[Copernicus]

Source

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez threatened Thursday to punish European countries that apply strict new rules for deporting illegal immigrants by denying them oil and blocking their investments.

The EU Parliament passed new guidelines Wednesday under which illegal migrants can be held in special detention centers — not jails — for up to 18 months before being expelled.

Chavez said in a televised speech that the measure shows "signs of fascism," and that countries would have to "build concentration camps" to hold millions of immigrants.

"Our oil shouldn't go to those countries" that adopt the policy, he said.

Venezuela sells most of its oil to the United States despite political tensions between the two nations, but is only a minor supplier to Europe. Some European companies operate in Venezuela, including France's Total and Norway's Statoil.

Chavez added that "if some European country starts to apply this and jails Colombians, Paraguayans, Bolivians, Ecuadoreans, then we're going to make our own list of companies from that country that have investments in Venezuela.

"We aren't going to take anyone prisoner, but the company would have to take its investments back there."

The socialist president noted that Venezuela has good relations with many European countries, such as France, and said it has "turned the page" with Spain after a flap over its king telling Chavez to shut up at a summit last year.

But if Europe pursues this course on immigration, he said, "why have more summits with the European Union?"

[hannu]

This will be a big blow for Londoners.

Chavez gives free oil to everyone who lives in London.

Is Chavez any relation to Hugo Boss?

[pikachu]

So now Venezuela will be selling ALL of its oil to United States? Kool.

[Arbiter Azariah]

Well, this is an interesting development. This is occurring in the wake of a global oil shock, whilst Britian is planning on lobbying OPEC nations to invest in alternative energy industries in the UK. Meanwhile, other countries want to apply pressure to suppliers to reduce the prices of oil, which are hurting their citizens and their industries. With Chavez threatening to cut off oil, there's a renewed sense of urgency to the oil conference currently taking place in Jeddah. Let's see how things unfold.



Link for those interested in knowing more about the Jeddah conference. Hat tip to the Sydney Morning Herald.

[QatzelOk]

to punish European countries that apply strict new rules for deporting illegal immigrants by denying them oil and blocking their investments

Chavez is positionning himself as the champion of the world's poor and disengranchised. This is the kind of globalization that I can support. Global empathy.

The globalization of America is all about chaining third-world children to shoe-stitching machines and making them pay one of our companies for drinking water, while Hugo's globalization is about extending charity to all of the poor on the earth's crust. Two very different "visions" and only one of them resembles anything human.

[NYYS]

I honestly haven't seen one move by Chavez that hasn't been destructive and plain idiotic. The man has threatened to cut off almost everyone and has made himself an international pariah.

He's accomplishing nothing but the stepping Venezuela ever closer to collapse and terrible poverty.

[QatzelOk]

He's accomplishing nothing but the stepping Venezuela ever closer to collapse and terrible poverty.

I guess that's what happens when you try to redistribute income so that the poor can eat and go to school: rich people post texts that say it isn't working.

[Nets]

Or alternatively, when one sees Capitalism as having raised the first world out of crushing poverty into affluence, a (relatively) poor lazy person posts texts saying it "isn't working".

[NYYS]

I guess that's what happens when you try to redistribute income so that the poor can eat and go to school

Correct. Venezuela is a train wreck. Even you, Qatz, have to admit something they're doing isn't working. Their people have been getting poorer since 1970, that's terrible. GDP growth simply hasn't been able to keep up with population growth.

[Noelnada]

I don't support this new legislation at all, i have been demonstrating in front of the EU parliament against it. I also got arrested while demonstrating in front of the national immigration office (Office des étrangers).

So i believe the critics of Chavez are welcomed and think he should just do it but i also believe this is just one more empty threat .

[pikachu]

NYYS, something about your graph just isn't working.
The world bank reports the Venezuelan GDP as growing by about 8% a year, while Venezuelan population growth is about 1.6%.

So how the fuck can they be getting poorer on average?

I've noticed that the graph ends at 2002 - ok let's look at 2002:
Population growth: 1.52%
GDP growth: 2.7%

Still higher. Anyway, a lot of things could have changed since 2002. Do you have a more recent update?

[Nets]

Pikachu, any information on the growth of the money supply? Something tells me Venezuela's Gov't is the type to use an inflation tax.

[QatzelOk]

You guys are looking at GDP growth as the measure of Chavez's success. As if consuming even MORE RESOURCES is the solution for anything right now.

Redistribution is about redistributing what you already have. And the economies that collective sharing can provide can lead to a decrease in resource consumption, which appears as a negative on a GDP growth chart.

Whereas if everyone in the US got AIDS tomorrow, the GDP would shoot up because of all those thousand-dollar-a-day medical bills.

This is why fundamentalist consumers don't get Hugo Chavez: he isn't trying to increase Rolex purchases.

[san christobol]

Inflation is rampant in Venezuela.

[QatzelOk]

Inflation is rampant in Venezuela.

I'm sure all those 6-year-olds who are seeing the inside of a school for the first time are really worried about what this might do to rich people's portefolios.

You can't eat a stable currency.

[pikachu]

Pikachu, any information on the growth of the money supply? Something tells me Venezuela's Gov't is the type to use an inflation tax.

Well, the inflation was 12% in 2001 or 2002, but to my knowledge, the so-called "Real GDP growth" already takes that into account.

And the GDP per capita, to my knowledge, is simply Real GDP divided by total population. If no further calculation is involved, then something among the figures must be wrong because they can't all be true.

As if consuming even MORE RESOURCES is the solution for anything right now.

More resources = more power.
More power = more chance to stay alive.

By the way, GDP is about producing, not consuming.

he isn't trying to increase Rolex purchases.

Oh yes he is. That's exactly what he must be telling his National Assembly every year. If he tells the opposite, he will be fired immidiately.

[QatzelOk]

More resources = more power.
More power = more chance to stay alive.

This is really the "four legs good, two legs bad" of capitalism, isn't it.

[pikachu]

Or you think what, Qatz, that people are superior to animals? Every time you think that, please recall that humans still reproduce by fucking each other in the ass.

[QatzelOk]

Or you think what, Qatz, that people are superior to animals? Every time you think that, please recall that humans still reproduce by fucking each other in the ass.

Not only does this sentence not make any sense, but it is completely unrelated to Hugo Chavez's gesture towards oil-dependent Europe.

The problem here isn't Chavez, it is European addiction to foreign products that they often procure via military means.

[pikachu]

sorry if it was off-topic.