I bet this is what put Mullah Pat Robertson over the edge

[NNN0LHI]

http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=nifea&&sid=a3z63_HrIvtc

Venezuela's Chavez Squeezes Oil Companies With Taxes, Raids

Aug. 24 (Bloomberg) -- On July 14 in the western city of Maracaibo, Venezuelan government tax auditors and a prosecutor went to the offices of Chevron Corp., the second-largest U.S. oil company.

They seized boxes of records to build a case that San Ramon, California-based Chevron and 21 other energy companies owe Venezuela $3 billion in back taxes. The raid is part of President Hugo Chavez's push to squeeze more money out of foreign companies that want to pump oil from the world's fifth-largest petroleum exporter.

Since October 2004, he has raised heavy-oil royalty fees to as high as 30 percent from 1 percent, begun paying for some services in nonconvertible bolivares instead of U.S. dollars, and ordered oil well contracts converted into government-controlled joint ventures.

Chavez, 51, wants to use the revenue to pay for homes, clinics and schools for the 58 percent of Venezuelan families who live on less than $200 a month.

Since taking office in February 1999, Chavez has embarked on a socialist revolution: seizing ranches to hand over to the poor and starting a TV news network with promotional ads featuring a swastika painted on a U.S. flag.

Chavez says he's using oil money to bankroll a quest to become Latin America's leader against U.S.-style capitalism, and in a May 4 speech, he said ``Being rich is bad'' and ``Jesus Christ was a socialist.''

[H5N1]

1. Viva Chavez!

[gmoney]

2. Patwah! (n/t)

[madokie]

3. You go Hugo

With a Hugo in this country could you imagine where we could go as a society. The love and good will it would foster, gives me goose bumps just thinking about it.
Hell I'd just like to have my old Bill back. I miss an intelligent and honest man in the whitehouse.

[TheFarseer]

4. If I was Venezuelan, I would love that guy!

It's pretty amusing to see him screw with the oil barons and bush. It's hard to get a country out of a cycle of poverty. I hope he can do it.

[zoeb]

5. I don't suppose he was born in the US...

I think he could win in 2008!

[wli]

6. viva Chavez!

[MisterP]

7. he's been past the edge and is hurtling down past scrub and rocks

and stork nests at 102 mph--or the prevailing effective terminal velocity for a non-streamlined body depending on humidity, currents, and air pressures