Originally posted by andy1972
How in the name of sweet Jesus can a country loose nearly 30 BILLION dollars, and nobody ask's questions until it's to late.....

Well .. when the leader of the country (Chavez) NATIONALIZES the media and takes it over .. and freedom of speech and freedom of the press is gone ... that sort of thing tends to happen. No one can ask questions. No one can print or report the information.

So, with all that siphoned off personal wealth, we'd expect to see hsi family members living it up in foreign capitols, buying up multimillion dollar / pound residences in swanky neighbourhoods, just like the families of some pretty nasty dictators we in the west cosy up to. After all, no point in having that wealth if you are not going to benefit from it... right?

So, lets have a look at where ol' Hugo has been spending his ill-gotten wealth. And no, I am not gonna go looking, that's down to those flinging the mud, isn' it. Prove to the rest of us that this money was indeed stolen and is stashed somewhere in his name. Show us what he or his family have bought with this incredible wealth, both in and out of the country, then we might have something to talk about.

Personally, without any evidence being presented, this one currently ranks up there with "6 Million Jews died in the holocaust" and "Saddam's WMD's".

Originally posted by Kang69
What, as opposed to building an Empire and averaging a war every 20 years?

Deflection. What countries and/or world leaders other than Chavez did are not the subject of the thread. Why are you not capable of discussing the crimes Chavez has committed? Why the deflection?

Did Venezuela go to Vietnam and kill millions of people? No they did not. Iraq? Afghanistan? Korea? The list goes on and on.

Again. Those aren't the topic. Chavez taking over the oil profits and then probably stealing $2 Billion for himself is the topic.

'm guessing you hold the same judgement for all world leaders?

Sure. If Bush43 or Obama took over the oil fields in the USA .. and then took over the media and ruled the media with an iron rod, not allowing free speech or freedom of the press ... and then billions went missing from the oil field profits ... Yes, I'd hold the same judgement for those people.

Or just the ones that you "think" are bad?

Taking away freedom of the press and then putting yourself in charge of oil profits for an entire country .. and then have billions go missing and yet your personal wealth goes up by billions ... I don't 'think' that's being a bad guy, I KNOW that's being a bad guy. If Bush43 did this, you'd be calling for his head on a platter. And rightfully so.

If you honestly think Chavez was a worse leader than any of the recent US presidents or say, Prime Ministers of Israel, you are sadly mistaken.

Another deflection attempt. Fail. No where did I compare Chavez to anyone else. No where did I say anyone else was wonderful or bad. This is just about Chavez and his alleged crimes.

For Christakes think for yourself! .

Right back atchya.

Originally posted by Britguy
So no evidence then, just a bunch more speculation, innuendo and maybe's.... hardly anything that would stand up in a court of law, and from MSM and corporatist sources who bear a brudge!

The evidence is there. Just as it was there for Arafat. There won't be swiss bank account numbers given out, because they don't want to do that sort of thing. But the facts about his landholdings and his families landholdings and investments and bank accounts and fleets of cars are there. Looks like you just want to deny it. I suppose that's understandable. When people put others up high and admire them, it's hard to admit when those people aren't as wonderful as we thought.

Dictators are all rich...

All this hypocracy makes me want to spew . . . Chavez takes a few billion from the people and stashes it and he's villified in every 'free world' media outlet. Meanwhile, our political leaders siphon trillions from the people, send it to the rich folk under the guise of 'bailouts' and they're saviors of the friggin' universe. Go figure.

Yup . . . spewing big old chunks at this point.

Originally posted by SirMike

When you single handedly control all the levers of power in a nation, its not too difficult to siphon off a bit here and bit there to leave yourself a golden parachute when the day comes you are run out of office. It happened with Pinochet and the Castro brothers and Chavez certainly seemed like he was cut from the same cloth.

Politicians around the world have engaged in a little monetary slight-of-hand in one way or another. French leaders get money from Libyan politicians -- then they kill the donor. US leaders simply loot the treasury, loot foreign treasuries or steal the gold. I wonder what happened to the story about the secret Vatican bank accounts for our political players -- including the Chief "Justice" of the Supreme Court?

Chavez's rise to power was a totally understandable and natural opposition to US robber-baron capitalism and military adventures in Central/South America. While I don't care for socialism/communism, I did admire the way the Chavez was creating housing and independent jobs (manufacturing, etc) for his people. I also admire the fact that he kept out the pentagon. Definitely a smart man.

Originally posted by Cauliflower
Even if Chavez was just a sock puppet he probably shared profits from an estimated $14.195 billion black market, the United Nations claims that Venezuela is now the source of more than half the coc aine seized at sea en route to Europe. .

One of the top Venezuelan coc aine traffickers testified that government officials were on his payroll.

And that's different from any other country? Sounds like the UN was upset they weren't getting their cut of the action.

Closer to home, I'm told that US narcotics investigations are mysteriously brought to a halt when they get 3 to 4 levels above the street. That would tie-in nicely to US troops guarding poppies and CIA jets crashing with multi-ton payloads of coc aine. You think other nations are any different? By some estimates, one half of Turkey's GDP is due to narcotics trafficking.

Before we start throwing stones at Chavez, we should exit the glass houses we live in.

Originally posted by jcarpenter
Before we start throwing stones at Chavez, we should exit the glass houses we live in.

People here are capable of pointing out the problems that are EVERYWHERE. We don't have to do one at a time. We can discuss what Obama is doing wrong .. what Israel is doing wrong .. what the Palestinians are doing wrong .. what Chavez did wrong. We can do it all. And we do.

Originally posted by GoalPoster
All this hypocracy makes me want to spew . . .

People purposely closing their eyes to corruption of any kind make me want to spew.

Chavez takes a few billion from the people and stashes it and he's villified in every 'free world' media outlet.

He STOLE two billion dollars. The media is EXPOSING that fact .. not 'villifying him'. And anyone who shuts down the free press and then steals two billion dollars deserves to be exposed for what he is doing. If it were Bush43 doing this .. you would be shouting from the roof tops, right? So why give Chavez a free pass.

Meanwhile, our political leaders siphon trillions from the people, send it to the rich folk under the guise of 'bailouts' and they're saviors of the friggin' universe.

And where, exactly, do you see anyone here saying that these people are 'saviours of the frigg'n universe' .. or even anything close to it?? You might see a few O-Bots proclaiming their messiah as perfect, but for the most part everyone is fed up with those people. Congress has an 11% approval rating. Obama is something like 44% (which is way too high).

Originally posted by marg6043
the America gullible believe that is ok for the government to steal tax payers money for waste, abuse, Bailouts to the rich, to pay for foreign terrorist countries briberies and favors for pay off to the private interest.

Actually .. americans do NOT think that is okay.

And exposing the fact that Chavez stole billions from the people .. that he shut down freedom of speech and freedom of the press ... that shouldn't get people upset. They should be glad that a corrupt leader of a country is being exposed. But for some strange reason .. they just get all indignant and keep cheering the guy.

I'd like to see them cheer for George Bush 43 if he did the same thing.

Originally posted by SilentE
Gobble Gobble Gobble.

Hmmm, more disinformation please i'm not quite full yet.

So lets get this right. Don't believe our governments propaganda about Chavez but by all means gobble up the propaganda his regime spreads?.

Its amusing how easy it is to win over a board full of people who are supposed to deny ignorance and use critical thinking. Just state the opposite of what they guy they dislike says and voila you're a benevolent hero! Its like some of you dont want to take the effort or are comfortable realizing both sides are attempting to manipulate people and you rather have a black and white easy to digest way of looking at the world.