Chavez seeks indefinite rule

[minionofmidas]

Reality check. He's abolishing term limits. Not trying to be elected president for life. End of reality check.

[minionofmidas]

Reality check. He's abolishing term limits. Not trying to be elected president for life. End of reality check.

Reality check. He's trying to become dictator for life, this is just the first step. If you don't believe it you are not that alert. End of reality check.

I'm referring to the moronic comparisons with Niyazov and the like. I don't like Chavez (I much prefer Evo Morales ). He's not trying to become dictator of Venezuela for life, he's trying to remain the hugely populist, hugely popular president of Venezuela for life (oh yes) - and the informal, ahem, líder of the Western Hemisphere.

[minionofmidas]

Now this reminds me, Has there ever been a modern world leader who ACTUALLY holds the title "dictator" or calls himself "dictator" or admits that he is one?

Not even Fidel Castro says it.

No, of course not. "Dictator" means, very roughly, "non-democratically elected President". Which gives journalists infinite wiggle-room for misrepresentation, such as calling Eritrea's brutal, internationally isolated dictator "dictator" and Ethiopia's almost as brutal, US allied dictator "president" in the same sentence. (In a supposedly leftish German newspaper, no less. ) "Dictator" is not a bureaucratic rank, but a statement of fact. Mussolini's official position was that of Prime Minister. As was Hitler's until Hindenburg died.

Kim Jong Il calls himself supreme leader.

Actually, he uses the title "Chairman of the National Defence Commission". That's because his late father is still officially the President.

Reality check. He's abolishing term limits. Not trying to be elected president for life. End of reality check.

Oh come on Lewis.  Yes technically the measure doesn't make him President for life.  But I can't see you arguing/don't believe you would dispute that he would win every election for president that he stood for.

While the oil boom lasts, yes. This is supposed to demonstrate exactly what?

[minionofmidas]

Chavez's statement of "removing term limits will enhance democracy" reminds me of all these idiots that we elect that think the 22nd Amendment is a bad idea and should be revoked.

Well, it is. There isn't really much basis for a defense of term limits. Keeping individual politicians' ego in check and politicians in fear of being retired by the voters - preventing them from becoming as all-dominant as Chavez in Venezuela or Kaukonen in 50s-70s Finland - is a job for civil society, not the constitution.

[minionofmidas]

FYI, seems Mugabe in Zimbabwe might get the same thing.

He already is, more or less, just on rather informal lines (read mass terrorisation of political opponents).

Now Zimbabwe, that's a really down-the-drain ex-democracy with a tiny few figleaves left.
Not comparable to Venezuela at all.

[minionofmidas]

FYI, seems Mugabe in Zimbabwe might get the same thing.

He already is, more or less, just on rather informal lines (read mass terrorisation of political opponents).

Now Zimbabwe, that's a really down-the-drain ex-democracy with a tiny few figleaves left.
Not comparable to Venezuela at all.

Give Chavez some time and he'll get to that as well. He's already screwed their hospitals over, foreigners aren't allowed in side because of how bad they are now.

Actually, that was you. Venezuela's once fairly good health care system deteriorated to teh point of nonexistence during the last twenty years before Chavez.
Chavez' attempts to rectify the situation, though, have been largely a disaster, though not a quite unmitigated one. Which is largely due to ideological battles being fought over the issue, by both sides by the way though of course folly in a President is a more serious offense than in private lobbyists... (Chavez basically built a government system of cheap healthcare in neighborhoods that hadn't had any for decades - but ran it very much as a competitor to private establishments, plus tried to use it for election purposes, etc. ANd staffed it mostly with underpaid (by Venezuelan standards) Cubans. Etc. Bad, bad populist rightwing fool, Hugo Chavez. As I was saying.)

[minionofmidas]

An arch-Nationalist, quite lacking in democratic instincts (while obviously no dictator - if he really wanted a full dictatorial position he's had ample opportunity go by unused) who aspires to regional leadership? That's right-wing in my book, anyhow. Although of course an entirely legitimate opposite view can be held (Chavez is certainly on the left on traditional race/class cleavages and such) - but was Peron a leftist?

[minionofmidas]

Reality check. He's abolishing term limits. Not trying to be elected president for life. End of reality check.

Oh come on Lewis.  Yes technically the measure doesn't make him President for life.  But I can't see you arguing/don't believe you would dispute that he would win every election for president that he stood for.

While the oil boom lasts, yes. This is supposed to demonstrate exactly what?

I'm challenging your statement..."Not trying to be elected president for life."

As I see it, you seem to be disputing the inferrence that while this measure doesn't make Chavez president for life, it effectively would do just that.  If I read you correctly.

Oh, he certainly wants to remain president for the remainder of his life - but "president for life" has a very different, Turkmenic ring to it that is completely out of place here. Eamon de Valera wanted to remain President for the remainder of his life as well. Konrad Adenauer wanted to remain Chancellor for the remainder of his life. So did Helmut Kohl. (All failed in that objective, eventually.)

[minionofmidas]

Kohl was a cheapshot. Adenauer didn't have to fear elections in the middle 19fifties. That Chavez will continue to govern *for ever* is by no means a given - he's unbeatable in the current political situation (such as, high oil prices, Bush**te antidemocratic coupists governing the Big Satan, etc), but that may not last.

[minionofmidas]

Can we get Colombia to kill him and end his slow trek to Communism and Dictatorship?

he'd love nothing more!  do you not get it?  he'd then die a martyr and hero who was murdered at the hands of Yanqui Imperialism.

Get Colombia to get some person that's poor from Venezuala who hates Chavez to do it. Just train him to do it and give him the weapons. It wouldn't look like that then.

Yes it would. How would you feel if another country trained some redneck hillbilly (has to be a White man to make it less obvious...) to assassinate your own favorite President? Think about that before throwing such disgusting shite around, ok?

[minionofmidas]

Chavez's statement of "removing term limits will enhance democracy" reminds me of all these idiots that we elect that think the 22nd Amendment is a bad idea and should be revoked.

Well, it is. There isn't really much basis for a defense of term limits. Keeping individual politicians' ego in check and politicians in fear of being retired by the voters - preventing them from becoming as all-dominant as Chavez in Venezuela or Kaukonen in 50s-70s Finland - is a job for civil society, not the constitution.

There is. In presidential systems of Lat Am type actual electoral loss by an incumbent absent a major disaster of cataclismic proportions is an extremely rare, if not an unheard of, event. Even when press, etc., work well (as they rarely do), it turns out it is a lot easier to depose an incumbent who does not want to go by a coup or revolution, than at a ballot box. Hence, I tend to believe, that absent term limits, democratic transfer of power from a non-senile leader would be an extremely rarely observed phenomenon in Latin America (not every generation of voters would live to see one). At the same time, there would be a lot more coups.

"Practical considerations", eh?
Well, even then a term limit is but a weak surrogate for a strong civil society (which of course doesn't exist in South America)

[minionofmidas]

Anyway, bad is that political system that is not based on practical considerations: otherwise, there would have been many perfectly defensible versions of Communism

Admittedly.

Anyways, guess I sort of ignored just how common presidential term limits are all over South America.