The Herald has an editorial about the Joe Kennedy commercials promoting the oil program with Venezuela.
Strikingly, the viewers were under no illusions about the purpose of the exercise. Some 37 percent said it was an attempt to boost Citgo’s image, 13 percent said the image meant for boosting was Venezuela’s, 20 percent said it was an attempt to embarrass President Bush, 15 percent said it was an attempt to promote Kennedy - which left 15 percent who said Venezuela was actually trying to help.
What should be better known is that Venezuela is poor. Per capita income is about one-seventh of what Americans have. Income is more unequally distributed. And last month Chavez finally had to lift government price controls on milk because they had so dampened production that Venezuela’s children were going without. (Maybe Kennedy can do a milk for oil exchange program.)
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