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Socialism, The Great Destroyer

LowDown

Curmudgeon
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The story of Venezuela, brought from affluence to misery by its own madman in authority, makes this point with singular clarity. In 1914, the discovery of oil on Venezuelan land brought the country vast revenues and produced a relatively free economy. By 1950, Venezuela enjoyed the fourth-highest per capita income in the world, behind only the U.S., Switzerland, and New Zealand. As late as 1980, it boasted the world’s fastest growing economy in the 20thcentury. In 2001, Venezuela still ranked as Latin America’s wealthiest country.

Today, Venezuela has become the most hellish place on Earth, with its population fleeing to neighboring countries, crime skyrocketing, its kleptocrat rulers kept in power through military force, and its remaining population, having eaten the family pets, hunting rats for dinner. Link.

For many years now people such as myself have been writing that Venezuela was going to end up like this. It was absolutely clear from the very first day that Hugo Chavez took power.

And now we have Americans toying with the idea of socialism again. One wonders how many examples of disaster and death they will need to have stacked around their feet before they realize that socialism is a dead end. But perhaps the key to the persistence of this ideology is the word "kleptocrat". Perhaps American socialists all imagine that they will be in the inner circle of leadership who, like Maduro and his friends, enrich themselves by running their country into the ground.
 
In all truth Socialism actually works, too bad that this effect only takes place in a vacuum however.
 
For many years now people such as myself have been writing that Venezuela was going to end up like this. It was absolutely clear from the very first day that Hugo Chavez took power.

And now we have Americans toying with the idea of socialism again. One wonders how many examples of disaster and death they will need to have stacked around their feet before they realize that socialism is a dead end. But perhaps the key to the persistence of this ideology is the word "kleptocrat". Perhaps American socialists all imagine that they will be in the inner circle of leadership who, like Maduro and his friends, enrich themselves by running their country into the ground.

What kind of "socialist" ideas are Americans toying with exactly ? Care to give some examples ?

Universal healthcare, "free" college, minimum wages are all proposed government spending. The idea is to spend differently the money already taxed by the government and/or increasing the total tax revenue by taxing really high revenues. Giving x million to the military budget is as "socialist" as giving x million to the education budget.

I don't seem to recall any mainstream politician advocating for the worker ownership of the means of production.

By the way, the Venezuela crisis was brought about, arguably, by three things :

- price control
- foreign currency control
- the oil price drop of 2014 (95% of export income from Venezuela came from oil)

Basically, Venezuela relied to heavily on it's oil reserves and, since they were making a lot of money, enacted a lot of government programs that "trapped" the people in a failing economy.
I don't think any "socialist" in the US is advocating for price control and foreign currency control, also, the US depends on a lot more than oil.

So again, what socialist ideas, advocated by the american left, can be compared to Venezuela's situation ?
 
The United States already has socialism ingrained in our history and culture and I seriously doubt that we would be where we are today without it.

The Labor Movement fought hard for the Fair labor & Standards Act which was passed by Congress in 1938 (40 hr. work week, no oppressive child labor, minimum wage, and time and a half over 40 hrs.)

Welfare and other forms of Government assistance...…..too many to go into.

We have a incredible highways and bridges network across the country.

We still operate many of the dams and hydroelectric facilities (and other public utilities) that FDR brought forward under the New Deal.

Obama's stimulus package of 2009 was a good example, along with many other corporate bailouts & business grants that go back as far as the 1800's.


So in my opinion...…….denying that the USA is not socialistic...... is really being foolish.
 
This was only 5 years ago...

"Senator Sanders declared: “These days, the American dream is more apt to be realized in South America, in places such as Ecuador, Venezuela and Argentina, where incomes are actually more equal today than they are in the land of Horatio Alger.”"


And STILL there are morons supporting this wackjob!
 
The best countries of the world are heavily run with man social programs. The article in the OP is complete propaganda garbage.
 
For many years now people such as myself have been writing that Venezuela was going to end up like this. It was absolutely clear from the very first day that Hugo Chavez took power.

And now we have Americans toying with the idea of socialism again. One wonders how many examples of disaster and death they will need to have stacked around their feet before they realize that socialism is a dead end. But perhaps the key to the persistence of this ideology is the word "kleptocrat". Perhaps American socialists all imagine that they will be in the inner circle of leadership who, like Maduro and his friends, enrich themselves by running their country into the ground.

Show us who is arguing to have pure socialism in the US because the left sure isn't.
 
For many years now people such as myself have been writing that Venezuela was going to end up like this. It was absolutely clear from the very first day that Hugo Chavez took power.

And now we have Americans toying with the idea of socialism again. One wonders how many examples of disaster and death they will need to have stacked around their feet before they realize that socialism is a dead end. But perhaps the key to the persistence of this ideology is the word "kleptocrat". Perhaps American socialists all imagine that they will be in the inner circle of leadership who, like Maduro and his friends, enrich themselves by running their country into the ground.

Overly simplistic thinking masquerading as journalism. Venezuela was destine to destroy itself, not from socialism alone but as you hint at by authoritarianism.

Hugo Chavez, and those around him at the time, should have taken Venezuela to different outcomes. With one of the largest oil reserves in the world Venezuela should have a mechanism of wealth not unlike Saudi Arabia, but they made too many economic faults. The risk was so much of their economy based on one commodity, but other nations have pulled this off and some have far greater leans to authoritarianism of some sort than Venezuela has (had.) Saudi Arabia and Iran for examples, not exactly shining beacons of freedom and market economics.

A heavy lean to socialism is one of those economic faults Venezuela made, engaging in a level of spending that their own bolivar could not keep up with. Sound familiar? It should, many nations spend beyond means but the difference is Venezuela has to rely on outside nations to print their money for them. No one uses their currency as reserves and it stands to reason that valuation of the bolivar is tied exclusively to domestic economic indications. Valuation is painful for them to control but they tried anyway. They still relied on printing sprees and that made the bolivar fall in valuation against the international basket of currencies some 95% in just 3-4 years. Fell 99% against the dollar over the same period. They blamed everyone but themselves. Rigged elections. When all else failed Venezuela literally tried to legislate what inflation was and more importantly what it could not be. A complete failure and those efforts ensured an eventual economic collapse.

But there was another problem. Chavez, those around him and those after him, engaged in what always happens with centralized power. They took massive money out of their own system to the point that they hid their fortune in currency other than their host nation's currency, separating their wealth from what they ruled over. Socialism tends to do that but then again all wealth from all economic systems tends to do that, move wealth to more save havens regardless of what is happening at home.

In terms of economics, this is why most modern economies are a mixed model. Taking parts of one economic model to throttle the pitfalls of the other.

This is true of market economics, or capitalism, that on a long enough timeline destroys itself with the worst amplitude of the economic cycle by mixing it with planned economics, or socialism, as a means to lessen that amplitude. All modern economic and monetary theory is based on balance. Most nations arguing for this or that economically are only talking about sliding where we are on the scale between strict market economics on one side and strict planned economics on the other. Very few, even the democratic socialists of today, are asking for strict socialism as that would mean government seizure and ownership of all means of production and distribution of all goods and services.

In this nation that is not the argument, the issue is throttling the pitfalls of capitalism... in our case crony capitalism.

The tie of wealth based aristocracy to government based aristocracy is well documented and beyond debate. And to not pretend for a moment that is not happening, we all know it is therefore it is natural for those without power to attempt to slide the scale away from wealth collection that is in bed with governance. To the point that many large organizations today are entirely dependent on their relationship with governance to function. You may call it Americans trying to go with the Venezuela model, but it would be wildly inaccurate to the point of intentionally misleading.

All we are talking about is throttling what economics in this nation has become, and very few (if any) want a Hugo Chavez type in the US to try to remedy it all.
 
For many years now people such as myself have been writing that Venezuela was going to end up like this. It was absolutely clear from the very first day that Hugo Chavez took power.

And now we have Americans toying with the idea of socialism again. One wonders how many examples of disaster and death they will need to have stacked around their feet before they realize that socialism is a dead end. But perhaps the key to the persistence of this ideology is the word "kleptocrat". Perhaps American socialists all imagine that they will be in the inner circle of leadership who, like Maduro and his friends, enrich themselves by running their country into the ground.

ISMs, as in Socialism, Communism, Corporatism, Republicanism, Buddhism, Imperialism, etc., are never the problem per se. The problem is the interpretation of Socialism by the leadership and/or external events. For instance, the USA has created the economic problems in Venezuela and the simple minded blame the leadership of Venezuela. Qaddaffi and his unique Socialism was attacked by the USA and Western allies and destroyed and his Socialism was not the cause. Cuba and its' unique Communism has the best healthcare and educational system in the World and has survived against USA embargoes and sanctions. Socialism is a threat to Corporatism and the Plutocracy that runs the USA sabotages Socialism and generates negative press vilifying its' leadership at every opportuity. As an example, I remember reading Associated Press articles calling Hugo Chavez a dictator after Chavez had been elected 7 times. That means AP is in the pocket ol Corporatist/Plutocratic interests and an outright liar. The USA is running Venezuela into the ground, not Maduro. A successful Socialist Nation might make Corporatism, as practiced in the USA, look bad. Might start a groundswell for change within the USA. USA intrigues have killed 20 million+ people since WWII. Did you vote for that? Hugo Chavez improved the lot of millions of Venezuelans, but Venezuela is a one horse economy and when the OIL price collapsed, Venezuela suffered. Venezuela would have recovered as the price rebounded except the USA sanctions killed the Venezuelan oil business and still does. The USA is the actor driving poverty in Venezuela, not Socialism.
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For many years now people such as myself have been writing that Venezuela was going to end up like this. It was absolutely clear from the very first day that Hugo Chavez took power.

And now we have Americans toying with the idea of socialism again. One wonders how many examples of disaster and death they will need to have stacked around their feet before they realize that socialism is a dead end. But perhaps the key to the persistence of this ideology is the word "kleptocrat". Perhaps American socialists all imagine that they will be in the inner circle of leadership who, like Maduro and his friends, enrich themselves by running their country into the ground.

You know the answer, this time, it'll be different. Same thing with every stupid entitlement program. Bush tried the GOP version of that with Medicare Part D, how'd that turn out? The Dem's with the ACA... it's always going to fail these big government solutions.
 
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