The Left's Venezuela Mess

LowDown · Mar 10, 2015

Socialism always starts with the same promises, ends with the same accusations and excuses.

Venezuela had a good run for a while, send a little fuel oil to New England and some democrat pols were praising Chavez to high heaven. Leftist celebrities from Sean Penn to Oliver Stone fawned on him never mind the sham democracy, the unlimited executive authority, the political repression, the hunting down of government critics, the stacking of elections and the government’s perpetrating violence inside polling places.

But all of that is going down the memory hole. It's over:

The Obama administration has announced economic sanctions on Venezuela’s rulers and its intelligence agents, citing the “erosion of human-rights guarantees” – erosion, as though this were something new, as though Hugo Chávez hadn’t been a tyrant back when President Obama’s ally Representative Fattah was carrying his political water all over the eastern seaboard. In the New York Times’ account of Venezuela’s woes and Maduro’s misrule, there is no mention at all of the critical role the American Left played in lending legitimacy to Chavismo, of the so-called liberals and progressives who denounced legitimate protests against Maduro’s brutality as nefarious U.S.-backed coup attempts, who remained — and remain — silent on the regime’s censorship, political repression, torture, and economic incompetence.

Link

And the difference between "socialist" democracies like Sweden and those like Cuba and Venezuela is that the former stick to the rule of law and democracy and the latter do not. That's why none of those Northern European nations has gone full socialist, because the people don't want that. Not without coercion and the force of violence has full socialism ever been implemented in modern times.

It has been the same thing time after time. Socialist leaders take power and move toward implementation of their ideals but run into opposition over key issues like private property rights. Then they lose patience and start thwarting the law and corrupting democracy.

iliveonramen · Mar 10, 2015

LowDown said:
Socialism always starts with the same promises, ends with the same accusations and excuses.

Venezuela had a good run for a while, send a little fuel oil to New England and some democrat pols were praising Chavez to high heaven. Leftist celebrities from Sean Penn to Oliver Stone fawned on him never mind the sham democracy, the unlimited executive authority, the political repression, the hunting down of government critics, the stacking of elections and the government’s perpetrating violence inside polling places.

But all of that is going down the memory hole. It's over:

Link

And the difference between "socialist" democracies like Sweden and those like Cuba and Venezuela is that the former stick to the rule of law and democracy and the latter do not. That's why none of those Northern European nations has gone full socialist, because the people don't want that. Not without coercion and the force of violence has full socialism ever been implemented in modern times.

It has been the same thing time after time. Socialist leaders take power and move toward implementation of their ideals but run into opposition over key issues like private property rights. Then they lose patience and start thwarting the law and corrupting democracy.

Yeah....the rule of law and democracy are pretty important...

longview · Mar 10, 2015

Good point, in a real democratic system, there is a feedback mechanism
for when someone gets too far from the will of the people.
Any system could become totalitarian, if the feedbacks were ether ignored or bypassed.

Fenton · Mar 10, 2015

iliveonramen said:
Yeah....the rule of law and democracy are pretty important...

So is the existence of Free market forces that efficiently allocate goods and services.

Venezuelans fell victim to the Central planning scam.

AmericanSpartan · Mar 10, 2015

LowDown said:
Socialism always starts with the same promises, ends with the same accusations and excuses.

Venezuela had a good run for a while, send a little fuel oil to New England and some democrat pols were praising Chavez to high heaven. Leftist celebrities from Sean Penn to Oliver Stone fawned on him never mind the sham democracy, the unlimited executive authority, the political repression, the hunting down of government critics, the stacking of elections and the government’s perpetrating violence inside polling places.

But all of that is going down the memory hole. It's over:

Link

And the difference between "socialist" democracies like Sweden and those like Cuba and Venezuela is that the former stick to the rule of law and democracy and the latter do not. That's why none of those Northern European nations has gone full socialist, because the people don't want that. Not without coercion and the force of violence has full socialism ever been implemented in modern times.

It has been the same thing time after time. Socialist leaders take power and move toward implementation of their ideals but run into opposition over key issues like private property rights. Then they lose patience and start thwarting the law and corrupting democracy.

"Ever notice how people who support socialism always live in Capitalistic Nations?"-AmericanSpartan

AmericanSpartan · Mar 10, 2015

iliveonramen said:
Yeah....the rule of law and democracy are pretty important...

Nope, not democracy, it caused this mess...Mob rule always ends in this kind of mass theft.

US Conservative · Mar 10, 2015

Leftism always fails, so its always blamed on others. Thats what the left does, frankly.

AmericanSpartan · Mar 10, 2015

US Conservative said:
Leftism always fails, so its always blamed on others. Thats what the left does, frankly.

Why can they just leave us alone/leave America?

US Conservative · Mar 10, 2015

AmericanSpartan said:
Why can they just leave us alone/leave America?

I wish they would, but they cant-parasitic leftism can't sustain itself unless its taking other peoples money.
They know anywhere they go would end up looking like venezuela soon enough.
If it didn't burn itself down-it would die from failure to maintain population.

US Conservative · Mar 10, 2015

longview said:
Good point, in a real democratic system, there is a feedback mechanism
for when someone gets too far from the will of the people.
Any system could become totalitarian, if the feedbacks were ether ignored or bypassed.

Thats happening now-the left is dumbing down our schools and culture, and increasingly resorting to orwellian tactics in govt, and they ignore it.

TheDemSocialist · Mar 10, 2015

Well this just turned out to become a major right wing rhetoric circle jerk without any regards to factual information.

Kobie · Mar 10, 2015

AmericanSpartan said:
Why can they just leave us alone/leave America?

Ah, yes, that delightful argument. "Be a conservative or leave." Nice.

Kobie · Mar 10, 2015

TheDemSocialist said:
Well this just turned out to become a major right wing rhetoric circle jerk without any regards to factual information.

What else is new? When you get this crew together, it's what happens. Somehow the fact that Venezuela is being a bag of dicks means "leftism" (whatever we're conveniently defining it as today) "always fails." Typical retrograde hackery.

US Conservative · Mar 10, 2015

TheDemSocialist said:
Well this just turned out to become a major right wing rhetoric circle jerk without any regards to factual information.

Last I heard due to price controls the govt couldn't keep food and toilet paper stocked. Socialism in action.

US Conservative · Mar 10, 2015

Kobie said:
What else is new? When you get this crew together, it's what happens. Somehow the fact that Venezuela is being a bag of dicks means "leftism" (whatever we're conveniently defining it as today) "always fails." Typical retrograde hackery.

Kobie, venezuela is just another failed marxist state. Im sorry your political ideology leads to failure. 100 million killed last century are as well.

Kobie · Mar 11, 2015

US Conservative said:
Kobie, venezuela is just another failed marxist state. Im sorry your political ideology leads to failure. 100 million killed last century are as well.

Marxism is not my "political ideology." Keep failing.

US Conservative · Mar 11, 2015

Kobie said:
Marxism is not my "political ideology." Keep failing.

Kobie, its based in marxism, why wont you accept the obvious?

Kobie · Mar 11, 2015

US Conservative said:
Kobie, its based in marxism, why wont you accept the obvious?

Marxism is not my "political ideology," nor is my "political ideology" based in Marxism. Please continue to fail.

US Conservative · Mar 11, 2015

Kobie said:
Marxism is not my "political ideology," nor is my "political ideology" based in Marxism. Please continue to fail.

Kobie, are you a proponent of social justice? Is wealth redistribution more fair to you than merit?

longview · Mar 11, 2015

I suspect when a form of Government stops receiving feedback from
the governed, freedoms are lost. The form of government does not matter,
just that they no longer follow the will of the people.

Kobie · Mar 11, 2015

US Conservative said:
Kobie, are you a proponent of social justice? Is wealth redistribution more fair to you than merit?

What? Drop the buzzwords and try making sense.

US Conservative · Mar 11, 2015

Kobie said:
What? Drop the buzzwords and try making sense.

Kobie, that question was very simply worded for you. Did you understand it?

Kobie · Mar 11, 2015

US Conservative said:
Kobie, that question was very simply worded for you. Did you understand it?

I understood it; it was just a stupid question.

LowDown · Mar 11, 2015

longview said:
I suspect when a form of Government stops receiving feedback from
the governed, freedoms are lost. The form of government does not matter,
just that they no longer follow the will of the people.

Once you have an authoritarian government ruled by an oligarchy, like the USSR or Communist China, the political left and right tend to blur together. In both the leadership tends to concentrate wealth and resources to itself while sprinkling some goodies on its supporters. A left wing government might pay more attention to social services, but the prosperity of the people is very low in either case. But even an authoritarian government that many considered to be right wing provided lots of benefits and social services to citizens, and that was German National Socialism. Juan Perón is considered by most left wingers to be a right wing dictator, but he had social justice, increased employment, increased wages, reducing the wage gap, etc., as his primary goals and was very popular. He also nationalized foreign owned companies like the railways.

eohrnberger · Mar 11, 2015

LowDown said:
Socialism always starts with the same promises, ends with the same accusations and excuses.

Venezuela had a good run for a while, send a little fuel oil to New England and some democrat pols were praising Chavez to high heaven. Leftist celebrities from Sean Penn to Oliver Stone fawned on him never mind the sham democracy, the unlimited executive authority, the political repression, the hunting down of government critics, the stacking of elections and the government’s perpetrating violence inside polling places.

But all of that is going down the memory hole. It's over:

Link

And the difference between "socialist" democracies like Sweden and those like Cuba and Venezuela is that the former stick to the rule of law and democracy and the latter do not. That's why none of those Northern European nations has gone full socialist, because the people don't want that. Not without coercion and the force of violence has full socialism ever been implemented in modern times.

It has been the same thing time after time. Socialist leaders take power and move toward implementation of their ideals but run into opposition over key issues like private property rights. Then they lose patience and start thwarting the law and corrupting democracy.

An interesting analysis there. Now cast that framework onto how Obama has lost patience and has 'his pen and his phone', and the similarities are quite striking.

The Left's Venezuela Mess

LowDown

Curmudgeon

iliveonramen

Pontificator

longview

Fenton

AmericanSpartan

AmericanSpartan

US Conservative

AmericanSpartan

US Conservative

US Conservative

TheDemSocialist

Gradualist

Kobie

Kobie

US Conservative

US Conservative

Kobie

US Conservative

Kobie

US Conservative

longview

Kobie

US Conservative

Kobie

LowDown

Curmudgeon

eohrnberger

The Left's Venezuela Mess

Curmudgeon

Pontificator

Gradualist

Curmudgeon

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