Rule by decree passed for Chavez

Venezuela's National Assembly has given initial approval to a bill granting President Hugo Chavez the power to rule by decree for 18 months.

Mr Chavez said he wants to approve "revolutionary laws" to enact sweeping political, economic and social changes.

He has said he wants to nationalise key sectors of the economy and scrap limits on the terms a president can serve.

Mr Chavez began his third term in office last week after a landslide election victory in December.

The bill allowing him to enact laws by decree is expected to win final approval easily in the assembly next week on its second reading.

'Bolivarian revolution'

Venezuela's political opposition has no representation in the National Assembly since it boycotted elections in 2005.

Mr Chavez has said he wants to see major Venezuelan power and telecoms companies come under state control.

He also called for an end to foreign ownership of lucrative crude oil refineries in the Orinoco region.

Critics of Mr Chavez say he is trying to build a totalitarian dictatorship with all institutional powers consolidated into his own hands.

National Assembly President Cilia Flores said "there will always be opponents, and especially when they know that these laws will deepen the revolution".

Mr Chavez has said he wants to deepen his "Bolivarian revolution", named after the 19th Century Latin American independence fighter.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6277379.stm

It's official, democracy is now dead in Venezuela.

 

Democracy is extremely flawed.

Not all Dictatorships have been evil.

Augustus
Constantine
Peter The Great
Khrushchev
Breshnev
Tito

To name a few. So who knows, and even if Chavez abuses his power for a negative purpose, he can't possibly be worse than Amin, that guy's record will never be broken.

 

It doesn't matter if the dictatorships are evil or not, it's still a dictatorship.

And Chavez always calls it the Bolivarian revolution, ironic considering Simon Bolivar called himself a liberal who supported limited government, property rights, serperation of powers and supported the free market economy.

 

So are you saying it's better to have a horribly flawed government because of democracy than have a thriving government that's a dictatorship?

Dictatorships have done a lot of good, and just about as much bad as democracy ( mind you democracy is still rather new )

 

Yes I would, for freedom is everything, but it actually brings up an interesting point I've heard people say before of would you rather live in a dirt poor democracy like India, or a rich single party state such as Singapore of Taiwan up to about 15 years ago.

 

Is it really neccessary for Chavez to rule by dictatorial means?

 

Well, see, Chavez hasn't really done anything to show he's evil, he's much like Castro, America hates him but the rest of the world doesn't really care.

We'll just have to see.

 

Well technically Liechtenstein has always been a dictatorship, they've never had a democracy, and that country is very well off. ( Mind you it's only got 35,000 people living in it and uses the Swiss currency but whatever, no democracy )

China's still a dictatorship and that country's headed to become the next world power, and yeah, living standard is way up. Also, the Soviet Union in the 60s and 70s ( in western Russia ) was had great living conditions, exellent medical system, exellent educational system etc.

 

Capitalism, democracy, and freedom are far from synonyms. One can argue that a cuban or venezuelan citizen is more free than an american, simply because they don't live with the illusion of freedom or civic power.

 

No,Americans are more free. Let's not try to complicate this.

 

Riiiiiight. With all the laws in place in the States there is little freedom, you know how easily you can be sued?

 

Wouldn't that be another freedom, the freedom to sue people for damage you believe has been done to you.

And like Motion said, compared to them, we are more free, it's not even a valid argument to fight against it.

 

Now I want to be a lawyer, but a defence lawyer, the crown is quite evil, they're always after trying to get the best deal, they don't care about justice, freedom to sue? Are you kidding me?

In America you also have a lot of political correctness, Canada too ( for example, if the city of Toronto has 10% black population, the University of Toronto has to have 10% of its students black, true ) it's all bs.

The only freedom you don't have in countries like Venezvuela is the freedom to mock the government, which I for one think is right.

 

but why wouldnt they want anyone to mock the government?

 

I'm not sure anybody knows about this, really. He seems like a good guy. He seems to have all the right stuff going on. What about just "wait and see" instead of making a bunch of assumptions? Maybe he can do something that we can't. Would that be so bad? He has a bigger majority in his country that likes him than we ever have had here, as far as liking a pres. How can that many be that wrong? And there is the "opposition" who seem to be able to "mock" the government all they like. I just think some folks are scared of Chavez because he sees things differently. But we are not doing so well here, so we don't have much room to complain at this time.

 

One problem I see for Chavez in convincing other Latin countries to take his anti-capitalism/pro-nationalization route is the example of Chile.


Chile is an example of a country that has benefited from neo-liberal economics.

This Chilean example is what other Latin countries are probably looking at as a model for development over what Chavez wants to see. Chavez seems to want to go back to the old state controlled economies of the former Soviet Union and Castro Cuba which doesn't seem to have much appeal now days.

 

what about freedoms like freedom to invest ,business freedom,trade freedom, fiscal freedom,monetary freedom,financial freedom,labor freedom, and property rights?not to forget freedom of the press!

 

hopefully it will be only for the 18 months as it has been stated. However I doubt that will happen. And things seemed to be going well in Venezuela. I was a fan of Chavez up to this point. But putting the people in democratic power is a nessecity for democratic socialism and Chavez has only given power to himself.

On the the less cynical and pessimistic side if he is going to reform the economy and he gives up his power when he is supposed to and he increases the power of the common person then:yay!

But once again I doubt that will happen.

 

Freedom of the press? Where in the world does that exist? Denmark? Denmark maybe, Sweden too, but in what country of 50 Million+ is freedom of the press actually existent?

 

You dont get out much do ya?