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Amid Chaos Venezuelans Struggle To Find The Truth, Online (npr.org)
In Venezuela, where media is controlled by the government, figuring out what is truth, rumor or propaganda has always been difficult. NPR reports: In recent days it's gotten even more confusing. President Nicolas Maduro has refused to cede power to the opposition party. There have been widespread protests and looting -- and the rumor mill has been churning on social media. But many Venezuelans have found a way to use social media in their favor.
Javier Rojo owns a pharmacy in the capital city of Caracas. As the chaos started, he gave his workers the day off, went home and turned on the TV -- only to find nothing was being reported. "Independent media has been gradually attacked or shut down over time," says professor Gregory Weeks, who teaches Latin American politics at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. "So that in general social media becomes the means by which you learn what's going on, on an ongoing basis."
Back at his house, Rojo says he started getting messages on WhatsApp like this one from from one of his employees: "Tanks are rolling into the park. They are launching tear gas." But then, Rojo started receiving WhatsApp messages with rumors from people he doesn't even know. One man, who says his aunt's husband is a military officer, swore that Maduro has resigned. Professor Raisa Urribarri researches technology and politics at Universidad de Los Andes in Venezuela. She says it's hard to trace the origins of some messages in Venezuelan social media. They can be from panicked citizens, the opposition or the government.
Javier Rojo owns a pharmacy in the capital city of Caracas. As the chaos started, he gave his workers the day off, went home and turned on the TV -- only to find nothing was being reported. "Independent media has been gradually attacked or shut down over time," says professor Gregory Weeks, who teaches Latin American politics at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. "So that in general social media becomes the means by which you learn what's going on, on an ongoing basis."
Back at his house, Rojo says he started getting messages on WhatsApp like this one from from one of his employees: "Tanks are rolling into the park. They are launching tear gas." But then, Rojo started receiving WhatsApp messages with rumors from people he doesn't even know. One man, who says his aunt's husband is a military officer, swore that Maduro has resigned. Professor Raisa Urribarri researches technology and politics at Universidad de Los Andes in Venezuela. She says it's hard to trace the origins of some messages in Venezuelan social media. They can be from panicked citizens, the opposition or the government.
They can be from panicked citizens, the opposition or the government.
That should probably read 'a government'.
I reserve the write to mangle english.
https://twitter.com/Louis_Alld...
@Louis_Allday
This is too perfect.
Anti-Maduro Venezuelan on 19 January: "I'm living in the cutest apartment in Paris studying fashion... life is good"
24 January: "I live here [Venezuela]. I live this. live with having rationed food, toilet paper, basic human necessities."
The Internet has a protocol for this problem: Pics or it didn't happen.
Video is even better.
When you get right down to it, trust is a valuable, important thing. Civilizations that learn how to cultivate and protect it do better than those which don't. US media once knew this. Then they discovered they could lie for money, and burned all the trust they'd ever had (except among the elderly who are no longer capable of detecting that their once cherished institutions have turned into money-grubbing liars). I would have called them lying whores, but whores at least provide a useful service.
This is an opportunity for some Venezuelans to become a reporters. Real reporters. If they live through it, they could win the Pulitzer prize. Odds aren't good they'll live through it. Speaking truth to power in such places is hazardous to one's health.
If you spend your whole life blaming everyone else for your problems it becomes difficult to accurately trace cause to effect.
Oh yea, and some of the people in charge are secretly evil.
He's not actually in the US. He's technically not a traitor, either. He's a loyal and patriotic Russian citizen. He's also a liar, mind you, but only a fool would take comments on this site for fact.
Most of the media in Venezuela is not controlled by the government, it is owned and controlled by capitalist oligarchs just like in the US.
And just like in the US there is a shitstorm of disinformation being pumped out by everyone. In fact the gaslighting has gone global.
And why should Maduro cede power? He just won an election. If the opposition wanted to win they should have taken part.
Want to know what to think? Ask the old old question: Who benefits? Then follow the money.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/0...
Conspicuous by its absence in much of the mainstream news coverage of Venezuela’s political crisis is the word “socialism.” Yes, every sensible observer agrees that Latin America’s once-richest country, sitting atop the world’s largest proven oil reserves, is an economic basket case, a humanitarian disaster, and a dictatorship whose demise cannot come soon enough.
But socialist? Perish the thought.
Or so goes a line of argument that insists socialism’s good name shouldn’t be tarred by the results of experience. On Venezuela, what you’re likelier to read is that the crisis is the product of corruption, cronyism, populism, authoritarianism, resource-dependency, U.S. sanctions and trickery, even the residues of capitalism itself. Just don’t mention the S-word because, you know, it’s working really well in Denmark.
Curiously, that’s not how the Venezuelan regime’s admirers used to speak of “21st century socialism,” as it was dubbed by Hugo Chávez. The late Venezuelan president, said Britain’s Jeremy Corbyn, “showed us there is a different and a better way of doing things. It’s called socialism, it’s called social justice, and it’s something that Venezuela has made a big step toward.” Noam Chomsky was similarly enthusiastic when he praised Chávez in 2009. “What’s so exciting about at last visiting Venezuela,” the linguist said, is that “I can see how a better world is being created and can speak to the person who’s inspired it.”
Stop lying. The refugee invasion from Libya caused the French and Italian military response, not the other way around. The Afghan government harboring Al Quada caused the US invasion, not the other way around. The Iranian puppetry in Baghdad caused the rise of ISIS, not the US. You desperately want to blame the US, because that's what you've been told to believe, but you just keep spreading lies.
European allies wanted the so-called refugee influx! They begged for it. They even try to shame other countries for not wanting it also. They did it to themselves. They say it's immoral to not want millions of immigrants!
US did not create the Venezuela mayhem. The people there voted it in, then realized too late that it was the wrong thing to do. Here in the US there are also goof balls that want socialism and try to act like Venezuela is just an anomaly and not the typical result.
In all of those places the mayhem was not created by the US but instead the US has to go in after it was already started and try to quell it before it gets worse. The US then becomes the policeman for the world. The US gives billions of aid to countries to try to solve these problems. I really wish we would stop and just let them battle it out. Of course if the US did stop policing they would then be criticized for not policing.
Wrap your head around it.
The biggest "news" channel in the US is Fox "news."
How is that the democratic left? It's the propaganda arm of the Republican party.
Hey man, the U.S. is just backing up what CANDA said - that Maduro is not the recognized president.
If you find yourself on the wrong side of Canada, you should be questioning your life-choices.
P.S. if you want to ask about interference, perhaps you should be asking why you are backing the person backed by both Cuba (who sends military and social manipulation advisers to Venezuela) or Russia (same deal, and they support Maduro).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
As a citizen of the USA, it sometimes feels like all of our leaders are fascists but I can assure you that the people don't intend to be. The problem is that our Constitution while effective in most regards did nothing to prevent the eventual buyout of the legislature by corporations. Corporations run our country now.
The biggest "news" channel in the US is Fox "news."
How is that the democratic left? It's the propaganda arm of the Republican party.
These days it may be more accurate to say that the Republican Party is the political wing of Fox News.
Faux News.
FTFY. :-/
It is a sad state of affairs when the MSM (Mainstream media) "News" have become comedy and comedians tell the actual news. :-/
... in Venezuela it's very difficult to distinguish propaganda from actual news. But not because the government controls, or owns the media. It's just the other way around. Most information in Venezuela comes from private corporations who have been battling against the government for almost 20 years, even sponsoring this 2002 coup that ousted the president for a couple of hours.
So please, Slashdot, don't give me this crap.
Here in the US the media is controlled by the democratic left - just as many lies to the people as in Venezuela.
You mean the media that got Trump elected? That "democratic left"?
The media that has put a Republican majority in our local, state and federal governments for 20 years now?
Did you know that the number one cable news channel is Fox News? Are you saying that they are controlled by the "democratic left"?
If you think the US media is "democratic left", I don't want to know what you think is centrist or even right wing.
I bet you think Venezuela is "socialist" too.
We're supposed to listen to the other side, but the other side is so misinformed to the point where their opinions have no basis is reality, all bets are off. I was brought up as a Ford/H.W. Bush Republican, but today's conservatives are just off their fucking rocker to the point of being just kooks.
Maybe, just maybe, this is a mess created by Chavez and further worsened by Maduro.
I know it's popular to blame the US for everything that happens.. but shits been hitting the fan all over the world a lot longer than the US has been in existence.
If the people are being taken care of, I doubt there would be massive demonstrations.
"Action without philosophy is a lethal weapon; philosophy without action is worthless."
Why do you support Maduro?
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Why do you support intervention in foreign countries? How many times in the past 65 years has that actually helped?
You are welcome on my lawn.
This got to be another Chavista posing as a credible source with a couple of actual facts, (NPR, BBC, TeleSur owners)
Who do you expect would believe "the US and it's poodles haven't been deliberately ruining Venezuela's economy and impoverishing it's people" ?. Either you're so dumb you believe your own BS, or Maduro's BS, or you got to be part of Cuba's G2 infiltrated fake news generation machine established in Venezuela many years ago.
Blaming the US, or anyone else beside Chavez' / Maduro's crooks for their corruption / mismanagement and pure fascism is not only false but moronic, and part of the Cuba recipe to always blame someone else, specially the US, for their own inflicted problems for the last 20 years since Chavez got into power.
And to say the record straight, the people DID and DOES support Juan Guaidó as an interim president, which btw, is by the book, ie the constitution. Article 233 of the Venezuelan constitution is the one the National Assembly applied to name Guaidó as an interim president, the same article chavistas use in 2002 when there was actually a coup. So it was good for Chavistas but not for the 80%+ mayority who supports Guadó, right ??. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002_Venezuelan_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat_attempt)
If Maduro is so sure he'll win any election, why doesn't he open the whole electoral process and office with independent people without putting in jail many of his opponents ? It's just another fact in a long list of fact he's a dictator, and a bad one since he bankrupted the country, badly. It's only the Chavistas who allowed the stated owned oil company, PDVSA, to become so inept, corrupt and mismanaged that production went from 3M+ barrels a day to around 1M, and by tripling the payroll. Before Chavez oil prices were around $10 and the country did NOT enter into hippeinflation. Yes, they did have some high inflation, but nothing compared as what happening today, not to mention the shortages of basic goods, which didn't happen before 1999.
All in all, go to your leftist café where you crawled from, or go back to the G2 bunker to come up with more G2 BS.
Fox News is a single cable channel that leans right.
Is that a balance against the other major cable news channels of MSNBC and CNN which lean heavy left and left?
Does that also balance out the 3 major OTA commercial news channels (which are also shown on cable) of NBC , CBS and ABC? Those also lean left, some more than others.
You have all these left leaning networks and you bitch about ONE right leaning network in Fox News?
Wow....at least there is one dissenting voice out there....
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Except that the socialism had nothing to do with the problems in Venezuela. It was authoritarianism that brought it to hell. Socialism doesn't require that all hotels charge a maximum rate for a room. When you start doing anything to the extreme you will fail miserably. Whether it be communism or capitalism. Socialism in the middle has proven quite successful the world throughout.
It is hard to make a serious argument that Canada failed when they tipped the scale of socialism to include healthcare for all. It's hard to make the same argument in France and the U.K. The Scandinavian countries all have tipped the scales to include a little more socialism. There are still rich people but the poor live with much better enjoying some semblance of quality of life.
Given just how much more money there is in this country it should be quite easy to provide a minimum level so kids don't go hungry which stunts their growth leading to poor performance which often leads to them continuing to under-perform their entire lives as they make kids that also under perform. It is better for everybody if everybody does better.
Of course I support single payer health care, after all as a developer I make enough to afford the supplemental insurance that ensures I will not die if I need to use it.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
This should illustrate the need for a strong, independent media.
I know that it is currently en vogue to say "we don't need the media, we can just do their jobs ourselves using the internet", but it should be obvious that if you take that approach, you wind up trusting the "truth" being peddled by propaganda websites such as Zerohedge and Alex Jones.
It is literally the job of a strong independent media to figure out what is truth and what is fiction. They are trained to do this and therefore can figure things out much better than you or I can. Sure, they get things wrong from time to time - but they then state their errors, correct it, and move on.
A state-run media is no better than a collection of blogger-run media. Bloggers will get things right, but they almost always have an angle (I would posit that the less someone is paid to blog, the more they have a stake in putting out a specific message).
Have a look at the main newspapers. Here is a list. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... Most private newspaper are against Maduro. They even came to the extreme of asking for an intervention. Look at this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... Plus internet is not blocked in Venezuela. Total bullshit article
"Why do you support intervention in foreign countries? How many times in the past 65 years has that actually helped?"
It worked in Korea, it gives us cheap (or not so cheap) electronics and cars from half the country and perhaps missiles on the head from the other part.
On the left you have CNN, New York Times, Washington Post, NPR, USAToday, all the television networks (except Fox), and a plethora of wannabe outlets like BuzzFeed, HuffPo, Vox, etc.
On the right you have...Fox.
How many times in the past 65 years has that actually helped?
Certainly that depends on who's asking... But basically it boils down to being cheaper than all the alternatives, for the people who make those decisions...
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
The window of opportunity for us software engineers to solve the global problem of misinformation is rapidly closing -- and the problem is about to intensify with deep fakes. Particularly Russia but also various other states are pushing misinformation very hard but so are various political and commercial interests around the world.
As Net Neutrality is lost and not only misinformation flourishes but conspiracies about media organizations like Youtube degrading the searches on conspiracy theories are also likely to flourish. The world is aiming strongly toward an era of ruthless darkness.
The suggestions to solve this problem so far, have been petty.
I have developed the plan for a comprehensive solution. I am calling it Solinova (latin for -- new sun). It's a mesh network that hides personal identities while retaining consistency of identity and earning reputation for interactions with others. Research into microloans demonstrated that giving loans on the basis of research into the personal reputation of individuals among those they know, was very successful. I believe the same can be applied for more than just monetary credibility.
Solinova includes a currency called "promise" that is more secure than blockchains and much faster. It also integrates inherent insurance for everything and greatly reduced risk of transactions. I will publish this soon. I am working through simulations to verify the validity and comprehensiveness of the philosophy.
The Government and Media Companies are equally at fault.
The Government will always want to only have portrait what looks good to them, and not have their dirty Landry shown, they will always be a force to keep the news down and as censored as they think they can make it. Right now the two party system in America, where both parties have enough power to want the other side to be seen poorly, so they will tolerate such freedoms.
The Media companies are out for profit. To maximize profits all their stuff they show is targeted towards people with an 8th grade education, and is afraid to go into details, as that would get boring, and loose the audience. Also because of this, there is more money blurring the lines between Facts, Opinions, and Call to action.
So we are getting most news mixed with commentary and trying to make us to go out and fight it. We get things like Changes that will hurt this group of people has passed with so much opposed and so much approved by which party, then we point out party members that had broken with their party and either give them props for being bipartisan, or admonish them for selling out. The change was passed (fact), the people who will get hurt by the change (opinion), those who and didn't cause the vote (call to action, to affect your vote)
Because the Media companies are getting dirt about the other party, the party will often give them more exclusive access to their side of the issue. Thus make the problem worse.
It takes a disciplined news source to be actually fair and informative. I think NPR does the better job at it, then others I have seen, where when they cover Trump voters they try to get the ones ones who can explain their position a bit more clearly and rationally, when they cover liberal groups they stay away from the more Hippy Pie in the Sky folks as well. While their political leaning does often come across (leaning left) they seem to try hard to be more fair on what is going on, then the others.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
In 2009, Noam Chompsky said " “What’s so exciting about at last visiting Venezuela,” the linguist said, is that “I can see how a better world is being created and can speak to the person who’s inspired it.”
In 2017, he says "I never described Chavez's state capitalist government as 'socialist' or even hinted at such an absurdity. It was quite remote from socialism. Private capitalism remained ... Capitalists were free to undermine the economy in all sorts of ways, like massive export of capital."
It's always "I have seen The Future, and It Works", until the megadeaths become impossible to ignore, then "Oh, no, that wasn't real socialism. We need to try real socialism. This time for sure."
That trick never works. Never.
Chile, Contras in Nicaragua, Supporting fascist thug government in Guatemala, Cuba. ... now Venezuela (and I'm sure I missed a few).
USA sort out your own f'**ing mess and stay out of other peoples' countries.
You say you make the world safe for democracy. That's BS, you kill democratically elected governments who don't let you steal resources, or who you have some political disagreement with.
Venezuelan crisis is a creation of US economic sabotage. (embargos, preventing international lending, etc etc) Wikipedia it yourself.
Venezuelan Presidential Elections:
1998 Chavez (Democratic Socialist): 56%
2000 Chavez (Democratic Socialist): 60%
2004 Recall-Chavez-Referendum: No: 58%
2006: Chavez (Democratic Socialist): 63%
2012: Chavez (Democratic Socialist): 55%
2013: Maduro (Democratic Socialist): 50.6%
2018: Maduro (Democratic Socialist): 68%
Summary: The slim majority of people in Venezuela have for 20 years and continue to support the democratic socialist regime in power.
The main CRIME of this government party according to US was nationalizing oil resources. In other words refusing to sit back and just take a few bribes while US oil companies raped the resources and took almost all of the profits.
Current US government can't STAND that there is a democratic socialist government in South America that dares to say that its own people own their natural resources and US does not own it. It's an afront to the US's worldwide modus operandi.
We are seeing the process of the US stealing the Venezuelan oil reserves back from the uppity local socialists.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
but he is the democratically elected representative of the nation. The opposition party decided to boycott the election. I haven't heard anyone say it was out of fear of reprisals either (ala Russia). The fact that there _is_ an opposition party indicates that Maduro isn't doing pogroms.
I think this is our CIA gearing up for more "liberation". Here's a series of clips of Donald Trump saying the quiet part out loud. e.g. we're going in to steal their oil. You can argue that Maduro was gonna steal it anyway, and maybe you're right. But that doesn't make us doing it right.
The part I really hate though is that the American war mongers start trouble south of the border and then use the refugees they created to frighten people into voting for them. That's where those "caravans" are coming from. That's just insane that it works...
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Only a small percentage are secretly evil.
The rest are pretty open about it.
Quite an accomplishment, you managed to get score:-1, Insightful :D
Not sure what this comic list comes from, but you can hardly blame gay people for turning the tide on the use of social ostracism to hurt people, having been kept down by it for millenia.
How does it feel?
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
how to get by in a world where AI and automation are doing most of the work formerly done by people.
I guess you'll either be teaching them how to steal with firearms,
or educating them about the merits of universal basic income (a suspiciously "socialist" solution, no? but a solution nonetheless.)
Don't believe AI is coming for their jobs?
Good luck with that.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
One right-wing voice?
Suuuurrrreee... dozens of news anchors at stations across the US (all owned by Sinclair media, which leans heavily to the right) just happened to recite the exact same right-wing message echoing Trump's comments about fake news and the media being the enemy on the same day using the same wording.
You can keep telling yourself that Fox News is the only right wing voice out there, but reality proves you're wrong.
Here in the US the media is controlled by the democratic left
That's not true, and you omitted News Corp, Sinclair Broadcast Group, Tribune Media, and other conservative media conglomerates; not to mention conservative shows that dominate the News Talk radio format.
Finding God in a Dog
I'm in favour of an independent and transparent non-profit global agency equipping itself with modern tech (inspectable open systems e-voting tech, most likely) to be able to offer election and referendum services (and citizen authentication services) to any country / state.
That being said, around the world, in all but a handful of countries, whenever there are close elections, the losing party ALWAYS claims fraud. Why wouldn't you? Sad but true.
And even those election-accepting countries have problems like gerrymandering of districts, politically biased supreme courts deciding elections, FBI directors implying one candidate is a criminal 11 days before the big vote etc.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
The last 100 years of history has shown that socialism inevitably breeds illiberal, totalitarian states. The further to the left a society goes, the more totalitarian it gets.
but he is the democratically elected representative of the nation.
He is no more "democratically elected" than any other tyrant in history.
Which is why CANADA supports the fellow who actually won, and many are calling for an open and monitored election to take place...
As for "probably not a nice chap", turning the bread basket of South America into a hell-hole where there is literally nothing - not clean water, not clean food, not even toilet paper - someone who maid that happen, is the Devil incarnate. He has earned his place with the monsters of history like Stalin or Pol-Pot.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The fucking obvious ones, as it were...
Why do you support intervention in foreign countries? How many times in the past 65 years has that actually helped?
Weren't you recently going off on slashdot about how the US has a glorious past punching Nazis in WWII? I'm pretty sure all the Nazis attacked in WWII were on foreign soil.
(Or is this another one of your positions where it's okay, but only if their politics match yours?)
I'm a minority race. Save your vitriol for white people.
People willing and wanting to cover more than one side of an issue. It's ok for reporters to have an angle, if you have lots of different reporters so that pretty much all angles are covered. That is, fake news is a symptom, not a problem. The remedy isn't to quash fake news. The proper remedy is to educate the people so that they're better able to determine for themselves what news is fake and what isn't. Then all you have to do is allow all news reports to get through, and the people can decide for themselves what the truth is.
That's what worries me about the current fervor to stamp out "fake news." While I can appreciate the intent, you're basically taking the the power to judge what constitutes real or fake news away from the people, and handing it to a few people at a company or in the government in charge of deciding what's fake and what's real. Those of you who've never lived through armed repression (i.e. the vast majority of the U.S. population) don't truly understand how precious a free media is. The people in Gwangju burned down one of the TV stations because they weren't doing their job and reporting what was happening. The reporters had been intimidated by the government and feared for their lives if they spoke the truth.
Yes, having a commission or department which decides what constitutes fake news can help. But it can also be horribly abused, with no way for the population to tell that it's being abused to repress legitimate information. The system works best when such repression is made more difficult, not easier. You just have to take upon yourself the harder task of properly educating the population, instead of the quick and dirty solution of a committee to decide which "fake news" should be repressed.
He's the democratically elected representative of the nation.
This is what happens when you boycott elections. Lefties in America stayed home because they didn't like Hilary and that got us Trump. Elections have consequences.
But it's more than that. I'm guessing the opposition party boycotted the election so they could de-legitimize Maduro in preparation for the US to help them over throw the government. Then they'll hand us the oil in exchange for power.
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If we haven't tried real socialism yet, then we haven't tried real capitalism yet
Seriously? Without intervention, proxy wars and NATO the world would look a LOT different. Milosevich close enough for you? How about Saddam or Hitler? China would probably still be fighting against Japan if it existed at all. The US wouldn't have any important trade routes and oil open for either the US or Europe.
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Welcome to leftists politics - only good if it "feels" good.
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Maduro and his military are pretty close to a Nazi. Just because they are left on the spectrum doesn't mean they can't be Nazis, after all Hitler and Stalin were both leftist socialists bent on socializing healthcare and taking over private industry.
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You will notice I specified "past 65 years". Plus, as you well know, Nazis are a special case. Whenever they appear, it is incumbent on all free peoples to come together to put them down.
Last I heard, there were no goosestep-incarnated Nazis down in Venezuela.
LOL.. You DO realize that South America was a favored place for the Nazi's to flee after WW2 right? I suspect more than one ended up in Venezuela and may still be there. The "Bolivar revelation" of Maduro is not exactly Nazi in name, but it shares many of the same concepts, principles and practice that brought Hitler and his party to power. Largely it's been successful in destroying the economies of most of South America, where socialism took deep root in the poverty ridden societies that once thrived down there. Rich in natural resources, squandered by social programs, no government can effectively spend more than it takes in, without eventually destroying the very economy that feeds it. Poverty and lower standards of living, with rebellion and bloodshed follows like the plague after the scourge of socialism takes root. It's happening in Venezuela right now.
The names may be different, but the results that follow as sure as the sun rises in the east, are the same.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
The name Nazi actually has socialist in it. Cmon you commy dem. Read your history. Quit getting spoon fed.
to the discussion. Venezuela's problems have more to do with the collapsing price of oil and the most powerful nation on earth cutting them out of the global banking network via sanctions.
Venezuela is a small island nation that only recently became a civilized place when their Dictator, for reasons of his own, decided to share some wealth with the general population. This was not OK. The powers that be do not want this. That oil was theirs. He can have his banana republic but they get the oil. That's how this works.
While we're talking about things our media never seems to say, how about we talk about where all those refugees that our president just shut down our government (to the tune of $11 billion in loses, $3 of which we'll never get back) came from?
You want more refugees? You want more folks streaming over the boarder taking your jobs? This is how you get that. You destabilize a country so rich people can step in and steal the oil. Then you impoverish a country for generations which means violence and folks desperate enough to cross an ocean on a raft.
But I haven't heard a bloody peep about that from the media. When it comes to war (and make no mistake, they're gearing up to put boots on the ground just like they did with Syria) the media never met one they didn't like. That more than anything tells you who's _really_ in charge of this country, and it sure as hell ain't you and me.
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Good try. Next, you'll us Venezuela is invading Poland.
You are welcome on my lawn.
The below was originally written in response to an article blaming the Venezuelan economic issues on oil price declines, so you'll see references to that. I'm posting this as-is, rather than rewriting it. In the year or so since I wrote it, things have only gotten worse, in terms of lack of food and in terms of oil production (despite recently rising oil prices, up $10/barrel in that time), to the point where we're seeing news stories about treason charges for oil workers in a futile attempt to get production back up at government-run PDVSA. How bad is it according to Reuters? :
About 25,000 PDVSA workers resigned between the start of January 2017 and the end of January 2018, out of a workforce last officially reported at 146,000, Reuters reported last week. The resignations including high-level professionals that are now almost impossible to replace have only accelerated since Quevedo arrived, two dozen industry sources told Reuters.
Disclaimers:
This isn't original research, it's collating from publicly available sources. I did run the results past three people who live in Venezuela and they agreed it describes what they've seen/experienced.
---
The Studebaker article contains some facts, but it also includes opinions and as Gilberto pointed out, it leaves many facts out, mostly about the government as related to the economy.
Here are some additional facts and opinions to consider:
From 1998 to 2018, oil production in Venezuela is down from 3.5 million barrels per day in December of 1997 vs 2 million in October of 2017.
So what happened in the last 20 years? From Wikipedia
"After Hugo Chávez officially took office in February 1999, several policy changes involving the country's oil industry were made to explicitly tie it to the state under his Bolivarian Revolution. Since then, PDVSA has not demonstrated any capability to bring new oil fields on stream since nationalizing heavy oil projects in the Orinoco Petroleum Belt formerly operated by international oil companies ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, Chevron and Total. Chávez’s policies damaged Venezuela's oil industry due to lack of investment, corruption and cash shortages."
Probably just a fluke, though, right? I mean, steel production in Venezuela increased from 3400 tons in 1998 to about 4600 tons in 2008. The steel industry was nationalized by the Venezuelan government in 2008 and production declined to under 1600 tons. Huh, definitely a pattern forming. Similar stories of lower production and losses in the other industries after they were taken over: aluminum, cement, gold, iron, farming, transportation, electricity, food production, banking, paper and the media.
How well does the government run the nationalized oil company, PDVSA? Reuters:
"The output fall could not come at a worse time, with the economy in crisis and the socialist government struggling to pay its foreign debt." and "Compounding the situation, another eight managers and employees of state oil company PDVSA in eastern Venezuela were arrested in recent days for fiddling production figures, chief prosecutor Tarek Saab told reporters.
In a major corruption sweep engulfing the oil sector, about two dozen high-level executives have already been arrested in recent weeks, ridding PDVSA of much of its top brass."
Without the government takeover, even if oil companies were only competent enough to continue production levels and not grow them (as they've done previously over tim
The party of stupid and the party of evil get together and do something both stupid and evil, then call it bipartisan.
Oh! But the USA would be different! We'd run it correctly! We'd take care of the people! BUNK! It's never worked and never will.
How is it intervention to recognize the rightful President of a nation? Why do you want to normalize tyranny?
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Not even close. ABC/NBC/CBS do about 3-4 times more viewers than Fox News.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
You know the Trump administration is discussing military intervention, right? And just today, Bolton "accidentally" let out that they're considering sending 5,000 troops to Columbia for...something.
It's Wag the Dog, Rooster. Just like Bill Clinton did in Serbia. When you're having big trouble at home, nothing gets the mainstream media all fired up and saluting like seeing US firepower blowing some weak foreign nation all to Hell. Then, it takes a decade before they realize they've been had, and by that time (so it goes) you're done with a second term.
It's an old playbook. Grenada. Iraq 1, Iraq 2. Bosnia, yee-haw.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Of course not.
I'm saying that the concepts of socialism behind the rise of power of the Nazis are alive and well, in South America, they just have Spanish and Portuguese names down there. Further these concepts where not unique to pre-WW2 Germany, they didn't originate there nor did they die there. They just keep taking root in poverty and desperate economic conditions, like in Germany (and many times before that), with the promise of a better, more fair way that some then have to force on the masses.
It's what is killing Venezuela and will lead to the bloody revolt that is almost sure to soon come at this point. It's what nearly killed other south American countries in violence and economic collapse.
I've been down there, I can tell you that the poverty they have is like nothing you can imagine if you are from the states. I've seen some BAD places in the back woods of North Carolina, shanty huts with dirt floors at wide places in the road, but those places are heaven compared to the poverty I've seen in South America where row upon row, block on top of block of desperately poor, even in *nice* places like Chilie where the economic conditions are not as bad as some. It's no wonder such ideas catch on down there.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
You didn't answer the question - we've done what the EU. the OAS, and many others have done - recognized Maduro's opponent. How is that a drumbeat for war? Other than Maduro demanding the US embassy to close (and then backing down when we rightfully pointed out the US embassy is US soil and we will not tolerate a Venezuelan invasion)... We recognized the winner, we did not threaten Maduro, we responded to his threats of violence with defensive posturing only - and we're the bad guys. Because military people do their job and provide options in case it all Goes To Hell...
As far as "wag the dog", how about that Libya move by Obama and Hillary? That was a great one, wasn't it? Syria as well...
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Let me stop you right there. First, the "EU, OAS and many others" have not proposed sending troops to Venezuela.
Second, are you really suggesting that the fact that the EU has adopted a policy is a good reason for us to adopt the policy? If so, you're showing some growth there, Rooster.
This isn't about who to recognize or who to condemn. This is about direct intervention.
First, Obama has admitted that Libya was the worst mistake of his presidency (see link). Second, I bet you didn't know that more Americans died in Syria under Trump than under Obama.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world...
You are welcome on my lawn.
The EU, the OAS, and many others weren't threatened by Maduro, either - were they?
It's also good to see the EU on the right side of things - in this case, clear electoral fraud. Again, if the EU, the OAS, Australia, and dozens of others see the facts, why can't we? This isn't about direct intervention - it was about "what do we do if Maduro carries through on his promise to invade our embassy". Would you prefer we have no plans?
More Americans died in Afghanistan under President Obama than President Bush, too... I believe the previous White House resident promised to end the war in Afghanistan, end the war in Iraq, and stop the policy of US military intervention. He didn't do any of that, but got us involved in additional wars.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
The biggest "news" channel in the US is Fox "news."
Fox News is the biggest all-news cable channel, but they are still dwarfed by the likes of CBS News, NBC News, Reuters, and so on.
So now your argument is that we should do military intervention because Obama and Bush did military intervention? Now we're getting somewhere.
You are welcome on my lawn.
The further to the left a society goes, the more totalitarian it gets.
Which, when you think about it, is the natural outcome of pushing socialism. At its heart, socialism is the antithesis of human nature. Humans as a group are not altruistic. The average human is concerned about what's in it for them, not whether it benefits some nebulous "other" or society as a whole. It doesn't mean humans are evil. It's the natural instinct for a species to focus on individual survival and that's been bred into us over millions of years. Socialism tells you the individual must sacrifice for the group. People won't do that voluntarily. Capitalism entices people with a risk/reward structure which encourages the individual to work hard for a reward; the benefit to society is a side-effect.
Since people by and large won't do this voluntarily without a defined individual reward -- which is the case under socialism -- they must be coerced into doing it. That requires socialist governments to amass power and repeatedly wield it in every corner of society. It's forcing a round peg into a square hole and will not work for long. It's caused massive suffering everywhere it's been tried with the suffering being in direct proportion to how hard it's been pushed.
The sad part is socialism looks so appealing on paper. Couple that with the apparent lack of awareness of history and you have whole swaths of well-to-do societies clamoring for it. Meanwhile everyone that's ever been under the heel of a socialist government is running away from the concept.
In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
the Middle East might not be a wasteland
Pretty sure the Arabs and Jews have been hating and killing each other for a lot longer than the US has even existed. The only difference is oil. Without it, the ME would still be a barren wasteland but nobody would care.
there wouldn't be refugees from Central America
Yes, because all those Central American countries had thriving economies, stable governments, and prosperous societies before the US came along! Oh, wait, no...they've been hellholes for a lot longer than the US has been around.
North Korea might have electricity and enough food
Funny how South Korea, which has pretty much the same resources, land area, and so forth as North Korea, is thriving and prosperous while the North starves. Yeah, can't blame the crushing hardline cult-of-personality Kim government for that, can we? Nah, that can't possibly have anything to do with it. Gotta blame the US even when it makes no sense at all. It's so fashionable these days.
In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
You have all these left leaning networks and you bitch about ONE right leaning network in Fox News?
They don't like people upsetting the echo chamber of leftist media outlets. If we can't have state-controlled media where all the talking heads say the same thing in the same way at the same time then the next best thing is a uniformly leftist media. Alas, Fox News will not follow the guidebook. Hence they must be demonized even when those doing the demonizing can't point out where Fox is wrong or inaccurate in their reporting. Apparently it's enough to just dislike what they're reporting, scream "racist" or "sexist" or whatever, and claim victory. All this from the "tolerant" left.
Orwell would be so proud of them.
In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
conservative shows that dominate the News Talk radio format
Oh, leftist talk radio has been tried in many markets. Remember "Air America"? No? That's because it went bust. No, it didn't go bust because Fox sent a team of ninjas to decapitate everyone. It failed because it could not compete.
Talk news is not a good format for leftists because the format encourages and relies on critical thought. Further, it encourages people to call in and challenge the host in a test of logic. Air America failed because it was basically shrill leftists telling everyone what to think and lambasting them if they didn't agree. Conservative radio doesn't do this and has thrived on debate.
Come to think of it, leftists as a whole seem to be quite shrill on avoiding debate of any kind, either by protesting campus speakers, threatening broadcasters, or trying to use the power of government to regulate airwaves. You'd think an ideology confident in its principles would welcome debate, but leftists don't. It's dogma or nothing, apparently. Speaks volumes about the logic of leftist ideology.
In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Nice strawman, pope! No - I would advocate using military defense to defend our borders - and an embassy IS a border. Glad we have a President more interested in getting us out of wars and using negotiating tactics instead of drones and bombs and troops. And yes, when you negotiate with a bully, you do need to use the language and threats they understand - you don't have to carry through, just speak their language. Maybe it's why President Obama sucked so terribly at foreign policy...
But you've never answered the question - how is it foreign intervention to recognize the rightful President of a nation?
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
That trick never works. Never.
Don't tell that to AOC, her hordes of supporters, or the fawning media who adore her. Never mind that her "democratic socialism" is no different in practice than the socialism we've seen play out in Stalinist Russia, or Maoist China, or Castro's Cuba, or Kim's North Korea, or Maduro's Venezuela, or [insert failed state with starving, rioting people here]. No this is New Socialism and it's going to work out Just Fine this time because she says so!
Funny how everyone who's ever experienced the heavy hand of socialism is running screaming in terror from it to liberal democratic capitalist nations. You'd think if socialism worked it'd be the other way around, right?
Socialism cannot work without control. Control of markets. Control of social behavior. Control of the media. Control, control, control. It's forcing people do behave in ways contrary to their natural instincts, that being the desire for individual prosperity not group prosperity. That control requires an oppressive, authoritarian government with absurd amounts of power over the populace. That kind of power attracts corruption, cronyism, and cult-of-personality "leaders" who inevitably run the whole train off a cliff. History has shown this is the case every time it's been tried. That doesn't stop leftists everywhere from dreaming that it'll still work if only the right people are in charge. They're oblivious to the fact that the "right people" frequently aren't the angels they proclaim to be, and even if they are they eventually grow old, die, and must be replaced with others who may not share their altruism or competence.
In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Go look up some of their interviews with AOC where they desperately try to get negative sound bites out of her. Go look up their coverage to the run up of the Iraq war. Go look up their coverage of the 2008 market crash and bail out.
MSNBC & CNN are left of center on social issues (Gay rights, Abortion, general civil rights, etc). They're that way because they're corporatists, and they go with whatever has the least controversy and generates the most money. Gays money spends well, so they're for Gay rights. 70% of americans support Abortion rights, so they're for Abortion rights.
But on anything economic they're right. Hard right. Go read or watch Norm Chomsky's "Manufacturing Consent". The mainstream media is _not_ on your side.
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Surprisingly, not.
So, you believe a country being a "hellhole" is reason enough for the US to invade?
You are welcome on my lawn.
And if they do start piling up, who's to blame? Is it the small, impoverished third world nation that's been trying to modernize itself or the giant empire that's been throwing economic sanctions at them non stop?
/.'s readership is getting up there in years). We should be able to figure out the difference between socialism and using Karl Marx's rhetoric to get the rubes to buy in. We should be able to understand the difference between Donald Trump & Bernie Sanders when they both promise us Universal Healthcare. We shouldn't trust our gov't when it tells us Venezuela's bad when that same gov't supports the Saudi's who just murdered one of our journalists and got away with it. We should be able to see the pattern of destabilizing nations and then using the refuges as jingoistic props.
Maybe Venezuela could have pulled out of their nose dive with a bit of international help. Maybe they could have had Democracy and permanent first world nation status with just a friendly push in the right direction. But we'll never know, because to be blunt somebody is after their oil and by God and Country they're gonna get it...
I don't expect to get much of anywhere with this line of thought and it frustrates me. The US has been fucking with the rest of the Americans non stop for over a century.
I know where not supposed to bitch about mods but come one. It's 2019. We have the internet. We're adults (mostly,
Fuck. I mean, just fuck.
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Except, the only people talking about violence against US personnel in the embassy are in the Trump administration
It's such an obvious ploy. Venezuela didn't threaten the US embassy in any way except to say, "things are getting hairy, you might want to go home" and the next thing we hear is Trump warning Venezuela not to hurt any US citizens. It's the traditional, "why are you hitting yourself?" approach to foreign intervention. The US is good at it;. We've been doing that dance since at least Vietnam.
Fuck, all I'm saying is let Venezuela do what Venezuela is gonna do. They are no threat to the US. Find some other way for Trump to distract the American people from the laundry list of crime and corruption that his administration has been guilty of. We don't need to put another foreign war on the credit card with money borrowed from China. We're already hemorrhaging money from Trump's tax cuts for wealthy corporations, and the trade wars, and the shutdown, and...on and on.
Enough with the foreign wars.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Only a naive fool would believe someone has no biases.
Of course everyone in the entertainment business is lying -- that why it is prudent to check multiple sources.
about how the US has a glorious past punching Nazis in WWII?
Let's not forget that the Nazi part of America filled Madison Square Garden as late as 1939. One of the reasons that the US initially stayed out of the war was fatigue from WW1, but the other was that the Nazis had, in fact, a lot of support in the US, both popular and among the elite (The Bush family was among those who made deals with Nazi Germany well into the war).
Yes, once the US had decided that being on the side of the Allies was in its best interest, they simply outproduced everyone and crushed them with volume. But history is more complicated than "we are the heroes and did the right thing" - there was a lot of interests to consider, and in an alternate universe, things could've gone another way.
So yes, all the Nazis attacked were on foreign soil. All the Nazis at home were not attacked. They just quietly decided that it was better to put the Swastika into that chest in the attic.
Also, technically speaking, the OP said:
How many times in the past 65 years has that actually helped?
And WW2 was more than 65 years ago, but that's nitpicking.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
The word "socialism" definitely does not breed illiberal, totalitarian states : I just pronounced it many times and it had no effect.
Now we come to the meaning : in the US various features of various European countries are ridiculed as "socialism". This includes universal healthcare, state funded higher education, employee rights etc. Clearly many European countries are not illiberal, totalitarian states - hence even the meaning of the word "socialism" does not breed illiberal, totalitarian states.
Now, some meanings of the word socialism could breed illiberal, totalitarian states.
Bingo Dictionary - Pragmatist, n. A myopic idealist.
He was right about national bourgeoisie though, it always betrays the country for the stronger enemy. That's how Morsi was toppled in Egypt.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
Oh, fuck right off. Nazis killed socialists. Socialism was not the concept behind the rise of power of the Nazis.
Lay off the Infowars, my man.
Dude.. Learn your history.. Socialist is in the Nazi party name (The National Socialist German Workers' Party) for Pete's sake and they where anti-communist and anti-capitalist spewing (among other things) socialist clap trap. Basically the democrat party of their day.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Maybe, just maybe, this is a mess created by Chavez and further worsened by Maduro.
I know it's popular to blame the US for everything that happens.. but shits been hitting the fan all over the world a lot longer than the US has been in existence.
If the people are being taken care of, I doubt there would be massive demonstrations.
Anyone who's worked in IT long enough knows that if you stick your neck into a mess, you end up being responsible for it.
I can buy that the US isn't initially responsible for the mess Venezuela is in... but the US just can't manage to keep their dicks out of it, so they've taken ownership.
The US has two problems with it's approach to Venezuela
1. Guiado is still a socialist. He might dress it up as a nicer, gentler kind of Socialism but he's still pretty firmly on the Left.
2. It doesn't matter who calls themselves president, it doesn't matter who has international support... It doesn't even matter who actually won the elections. When you've got a dictatorship, all that matters is who is in control of the Army and right now, that is Maduro.
So Maduro is in charge until one of his generals decides to try the crown on for size. The correct course of action is to leave them be until someone with half a brain decides to get rid of the current crop of idiots and asks to sit at the big table again... I doubt this will happen so you'll need to accept that the US owns this mess because the US stuck it's dick in where it wasn't wanted or needed and won't bloody stop doing it.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Congratulations! For nitpicking and pointing out that I suffer from dyslexia. And discrediting the points I have made, because of such disability.
When writing my Masters Thesis, I needed to spend extra weeks reviewing the spelling and correct word use, and needed others to review it, because of it. Now to make a point on Slashdot, I have 5 minutes to express my idea. And sometimes spelling will get lost, especially using a GNU spell checker.
Thank you for being a jerk.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Do you also believe that a tiger shark is a tiger? Is the Democratic People's Republic of Korea a democratic republic?
How stupid are you?
You are welcome on my lawn.
So, are you really trying to claim the Nazi's where not socialist, yet claimed they where? LOL.. And I'm being called stupid....
Those who know their history are condemned to watch while others repeat it over their objections.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
So, are you really trying to claim the Nazi's where not socialist, yet claimed they where?
No, Nazis were not socialist.
https://www.britannica.com/sto...
I'm going to do you a big favor. Here is the entire Encyclopedia Britannica article on "Were the Nazis Socialists?" Maybe if you learn the actual history of where the "socialist" part of "national socialist" comes from, and what happened to socialists during the Night of Long Knives, you'll give up the notion that "Nazis were socialists tho" once and for all. But I doubt it.
You are welcome on my lawn.
the world would step in. We're pretty desensitized but a mass genocide would get our attention. Go check the old Testament. There's no shortage of genocides there. And for good measure check just about any other Holy Book you care to name. Genocide has been the default for most of human history.
Palestinians hate Israel because they keep getting their land snatched and impoverished as a result. They're getting away with it because there's a significant portion of Christians (especially in America) who want to see Israel take the land because they believe that will bring the rapture. No joke. They're a significant and reliable voting block for the American Republican Party and that's one of the issues they hang their hat on.
Yes, lots of Palestinians do bad things. They also lack food and water security. People do bad things when you put them up against a wall. Meanwhile Israeli snipers are regularly shooting protestors with rock slings from half a mile away and the occasional children and there's hardly a peep. That's gonna get under some people's skin.
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Surprisingly, not.
If you're not going to bother to read up on two millennia of discord between Arabs and Jews then there's really no point in pursuing this point with you. You have no idea what you're talking about and no interest in remediating your ignorance.
So, you believe a country being a "hellhole" is reason enough for the US to invade?
Wow! If you can make leaps like that you should try out for the Olympics. You'd set gold medal records for sure. Typical liberal. Since you can't argue with facts and logic, you're reduced to strawmen. What's next, ad hominem attacks? That's usually where your type goes when they're losing the argument.
In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Again, WHY are you supporting Maduro?
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One more time for the kiddies who don't know their history and cannot speak German.
The Nazi party has "socialist" in it's name and was founded on socialist principles. It did this to distinguish itself from the other two options, communist and Conservative.
I'm not saying that's all it pushed, nor am I saying that was the focus of it's ideology over all, only that it was how it STARTED. The Nazi party used socialist rhetoric and ideals to establish it's foot hold in Germany's political power structure. Eventually other of it's principles became more and more important, but it was started by building a base of socialist ideas and building on that.
So, you want to argue on their eventual destination, where they ended up, that it wasn't very socialist. But history is hardly ever cut and dried on such questions because things change over time. The Nazi party changed throughout it's existence. There is a reason "socialist" is in it's name that very much has to do with socialism it was pushing when it was named. They never really stopped being what they originally where, they just modified their emphasis over time. Socialistic programs and principles are in there still, just not as apparent towards the end.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
So far, I don't see us getting involved in Venezuela other than saying "mess with out embassy and we'll stomp you", since that is effectively US soil. Having a plan to back up the statement seems wise - don't you think?
But you've never answered the question - how is it foreign intervention to recognize the rightful President of a nation?
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
I agree, which is why I don't recognize the current American president.
You are welcome on my lawn.
So you agree you were wrong - it is not foreign intervention (as you posited) to recognize a rightful President.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
it is not foreign intervention (as you posited) to recognize a rightful President.
I'm not concerned about who Trump recognizes and who he doesn't. At this point, he probably thinks Fidel Castro is the president of Brazil. But when you start rattling sabers and talking about sending 5,000 troops into the area, and freezing assets, I would indeed call that intervention.
And we have a long, ugly history of intervention in that part of the world and it's always made things worse and caused nothing but problems.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Venezuela was a third world hell hole that did the unthinkable: they took some of their oil money and used it to benefit the working class.
Maybe they should have taken some of that oil money and used it to diversify their economy so it's not so dependent on a single export whose price fluctuates wildly.
Anyone who isn't engaging in gaslighting and willful dumbfuckery? Sanctions have specifically targeted Venezuela's #1 industry, but have also made it nearly impossible to borrow money or even get diapers. Venezuela has billions in gold abroad that it could use to buy food - but America's lapdogs are refusing. The US has been openly funding opposition parties while whining about supposed Russian interference in its own elections.
Everyone who actually looks at Venezuela's elections, as opposed to parroting US propaganda, says they are free and fair. And if they were rigging elections - then Juan Guaido wouldn't be head of the national assembly, you dumb fuck.
Dumb.
Fuck.
Er.
Eee.