Chavez Seeks Sweeping Changes in Vote

CARACAS, Venezuela - President Hugo Chavez faces his stiffest challenge in years Sunday as voters decide whether to approve constitutional changes that would greatly expand his powers and let him seek re-election for decades to come.

An emboldened opposition and recent violent clashes in street protests point to a potentially volatile dispute if the vote is close.

Chavez has warned opponents he will not tolerate attempts to stir up violence, and threatened to cut off oil exports to the U.S. if Washington interferes. The South American country is a major supplier to the United States — the No. 1 buyer of Venezuelan oil.

"In the case of an aggression by the United States government, we wouldn't send any more oil to that country," Chavez told reporters Saturday. "Forget about our oil."

Chavez, who has become Latin America's most outspoken antagonist of Washington since he was first elected in 1998, calls the constitutional overhaul vital to making Venezuela a socialist state. He labels those who resist it pawns of President Bush. :::::: Such a reminder of what a Marxist president, supported by a socialist, anti-American congress would be like and what their objectives would be....we have already seen many samples of their REAL agenda....the "Fairness" Doctrine, direct attacks by presidential candidates on the free speech rights of talk radio's Rush Limbaugh, mandated, ORDERED, socialist health care (not optional) -- the government controls all. Let us pray that America wakes up and prevents radical, power-mad socialists from destroying America any more than it has already been damaged.

“I wonder how long Chavez will be “around”???”

Probably for many years. After surviving the 2002 coup and the subsequent national strike, I think he had beaten his most daunting obstacles.

I am curious to know whether the State Department actually did pressure the group that removed Chavez to reinstate him right before he was in fact returned to power. Does anyone have any knowledge of State’s actions in this?

http://www.financialsense.com/editorials/gue/2007/0330.html ALL HAT, NO CATTLE by Elliott H. Gue Editor, The Energy Letter Here's the problem for Venezuela: The country has no alternative market to the US for much of its crude. One useful measure in this regard is a refinery's complexity index. Refineries that are able to run heavier, more-sour feedstocks are said to be more complex than refineries that can only run light, sweet crude. There are a few different ways to measure this, but one of the simplest is to compare a refinery's conversion capacity to its total throughput capacity. Without delving into too much detail, suffice it to say that conversion capacity is what allows a refiner to process heavy, sour crudes. Venezuela has total refining capacity of about 1.28 million barrels of crude oil per day. The country's total conversion capacity is less than 40 percent of that amount; my crude measure of complexity stands at 38 percent. Venezuela is woefully incapable of refining even a small part of its crude domestically, so it must export that oil to countries where it can be refined. Of course, the Venezuelan government-owned oil company, doing business as Citgo in the US, owns refineries abroad--mainly in the US mainland and in the US Virgin Islands (St. Croix). Citgo either owns outright or holds a large stake in another 1.1 million barrels per day worth of refining capacity located in the US. The complexity index for its US-based refineries stands at 83 percent. Obviously, these refineries were set up with the express purpose of handling Venezuelan heavy crude oil imports into the US market. And, as a whole, US refineries are among the most complex in the world; it's a logical importer of Venezuela's crude. How about those other potential markets? China has total refining capacity of about 6.25 million barrels per day. But the complexity index for these refineries is only 15.5 percent; China can't adequately refine heavy crudes, so the vast majority of Venezuelan oil exports would be useless to China. Chavez's threats ring hollow when you consider these facts. Chavez needs every ounce of oil revenue he can get to stay in power. Without his oil-funded social programs and "21st century" socialist spending, he'd likely be out of power in a matter of weeks. The fact is he's just as dependent on the US as the US is on Venezuela, perhaps even more so.

Chavez Warns Voters Not to Anger Him by Rejecting His New Constitution [semi-satire]

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez warned voters that anyone voting against his proposed constitutional changes would be considered a “traitor.” “People may vote freely, but they must also vote correctly,” Chavez said. “A ballot is too precious to be wasted on a wrong decision.”

The harsh words followed recent polling data showing that the fate of Chavez’s
proposed reforms was up in the air. It could be a case of overreaching. Addled Venezuelans who seem quite content to grant Chavez broad dictatorial powers for life including authority to shut down newspapers, television and radio stations and detaining citizens without charges, may have been spurred to reconsider after discovering that one of the new powers to be granted is droit du seigneur.

The droit du seigneur clause of the new constitution would give the president the legal right to engage in the first sexual congress of all newly weds. While Chavez has attempted to justify this clause on the grounds that he has “superior seed” this argument is not going over as well as he had hoped.

“Making to effort to try to ensure that the eldest child of each new family will be the best possible child is essential to the future strength of the nation,” Chavez argues. It remains to be seen whether this argument will hold sway in the election.