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May 14, 2006
Looney-tune Chavez New Latin King
Chavez doesn't pull any punches
Venezuelan president's style surprises many, but foreign oil firms not leaving
SAN TOME, VENEZUELA - Touring a branch office in central Venezuela, an executive from the state-run oil company worked himself into a lather.
Why? Because there weren't enough portraits of President Hugo Chavez hanging in the building.
"I want a nice, big photo of the president in the main entrance," he barked at a press officer. "And that's an order."
Venezuela's leftist president has sharply raised taxes on foreign oil firms and abruptly rewritten contracts, giving his government majority ownership and control over dozens of privately developed fields.
Last week, Chavez announced that his government will increase taxes from 34 percent to 50 percent on petroleum from the Orinoco basin and that royalties will double to 33.3 percent. On Thursday, the Venezuelan Congress, dominated by Chavez allies, recommended that the state convert the four Orinoco projects to joint ventures with the state oil company — known by the acronym PDVSA, pronounced pay-day-VAY-sa — assuming majority control and management.
Venezuela adopted similar changes last month on 32 smaller oil fields. Eventually, all petroleum operations in the country will be brought under majority government control, Oil Minister Rafael Ramirez said last week.
"Companies are making a lot of money taking oil from Venezuela," Chavez said last Sunday on the radio. "For the next year, the extra revenue (for the government) looks like it will come to more than a billion dollars."
Chavez said in Rome on Thursday ( May 11) in case of a military attack against Iran, no country in the world would have access to crude oil.
Chavez made the remark at a press conference, adding, “As Iran’s President Ahmadinejad has reiterated, if Tehran would come under attack, oil would get scarce for everyone.”
He also said that the US President George W. Bush should be put to trial at the international court of justice for having launched genocide in Iraq. “For all the horror it has created around the globe in the course of the past century, the United States’ war machine should be dismantled, since under the current conditions it is a threat against the entire mankind, particularly against our children.”
Chavez added, “The North American empire is the most cruel murderer regime that has ever come to power in world history and a serious threat for all nations.”
He believes the death of the United States had better taken place in the course of the 21st century, because “otherwise the entire world would face the threat of annihilation.”
Wild Thing's comment......
March 4, ***...Chavez appoints radicals to head Venezuelan passport agency - reports of Arabs otaining ID documents*** CARACAS -- Already facing allegations that Muslim extremists have obtained Venezuelan identity documents, President Hugo Chávez has put the country's passport agency in the hands of two radicals -- one a supporter of Saddam Hussein.
Hugo Cabezas and Tareck el Aissami were appointed last month as director and deputy director of the Identification and Immigration Directorate, in charge of border controls and issuing passports and national ID cards. The agency also works with electoral authorities on voter registration.
Both were top student leaders at the University of the Andes in the western city of Merida, described by senior school officials as a virtual haven for armed Chávez supporters and leftist guerrillas.
.........Allegations that Chávez's leftist government issued ID documents to Islamic radicals surfaced most recently in the newsweekly U.S. News and World Report. ''Venezuela is providing support -- including identity documents -- that could prove useful to radical Islamic groups,'' the magazine reported last month, quoting senior U.S. military and intelligence officials...... ***
Chávez was the only head of state to visit Hussein in recent years -- in 2000. He bitterly opposed the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq and tried to have a postwar Iraqi delegation banned from OPEC meetings.
Posted by Wild Thing at May 14, 2006 09:55 AM
Comments
Nationalize all of Citgo's assets in the U.S. But then again the left probably would send him donations to make up the loss.
Posted by: Jack at May 14, 2006 11:58 AM
Open up exploration in America, build more refineries, develop alternate energy, get the illegals and their pickups and vans off the road. We would then not need to import much, especially from Chavez, the Mideast and Nigeria.
Posted by: TomR at May 14, 2006 02:38 PM
Jack yes the left probably would send them donations.
Posted by: Wild Thing at May 14, 2006 03:32 PM
Yesss Tom and I wish we would stop letting the enviro's stop of from drilling where we have tons of oil.
Posted by: Wild Thing at May 14, 2006 03:33 PM
Part of the problem is refining another part is the source of the oil, the biggest problem are the leftist in our own country. Many Americans are still buying gasoline and products from Hugo Chavez's wholly Venezuelan owned CITGO which has Venezuelan owned refineries and distribution points inside the United States. This gives Hugo two things 1. A monopoli. 2. Blackmail leverage. Seize Hugo's refining and selling capacity here and he'll soon be singing a new tune.
Posted by: Jack at May 14, 2006 07:25 PM
Jack thank you for the link, you did a GREAT post about this. Very informative and I agree when going to Citgo it is money in the pocket for Hugo.
Posted by: Wild Thing at May 15, 2006 12:01 AM
