George Bush and Huge Chavez: Reflections in a Mirror?

There has been a long running feud between the Bush Administration and Venezuela’s President, Hugo Chavez.

In the past, Chavez has threatened to cut off its oil to the United States (a serious threat as the US gets about 25% of its crude from Venezuela.)

Recently, the countries had another spat after the US expelled Bolivia’s ambassador and then Bolivia expelled the US ambassador in retaliation. Chavez, in solidarity with Bolivia, also expelled the US ambassador from Venezuela.

On Sep 11, Chavez gave a rousing speech to several thousand people. From the BBC:

President Chavez used coarse language to describe his feelings about Washington as he ordered the expulsion of US envoy Patrick Duddy.

“The Yankee ambassador to Caracas has 72 hours to leave Venezuela, in solidarity with Bolivia, with the Bolivian people, and with the Bolivian government,” Mr Chavez said.

“Go to hell 100 times,” he said.

Mr Chavez also announced that he was recalling his envoy from Washington.

Why should we care about this on a financial blog? I’m just giving you some background information about the ongoing feud between the two countries and their leaders. Because despite disliking each other, these two presidents have a lot more in common than they would like to admit.

George Bush:

1. Nationalized Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, the two largest mortgage institutions in the United States. Billions of dollars lost for shareholders.

2. Nationalized 80% of AIG, the world’s largest insurance company by providing an $85 billion loan. Billions lost for shareholders.

Hugo Chavez:

1. Nationalized oil fields and refineries jointly owned and operated by Chevron, ConocoPhillips and ExxonMobil and Venezeula. Billions of dollars lost for shareholders. (Conoco, for instance, took a $4 billion write-down for those lost facilities.)

2. On Aug 19, nationalized the cement industry including simply taking Mexican cement company, Cemex’s, facilities. Cemex produced 52% of Venezuela’s cement and employed 3,000 workers.

Said Chavez:

“So tomorrow, we’ll go ahead with nationalizing and regaining the cement industries.”

“The government will not stop, now or ever,” Chavez said.

Chavez says he hates Bush but you know what they always say: there’s a fine line between love and hate.

And besides, they have much, much more in common than is apparent.

Nationalization.

Never thought I’d hear about it happening in the United States. But it is.

What’s next?