Eliminate capitalist practices at public firms: Chavez

Yahoo India News (IANS) ^ | January 25, 2010

[Cheap_Hessian]

Caracas, Jan 25 (IANS/EFE) Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has asked for the cooperation of the national legislature in drafting laws permitting the elimination of capitalistic operating guidelines at public firms.

Chavez on his weekly radio and television show Sunday revealed the societal model he envisions, according to which public firms will not depend on their established production capacity or on the quality of their products, their costs, or their sales, because their survival will be guaranteed by an annual budget provided by the state.

With their operations assured in this way, the firm will not sell its products in the open market but rather will deliver them to a state entity which will undertake to market them at prices whereby the value added is eliminated.

According to Chavez's idea, the consumer goods that are sold to the public in this way will be much cheaper but will be of similar quality to those offered by capitalist-run firms.

[Oceander]

Apparently, Hugo Chavez has been dumpster-diving in the ash-heaps of history, because he has done nothing more, and nothing less, than revive the old Soviet production system. All we need him to say now is the phrase "five year plan" and the circle will be complete.

Still, you have to give him credit (actually, I wouldn't if you're a lender of any sort), after all, I'm sure we all remember 1988, when those dashing young men in the socialist utopia of East Germany were all zipping around in their cutting-edge Trabants:

And those poor, slaves-to-capitalism living over in the hovels and ghettoes of West Germany had to make do with poorly-designed trash such as the VW Jetta:

Man, who wouldn't want to trade a 1988 VW Jetta for a Trabbie, any day of the week!

And what a shame that all of that was destroyed, in 1989, when Ronald Reagan drop-kicked the Soviet Union into the ash-heaps of history (The Gipper won that one!):

And with that, the prices of everything skyrocketed, didn't they?

Geez, what an effing loser - and to think that Dear Leader looks up to this chump.

[zeugma]

When Venezuela completely implodes, the U.S. media will describe it as “unexpected.”

Nope. They'll say it's our fault that yet again, socialism has devolved into utter death, desolation, and misery.

[jimt]

In other news, Chavez declares pi equals three.

“All that decimal business is a capitalist plot, and unnecessary in a socialist utopia !” he said Monday.

[ScottinVA]

According to Chavez's idea, the consumer goods that are sold to the public in this way will be much cheaper but will be of similar quality to those offered by capitalist-run firms.

LOLOLOLOL!!!!!!!!!! Hel-lo, Hugo! Cold-war Eastern Europe? Cuba? China? Russia?... ah never mind. Let them find out on their own.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Si, Si! This is the kind of fresh thinking and insight the world needs! Eliminate the middleman!

If only Che had lived to see this!

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

When Venezuela completely implodes, the U.S. media will describe it as “unexpected.”

Cuba has limped along for fifty years on a lot less. Venezuela has huge oil resources. Hard, even for a socialist, to screw that up. Of course, Venezuelans don't need a boat to escape.

[TexasRepublic]

“Of course, Venezuelans don’t need a boat to escape.”

Neither did the East Germans.

[green iguana]

Venezuela has huge oil resources. Hard, even for a socialist, to screw that up.

I'm sure you're right - the reserves will not be screwed up. But they will remain just that - reserves - as he screws up the companies and technology needed to get it out of the ground and turn the oil resources into the cash resources needed to fund his utopia.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Even the most die hard ideologues learn to step back and let the doctors revive the golden goose when it stops laying. I see an “ideology free zone” eventually being cordoned off around the oil industry.

[green iguana]

For the Venezuelans sake, I hope you’re right.

But remember, Zimbabwe used to be the bread-basket of Africa.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

The Chinese didn’t croak Hong Kong.