The present is not an unhappy situation for Venezuela, but what Chavez and Venezuelans need is not so much ever higher prices -- which will eventually negatively impact the world economy -- as a moderately high price on which they can count for a relatively long term, at least till the Venezuelan economy grows out of its dependence on oil for export earnings and government revenues (cf. <http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/pipermail/lbo-talk/Week-of-Mon-20060522/038855.html>).
But nothing will ever be stable under capitalism, and we'll see what Chavez and Bolivarians will do when they confront the next economic trouble. So far, they have admirably succeeded in strengthening themselves at each negative turn of events (the coup, the lockout, the opposition's campaign for the referendum, etc.).
-- Yoshie <http://montages.blogspot.com/> <http://mrzine.org> <http://monthlyreview.org/>