Chavez says Latin America needs Russia

There one commodity to import from Venezuelan

Why are we giving this man attention...personality cults are soo last century lol

Does Russia need Latin America???

Russia does need Latin America, if for nothing else than to piss off the
Americans.

Yeah, but I mean, how much of Latin America is hopping aboard this bullshit train? Bolivia? Cuba? Please, they weren't the biggest friends of the United States before Chavez either.

Yeah, but I mean, how much of Latin America is hopping aboard this bullshit train? Bolivia? Cuba? Please, they weren't the biggest friends of the United States before Chavez either.

Cuba was before Fidel, Venezeula used to be much better.
The big problem as i see it is that American foreign policy is too often
very short sighted, and ususally not enough effort is made to get the
people in these regions a better life. They just deal with the leaders,
and whatever the leaders do is good enough for the US.

Just when I was starting to think Hugo Chavez might be a good guy, he starts pulling this bullshit, just for the sake of pissing off America. I guess he doesn't know better.

Chavez has been stridently Anti-American for quite some time.

Shut up and go back and watch your BBC

Yeah, but I mean, how much of Latin America is hopping aboard this bullshit train? Bolivia? Cuba? Please, they weren't the biggest friends of the United States before Chavez either.

Cuba was before Fidel, Venezeula used to be much better.
The big problem as i see it is that American foreign policy is too often
very short sighted, and ususally not enough effort is made to get the
people in these regions a better life. They just deal with the leaders,
and whatever the leaders do is good enough for the US.

I agree with both counts. However, I believe the US has good relations with Colombia, Brazil, Chile, Argentina, and possibly Peru...at least these nations aren't really going out to piss off the Americans, which today seems to be a sign of good relations. No offense, Chavez has been a major prick, not just to the Americans, but to the Colombians as well with their support of the FARC.

Whoa!

I once read that beauty pageants are serious business business in Venezuela.

If the USA was dictating social policy to these countries in order to "get the
people in these regions a better life" you'd certainly say that we were meddling in the affairs of sovereign nations. We only deal with their leaders because that's what we're supposed to do.

It's the job of those leaders, Chavez, Morales, and Castro, to imporve the statndard of living for the people they rule over. It is NOT the responsiblity of thje US Government to concern itself over the domestic affairs of Cuba, Venezuela, or Bolivia.

In a perfect world, i would agree with you Bart.

But, the world isnt perfect, and all these guys are in power because the previous
bunch who had US support, were pretty poor at the job.

And now we're out of the picture. What would you have us do? Run a coup against democratically elected governments?

While I certainly emphathize with the Cubans, Venezuelans, and Bolivians, the problems they are experiencing becuase they elected asshats to rule them is a problem they need to resolve (or not) on their own.

So far as Venezuela goes, should they choose to start messing with shipping in the region or to invade the Netherlands' Antilles as Chavez has said they would then there will be a war. And if Russia wants to back Chavez on that play then it will be an ugly war.

Honestly, Latin American governments will never be amazingly successful because of the cultural issues they must first surmount in order to be successful. Latin American "macho" culture lends itself to abusive, corrupt tendencies and you'll find that the most corrupt and abusive people in the region are all too often lionized as role models in their respective nations.

Some of the LA nations have made remarkable progress to take their cultures away from the corruption that some people celebrate. Argentina and Chile come to mind for starters, Peru is working on it, so is Colombia, so is Brazil. The rest of them, though, have a long way to go and neither American nor Russian influence is going to help.

Change must come from within.