Venezuela is suffering the worst economic crisis in its history. Ordinary people in the oil-rich country are regularly going without food. Three-quarter empty supermarkets are being ransacked by angry, hungry mobs. The government has declared a state of emergency, food is now being transported under armed guard, and basic necessities are being rationed. People have to queue for hours and sometimes overnight on their assigned days to receive staples like rice and cooking oil.
'We are like a bomb': food riots show Venezuela crisis has gone beyond politics

 
By IMF figures, it has the world’s worst negative growth rate (-8%), and the worst inflation rate (482%). The unemployment rate is 17% but is expected to climb to near 30% in the coming few years.

The shadow of hunger, the desperation of the crowds and the spread of unrest and criminality threaten the government of Nicolás Maduro, three years after he was bequeathed power by the dying revolutionary strongman, Hugo Chávez. The opposition has launched a drive to canvas signatures for a petition for him to step down. That will be a difficult task in the face of a state-run electoral system determined to thwart it, but the state may implode even if the recall referendum fails.

How did such an oil-rich state collapse so catastrophically?

The Maduro government has blamed the crisis on the US and rightwing business owners who it accuses of cutting production to sabotage the economy, but Maduro has inherited a ruinous state-run system from Chávez to which economists say he has added some damaging mistakes of his own. Chávez build his popularity on oil money and foreign debt, using both to fund consumption, while nationalising more than 1,200 private companies deemed not to be functioning in the public interest. But in 2015 the oil price was cut in half and Venezuela’s reckless public finances helped make it a high-risk debtor, cutting the country’s access to international capital.



The Maduro government has responded to the consequent hole in public finances by printing money, fuelling inflation. It’s estimated that the cost of basic groceries that would keep a family going through a week increased by more than 25% between March and April, and now costs 22 times the state minimum salary.
The state has tried to ration basic foodstuffs and set their prices, but the consequence is they have simply disappeared from the shops into the black market. The opposition says the direct distribution of food has been politicised by being channeled through local committees run by Maduro’s United Socialist Party of Venezuela.
According to Transparency International, Venezuela is the ninth most corrupt country in the world. Member’s of Maduro’s family and immediate entourage have been implicated in drug smuggling and hundreds of billions of dollars are believed to have been syphoned out of the economy.

The crisis is likely to get even worse in the near future.


The government has been running through the country’s gold reserves to pay its international debt service and finance at least some basic imports, but those reserves are now dwindling, and Maduro will either have to default or stop importing food. Both options are potentially catastrophic.


Will Maduro be brought down by the recall referendum?

The opposition have put high hopes in a referendum, and launched a signature drive in April but Venezuela’s National Electoral Council (CNE) has imposed a set of high hurdles for a petition to pass before the choice can be presented to the general population. Roughly 1.3 million people signed a petition for a recall vote – far more than the 200,000 required by law, but 600,000 of the signatures have already been rejected by the CNE, and people have been queueing for hours to validate the rest of the signatures by having their fingerprints scanned. Even if they are found to have passed the required threshold of 1% of voters, that just allows them to go forward to a second petition, in which opponents would have to amass close to 4 million votes to trigger a recall vote.
(Guardian)

Elect socialists or quasi-socialists (ie "progressives") anywhere and the result is the same.

Nobody willing to leap to the defence of the socialists in Venezuela?

bogarde73 wrote on Jun 23^rd, 2016 at 4:35pm:

Nobody willing to leap to the defence of the socialists in Venezuela?

marla must be offline.  ;)

Marla's always offline.

Hey babe, take a walk on the weed side.

This forum is full of socialists mainly. I think that is undeniable.
Why is it then that they have no comment to make on this example of the glorious sunshine which socialism offers to the world if only the idiots like me would realise it?

At the very least they should be here putting forward reasons for the abject failure: this was never true socialism perhaps; the US capitalists brought the collapse about; maybe the ignorant peasants of South America had not reached the stage of development to make it work.
Something . . .anything?

There are failed Capitalist countries too, and Communist ones.  It's not hard to find failures.  The problem with Venezuela seems to be to me to be more a problem with humankind in general.  Socialism, or to take its more extreme form, Communism, requires everyone to work towards the common good.  Unfortunately humans are not like that.  It is more often a case of “what’s in it for me?”.  In the case of Venezuela a lot has gone wrong.  One of the major problems there has been corruption - that and outright incompetence.  Socialism has no chance in such an environment, hence the failure.  Venezuela needs a total change of government before it can recover.  The ruling elite needs to be removed from all spheres of influence before things can improve.  Whether this will happen remains to be seen.

Another boring Boey Boy bait and switch topic.

Marla, get your head out of the sand. Venezuela had every possible natural advantage, yet after socialist mismanagement, it is a total basket case. If it is the fault of US business interests, as the government claims, they should have seen it coming and had contingency plans. That is, if their system is so damn competent at organizing national interests.

I suppose the above point of view makes me another hippie.

I have already discussed this topic. Boey is just bored with himself.

Part of being a socialist requires one to not be able to see the bleeding obvious, socialism is more a religion, like islam, it requires faith not logic, and those having the most faith have the most to gain from that religion, take marlene for instance, in a socialist system she would most likely be put in charge of something as a reward for having faith and not because she is good at something, she doesn't support socialism because its good for everyone she supports socialism because it will be good for her and like the mad muslim she has a very hard time of convincing everyone else to convert because they don't have the faith and they will be cast out as unbelievers.

Marla wrote on Jun 28^th, 2016 at 9:23am:

I have already discussed this topic. Boey is just bored with himself.

This is true but only momentarily.

innocentbystander. wrote on Jun 28^th, 2016 at 9:31am:

Part of being a socialist requires one to not be able to see the bleeding obvious, socialism is more a religion, like islam, it requires faith not logic, and those having the most faith have the most to gain from that religion, take marlene for instance, in a socialist system she would most likely be put in charge of something as a reward for having faith and not because she is good at something, she doesn't support socialism because its good for everyone she supports socialism because it will be good for her and like the mad muslim she has a very hard time of convincing everyone else to convert because they don't have the faith and they will be cast out as unbelievers.

http://i.imgur.com/D7uIJBQ.png

Capitalism has educated you so well.

Marla wrote on Jun 28^th, 2016 at 12:02pm:

innocentbystander. wrote on Jun 28th, 2016 at 9:31am: Part of being a socialist requires one to not be able to see the bleeding obvious, socialism is more a religion, like islam, it requires faith not logic, and those having the most faith have the most to gain from that religion, take marlene for instance, in a socialist system she would most likely be put in charge of something as a reward for having faith and not because she is good at something, she doesn't support socialism because its good for everyone she supports socialism because it will be good for her and like the mad muslim she has a very hard time of convincing everyone else to convert because they don't have the faith and they will be cast out as unbelievers. http://i.imgur.com/D7uIJBQ.png Capitalism has educated you so well.

When I used to write letters to be signed by the Minister or Commissioner of the Department, the general rule of thumb was that, if the sentence would be longer than two lines when printed on an A4 page, it was too long.

It is good that Marla, the pedant, has arrived. ;)

If she's a pedant why can't she give me a lecture on how well Venezuela is doing.
I'm all ears

bogarde73 wrote on Jun 28^th, 2016 at 7:59pm:

If she's a pedant why can't she give me a lecture on how well Venezuela is doing. I'm all ears

Marlene is just a useful idiot, if she was born in Gaza the Pals would have convinced her to blow her self up at an Israeli checkpoint by now   ;D

OK so lets investigate further why Marlene is a big fan of socialism, socialism is essentially the revenge of the losers, when Marlenes socialist hero Castro took over Cuba he made Che Guevara the head of the national bank, Che was just as shocked as anyone else at this appointment, after all he was a serial killer not a banker but the reason he was appointed at all was because he had the most faith in the mental illness that is socialism.

Now enter Marlene, what if you have delusions of grandeur yourself without the wherewithal to carry out those delusions by fair means ... bing, socialism is the answer, you can be made important not on the basis of hard work or intelligence but solely on the basis of sucking up to the big man upstairs that shares your delusions to a tee.

This is an evolutionary pathway that some humans like Marlene have adopted to get ahead and if they can just get the hard workers and the intelligent out of the picture like Castro and Stalin did it will be a successful pathway.       

Wolseley wrote on Jun 27^th, 2016 at 10:47pm:

There are failed Capitalist countries too, and Communist ones.  It's not hard to find failures.  The problem with Venezuela seems to be to me to be more a problem with humankind in general.  Socialism, or to take its more extreme form, Communism, requires everyone to work towards the common good.  Unfortunately humans are not like that.  It is more often a case of “what’s in it for me?”.  In the case of Venezuela a lot has gone wrong.  One of the major problems there has been corruption - that and outright incompetence.  Socialism has no chance in such an environment, hence the failure.

Socialism has no chance in ANY environment, and you just explained why: "Socialism, or to take its more extreme form, Communism, requires everyone to work towards the common good. Unfortunately, humans are not like that."

It's the same reason utopian societies inevitably fail -- because it's human nature to want to improve yourself, not to spend your life settling for mediocrity. So, competition is inevitable, but competition is what leads to improvement.

Recent developments in Cuba make a mockery of the old Communist revolution. As CBC News reported in March:

"In Old Havana, there's a storefront with a cardboard sign for a private hairdresser. A notice advertising a room for rent in a seafoam-green casa. A sidewalk stand selling pizzas and honey-drizzled flatbreads.

"Cuban capitalism, once an oxymoron, now represents a softer kind of revolution."

bogarde73 wrote on Jun 28^th, 2016 at 7:59pm:

If she's a pedant why can't she give me a lecture on how well Venezuela is doing. I'm all ears

You know, you're really starting to piss me off. As I had mentioned before, the pro-capitalist, bourgeois nationalist policies of the ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) are the oness who have solely created this social catastrophe for Venezuelan population.

Google the caracazo of 1989 Not only is it falling oil prices but the pro-capitalists overtake of both private foreign and domestic banks who are in control of the commanding heights of the Venezuelan economy.

The same god damn capitalist banks that are pulling the strings of the Venezuelan government who are the ones slashing desperately needed imports of food and medicine in order to continue funneling tens of billions of dollars to meeting interest payments right back into the pockets of Wall Street bondholders.

So either shut the bugger up or learn some god damn facts.

bogarde73 wrote on Jun 23^rd, 2016 at 4:46pm:

Marla's always offline. Hey babe, take a walk on the weed side.

She'll bong you over the head for saying that.

Boey is nothing more than a deaf, dumb, and blind robot for the right-wing media machine.

Marla wrote on Jul 4^th, 2016 at 7:33am:

Boey is nothing more than a deaf, dumb, and blind robot for the right-wing media machine.

Capitalism has some nasty side-effects, but to a great extent these have been compensated for by massive welfare bureaucracies dispensing alms to those who fall through the cracks. Western capitalism can afford innumerable welfare benefits for its citizens which put to shame previous and current socialist and communist regimes.

Marla is young and sassy and full of bile and grievances about what previous generations have left her with - which all goes to show she's a normal, healthy young American filly with good prospects for the future when eventually she channels all these delinquent energies towards child-bearing and being an asset in her husband's kitchen and bedroom.   

Lord Herbert wrote on Jul 4^th, 2016 at 8:04am:

Western capitalism can afford innumerable welfare benefits for its citizens which put to shame previous and current socialist and communist regimes.

Same old hippie rhetoric. The most dangerous alliance against the working class is to have anything in the way of a tripartite pact between corporations, the state, and controlled unions.

Capitalism utilizes union movements to suppress the struggling working class struggles while at the same time attract increasing foreign direct investment and create a growing low-wage manufacturing sector. Capitalism is a disease that inhibits the working class from organizing independently to defend its own interests and quality of life. You're just a blind ass kisser for imperialism.

Venezuela is in a crisis mainly due to be a trading partner of the US which has in turn  increased that country’s dependence upon the volatile capitalist commodity markets which delivers nothing but low wages to attract investment which has led to a weakened export performance which in turn had led to the to the fall of commodity prices which in turn is what you see going on in Venezuela today.


All.Due.To.Capitalism.

I see they've got the power back on thanks to the rain.
Now all they've got to do is pay their bills and the ships might come back to take their oil away.
But socialists mostly like taking handouts, not paying bills.

Let me know when you develop some neurons.

Is this your top drawer stuff hippie?

Marla wrote on Jul 4^th, 2016 at 8:20am:

Lord Herbert wrote on Jul 4th, 2016 at 8:04am: Western capitalism can afford innumerable welfare benefits for its citizens which put to shame previous and current socialist and communist regimes. Same old hippie rhetoric. The most dangerous alliance against the working class is to have anything in the way of a tripartite pact between corporations, the state, and controlled unions. Capitalism utilizes union movements to suppress the struggling working class

And Christ wept for His people!

Jesus CHRIST, Marla Schmarla - When did you swallow a 'Socialism for Dummies' book at that university of yours?  

"Struggling working class" .... You are more wedded to the goddamned soap-box Sunday-in-the-park rhetoric of the 1950's than I am! Who the hell has been feeding you this crap/pap? It was your father, wasn't it ... and in order to ensure his love you learnt to parrot his angst and faux outrage like a series of psalms, didn't you?

Didn't you?

Answer the question!

Marla wrote on Jul 4^th, 2016 at 8:20am:

All.Due.To.Capitalism.

Are we to understand that you view Jews as the Devil's Spawn for their contribution to world capitalism?

Lord Herbert wrote on Jul 4^th, 2016 at 8:04am:

Marla wrote on Jul 4th, 2016 at 7:33am: Boey is nothing more than a deaf, dumb, and blind robot for the right-wing media machine. [quote] Marla is young and sassy and full of bile and grievances about what previous generations have left her with - which all goes to show she's a normal, healthy young American filly with good prospects for the future when eventually she channels all these delinquent energies towards child-bearing and being an asset in her husband's kitchen and bedroom.

Pure gold. Inspired even!

Mistress Nicole wrote on Jul 4^th, 2016 at 1:29pm:

Lord Herbert wrote on Jul 4th, 2016 at 8:04am: Marla wrote on Jul 4th, 2016 at 7:33am: Boey is nothing more than a deaf, dumb, and blind robot for the right-wing media machine. [quote] Marla is young and sassy and full of bile and grievances about what previous generations have left her with - which all goes to show she's a normal, healthy young American filly with good prospects for the future when eventually she channels all these delinquent energies towards child-bearing and being an asset in her husband's kitchen and bedroom.    Pure gold. Inspired even!

I was actually expecting a tongue-lashing from you at our secret trysting place for allowing myself to experiment with being a 'male chauvinist pig' with Schmarla. 

Jokes aside, Marla has a lot of potential, and it only needs that she broadens her current tunnel vision towards letting it encompass more than just focussing upon trashing and vandalising the society she has grown/groan up in.

I'm waiting for Marla to say something proud, grateful, and supportive of capitalist America.

Lord Herbert wrote on Jul 4^th, 2016 at 2:37pm:

Mistress Nicole wrote on Jul 4th, 2016 at 1:29pm: Lord Herbert wrote on Jul 4th, 2016 at 8:04am: Marla wrote on Jul 4th, 2016 at 7:33am: Boey is nothing more than a deaf, dumb, and blind robot for the right-wing media machine. [quote] Marla is young and sassy and full of bile and grievances about what previous generations have left her with - which all goes to show she's a normal, healthy young American filly with good prospects for the future when eventually she channels all these delinquent energies towards child-bearing and being an asset in her husband's kitchen and bedroom.    Pure gold. Inspired even! I was actually expecting a tongue-lashing from you at our secret trysting place for allowing myself to experiment with being a 'male chauvinist pig' with Schmarla.  Jokes aside, Marla has a lot of potential, and it only needs that she broadens her current tunnel vision towards letting it encompass more than just focussing upon trashing and vandalising the society she has grown/groan up in. I'm waiting for Marla to say something proud, grateful, and supportive of capitalist America.

You want to hook me? You're using worms, not cockles, old man.

Marla, let me tell you a story, for I used to be a lot like you. My head was full of left wing, university inspired ideas when I was in my 20s. In fact I clearly recall wanting to bomb Myers (a department store), such was my hatred of capitalism and the mindless flock herded into it.

I searched for something on the Internet, and found a link to my first ever debate forum - Chronwatch. It was a right wing, republican dominated, political debate board. I had found a vipers nest of right wing American arseholes.

My first post was to start a thread, entitled "Osama is basically right" (this was jut after 911) and I took bin Ladens open letter to the American people, and argued in favour of every point Osama made.

I was attacked, flogged, whipped, shouted down, and robustly sh*t upon. I immediately became the forums favourite whipping girl. Yet, unbeknownst to me, there was a character sitting in the bleachers, watching. He saw something in me that he felt he could work with. His name was TheFourthEstate.

Now, in terms of 4E, you did something very silly. You attacked him personally for being an uneducated mid western redneck. So, he has justifiably, sat you on your arse. Why don't you try a different approach and engage with ideas? Perhaps you are afraid where that might lead?

Herbert is also rather fond of you, and, reminding me of a young me, I am prepared to give you a go. But tackle the ball, not the man.

Incidentally, to the forum at large, there is nothing wrong with Marla having the odd joint occasionally. I did far worse than that, and I survived.

Your words, not mine, but I'll work with them.


Quote:

You attacked him personally for being an uneducated mid western redneck.

Who could blame her for that?  She is right from what I've read so far.  All he has posted is anti Islam stuff, pretty much.


Quote:

So, he has justifiably, sat you on your arse.

Really, I must have missed that.

Further, given you have only just arrived here after years of absence, I doubt you are the best person qualified to give Marla advice on what the Forum thinks.

I like her.  She has sass, whereas others seem only to have 'suck.'

Aussie wrote on Jul 4^th, 2016 at 4:49pm:

Your words, not mine, but I'll work with them.

Quote:

You attacked him personally for being an uneducated mid western redneck.

Aussie wrote on Jul 4^th, 2016 at 4:49pm:

Who could blame her for that?  She is right from what I've read so far.  All he has posted is anti Islam stuff, pretty much.

And I guess all you've posted is pro-Islam stuff, pretty much.

So by all means, share with the class, O Self-Appointed Defender of Islam: What is it about the religion of beards, burqas and beheadings that appeals to you so much?



Quote:

So, he has justifiably, sat you on your arse.

Aussie wrote on Jul 4^th, 2016 at 4:49pm:

Really, I must have missed that.

You miss a lot of things, Aussie.



Aussie wrote on Jul 4^th, 2016 at 4:49pm:

Further, given you have only just arrived here after years of absence, I doubt you are the best person qualified to give Marla advice on what the Forum thinks.

Speaking of missing things, nowhere in Nicole's post does she claim to be giving advice on what the Forum thinks. Quite obviously (well, to most of us), she was giving advice on what she thinks.

And in that regard, I'd say Nicole is indeed the "best person qualified" to do so, wouldn't you?

I'm not interested in you until you haver woken up to what some Members get up to and you have joined the dots.


Quote:

Incidentally, to the forum at large, there is nothing wrong with Marla having the odd joint occasionally.

Do you have issues with comprehension underneath delusions of grandeur?

Aussie wrote on Jul 4^th, 2016 at 4:49pm:

All he has posted is anti Islam stuff, pretty much.

Who in their right mind would be pro islam?

Now that's a point worth considering. Are the Islamic apologists in fact mentally deranged and suitable cases for treatment?

We would have to build a lot of correctional & treatment centres.

Aussie wrote on Jul 5^th, 2016 at 9:31am:

I'm not interested in you until you haver woken up to what some Members get up to and you have joined the dots.

It's your job to connect your own dots. If you choose to leave them unconnected, that's your prerogative.


Quote:

Incidentally, to the forum at large, there is nothing wrong with Marla having the odd joint occasionally.

Aussie wrote on Jul 5^th, 2016 at 9:31am:

Do you have issues with comprehension underneath delusions of grandeur?

If you're addressing me, my comprehension works just fine, thanks. And apparently you need a demonstration.

So I'll simplify Nicole's sentence in words that perhaps even you can understand: The key word in the phrase "to the forum at large" is "to."

Voila! That's your first clue that Nicole isn't purporting to speak FOR the forum at large; she's speaking TO the forum at large.

Speaking TO an audience is hardly the same as speaking FOR that audience; ergo, I stand by my original statement.

And here's the very latest from Venezuela. Apparently, socialism continues to not work out for the Venezuelans (imagine that!):
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-36722422


Quote:

About 500 Venezuelan women in search of food have broken through border controls separating the western state of Tachira from neighbouring Colombia. The women said their families were going hungry because of severe food shortages in Venezuela. Hours later, they crossed back into Venezuela carrying basic goods and singing the Venezuelan anthem. Venezuela is going through an economic crisis and many Venezuelans say they struggle to feed their families.

You'd think they'd have the decency to sing the Colombian anthem seeing as how they fed them

But I guess after, what would it be, a generation of Chavez/Maduro that's the only tune they know.

Well, I'll give them credit for being polite and orderly once they reached the Colombian store.

Can't blame them for wanting to escape socialism, even for a few minutes.