Hugo Chavez Quotes
Chavez is not Chavez. Chavez is the people! And the people will not be stopped.
Hugo Chavez Frias, President of Venezuela, Speech from the Presidential Palace Balcony, July 26, 1999
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
Despite his speeches like this one, he was a ruthless dictator who then before his death in 2000 handed power to his son.
What is fascinating about his perception of governance is that if this quotation were viewed in isolation, one might conclude that Khamenei was a populist whose political views do not differ much from those of Thomas Jefferson. But then Islam enters the picture. His belief is that the Koran and the word of the Prophet trumps everything else including the people. So he has little trouble passing laws or enacting regulations that are opposed by the vast majority of Iranians. In a Presidential and parliamentary election, the candidates most popular were disqualified by Khamenei on the grounds that they were not sufficiently consonant with his interpretation of Islam. So in reality his personal view of Islam comes first and secondary to that is the will of the people.
In the late 1830's a revolutionary political movement of small tenant farmers grew in upper New York State. There was much violence and anti-renters were hanged and jailed. After a few years they elected 14 members of the state legislature and had their fellows pardoned:
Babeuf led a faction of French revolutionists who thought that the revolution had become to hierarchical and had substituted a dictatorship of certain citizens for the dictatorship of the King. He was arrested and executed by the hierarchy he was trying to replace in what has become known as the “conspiracy of the equals.”
Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías was a Venezuelan politician who was president of Venezuela from 1999 until his death in 2013, except for a brief period in April 2002. Chávez was also leader of the Fifth Republic Movement political party from its foundation in 1997 until 2007, when it merged with several other parties to form the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), which he led until 2012.
