{"product_id":"9780615428444","title":"2 Worlds, The Real Venezuela: Living on the Edge of the Jungle and the Rise of Hugo Chavez","description":"The ancient underlying geology of Venezuela ranges up to at least 3.4 billion years old.  It controls the soils and vegetation above it, and thus predicates the immense natural biological and mineral resources of the country. This incredible natural wealth includes, besides the well-known oil resources around Lake Maracaibo, heavy crude reserves in the eastern plains that could power the industrialized world for centuries, a forest with at least 2,500 species of trees, as well as vast iron, bauxite, gold, and diamond resources.  This natural wealth has powerfully influenced the history and politics of modern Venezuela.  Hugo Chavez is a predictable outgrowth of all that this natural wealth led to.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eJeff led a multi-year US Geological Survey science mission to map the nearly roadless, jungle-covered southern half of Venezuela - an area bigger than Texas – an effort that included a sophisticated mineral resource assessment.  This assessment shows that Venezuela is blessed beyond measure, with far more than its immense but already failing sweet crude reserves.  Interestingly, our five-year USGS mission was 100% paid for by the Venezuelan government, and we moved to Venezuela and lived in-country as a family.  Louise taught elementary and high school, fed hungry missionaries, and raised five children as Venezuelans.  We had Diplomatic passports, but they offered scant protection against the bandits, both official and unofficial.  Crocodiles, piranha, Bushmasters, Army Ants, Killer Bees, Bubonic Plague, and malaria (among other direct hazards) also don’t care about your passport. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe deliberately chose to live as Venezuelans, and were thus folded into the culture through a vibrant local Mormon Church as brothers and sisters. They taught us much – and they protected us as if we were family.  As interested bystanders we thus witnessed an amazing transition: we watched political corruption get so far out of control that it gutted the richest nation in Latin America.  THIS is what gave rise to Hugo Chavez.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eJeff spent much of his time in the incredibly beautiful jungle, but nearly died almost every week he was there.  His harrowing experiences show how political corruption has led directly and inexorably to the destruction of this ancient forest at a catastrophic pace. This destruction is not like the relatively temporary blight caused by burning a rainforest in Brazil, which can grow back with time.  Instead, this destruction is quasi-permanent because of how it is being done: through hydraulic mining. Agua negra – the still, black water left behind – will breed malaria and Dengue-carrying mosquitos for centuries.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe didn’t live in protected compounds in white-European Caracas, but in an interior city on the literal edge of the great Amazonas forest – the Other World.  We share in this book the hard, gritty Venezuelan reality behind Hugo Chavez' rise to power - and why the Venezuelan people as a whole prefer a benevolent dictatorship.  By comparison, it’s a vast improvement over the previous 40 years of what was piously called \"Democracy\", but which in fact was a malignant, take-turns Kleptocracy that nearly destroyed the country. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eUltimately, we share with you what the non-English-speaking, vast majority of Venezuelans are like: the most vibrant, fun-loving, long-suffering, yet generous people on Earth.  Our children came out of this experience  thoroughly “internationalized”, and among them we now count high fluency in Spanish, French, Arabic, Czech, Slovak, and Mandarin.  We all see American foreign policy through different lenses now: we understand the viewpoints of Latin Americans, Palestinians, Europeans, and Africans – all of which you can find in the Two Worlds of Venezuela.","brand":"WYNNDOTORG","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47104752419056,"sku":"9780615428444","price":4.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9780615428444_p0.jpg?v=1763597466","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9780615428444","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}