Obama's August surprise?
"Venezuelans oppose Chávez attempt to nationalize private food company" by Juan Forero, Washington Post | July 9, 2010
Then why is it in my July 18, 2010 printed Boston Sunday Globe?
Related: Sunday Morning Deja Vu
The Ole Sunday Switcheroo
WTF is this other than CENSORSHIP, readers, for this does not appear on the Globe's web version, either!
As in all major government takeovers of private companies in Venezuela, President Hugo Chávez declared that seizing beer-and-food giant Polar's facilities here would mark another victory for the poor in the country's march toward socialism.
"Why is it that Polar has so much money?" Chávez asked in a February speech made in this city in northwest Venezuela. "I say to the owner of Polar: Start making plans, because you are going to be out of here."
Weeks later, a decree expropriating Polar's warehouses and offices in an industrial zone of Barquisimeto was signed. And Venezuelans, after nearly 12 years of state interventions under Chavez, expected the government to quickly sweep the company's facilities in the country's fourth-largest city from their current location and replace them with apartments. Chávez suggested that he might even nationalize the entire company, which has plants and distribution points nationwide.
Except this time, the president's plans went badly awry, exposing mounting national opposition to a policy under which oil companies, supermarkets and factories have been taken over by the state, only to founder under the control of government functionaries.
Yes, but the SAME IS APPLAUDED when the AmeriKan government does it for Wall Street and the car companies -- except the U.S government leaves the looters in charge.
Not only did Polar fight back by taking its case to the Supreme Court, but its employees have risen up, too, rallying in opposition to Chávez's edict and holding all-night vigils to prevent a takeover.
Good for THEM,. Americans, not for YOU!
Among those who joined the uprising was Henri Falcón, the popular governor of Lara state, a former ally of Chávez's who says the president has not considered long-term consequences when nationalizing companies.
"The president arrives and it occurs to him to say, 'This has to be expropriated,' without taking into account the technical or legal criteria," Falcon said in an interview last week. "We oppose this because it does not make sense. It is more an impulse of the president."
The government has characterized the struggle with Polar as one between good and evil, with Chávez giving several speeches in which he has mocked Polar's owner, Lorenzo Mendoza, who is one of Latin America's richest men.
"We will see who can last longer, Mendoza, you with your millions or me with my morals," Chávez said in a nationally televised speech in June.
Mendoza, 44, has not publicly responded to the attacks, and Polar officials declined to comment about Chávez's efforts to nationalize the installations in Barquisimeto.
But employees said they oppose the government intervention because they think workers have fared badly at nationalized companies, where they have faced reduced wages and been unable to bargain collectively....
Of course, UNIONS are BAD in AmeriKa -- unless they are a tax-looting "public servants" union.
Workers also said Polar offers wages and benefits that far outstrip those of other employers in Venezuela, including the state.
"We are saying no because we have seen the experiences of other expropriated companies," said Juan Tacoa, president of the other union. "Here in Polar, we have benefits we know we would not have with the government."
The revolt against the president's plans has been particularly embarrassing because it has come during a roiling scandal involving the state's mismanagement of food distribution. Over the past two months, tens of thousands of tons of imported food bound for state-subsidized markets has been found rotting at ports and in warehouses....
Didn't the French have some experience with that kind of thing hundreds of years ago?
Now, I HAVE NO WAY of knowing whether that is true or not.
Am I supposed to believe it because the CIA's favorite agenda-pushing newspaper tells me so?
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