Reply #49: Good for Chavez and his people

[Goldstein1984]

I worked for Williams Energy in 2002 when it backed the unsuccessful coup against Chavez. Why the coup? Because Williams was extracting resources and giving very little back to the Venezuelan people. Nationalization of the oil industry in Venezuela gave Venezuelans control of their resources. Chavez also recently nationalized several Hilton hotels, which were catering to foreigners and paying Venezuelan nationals less than a living wage to serve non-Venezuelans.

I understand the hostility toward Chavez. The empire status quo is really tough to see slipping away, which is one reason why 5% of the world's population is doing 50% of its military spending--a big surge to retain hegemony.

By the way, note the Chavez introduction in the article: "Venezuela's socialist President Hugo Chavez ..." The mainstream Western media has to work that "socialist" in there. Never mind that he's the democratically elected socialist President.