Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez dead

http://www.cnn.com/2013/03/05/world/americas/venezuela-chavez-main/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

He was 58.

Sean Penn calls for the imprisonment of any journalist who dares suggest El Presidente has left this mortal coil.

I guess no chance in hell they will get a Democratic, Non-Socialist government in there to replace his administration.

Coincidentally, today is the 60th anniversary of Stalin's death.

7 days mourning, no less.

j7wild wrote:

I guess no chance in hell they will get a Democratic, Non-Socialist government in there to replace his administration.

I guess that there is no chance in hell that you will ever understand that democracy isn't automatically good and that socialism isn't automatically evil - they're only as good or as bad as the people using it.

I live in a country that is democratic. And about seventy years ago, we had a politician use that democracy to get himself elected by demonising socialism, just as you do. Under his leadership, we reintroduced consciption and sent thousands of soldiers to fight in a long and bloody war that we had no business being in, which was justified by exploiting the fear of socialism and communism that said politician had created in the first place.

You're not giving nearly enough credit to Communists themselves for creating anti-Communism. Seizing power and slaughtering millions takes a lot of work.

Prisoner Monkeys wrote:

j7wild wrote:

I guess no chance in hell they will get a Democratic, Non-Socialist government in there to replace his administration.

I guess that there is no chance in hell that you will ever understand that democracy isn't automatically good and that socialism isn't automatically evil - they're only as good or as bad as the people using it.

I live in a country that is democratic. And about seventy years ago, we had a politician use that democracy to get himself elected by demonising socialism, just as you do. Under his leadership, we reintroduced consciption and sent thousands of soldiers to fight in a long and bloody war that we had no business being in, which was justified by exploiting the fear of socialism and communism that said politician had created in the first place.

I have deep misgivings about liberal democracy's viability over the long term, but socialism is abhorrent in every respect and over all time-frames.

Dictator-loving douche-bags around the world have lost a friend in Chavez....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-21683426

Actor Sean Penn pays tribute to President Hugo Chavez

Academy award-winning actor Sean Penn and director Oliver Stone have paid tribute to Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez, who has died aged 58.

"I lost a friend I was blessed to have," said Penn, "and poor people around the world lost a champion".

Stone, whose documentary, South of the Border, celebrated Mr Chavez's 14-year leadership, praised him as a "hero".

"Hugo Chavez will live forever in history. My friend, rest finally in a peace long earned." he tweeted.

In the brief time I listened to Radio 2 today heard Ken Livingstone waxing/weasling lyrical about ol' Hugo, quotes by George Galloway and the rest. The question was: "should we/do we need a Chavez here?" Most were saying yes and all the good he'd do.
All the best for Venezuela, they'll need it I suspect.

Hilly wrote:

In the brief time I listened to Radio 2 today heard Ken Livingstone waxing/weasling lyrical about ol' Hugo, quotes by George Galloway and the rest. The question was: "should we/do we need a Chavez here?" Most were saying yes and all the good he'd do.
All the best for Venezuela, they'll need it I suspect.

I'd expect nothing less from a pair of maniacal communist blowhards.

Perilagu Khan wrote:

I have deep misgivings about liberal democracy's viability over the long term, but socialism is abhorrent in every respect and over all time-frames.

Not that I'm socialism's biggest advocate, but without free healthcare I'd be an even worse mess.

Perilagu Khan wrote:

I have deep misgivings about liberal democracy's viability over the long term, but socialism is abhorrent in every respect and over all time-frames.

Our PM apparently agrees wholeheartedly.
We have been protested! Awesome! Thank-you dear Leader. It's a great day for the Maple Leaf.
Venezuela protests Harper statement on Chavez as 'insensitive'
http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2013/03/06/pol-cp-harper-chavez-condolences-venezuela-reaction.html
"A wordy note from the vice-minister for North America, Claudia Salerno, said Caracas was protesting "in a blunt and categorical way, the statements issued the 5 of March 2013 by the prime minister of Canada, Stephen Harper, as they constitute insensitive and impertinent sentiments at a time when the Venezuelan people are grieving and crying ........"
Harper said in his short statement on Tuesday that he hopes the death of Chavez brings a more promising future for the Venezuelan people.
"At this key juncture, I hope the people of Venezuela can now build for themselves a better, brighter future based on the principles of freedom, democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights," Harper said in a statement Tuesday evening."

tiffanywint wrote:

I hope the people of Venezuela can now build for themselves a better, brighter future based on the principles of freedom, democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights

Disgusting.

Largo's Shark wrote:

Perilagu Khan wrote:

I have deep misgivings about liberal democracy's viability over the long term, but socialism is abhorrent in every respect and over all time-frames.

Not that I'm socialism's biggest advocate, but without free healthcare I'd be an even worse mess.

Perhaps not. Were healthcare privatized, its quality would improve, wait times would be reduced dramatically, healthcare would become more flexible and cheaper, and you'd be paying considerably less in taxes.

Perilagu Khan wrote:

Largo's Shark wrote:

Perilagu Khan wrote:

I have deep misgivings about liberal democracy's viability over the long term, but socialism is abhorrent in every respect and over all time-frames.

Not that I'm socialism's biggest advocate, but without free healthcare I'd be an even worse mess.

Perhaps not. Were healthcare privatized, its quality would improve, wait times would be reduced dramatically, healthcare would become more flexible and cheaper, and you'd be paying considerably less in taxes.

I don't know what kind of "mess" Largo feels he's in or would be in, but I can pick out one thing in his comments that is just dead-wrong: "free healthcare". There is no such thing. Somebody is paying for it. Maybe Largo's taxes pay for it (I don't know anything about London except what I see in the 007 films and Downton Abbey). And the truth is, if something is "free" it's usually not worth much, or eventually loses whatever value it may have had.

Back to my point: some body is paying for the health care system in Britain. What happens when those people are no longer able to pay for it?

In the U.S., the majority of healthcare is increasingly being funded by the minority (just like paid taxes). At some point the resources of the group of people paying for all this will be stretched to the breaking point, will snap, and then what? There's not much going on in America, from what I have seen, to bring more people into the pool of qualified contributors. Just the opposite, really. More people are being shown how to sign up for "free" government services, or the government is trying to force more corporations to buy insurance for their employees that covers more and more cost-prohibitive procedures. Very little, if any, discussion is had in this country about the individual person's responsibility to budget their lives to make sure they can afford to buy health insurance (or to even do the basic things to keep themselves healthy). No, healthcare is now a "right" and as such, we've become a society looking for ways to make other people pay for our bills. I can't count the number of employees I have who have no basic grasp of the amount of money the company spends on them to get their health insurance, because they don't want to know and don't care. I have a feeling that within 5-10 years, if that long, my company will dump all insurance plans for both the labor and the management people, and hundreds of thousands of employees will simply be shifted on to government rolls. When the fine for not having insurance is less than paying the premium, what would you expect an employer to do?

Perilagu Khan wrote:

Largo's Shark wrote:

Perilagu Khan wrote:

I have deep misgivings about liberal democracy's viability over the long term, but socialism is abhorrent in every respect and over all time-frames.

Not that I'm socialism's biggest advocate, but without free healthcare I'd be an even worse mess.

Perhaps not. Were healthcare privatized, its quality would improve, wait times would be reduced dramatically, healthcare would become more flexible and cheaper, and you'd be paying considerably less in taxes.

Which sounds great in theory but I doubt that it would work out quite as smoothly as that in practice. Private enterprise, the free market, etc. can have their downsides as well, and privatisation has sometimes been a disaster for the consumer.

I'm not socialism's biggest advocate either, BTW, but just sayin'.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

I don't know what kind of "mess" Largo feels he's in or would be in, but I can pick out one thing in his comments that is just dead-wrong: "free healthcare". There is no such thing. Somebody is paying for it. Maybe Largo's taxes pay for it (I don't know anything about London except what I see in the 007 films and Downton Abbey). And the truth is, if something is "free" it's usually not worth much, or eventually loses whatever value it may have had.

Are you okay with "free" policing and "free" national defence? If you're happy for those things to be provided through people's taxes, why not health care?

Loomis wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

I don't know what kind of "mess" Largo feels he's in or would be in, but I can pick out one thing in his comments that is just dead-wrong: "free healthcare". There is no such thing. Somebody is paying for it. Maybe Largo's taxes pay for it (I don't know anything about London except what I see in the 007 films and Downton Abbey). And the truth is, if something is "free" it's usually not worth much, or eventually loses whatever value it may have had.

Are you okay with "free" policing and "free" national defence? If you're happy for those things to be provided through people's taxes, why not health care?

Well, you can't exactly privatize policing and national defense, now, can you? Certain things must be arrogated to the federal government. Healthcare, in my very firm opinion, is not among them.

Loomis wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

I don't know what kind of "mess" Largo feels he's in or would be in, but I can pick out one thing in his comments that is just dead-wrong: "free healthcare". There is no such thing. Somebody is paying for it. Maybe Largo's taxes pay for it (I don't know anything about London except what I see in the 007 films and Downton Abbey). And the truth is, if something is "free" it's usually not worth much, or eventually loses whatever value it may have had.

Are you okay with "free" policing and "free" national defence? If you're happy for those things to be provided through people's taxes, why not health care?

Because a justice system and defence of the realm are vital to any sovereign nation. We create governments to serve these functions for the greater good of the people. Without these functions you have no sovereignty, no nation, no rule of law. They are indispensable functions of government. They are arguably the only two indispensable functions of government.
Healthcare on the other hand is an industry sector, subject to the vagaries of the market. It's ideally served by private insurers, and in a free and compassionate society, with a public option for those who can't pay preumiums. But the stronger your economy is, the less burden there should be on the public portion.

Loomis wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

I don't know what kind of "mess" Largo feels he's in or would be in, but I can pick out one thing in his comments that is just dead-wrong: "free healthcare". There is no such thing. Somebody is paying for it. Maybe Largo's taxes pay for it (I don't know anything about London except what I see in the 007 films and Downton Abbey). And the truth is, if something is "free" it's usually not worth much, or eventually loses whatever value it may have had.

Are you okay with "free" policing and "free" national defence? If you're happy for those things to be provided through people's taxes, why not health care?

But there isn't "free policing" and "free national defense". There is a cost to it, and it is paid for in blood, sweat, and treasure (in my case I've provided the treasure). We need to get away from putting the word "free" in front of other words, because there's no such thing as free.

And health insurance is a commodity. It is a service. When it was first introduced 120-150 years ago, there was no thought given to the idea that it would eventually become an inalienable "right". It was a commodity created for people who thought they might want it and could pay for it. It's only been through government intrusion into the market place that the cost of health care has sky-rocketed. In their attempt to do a good deed, government has created more problems than it has solved.

Now we're at a point in American society where everybody has a right to everything else that someone else has created or owns. Once the Internet started to become popular, there was an immediate push to make sure low-income communities were able to, as Jesse Jackson put it, bridge the "digital divide". Then it became making sure tax dollars went to putting high speed bandwith lines in low-income neighborhoods.

Here's an example of $4 million dollars that got wasted giving kids lap-top computers in Birmingham:
http://www.bhamwiki.com/w/Birmingham_Schools%27_XO_laptops

Turns out, only about 20% of the kids who received the lap-tops ever used them. Now they're obsolete and the tax-payer funded program has lost millions. People who want to keep the spigot of "free" money flowing claim that #1 teachers needed more training #2 that the program needed "momentum" (i.e. a fresh start, with more money behind it and a greater advertising push to get families to have their kids use these lap tops).

The lap-top fiasco in Birmingham is probably a great illustration of why people who have no ownership stake in their own lives probably will fail to value and treasure the "free" stuff that is given to them by the government; they did nothing to earn or merit the lap-top in the first place (other than qualify by virtue of being stupid and poor), so when it is given to them...when it simply handed over to them, they don't take care of it. They didn't have to work hard to earn the computer, so they feel no attachment to it when they abuse it (if they even bother to use it all). And Birmingham is just one example...a microcosm of a larger problem.

Same with healthcare. People who don't pay into system won't make any life-changes to improve their own health because they won't need to; Uncle Sam will pay their bills in perpetuity as long as the right people get voted into office. Meanwhile the tax base that funds programs like Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, and the Health Care Reform Act, continues to shrink and will eventually, like the Dodo, go extinct.

So fuck anyone that can't afford healthcare.

tiffanywint wrote:

Because a justice system and defence of the realm are vital to any sovereign nation. We create governments to serve these functions for the greater good of the people. Without these functions you have no sovereignty, no nation, no rule of law. They are indispensable functions of government. They are arguably the only two indispensable functions of government.
Healthcare on the other hand is an industry sector, subject to the vagaries of the market. It's ideally served by private insurers, and in a free and compassionate society, with a public option for those who can't pay preumiums. But the stronger your economy is, the less burden there should be on the public portion.

Not only that, but the policing and national defense are in place to, in part, protect people's individual liberties and their own pursuit of life, liberty and happiness. The government was never intended to provide us with any of those items; merely to make sure no one else attempted to take them from us. It is my responsibility to achieve my happiness and a fulfilling life; not Uncle Sam.

Python wrote:

So fuck anyone that can't afford healthcare.

Ah, yes. The old "false equivalency" counter-argument. When unable to respond with a cogent argument, just accuse the other side of not caring about poor people.

We all might afford healthcare a little better if the government wasn't exerting such undue pressure on the markets. Why am I forced to pay for insurance coverage that I WILL NEVER need simply because the government mandates that my insurance company include it in my plan? All that does is force my health insurer to pass the costs on to me, which is exactly what they've done.

Care to argue that one, Python?