This one's for you, Penta

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This one's for you, Penta

Postby friendlyskies » Sun Sep 26, 2010 11:15 am

"4 cylinder Camaro=communism" El Presidente

"You can smoke salmon but it's not quite the same as smoking heroin." nanuq
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Re: This one's for you, Penta

Postby Penta » Sun Sep 26, 2010 6:00 pm

Thank you, FS. Very jolly and chirpy. My not very well informed guess is that the chavistas will still win, but with a lower percentage than when they're voting for Hugo himself: maybe 52%. Since there's nothing much to go on, given that the opposition didn't even stand in the last elections for the NA, I don't think anyone can do much more than guess.
Shes never interfered with me. I have no complaints about her.
Same here.
Mega ditto.
I met her once and I found her to be a nice lady. Not kookey in any way.
Penta has always been gracious, kind and very sane in all my interactions with her.
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Re: This one's for you, Penta

Postby friendlyskies » Sun Sep 26, 2010 7:08 pm

Glad you liked it. I want to use it in my next pitched facebook battle when people are like, "Hugo Chaves, the dictator of Colomba Rica, is a terrorist and dictator and all Venezoalins all hate him because he's a godless communist, also." But I knew that at least one other person might appreciate it before that happens.
"4 cylinder Camaro=communism" El Presidente

"You can smoke salmon but it's not quite the same as smoking heroin." nanuq
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Re: This one's for you, Penta

Postby Penta » Sun Sep 26, 2010 10:49 pm

You have those sorts of battles on facebook? Maybe I should join after all. ;)

I feel very deprived this time. None of the opposition blogs I read in previous elections that were all hysterical about fraud (because they'd fallen for their own propaganda and the polls made up by the oppo polling companies) at around this stage in the proceedings are running any longer. They got paid work writing for the op-ed pages of American newspapers.
Shes never interfered with me. I have no complaints about her.
Same here.
Mega ditto.
I met her once and I found her to be a nice lady. Not kookey in any way.
Penta has always been gracious, kind and very sane in all my interactions with her.
User avatar
Penta
Ruby Tuesday
 
Posts: 15585
Joined: Thu Mar 25, 2004 4:32 pm
Location: UK, Spain

Re: This one's for you, Penta

Postby friendlyskies » Mon Sep 27, 2010 4:32 pm

Penta, I have had people tell me on facebook that Hugo Chavez is the dictator of Costa Rica, a "paramilitary power" that keeps its population under control by massacring its own people, who are denied the right to own guns.

It's like someone poured a bunch of propaganda into a blender, put it on "liquify," baked it in an oven, and used it to replace the brains of an entire Southern Baptist megachurch before releasing them into the online community. I don't know whether you're prepared to face an enemy like that.
"4 cylinder Camaro=communism" El Presidente

"You can smoke salmon but it's not quite the same as smoking heroin." nanuq
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Re: This one's for you, Penta

Postby Penta » Mon Sep 27, 2010 5:26 pm

Rather you than me. The people I talk to are not quite as bad, but it is astonishing how much propaganda people swallow. The ones that get me are the notions that Hugo's imprisoning or even murdering political opponents and that the media is cowed and compliant.

Anyway: good results in the elections. The opposition has managed to stop squabbling long enough to hold the electoral coalition together and win 60+ seats (out of 165, just enough to deprive the chavistas of a two-thirds super-majority), so there'll be something resembling scrutiny and opposition in the assembly at last. There's another thing - I couldn't count how many articles I read that said they'd made huge gains as if this was a stunning achievement, without pointing out that as they didn't even stand last time and they had no seats at all (apart from the ex-chavista breakaways), they could hardly fail to make "huge gains". But I expect they'll return to their hopeless ways in short order.
Shes never interfered with me. I have no complaints about her.
Same here.
Mega ditto.
I met her once and I found her to be a nice lady. Not kookey in any way.
Penta has always been gracious, kind and very sane in all my interactions with her.
User avatar
Penta
Ruby Tuesday
 
Posts: 15585
Joined: Thu Mar 25, 2004 4:32 pm
Location: UK, Spain

Re: This one's for you, Penta

Postby Penta » Mon Sep 27, 2010 10:39 pm

Oh a good, honest, accurate article for a change:


Venezuela: This was about the taking part

The Venezuela election was not a major blow to Hugo Chávez. It shows politics is working properly again
Mark Weisbrot

Today's election for 165 representatives in Venezuela's national assembly is significant but unlikely to bring about major change, despite the opposition having done better than expected. On the latest count the pro-government United Socialist party has 94 seats, with 60 for the opposition Democratic Unity, five for other parties and the rest undecided. The opposition claims it won a majority of the popular vote, but apparently it was very close between the two main parties.

As expected, most of the international press and its sources hailed the results as a "major blow" to Hugo Chávez, paving the way for his possible removal in the presidential election in 2012. But this is exaggerated.

The vote was widely seen as a referendum on Chávez, and it would be an anomaly in electoral politics if the government did not lose support after a recession last year that continued into the first quarter of this year. Chávez's popularity has always reflected the economy, reaching a low during the recession of 2002-03 – regardless of the fact that it was caused by an opposition oil strike. His approval rating has fallen from 60% in early 2009 to 46% last month.

For comparison President Obama's approval rating has fallen from 68% last April to 45% this month, and his party is expected to take big losses in the congressional elections. This is despite him having clearly inherited economic problems from his predecessor.

It is not clear why anyone would expect Venezuela to be exempt from the workings of electoral politics. The opposition has most of the wealth of the country – and most of its media. They have no problem getting their message out. Obama also faces a strong rightwing media, with Fox News now one of the most popular sources for coverage of the autumn elections, but there is much less of an opposition media in the US.

Much has been made of the opposition getting more than a third of the national assembly, thus being able to block legislation that would "deepen the revolution". Again, the importance of this is greatly exaggerated.

In reality it is unlikely to make much difference. The pace at which it adopts reforms has been limited more by administrative capacity than by politics. The Financial Times recently added up the value of industries nationalised by the Chávez government. Outside oil, it came to less than 8% of GDP over the last five years. Venezuela still has a long way to go before the state has as much a role in the economy as it does in, for instance, France.

On the positive side, the most interesting result of this election is that the opposition participated, has accepted the results, and now has a bloc of representatives that can participate in a parliamentary democracy.

This could be an advance for Venezuelan democracy, which has been undermined by an anti-democratic opposition for more than a decade. As opposition leader Teodoro Petkoff has noted, the opposition pursued a strategy of "military takeover" for the first four years, which included a military coup and a devastating oil strike that crippled the economy. In 2004 the opposition tried to remove Chávez through a referendum; they failed, and then promptly refused to recognise the result – despite its certification by international observers such as the Carter Center and the Organisation of American States.

They then boycotted the last election in 2005, hoping to portray the government as a "dictatorship" and leaving them without representation. This newly elected bloc could potentially draw the opposition into real political participation. If that happens, it would be a significant advance for a country that has been too polarised for too long.
Shes never interfered with me. I have no complaints about her.
Same here.
Mega ditto.
I met her once and I found her to be a nice lady. Not kookey in any way.
Penta has always been gracious, kind and very sane in all my interactions with her.
User avatar
Penta
Ruby Tuesday
 
Posts: 15585
Joined: Thu Mar 25, 2004 4:32 pm
Location: UK, Spain

Re: This one's for you, Penta

Postby friendlyskies » Mon Sep 27, 2010 11:08 pm

Well, I would use that as ammunition if I thought these folks could grasp the admittedly subtle difference between Hugo "being the genosidle dictater of Costa Rica" and "presiding over free, fair and peaceful Venezuelan elections where the opposition party made major gains."

But, considering the reality of facebook fighting, which is sort of like kung pao fighting with less fiber and more MSG, I think I'm still going to stick to the ska band. Did you notice that the opposition to Ska-P posted a video accusing them of being gay? Because, you know, being gay makes you much more likely to support genosidle dictaters, or in the case of North Korea, dictatertots.

The really funny thing is, they could tell you every statistic, and I do mean EVERY statistic, of any SEC game, and every player involved, since 1933. There is one enemy more hated than Hugo Chavez, the Ground Zero Terror Mosque, Obama, and France all put together - and that is Lane Kiffen. If there is ever another civil war, he will be the first up against the wall.
"4 cylinder Camaro=communism" El Presidente

"You can smoke salmon but it's not quite the same as smoking heroin." nanuq
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