.

(and yes, I fear unchecked socialism as much if not more than unchecked capitalism)

Stalin was a criminal who bastardized the doctrines of Lenin, Marx and Trotsky to serve his own glory.

Minor quibble: I would say "Marx was an idiot whose nonsensical and patently unachievable and abhorrent utopian ideals were easily and effectively implemented by criminals like Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin to their logical and inevitable end."
posted by loquax at 11:25 AM on November 23, 2005

maufacturing gave benefits--service doesn't. manufacturing was community-based--service isn't. Even a deadly boring job watching an assembly line gave people healthcare and paid enough to allow people to send their kids to college--a job at Walmart doesn't, and doesn't even provide healthcare. I could go on for days...

This deal is for NY too--upstate and in The Bronx.
posted by amberglow at 11:33 AM on November 23, 2005

EB: "I really don't understand what seems to me to be people's fetish about manufacturing as opposed to service."

Very simply, EB, if you don't actually make anything inside your country via manufacturing, you have to import all manufactured items from outside, which results in a huge trade deficit (our money flowing mostly out of the country, far less money returning) and other nations eventually owning most of your money.

In essence, too much internal service economy - you can't really outsource fast-food employees and cleaning people to other countries, as these are local jobs - and you make your national economy hostage to external market forces and other nations.

This is an oversimplification, of course. But it's not a "fetish," it's a real economic danger.
posted by zoogleplex at 11:34 AM on November 23, 2005

You talk morals, EB, yet you don't care that 50 million Americans don't have health insurance? that most new jobs created here do not provide health care or any benefits? that our poverty rate has been growing at a rapid rate?

morals only apply to people in other countries?
posted by amberglow at 11:36 AM on November 23, 2005

Oh, and since service jobs pay a lot less, your citizens can't afford to pay reasonable living expenses. That's a big deal too for internal economy.
posted by zoogleplex at 11:36 AM on November 23, 2005

I really don't understand what seems to me to be people's fetish about manufacturing as opposed to service.

Service recirculates wealth. Manufacturing creates it.
posted by Heywood Mogroot at 11:47 AM on November 23, 2005

Services are included in the balance of accounts. There is no reason at all that an economy couldn't run even a surplus yet be exclusively service-based. If you look at the numbers, you're not going to see "manufacturing turned into service which is not exported" and thus accounts for the trade imbalance. The whole amount of service exports is huge compared to the trade imbalance. The trade deficit is largely monetary. People create value, wealth, it's not worth much when it's dug from the ground or whatever. It's labor that creates wealth, even when there's no tangible thing to which that wealth is attached. Hollywood movies create wealth. Books create wealth. There is nothing magical about manufacturing in a mature economy.

I care about our economy and health care (I support a single-payer system). I just think that those are tiny problems when put in comparison to the poverty of the developing world. If it's a burden to us, then it's a burden that we are quite able to take upon ourselves by, say, not fighting a major war every decade. Some teenager making a rug in a developing country will take that two dollars or whatever and feed his family while, back here in the states, that two dollars lost was a biggie size of a value meal. There's no comparison, man.

The most efficient way we've discovered to create wealth is with market economics. It's not perfect, far from it. It create gaps between rich and poor, especially in the context we're talking about here. But no one with any other system has been able to create wealth as quickly. Our concerns about child-labor or environmental regulation are concerns that in relative terms are our luxuries and we don't have the moral right to say to the developing world: okay, you have to develop your economies according to standards that we were never held to. And, by the way, we developed worlders already have plundered a good portion of your natural resources.

A lot of leftism (like a lot of rightism) is masquaraded populism (which is the legitimate argument against Chavez). This sort of populism is isolationist and nativist but hides behind rightist or leftist principles. It's closely reated to fascism. Why do we think we're so damn special?

On Preview: "Service recirculates wealth. Manufacturing creates it."

Pick up a macroecon textbook, for crying out loud. That statement is provably, empirically, obviously false.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 11:59 AM on November 23, 2005

(though the service sector does create "social capital" like good health, education, information).

To amplify my above, one of previous fpp's here was RCA's aborted CED videodisc technology from the 1980s. The site included photos of middle-class middle-america working productive, if mind-numbing, assembly-line jobs in factories back in the 1970s.

Those jobs are gone to Mexico now.

Our economy is about fulfilling first our needs then our wants.

Our needs include food, shelter, clothing, social services (health-care, education, child-care for working parents), transportation about our locales, utilities (water, power, gas).

We want entertainment, luxuries, etc.

300M people in this country, and 6B+ in the world, have to make their way in securing their needs & wants from spending either their capital (accumulated savings) and/or drawing down their credit (future income + interest), or resorting to charity or theft.

The primary method to accumulate capital is to engage in wage-work, exchanging labor for a paycheck.

As a left-ibertarian I see socialism's main failure in removing the penalties for people avoiding wage-work and living on (government) charity.

But the left side of me doesn't think the invisible hand is all that great in finding global maxima, ie the most optimal state of economy, it is only good at incremental goal-seeking toward local maxima, pathetic examples of which can be termed "market-failures".
posted by Heywood Mogroot at 12:05 PM on November 23, 2005

Hollywood movies create wealth. Books create wealth. There is nothing magical about manufacturing in a mature economy.

Sure. But you can't eat a movie, or house your family in a book.

The third world consumes a lot of this wealth, but it largely illegally copies it now, and with the rise of networking I think the wealth you see exchanged for these particular productive enterprises (can't quite call them services) is going to be ephemeral.
posted by Heywood Mogroot at 12:13 PM on November 23, 2005

Very well said EB.
posted by loquax at 12:14 PM on November 23, 2005

The "no manufacturing base" canard is just silly. Yes, manufacturing in the US is declining as a percent of employment, even though industrial output is increasing in absolute terms.

But it's just dumb to say that the airliners, and warplanes, and satellite launchers, and cpus, and photolithographers and chip fabs, and pharmaceuticals, and farm equipment, and mining equipment, and construction equipment, and machine tools, and medical equipment, and millions and millions of cars made in the US just appeared out of nowhere instead being made by people (or made by industrial equipment made by people). Yes, there's no manufacturing base, except for the trillions of dollars worth of goods manufactured every year.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 12:14 PM on November 23, 2005

"People create value, wealth, it's not worth much when it's dug from the ground or whatever. It's labor that creates wealth, even when there's no tangible thing to which that wealth is attached."

I'm sorry, EB, but this is not correct. Value and Wealth are two completely different things. Value is created when people need or want some item, and destroyed when they don't. Thus you are correct when you say people create Value, but it's not about "digging stuff from the ground," it's about needing stuff that you then go try to find and dig up.

Wealth, on the other hand, is a relative measure of material "ownership," and is dependent on ownership of "things of Value." Labor only creates Wealth in that it is labor which creates "things of Value." It does not necessarily Wealth for the laborers, you see.

It can be successfully argued that a significan portion of "service" jobs are essentially luxury items, whose value only exists because there's excess wealth. Do we really need fast food and restaurant employees, Wal-Mart clerks, and cleaning ladies to survive? Hotel staff, cruise ship crew, Not really. Clearly we need healthcare people, but is that "service" or basic necessity? Anyone got any other examples of "nonessential to basic survival" but very common service jobs?

ROU, I did say I was oversimplifying. We do of course still manufacture some things here. We just import a lot more, and very importantly, most of the items you mention are mostly assembled here out of components that are manufactured elsewhere and imported. That's a very important distinction, as this massive importation of components still results in net flow of wealth outwards.
posted by zoogleplex at 12:32 PM on November 23, 2005

Yes, there's no manufacturing base, except for the trillions of dollars worth of goods manufactured every year.

The only measure that matters how well we as a society can meet our needs & wants... a just/optimal society is one where everyone has access to adequate capital resources to make their maximal contribution to the economy, proportional to their talents.
posted by Heywood Mogroot at 12:34 PM on November 23, 2005

I would say "Marx was an idiot whose nonsensical and patently unachievable and abhorrent utopian ideals were easily and effectively implemented by criminals like Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin to their logical and inevitable end."

Regardless of what you think of socialism or communism, you cannot seriously believe that Lenin Trotsky and Stalin effectively implemented his ideals. Unless of course you haven't read Marx.

(Not defending his ideas about how a utopian society would work, just saying that the policies in these countries are not policies that Marx advocated).
posted by duck at 12:43 PM on November 23, 2005

just saying that the policies in these countries are not policies that Marx advocated.

Agreed, but they were the logical extension of Marx's ideas and theories as implemented in the real world, as I stated. Just like unfettered capitalism leads to inequality and instability, unfettered Marxism leads to stagnation, oppression, and the destruction of the individual.
posted by loquax at 12:50 PM on November 23, 2005

dunno, loquax. I didn't study marxism in my UG poli-sci sequence, wish I would have. Do you have some actual criticisms of Marx's ideas, or are you just going after the easy targets of "Marxist-Leninism" and its asian strains?

From what I've read on wikipedia, I think Marx's ideas of "alienation of human labor" and "commodity fetishism" are terribly apropos today.

This is not to say that Marx wasn't all wet in some areas, like hist "labor theory of value".
posted by Heywood Mogroot at 1:10 PM on November 23, 2005

And unfettered State leads to inefficiencies, environmental degradation, loss of the individual and tradition, inequality, and oppression. And globalization is just another word for a global unfettered state.
posted by iamck at 1:35 PM on November 23, 2005

Heywood Mogroot: Read Hayek, especially The Road to Serfdom if you haven't already:

Hayek's central argument is that the goals and methods of socialism and economic planning use central planning that must necessarily reduce individuals' economic freedom to sell products and services and form businesses. Since trading and working as one wishes are important, perhaps fundamental human freedoms, suppressing trade and business formation requires powerful state interventions. Hayek outlines and analyzes the governmental interventions to enforce such economies and concludes that they must either fail in their economic goals, or cause totalitarianism. Hayek states that countries such as the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany had already gone down the "road to serfdom", and that various democratic nations are being led down the same road.
posted by loquax at 1:42 PM on November 23, 2005

Metafilter: I'm breathing heavier just typing this comment.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 1:51 PM on November 23, 2005

Hayek's central argument is that the goals and methods of socialism and economic planning use central planning that must necessarily reduce individuals' economic freedom to sell products and services and form businesses.

But Marx was opposed to central planning.
posted by duck at 2:04 PM on November 23, 2005

But Marx was opposed to central planning.

Central planning is the only way to achieve Marx's goals. It is the inevitable real-world result of Marxism.
posted by loquax at 2:08 PM on November 23, 2005

None of the five major oil companies subpoenaed to testify about record profits and high consumer energy prices at a hearing December 1 in Wisconsin would say this week whether their officers would attend. ...
posted by amberglow at 2:12 PM on November 23, 2005

loquax -- I find the Austrian-Schoolers to be largely full of shit.
posted by Heywood Mogroot at 2:23 PM on November 23, 2005

I find the Austrian-Schoolers to be largely full of shit.

Tough but fair.
posted by loquax at 2:27 PM on November 23, 2005

Isn't central planning the only way to achieve globalization?
posted by iamck at 2:31 PM on November 23, 2005

Loquax wrote:

I would say "Marx was an idiot whose nonsensical and patently unachievable and abhorrent utopian ideals were easily and effectively implemented by criminals like Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin to their logical and inevitable end."

You could say the same thing about Adam Smith - the godfather of Capitalism - and in both cases you'd be wrong. Most dictators and ideologues like to base their misguided dogma in the theories of great thinkers to give them legitimacy. Pol Pot used the philosophy of Rousseau to drive all the people of Cambodia out of the cities to starve - does that make Rousseau an idiot as well?
posted by any major dude at 2:31 PM on November 23, 2005

Oh and one more thing. If you think that Lenin and Trotsky are in the same class as Stalin you don't know much.
posted by any major dude at 2:33 PM on November 23, 2005

does that make Rousseau an idiot as well?

Good point, and I suppose that me calling Marx an idiot was indicative of my personal bias against him and his philosophy rather than an attempt on my part to objectively characterize him. Although with most thinkers, their ideas are bastardized and corrupted to a far greater degree than is the case with Marx. Marx's plans were implemented to a great degree, and were found to be practically unworkable, at which point the Marxist states needed to adapt to maintain the pretense that they were Marxist in the first place. This should have been obvious to Marx (I believe) to an uncommon degree when compared to most other thinkers in his position as the father of an ideology.

I'm not aware of the link between Pol Pot and Rousseau, but certainly Rousseau's ideas were not as well-developed in terms of an overall reorganization of society and economics as Marx's were. Marx had a plan, whereas Rousseau was just talking, to put it crudely. The time elapsed between the thinking and the implementation of the thought also comes into play.

If you think that Lenin and Trotsky are in the same class as Stalin you don't know much.

Right back atcha if you don't. Well maybe not Trotsky, but Lenin? He made the whole thing happen! NEP? Secret Police? Dead bodies strewn across the country? Unilateral coup and suppression of dissent, both political and press? That's Lenin baby! Maybe he didn't kill on Stalin's scale, but I say a few million dead Russians qualifies you as a criminal monster in my books.
posted by loquax at 2:44 PM on November 23, 2005

Central planning is the only way to achieve Marx's goals. It is the inevitable real-world result of Marxism.

His goal (one of the major ones) was the abolishment of the state. How is central planning even a way to achieve that, let alone the only way?
posted by duck at 3:01 PM on November 23, 2005

His goal (one of the major ones) was the abolishment of the state.

No. Well, sort of. He predicted the death of the "state" as the construct that perpetuated the class struggle as the proletariat assumed the functions that the "state" once had. He didn't get into the specifics of how such a society would be organized (as far as I'm aware), but any way you slice it, there would be a "government" or a "governing body" of some sort. Otherwise Marx would simply be proposing altruistic anarchy.

Once the working class has abolished the "old state", there must be a way to address disputes, organize labour, and continue the revolution. The only way that this can be accomplished is via central planning. Pluralism or market forces in any slight amount would instantly recreate class struggle, inequality, and risk the worker's loss of control over the means of production. Therefore in order to perpetuate the revolution, it is essential that a *powerful* state exist to ensure the suppression of what is essentially a natural state of inequality, conflict and exploitation.

Marx should have seen that this was inevitable, and that concentrated power without challenge would corrupt and spiral into what became the Soviet Union, Mao's China, and so on, beyond the actually criticisms of Marxism itself.
posted by loquax at 3:22 PM on November 23, 2005

People, we are missing the central point here! David Oritiz is Hispanic, Chavez is Hispanic, the $ went to MA, Boston is in MA, the baseball team is called the RED sox, Chavez is a Commie, and the Soviets loved RED! End of discussion.

I mean duh!
posted by Mr Bluesky at 4:31 PM on November 23, 2005

I agree that all power concentrations are bad, bad, bad.

Unbridled Capitalism produces capital concentration (the haves & have nots), and capital == political power, while unbridled state socialism produces a concentration of political power in the nomenklatura/party apparat.

This is why I'm a lefty-libertarian. Not sure this synthesis is workable, but in general it's better to err on the side of liberty than state power, though sometimes the state, excercising its delegated powers of the people, can & should step in and cut out or regulate the market. AKA the mixed economy I guess.
posted by Heywood Mogroot at 4:59 PM on November 23, 2005

i'd like to see a new political philosophy that was based on more than economics ... that's all
posted by pyramid termite at 8:57 PM on November 23, 2005

Uhmmm, in this whole futile Capitalism vs. Socialism debate, why hasn't anybody stopped to consider that this move isn't just good PR for Chavez, but also for Citgo itself, in a very verifiable, capitalistic sort of way?

I'm no fan of Chávez, but I notice that all his cheap oil handouts have had considerable material offsets. In exchange of cheap oil, Cuba send doctors. Other Latin American nations which have received Venezuelan handouts have granted exploitation rights to their own resources to Venezuelan state companies, and the cost of this very small US handout is probably going to be more than compensated by increased Citgo sales. So, it isn't just politics: it can be quite a wily commercial strategy, and I'm certain that in the top floors of other oil companies somebody must be kicking himself for not responding to Massachussetts' call.
posted by Skeptic at 7:11 AM on November 24, 2005