|
There was an event in Caracas yesterday called "Grito por la Libertad" ["Shout for Freedom"] in solidarity with the country's political prisoners. It was held in Chacaito, and featured speeches from opposition figures and musical concerts. Nacho performed. Here are a couple of pictures from the crowd:  A selfie by Jesus "Chuo" Torrealba, the head of the MUD:  The pictures below show a huge line outside the Abasto Bicentenario in Terrazas del Avila in Caracas yesterday morning:    Going through an ordeal like that even once would be traumatic. Imagine living in that for months and months. ecureuilmatrix posted:(Man, Canadian politics must look dreadfully boring to you, Chuck Boone.) Things do appear to move a lot slower up here. And there are fewer conspiracy theories to juggle in your head whenever you're trying to make sense of something. Justin Trudeau though  
|
#
?
Feb 21, 2016 16:11
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 15, 2024 19:53 |
|
|
fnox posted:Why would they hoard food? They don't control the prices, and they are the sole producer of corn flour, a fundamental foodstuff of the country's dietary plan, because government owned companies that supposedly manufacture corn flour don't actually produce anything. I want you to find testimony of one loving Venezuelan buying corn flour that isn't branded "Harina PAN", AKA the kind that Polar produces. Jimmy doesn't understand the concept of food reserves, and thinks that the granaries of Venezuela should be emptied to alleviate pressure on Maduro's popularity. Little does Jimmy know, the granaries have already been expropriated; all which stands between Venezuela and Holodomor is one below-average season. Not to worry, though! You can still que up for hours in the barrios for a free flatscreen TV! Because lord knows, when the bread runs out, a flatscreen TV will be so very handy as a unit of exchange. Normally, America would not allow your nation to starve itself, as peace, development, human rights, corn exports, and global security are the five core pillars American foreign policy. Unfortunately for Venezuela, it's an election year with majorities in two and a half branches of government currently at stake. Who the gently caress would risk the other party capturing the Executive and Judicial branches, in addition to a Senate majority, just for the sake of a bunch of Latin American socialists who refused to listen to us when we told them that their policies were going to result in everything we see in Venezuela today? My Imaginary GF fucked around with this message at 04:35 on Feb 22, 2016 |
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 04:30
|
|
|
Hey Borneo Jimmy I'm calling you out. Suppose everything you claim is true and there is actually a CIA backed conspiracy to out the PSUV, place them all in FEMA death camps, gas them with chemtrails, and replace them with a puppet US government. How would that actually be any worse than the government Venezuela has now?
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 04:34
|
|
|
-Troika- posted:Hey Borneo Jimmy I'm calling you out. Suppose everything you claim is true and there is actually a CIA backed conspiracy to out the PSUV, place them all in FEMA death camps, gas them with chemtrails, and replace them with a puppet US government. Because Venezuelans would all begin to have diets like Americans, with the evil of corn syrup putting Venezuelans at increased risk for development of T2DM and a wide range of other chronic illness, let alone the thousands of deaths which would result within days from the population's development of fluid and electrolyte disorders, especially hypophosphatemia, along with neurologic, pulmonary, cardiac, neuromuscular, and hematologic complications.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 04:39
|
|
|
Well, we can totally treat those with homeopathic remedies, maaaan. 
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 04:41
|
|
|
-Troika- posted:Well, we can totally treat those with homeopathic remedies, maaaan. Until those are all consumed  at which point mudfarming, especially in highly populated urban centers, becomes a gainful economic activity. Before Borneo Jimmy calls it racist foreign officer propaganda which has no basis in fact, it's happened elsewhere in Latin America and is the path which Venezuela appears headed down.  If PSUV was for mud farming, I'm certain Borneo Jimmy would decry those who make wood soup as lacking in sufficient revolutionary zeal. My Imaginary GF fucked around with this message at 05:01 on Feb 22, 2016 |
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 04:59
|
|
|
-Troika- posted:Hey Borneo Jimmy I'm calling you out. Suppose everything you claim is true and there is actually a CIA backed conspiracy to out the PSUV, place them all in FEMA death camps, gas them with chemtrails, and replace them with a puppet US government. I guess that's his argument, the US is causing all of this so that the population accepts a puppet government. Bring the puppet already then, because my mom can't find medicine for my grandpa, and my father-in-law hasn't taken his heart pills in three months.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 09:02
|
|
|
I've always been amused by the cognitive dissonance required to believe that the CIA can have vast conspiracies going stretched throughout South America dedicated to bringing down the PSUV, entirely undetected, and yet they are supposedly incompetent enough that the opposition barely can win elections and random people on the internet can easily detect their machinations somehow. If the CIA was really so competent then Maduro would be president of a hole in the ground and Venezuela would have the largest GNP in South America right now thanks to massive, expert exploitation of their natural resources and a boom of jobs from US companies outsourcing.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 09:44
|
|
|
Yeah I guess the simplest evidence that there isn't actually a CIA conspiracy against Maduro is the simple fact that he's still alive, as the most unpopular president ever on the most dangerous country in the world. That, and, you know, how every single US company is leaving Venezuela in droves, with all its citizens in tow.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 16:42
|
|
|
Last night, I listened to a radio interview with Jesus Torrealba, the head of the MUD. Unfortunately the ~20 minute audio clip was forwarded to me via WhatsApp, so I don't have a source to link you to. In any case, Torrealba made a couple of really interesting points that I think are worth talking about :
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 16:56
|
|
|
Just read the Gaceta Oficial 40845 and it's scary stuff because they are giving the ministry of defense all of PDVSA's attributions, this CAMIMPEG company they created is surely just to give the top military branch a way to steal more money and keep them at their side...
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 23:06
|
|
|
El Hefe posted:Just read the Gaceta Oficial 40845 and it's scary stuff because they are giving the ministry of defense all of PDVSA's attributions, this CAMIMPEG company they created is surely just to give the top military branch a way to steal more money and keep them at their side... I know Labradooble brought it up earlier, but I also just really found out about this today and it is troubling. What's happened is that the government has created a new corporation called Compañía Anónima Militar de Industrias Mineras, Petrolíferas y de Gas [Anonymous Military Company for the Mining, Oil and Gas Industries], or CAMIMPEG. The government has put the entire natural resource industry (including PDVSA) directly under the control of CAMIMPEG. CAMIMPEG itself is part of the Ministry of Defense, and answers directly to the minister, Vladimir Padrino Lopez. CAMIMPEG's executive board is made up of five individuals hand-picked by the minister of defense, and they answer only to him. CAMIMPEG is not accountable either to the Ministry of Oil and Mining or to the National Assembly. In other words, PDVSA - and 95% of the foreign currency coming into Venezuela - are now 100% under the control of the military. PDVSA's workers are still in the dark about what's going on. Ivan Freites, the secretary general of the union representing oil workers in Falcon state, said in an article published in El Nacional today: quote:We don’t know what’s going to happen to PDVSA since this company has been created, or what will happen to its workers. What happens to the companies working in the Orinoco strip that have agreements with PDVSA? This is an extremely delicate situation. Jose Bodas is the secretary general of the Federacion Unitaria de Trabajadores Petroleros [United Federation of Oil Workers], and he said that the CAMIMPEG business couldn't have come at a worse time. He said that the oil industry in the country is "falling to pieces" and provided as an example the fact that the Paraguana Central Refinery - the country's largest - is operating at 50% capacity due to lack a lack of maintenance to the facility. Bodas believes that the CAMIMPEG was created and handed to Padrino Lopez on a platter as a "reward for political support".
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 23:44
|
|
|
As an outside observer looking in, it continually strikes me how Venezuela is following almost a standard template in its descent into dictatorship. Is it really possible for power to be reclaimed from the PSUV? It seems that the levers that the opposition has managed to get a hold of only have vestiges of their former power; Chavez and Maduro have systematically stripped them of their ability to effect change. It seems like they were only kept around as a fig leaf, and now that the fig leaf is in the oppositions hands they're being ignored. From an outside perspective it seems that Chavez have actually manged to move their claim on authority from a constitutional basis to simply a military one. Will the military turn on the PSUV or act as the force that keeps them in power? If its the latter, it seems that Venezuela is headed to a long period of not just authoritarianism, but outright dictatorship.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 23:51
|
|
|
It's completely insane and it's obvious that the gasoline price increase is going to go straight to Padrino's pockets, every single day the situation gets so much worse at this rate people won't even have energy to riot because we will all be starving to death soon.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 23:51
|
|
|
Latest numbers say 89.7% of Venezuelans don't have money to buy enough food for the month...
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2016 23:55
|
|
|
Gorau posted:As an outside observer looking in, it continually strikes me how Venezuela is following almost a standard template in its descent into dictatorship. Is it really possible for power to be reclaimed from the PSUV? It seems that the levers that the opposition has managed to get a hold of only have vestiges of their former power; Chavez and Maduro have systematically stripped them of their ability to effect change. It seems like they were only kept around as a fig leaf, and now that the fig leaf is in the oppositions hands they're being ignored. From an outside perspective it seems that Chavez have actually manged to move their claim on authority from a constitutional basis to simply a military one. Will the military turn on the PSUV or act as the force that keeps them in power? If its the latter, it seems that Venezuela is headed to a long period of not just authoritarianism, but outright dictatorship. Chavez and Maduro have historically kept a disproportionate amount of military officers in their cabinets. The current cabinet includes eight military officers (out of 32 ministries):
There are also a disproportionate amount of state governors who are also military officers. Maduro seemed to nod to this fact when, after announcing his new cabinet in early January, he said, "We're not a government: we're a revolution that governs". In other words, as you've pointed out, the military plays a very important role in helping keep the PSUV in power. The creation of CAMIMPEG appears to be another step in that same direction. Through CAMIMPEG, the PSUV has given the military access to billions of dollars with absolutely no oversight. It's hard to see it as anything else but the biggest bribe in history, making your second scenario (the military keeping the PSUV in power) the most likely one right now. El Hefe posted:Latest numbers say 89.7% of Venezuelans don't have money to buy enough food for the month... For the curious: this is based on a calculation conducted by the Centro de Documentacion y Analisis Social, which found that it costs a family of five Bs. 106,752.72 to buy the amount of food necessary to eat a healthy diet for one month. This figure is almost 11 times the monthly minimum salary, and represents a jump of 482% from the same time last year.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2016 00:21
|
|
|
Gorau posted:As an outside observer looking in, it continually strikes me how Venezuela is following almost a standard template in its descent into dictatorship. Is it really possible for power to be reclaimed from the PSUV? It seems that the levers that the opposition has managed to get a hold of only have vestiges of their former power; Chavez and Maduro have systematically stripped them of their ability to effect change. It seems like they were only kept around as a fig leaf, and now that the fig leaf is in the oppositions hands they're being ignored. From an outside perspective it seems that Chavez have actually manged to move their claim on authority from a constitutional basis to simply a military one. Will the military turn on the PSUV or act as the force that keeps them in power? If its the latter, it seems that Venezuela is headed to a long period of not just authoritarianism, but outright dictatorship. The USSR and the PRI and the Sandinistas fell and they all had a lot more competence at keeping dissent out of the public eye. Eventually the Venezuelan people will Kill All Communists, there are no perpetual dictatorships.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2016 01:54
|
|
|
El Hefe posted:Latest numbers say 89.7% of Venezuelans don't have money to buy enough food for the month... Some posters may think I was being ironic, or even a troll, when I suggested that Venezuela was on the path to becoming the second failed state in Latin America dependent upon mud farming to meet its populations' daily caloric needs. I was not. If Venezuela's population does not change the path the nation is on, it will become a failed state at a time when our President is too thoughtful to take action and when inaction will result in a wave of support for the Trumpwall.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2016 02:16
|
|
|
M. Discordia posted:The USSR and the PRI and the Sandinistas fell and they all had a lot more competence at keeping dissent out of the public eye. Eventually the Venezuelan people will Kill All Communists, there are no perpetual dictatorships. I have bad news for you.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2016 02:35
|
|
|
Hey, PSUV could ineffectually come back a decade later as a democratic left-wing party too if they don't take this current situation to the point where liquidation is the only option. Their choice.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2016 04:17
|
|
|
My Imaginary GF posted:Some posters may think I was being ironic, or even a troll, when I suggested that Venezuela was on the path to becoming the second failed state in Latin America dependent upon mud farming to meet its populations' daily caloric needs. What is mud farming? I Googled it and nothing turned up that makes sense in this context (one seems to mean "highway robbery" and the other seems to mean some sort of mineral extraction from the soil). VVV "A reporter sampling a cookie found that it had a smooth consistency and sucked all the moisture out of the mouth as soon as it touched the tongue. For hours, an unpleasant taste of dirt lingered. Saladman fucked around with this message at 09:50 on Feb 24, 2016 |
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2016 19:06
|
|
|
Saladman posted:What is mud farming? I Googled it and nothing turned up that makes sense in this context (one seems to mean "highway robbery" and the other seems to mean some sort of mineral extraction from the soil). http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/01/080130-AP-haiti-eatin_2.html quote:Carrying buckets of dirt and water up ladders to the roof of the former prison for which the slum is named, they strain out rocks and clumps on a sheet, and stir in shortening and salt. Then they pat the mixture into mud cookies and leave them to dry under the scorching sun. Mud farming is the process by which mud cookies are made. Yes, there are regions of the world so poor without any food distribution capacity that individuals eat mus to survive. Yes, Venezuela is heading down the path of becoming the Haiti of South America.
|
|
#
?
Feb 24, 2016 09:10
|
|
|
El Hefe posted:Latest numbers say 89.7% of Venezuelans don't have money to buy enough food for the month... If this continues, there will be civil war. And not the glorious revolution kind, but the kind that involves failed states and numerous insurgent factions slaughtering each other. If enough people can't eat, they will kill whoever they deem responsible and anyone who gets in their way.
|
|
#
?
Feb 24, 2016 21:37
|
|
|
This is what going to the supermarket looks like in Venezuela. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=39BbVr88J-M
|
|
#
?
Feb 24, 2016 22:15
|
|
|
Woolie Wool posted:If this continues, there will be civil war. And not the glorious revolution kind, but the kind that involves failed states and numerous insurgent factions slaughtering each other. If enough people can't eat, they will kill whoever they deem responsible and anyone who gets in their way. Civil war? What civil war? Now that the military controls resource production and directly manages the foreign capital from export sales, the military will not starve. Who will fight the brave military of Venezuela? What food will they have to march on? No, I think my suggestion of mud farming may be the only scalable option for the barrios of Caracas. Have any of you Venezuelan white collar professionals considered leaving to work someplace with a bit more food security, somewhere like Liberia?
|
|
#
?
Feb 24, 2016 22:44
|
|
|
It is extremely difficult to emigrate from Venezuela right now because of the way currency conversion works there. You basically can't do it unless you have friends/relatives outside the country willing to help you.
|
|
#
?
Feb 24, 2016 23:27
|
|
|
My Imaginary GF posted:Civil war? What civil war? Now that the military controls resource production and directly manages the foreign capital from export sales, the military will not starve. Who will fight the brave military of Venezuela? What food will they have to march on? Well, you see, there is this handy-dandy thing called "terrorism" that allows an underequipped, undertrained insurgent force to destabilize and destroy a state if enough people support the insurgents. And if 90% of the entire population can't get enough to eat, they will support the insurgents. What will the army eat when the people have destroyed all the oil infrastructure? Even the worst regimes must maintain some basic level of respect from the population or else they will be torn apart by insurgents and parceled into fiefdoms for charismatic strongmen (who themselves will only exist for as long as they can convince their subjects to keep supporting them). E: knowing you, Stalin is probably like the worst dictator ever in your opinion, so think about this. Stalin, for all the horrible things he did and was, turned a war-torn quasi-medieval shithole into a world power and defeated a terrifying murder empire that sought to kill every last Slav in the world. That is why he held on to power (until the rest of the CPSU had enough of his poo poo and arranged for him to be poisoned) and why some Russians remember him fondly. What the gently caress has Maduro ever accomplished? He's a nobody. He's created nothing. He has neither talent nor foresight nor charisma. He will not survive a wave of mass starvation in Venezuela, and neither will his party. gently caress, if I were a respected general officer in the Venezuelan military, I would be plotting my coup attempt right now. Woolie Wool fucked around with this message at 02:11 on Feb 25, 2016 |
|
#
?
Feb 25, 2016 02:02
|
|
|
Woolie Wool posted:gently caress, if I were a respected general officer in the Venezuelan military, I would be plotting my coup attempt right now. The Venezuelan military is in the business of cocaine, not revolution.
|
|
#
?
Feb 25, 2016 03:16
|
|
|
Constant Hamprince posted:The Venezuelan military is in the business of cocaine, not revolution. Not only the military but Maduro's own family members, which btw that trial is happening in New York either this week or the next if I remember right.
|
|
#
?
Feb 25, 2016 03:28
|
|
|
Two polls published recently have some perhaps not-so-surprising figures that are worth looking at. The first comes from Venebarometro, and is the one El Hefe referenced earlier on this page (I think). The poll found that 79.6% of respondents did not have enough money to buy food, up from 69.1% who gave the same response in April 2014. The same poll found that 76.9% of respondents said that they did not have enough money to buy medicine, while 89.7% they could not afford to buy clothes. The poll had a sample size of 1,200 people, was conducted between January 21 and 31, and is accurate within 2.37% nine times out of ten. The second poll comes from DatinCorp, and deals with public opinion of Maduro and the military. The poll found that 72% of respondents would like Maduro to leave office before the end of his term in 2019, and are split about the best way of doing so along the following options:
The same poll found that 70% of respondents believe Maduro is too "incompetent" to solve the country's problems, while 67% believe that his economic emergency decree will not fix a single issue. The same poll also found that only 6% of respondents have a positive opinion of the National Bolivarian Armed Forces. The DatinCorp poll was conducted on February 2 with a sample of 1,196, and has a margin of error of 2.8%. There's a video of a woman expressing her desperation at the situation in the country that is making a big splash on social and traditional media. The video is here, and my translation is below: quote:Yajaira: [We are allowed] two items per person. It was all shampoo. [unintelligible - sounds like "Locatel doesn't have anything!"]. You go out looking for food, and nothing. They won't give us our pension. What's happening with this government? How much longer will this last? How much longer will the humiliate us? Sadly, videos like the one above are fairly common. I see at least one or two ever fifteen days, and I'm not looking particularly hard. Woolie Wool posted:gently caress, if I were a respected general officer in the Venezuelan military, I would be plotting my coup attempt right now. I've been following the situation in Venezuela very closely for years now (both out of a personal interest in the country due to my background and as a doctoral student doing research on Venezuelan issues) and the civil war scenario is one that I cannot imagine. I just cannot believe that the average soldier in the Venezuelan army/National Guard would have any interest/motivation/desire to fight that kind of war. There are just a handful of individuals who are really interested in keeping this kleptocracy going if it became a matter of life or death. Outside just a handful of the very top leaders of the armed forces, I cannot imagine Venezuelan soldiers fighting -- for what? I think that way before we got to the point where a civil war was even remotely possible, you'd see a scenario like the one you've pointed out at the end of your post playing out - a coup to remove Maduro from within the military, or any number of factions inside the PSUV. I don't doubt that the National Guard would repress social unrest like it did in 2014, but don't believe they would carry out an order to start mowing down crowds of civilians. El Hefe posted:Not only the military but Maduro's own family members, which btw that trial is happening in New York either this week or the next if I remember right. I believe the trial starts on February 29. I've read that the prosecutor in charge of the case has audio evidence linking the defendants' (Cilia Flores' nephews) drug trafficking operation with high-ranking PSUV members. Chuck Boone fucked around with this message at 03:48 on Feb 25, 2016 |
|
#
?
Feb 25, 2016 03:36
|
|
|
Constant Hamprince posted:The Venezuelan military is in the business of cocaine, not revolution. I didn't say revolution, I said coup. The blow must flow, with or without Maduro. Beats being dragged through the streets and necklaced when civil war breaks out. Chuck Boone posted:I've been following the situation in Venezuela very closely for years now (both out of a personal interest in the country due to my background and as a doctoral student doing research on Venezuelan issues) and the civil war scenario is one that I cannot imagine. I just cannot believe that the average soldier in the Venezuelan army/National Guard would have any interest/motivation/desire to fight that kind of war. There are just a handful of individuals who are really interested in keeping this kleptocracy going if it became a matter of life or death. Outside just a handful of the very top leaders of the armed forces, I cannot imagine Venezuelan soldiers fighting -- for what? The civil war scenario would likely involve mass desertion on the part of Venezuelan soldiers. Most of the fighting would be between various insurgent militias for what is left, as well as "advisors" from every country with a stake in the region. It would not end happily for anyone. Woolie Wool fucked around with this message at 05:53 on Feb 25, 2016 |
|
#
?
Feb 25, 2016 04:00
|
|
|
Woolie Wool posted:The civil war scenario would likely involve mass desertion on the part of Venezuelan soldiers. Most of the fighting would be between various insurgent militias for what is left, as well as "advisors" from every country with a stake in the region. It would not end happily for anyone. Mass desertion would be very unlikely, a significant part of the upper echelon of the Venezuelan military is actually very well educated and trained, and is unlikely they'll follow an order from a higher up to fight for the Chavista government. Would the "Bolivarian militias" and the National Guard which are heavily brainwashed revolt? Sure, but it's extremely unlikely to see commissioned officers actually follow any substantial order from a narco-general, or anybody promoted for ideological reasons. Civil war is unlikely, Balkanization is unlikely, and any scenario involving large scale conflict is also unlikely. People know what's up with the government and they're very unlikely to defend it as it goes down.
|
|
#
?
Feb 25, 2016 06:37
|
|
|
  
|
|
#
?
Feb 27, 2016 09:08
|
|
|
They literally tried to blame inflation on a freaking website. I can't even...
|
|
#
?
Feb 27, 2016 10:28
|
|
|
I don't have a link handy but the firm representing the BCV said the case was "still alive", meaning that they would take up the court's offer to re-frame the lawsuit in a way that it might be able to exercise jurisdiction over the matter. The BCV has a week to do that. Also, the start of the trial of the Flores cousins has been postponed til March 29. The defense requested extra time to go over the evidence against Cilia Flores' nephews. The trial was originally scheduled to start on Monday.
|
|
#
?
Feb 27, 2016 17:38
|
|
|
Chuck Boone posted:I don't have a link handy but the firm representing the BCV said the case was "still alive", meaning that they would take up the court's offer to re-frame the lawsuit in a way that it might be able to exercise jurisdiction over the matter. The BCV has a week to do that. They have a week to make a lawsuit that makes sense and has legal standing in the USA, that's what the judge told them, they won't be able to because DolarToday doesn't do anything that's illegal in the USA.
|
|
#
?
Feb 27, 2016 17:45
|
|
|
El Hefe posted:They have a week to make a lawsuit that makes sense and has legal standing in the USA, that's what the judge told them, they won't be able to because DolarToday doesn't do anything that's illegal in the USA. Right - but this decision isn't the last we'll hear of the BCV vs. DolarToday. I agree that the premise of the lawsuit is absurd and it makes perfect sense that the court said "What the hell are we supposed to do with this?", but as long as that law firm has a direct line to those juicy, juicy oil dollars they'll keep going with this as far as they can take it.
|
|
#
?
Feb 27, 2016 17:54
|
|
|
I read an article yesterday that pointed out that the Guri hydroelectric plant, which provides approximately 33% of the country's electricity, has a water level that is about five meters away from forcing some of its turbines to shut down or risk severe damage. CORPOELEC (the government's energy body) measured the water level at the dam yesterday at 249 meters above sea level; at 244 meters, air bubbles would cause damage to the turbines, and at 240 meters most of the dam's turbines would be unable to operate. Victor Poleo, the former vice-minister of Energy, said that the dam needed about two substantial rainy seasons to avoid forcing at least a partial shutdown of the plant. The article resonated with me because on February 19, Minister of Electrical Energy Luis Motta Dominguez said that unless drastic measures were taken to curb energy consumption in the country, the country's electrical grid could collapse in April. His comments make a lot of sense knowing what we know today about the situation at the Guri dam. To the goons living in Venezuela today: How common are blackouts where you live? This (apparently imminent) crisis is being compared to the one in 2010. What was the blackout/rationing situation like back then? Woolie Wool posted:The civil war scenario would likely involve mass desertion on the part of Venezuelan soldiers. Most of the fighting would be between various insurgent militias for what is left, as well as "advisors" from every country with a stake in the region. It would not end happily for anyone. It is true that the PSUV counts on a number of milita/pseudo-milita groups, ranging from the official Milicia Nacional de Venezuela to armed civilian groups often referred to as colectivos armados. It's also true that these irregular groups have clashed with protesters, sometimes resulting in deaths, as evidenced by the 2014 protest movement and the 2002 coup. Still, I'm not convinced that these groups are organized/cohesive/devoted enough to throw themselves into anything like a civil war. Besides, I can't think of a single equivalent group on the opposition side. I just have a really difficult time picturing the average opposition supporter picking up an AK and fighting colectivos house-to-house in Caracas.
|
|
#
?
Mar 1, 2016 18:40
|
|
|
I haven't had any blackouts in a while but I can't even remember the last time it rained either, probably more than 6 months ago and it was only a drizzle.
|
|
#
?
Mar 1, 2016 18:44
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 15, 2024 19:53 |
|
|
Well, Venezuela is officially a dictatorship now. http://www.el-nacional.com/politica/TSJ-Asamblea-investigar-designacion-magistrados_0_803319763.html
|
|
#
?
Mar 1, 2016 20:48
|
|