{{Hats and T-shirts of the late Venezuelan president are flying off the shelves at his street-side stand faster than he can keep them in stock.}}<\/p>\n
Ditto demand for Chavez tattoos, Chavez earrings, Chavez mugs and talking Chavez action figurines. <\/p>\n
One can even buy Chavez boxer shorts and panties, part of a cult of personality that began while the former paratrooper was still alive but has exploded in the week since he succumbed to cancer.<\/p>\n
“It’s really a shame the president died, but the souvenir business is booming,” said the 42-year-old Carrillo, who says he is selling five times as much merchandise as when Chavez was alive. <\/p>\n
“It isn’t good to make money off the death of someone like the president, but what can we do? People are asking us for it.”<\/p>\n
Analysts say we are witnessing the supersizing of a myth \u2014 and an industry.<\/p>\n
“Chavez died in perfect condition to be mythologized and marketed,” said Luis Vicente Leon, president of the respected Datanalisis polling firm, who predicted the Chavez industry would only grow. <\/p>\n
“He was young, he died in power and he was recently re-elected. It’s like James Dean or Marilyn Monroe.”<\/p>\n
Leon said that even when he was alive Chavez embraced his brand, unlike historical figures such as Argentine revolutionary Ernesto “Che” Guevara, who became a marketing phenomenon after his death \u2014 and contrary to his anti-capitalist ideals.<\/p>\n
“President Chavez was a stimulator of his own cult of personality,” said Leon. “He’d be all for it.”<\/p>\n
Yet others doubted Chavez would ever go global because his death from cancer wasn’t seen as heroic and didn’t coincide with an international movement<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
{{Hats and T-shirts of the late Venezuelan president are flying off the shelves at his street-side stand faster than he can keep them in stock.}} Ditto demand for Chavez tattoos, Chavez earrings, Chavez mugs and talking Chavez action figurines. One can even buy Chavez boxer shorts and panties, part of a cult of personality that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[101],"byline":[158],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-6516","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lifestyle","tag-internationl","byline-b_igi_adm1n"],"bylines":[{"id":158,"name":"b_igi_adm1n","slug":"b_igi_adm1n","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":1}],"contributors":[{"id":158,"name":"b_igi_adm1n","slug":"b_igi_adm1n","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":1}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6516","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6516"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6516\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6516"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6516"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6516"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=6516"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=6516"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}