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Ghost of Mussolini posted:Where are you hearing this? Not seeing any reliable source on this information. The twittersphere
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May 31, 2016 20:08
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beer_war posted:Man, I'm loving Venezuelanalysis' opening paragraph on this story: Ha! That's priceless! That sentence might as well read, "in a move that has been widely criticized by people who support Maduro and the PSUV". What does Maduro think about this?  fnox posted:Luis Almagro has now confirmed there will be an emergency session of the OAS to decide whether or not to apply the Democratic Charter to Maduro's government. It appears they do have the 18 votes to suspend Venezuela after all.
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May 31, 2016 20:11
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Chuck Boone posted:I can't wait to see how that vote turns out. Who's going to vote in against it? Bolivia, Nicaragua, maybe Ecuador, and assorted Caribbean islands that have very little affiliations with the US and are easily bought.
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May 31, 2016 21:25
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M. Discordia posted:Don't forget that homosexuals were sentenced to be literally worked to death in the sugar fields and the mentally ill were imprisoned for life until they were shoved onto a boat to the U.S. Cuba is a loving hellhole and the type of people who defend it are...exactly the type of people who would look at Venezuela in 2016 and think "ah yes, socialism is the way." Did socialism tup your mother and never call her back or something? What's going on here? It should be obvious to even the densest of observers that the Chavez regime is a pretty unique beast. The people that defend it are morons, nothing more and nothing less. It has little and less to do with democratic socialism which in fact works as intended, to greater and lesser extents, all over the world. I'd be curious to know what your personal politics are. And you should realize that by reflexively associating everything you don't like together you are pretty much doing the same thing as the idiots that reflixively associate everything they DO like and end up supporting the obvious steaming pile of poo poo that is the Chavez/Maduro regime.
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May 31, 2016 21:35
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I read a really great book on Chavez and recent Venezuelan history but I can't remember the name. It was written shortly after his death I believe. It had chapters on Chavez's crazy marathon television antics, he of the god-given hair, some semi-infamous American regime fangirl who moved to Venezuela, some technocrat with all these bizarre economic plans that made no sense, some chapters on the neighborhood gang situation, the colectivos, and tons of pure absurdity throughout. Probably that's not specific enough, but it was fantastic in the way that it captured the utterly bizarre, ungrounded, chaotic, and absurd nature of the regime and how that nature flowed down to effect every system large and small in the country. Although it was years ago the author pretty much saw a lot of this coming. This has been a long time in the making. And unfortunately it'll probably be even longer in the fixing, because there isn't a single thing that doesn't need to be overhauled.
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May 31, 2016 21:41
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Play posted:It has little and less to do with democratic socialism which in fact works as intended, to greater and lesser extents, all over the world. Unless your bar for success here is Gorbachev-era USSR, you probably mean social democracy.
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May 31, 2016 21:47
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Polidoro posted:I find the Mercosur thing hard to believe. Who's going to vote against them other than Paraguay obviously? Almagro is being called a traitor by people in government mainly by the super humble piece of poo poo Mujica. I've never read a bad thing about Mujica, what is your beef with him?
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May 31, 2016 21:55
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Play posted:I read a really great book on Chavez and recent Venezuelan history but I can't remember the name. It was written shortly after his death I believe. It had chapters on Chavez's crazy marathon television antics, he of the god-given hair, some semi-infamous American regime fangirl who moved to Venezuela, some technocrat with all these bizarre economic plans that made no sense, some chapters on the neighborhood gang situation, the colectivos, and tons of pure absurdity throughout. Rory Carroll's Comandante?
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May 31, 2016 21:56
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Our dear leader telling Almagro to roll up the democratic charter and stick it up his rear end https://twitter.com/AlbertoRT51/status/737737418648879104 There are no words.
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May 31, 2016 21:56
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Once I'm in Sweden I'm gonna make a series of videos on how Venezuela ended up like it is, in all aspects, for the purpose of showing outsiders exactly what went down in my time living here.
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May 31, 2016 21:56
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Anytime I see a pic or video of Maduro it makes me wanna puke, he's so loving fat and ugly and that stupid loving mustache, who the gently caress has a mustache in 2016? arghghghghg
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May 31, 2016 21:59
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Triglav posted:Unless your bar for success here is Gorbachev-era USSR, you probably mean social democracy. Gorby's USSR was still way better off than Maduro's Venezuela
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May 31, 2016 21:59
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My Imaginary GF posted:This is all very correct, and supported by the contemporary discussions going on within Cuba's major commercial stakeholders like United Fruit Co. and associated Cuban financial institutions.  Nice.
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May 31, 2016 22:32
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Maduro is going to sue Henry Ramos Allup, president of the National Assembly.
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May 31, 2016 23:49
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Play posted:Did socialism tup your mother and never call her back or something? What's going on here? It should be obvious to even the densest of observers that the Chavez regime is a pretty unique beast. The people that defend it are morons, nothing more and nothing less. It has little and less to do with democratic socialism which in fact works as intended, to greater and lesser extents, all over the world. Ah yes, no true No left winger here had a problem calling the country socialist 5-10 years ago here, in fact Venezuela was consistently pointed to in this forum as the textbook example of socialism working. The threads are easily accessible in the archives for those that doubt me. For some reason that's changed in the past couple years I wonder why. The other country pointed to is Cuba, which is likewise a hellhole. It's horseshoe theory in action really, for those on the extremes, [conservatism] [socialism] cannot fail, it can only be failed. And it doesn't matter how many times it's failed in the past, of course that time [blank] was wrong and they weren't reallllly true [conservatives] [socialists], this time will be different!
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May 31, 2016 23:51
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Play posted:Did socialism tup your mother and never call her back or something? What's going on here? It should be obvious to even the densest of observers that the Chavez regime is a pretty unique beast. The people that defend it are morons, nothing more and nothing less. It has little and less to do with democratic socialism which in fact works as intended, to greater and lesser extents, all over the world. I agree but I would point out Chavez used to have many, many fans here on the forums. There are a ton of morons out there.
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May 31, 2016 23:53
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TROIKA CURES GREEK posted:Ah yes, no true It is the Uganda of South America with a much less telegenic Idi Amin.
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Jun 1, 2016 00:01
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Somaen posted:I've never read a bad thing about Mujica, what is your beef with him? He was the worst president this side of 1985 by some distance.
I could keep going but this makes me mad as hell. The worst part is that I voted for him.
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Jun 1, 2016 00:27
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Triglav posted:Unless your bar for success here is Gorbachev-era USSR, you probably mean social democracy. Yes, thank you. What kind of idiot could mistake social democracy with democratic socialism??  TROIKA CURES GREEK posted:Ah yes, no true I am indeed referring to social democracy. Nearly every developed nature on earth practices it to one extent or another. I hail from California, and I would not hesitate whatsoever to call much of the work the CA legislature does socialism. To a lesser extent, the same is true of the federal government especially when in care of Democrats. When wealth is carefully redistributed to one or another extent, when social safety nets are created, when the market is reined in (responsibly) and businesses are regulated (again, responsibly), that is all socialism. Unions, social security, Obamacare, state pensions, labor laws, etc. etc. All in some part socialism. Taking care of the people, of the citizens. Disgusting corruption, criminal cartels, absurd market distortions, conspiracy theories, incompetence, confusion, mayhem. All while the people at the top fill their pockets and stuff their faces. To me it looks like garden-variety totalitarianism with a strange twist, a bizarre veneer of nationalist populism and faux-communism. Please understand I have no particular attachment to the term socialism and I don't give a tinker's fart if I'm labeled as one. But it's silly to lump this monstrosity in with the kind of market-supported people-oriented socialism that much of the world practices. In fact to me it seems that Chavez and his ilk are actual totalitarian communists trying to hide behind a seeming of democracy. quote:No left winger here had a problem calling the country socialist 5-10 years ago here, in fact Venezuela was consistently pointed to in this forum as the textbook example of socialism working. The threads are easily accessible in the archives for those that doubt me. For some reason that's changed in the past couple years I wonder why. The other country pointed to is Cuba, which is likewise a hellhole. I can't speak for what some people were saying but to me that's bizarre, because the signs of this impending collapse and the absurd incompetence of the chavistas has been clear for over a decade. quote:It's horseshoe theory in action really, for those on the extremes, [conservatism] [socialism] cannot fail, it can only be failed. And it doesn't matter how many times it's failed in the past, of course that time [blank] was wrong and they weren't reallllly true [conservatives] [socialists], this time will be different! Sounds about right. I have just as little patience for developing world left wing fetishism and idiotic anti-imperialist fervor as any sane person. That article someone posted from the guardian comparing sex tourism to first world communists was totally spot on and absolutely hilarious as well. beer_war posted:Rory Carroll's Comandante? Yes! That's amazing I can't believe you managed to name it from that shitpile of a description. Anyways that was a really great book, highly readable but somewhat rigorous, I would recommend it to anyone who is curious to find out more about how this situation came to be and the crazy monkeyman that was Hugo Chavez.
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Jun 1, 2016 00:40
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My Imaginary GF posted:It is the Uganda of South America with a much less telegenic Idi Amin. OOOOoooo someone's got a crush!!
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Jun 1, 2016 00:41
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I have to say I do like the firm defense of Batista in this thread whose economic numbers were nearly as phony and embezzlement much more brazen than Maduro's. Not to mention Batista's impeccable democratic credentials and soft touch policies on domestic dissent and opposition. He did enable US corporations to make a lot of money tough; and isn't that what really counts in the end? All that said he still didn't manage to preside over an economic and political clusterfuck of the scale that Maduro managed to generate over his relatively short time in office. To be more accurate: "Make much, much, much worse." A lot of the issues had already started spiraling out of control under the rule of heavenly Chavez, may flowers bloom where he treads. TROIKA CURES GREEK posted:It's pretty funny to watch people here try to defend the system by pointing to tiny, resource rich Scandinavian states as if they are socialist in any way instead of being countries with better than average social safety nets (again due to the enormous amount of natural wealth). Most people call it social democracy fyi, none of those states actually have the socialists in charge (thank god) Norway is the only Scandinavian country with significant oil and gas reserves. Sweden and Finland have essentially zero and their main national resources are a lot of trees. Denmark is kinda between those two and Norway. More right wing parties have only started ruling there in most Scandinavian countries recently and all the social safety nets you mentioned were put in place by social democratic parties; or are you like many of the hard left who don't count Social Democrats as Socialist? Even though the right wing parties are still significantly to the left of, say, US Republicans they still have eroded these social safety nets. But of course in these times of limited government revenues and record corporate profits making sure the ill and elderly are cared for is a frivolous luxury.
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Jun 1, 2016 00:43
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Maduro's gonna sue Ramos Allup for treason and usurping his functions, so now Ramos Allup is an usurper. He also said he's gonna put his trial on national broadcast on TV. Maduro is batshit insane at this point.
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Jun 1, 2016 00:45
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Play posted:I am indeed referring to social democracy. Nearly every developed nature on earth practices it to one extent or another. I hail from California, and I would not hesitate whatsoever to call much of the work the CA legislature does socialism. To a lesser extent, the same is true of the federal government especially when in care of Democrats. When wealth is carefully redistributed to one or another extent, when social safety nets are created, when the market is reined in (responsibly) and businesses are regulated (again, responsibly), that is all socialism. Unions, social security, Obamacare, state pensions, labor laws, etc. etc. All in some part socialism. Taking care of the people, of the citizens.
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Jun 1, 2016 00:49
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El Hefe posted:Maduro's gonna sue Ramos Allup for treason and usurping his functions, so now Ramos Allup is an usurper. why doesn't he just declare himself dictator for life already. also how bad will this get?
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Jun 1, 2016 00:50
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I do like how the Marxist Leninist framework of thought and vocabulary has been so eagerly taken up by their opposition. I supposed it is generally easier to fight the battles of 50 years ago. Then again many internet leftists haven't moved on either. I don't think anyone in this thread (other than Borneo Jimmy) is wanking off to the thought of establishing a vanguard party. Dapper_Swindler posted:why doesn't he just declare himself dictator for life already. also how bad will this get? Why do that when he can continue doing whatever he likes in his current position anyway? The only thing he can't do at this point is try to rein in the embezzlement and abuse of power by members of his clique as that would get him either killed or couped.
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Jun 1, 2016 01:03
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themrguy posted:How strong is the sense of "Venezuelan" national identity as opposed to regional identity? Is there any possibility of the country fracturing? Not really no. It's a pretty ethnically homogenous country, geographically too with it being split in half between the lowlands and the Amazon, but very few people live in the Amazon
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Jun 1, 2016 01:10
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Cicero posted:Yes, almost every country has a mix of private/capitalist and public/socialist sectors. But when people say "socialist state" that's not what they mean; they mean countries where the economy is completely (or close to completely) run by the state. Now, Venezuela wasn't quite there yet, but that's clearly what Chavez/Maduro have been moving the country towards, they admit as much with their talk of a "socialist revolution" and constant tirades against corporations. You don't see the same kind of thing out of Denmark or Sweden. Yes, "socialist state." But "socialism"? It's a much more grey area. I mean according to right wingers Barack Obama is a socialist. And in some ways he is. It seems like the difference hinges on the extent of economic control. Socialism as practiced by most nations is a balance (and in some ways a war) between free markets and responsible governance. Venezuela has smothered its economy with pretty much EVERY SINGLE stupid idea in the book (and a lot that weren't in the book). They attempted a command economy with the verbiage of the old-guard communists, the underpinnings of a standard market economy, the careless random style of a daytime talk show and the incompetent input of some truly stupid people. It really is a bizarre thing.
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Jun 1, 2016 01:15
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El Hefe posted:Anytime I see a pic or video of Maduro it makes me wanna puke, he's so loving fat and ugly and that stupid loving mustache, who the gently caress has a mustache in 2016? arghghghghg Listen buddy don't make me side with the guy who is cosplaying as a gardener. Mustaches are majestic and beautiful.
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Jun 1, 2016 01:16
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drilldo squirt posted:Listen buddy don't make me side with the guy who is cosplaying as a gardener. Mustaches are majestic and beautiful. Very few people can actually pull off a mustache though Maduro just looks like a pedophile
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Jun 1, 2016 01:19
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Venezuela's not really socialist they just have a hosed up system of price controls and currency exchange. Chavez did dabble in nationalization and promoting workers communes and things like htat but in my understanding that was more of a side project than the central aim of his politics
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Jun 1, 2016 01:21
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Play posted:They attempted a command economy with the verbiage of the old-guard communists, the underpinnings of a standard market economy, the careless random style of a daytime talk show and the incompetent input of some truly stupid people. It really is a bizarre thing. Are you saying Chavez watched that footage of Oprah giving everyone in her audience a car in 2004 and thought, "I should run my government like that!"?
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Jun 1, 2016 01:21
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Dapper_Swindler posted:why doesn't he just declare himself dictator for life already. also how bad will this get? I can't predict the future but I see a few general possibilities. The most benign would be a successful recall where Maduro puts up a fight but continues to lose support even among his allies and is ousted. Someone takes his place who probably isn't that much better. Alternatively, the army may put a stop to things and then do whatever they gently caress they want, from shepherding through a legitimate election to seizing power through a general or cabal. Of course complete civil breakdown is always a possibility. It seems like the security forces must already be strained, it's probably an enormous industry on its own right now and probably one of the main sources of legitimate money value. In that case you'd see people fleeing the country in significant numbers. I don't feel like anyone else is prepared to step in and do anything but who knows depending on how bad things get foreign intervention remains a possibility. If I had to guess I'd say it's going to get much worse before it gets better, but it won't get as bad as some of the scenarios above. Regime change will occur one way or another. The truly hard thing will be building a functional economy and civil society after all this. To me that looks pretty much impossible, as least in the space of a decade or so.
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Jun 1, 2016 01:24
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icantfindaname posted:Venezuela's not really socialist they just have a hosed up system of price controls and currency exchange. Chavez did dabble in nationalization and promoting workers communes and things like htat but in my understanding that was more of a side project than the central aim of his politics No it was definitely the aim of his politics, he took over the biggest companies in the country with only very few exceptions.
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Jun 1, 2016 01:25
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lothar_ posted:Are you saying Chavez watched that footage of Oprah giving everyone in her audience a car in 2004 and thought, "I should run my government like that!"? Have you seen his TV show?? The man appeared on tv for hours every day. And yes it was like a bizarre Oprah from another dimension where Oprah is a swarthy little communist high on his own moronic thoughts. He'd go around giving things away to people, pronouncing laws and sentences and engaging in bizarre monologues and facilitating propaganda. I wish I was kidding.
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Jun 1, 2016 01:27
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Play posted:Have you seen his TV show?? The man appeared on tv for hours every day. And yes it was like a bizarre Oprah from another dimension where Oprah is a swarthy little communist high on his own moronic thoughts. He'd go around giving things away to people, pronouncing laws and sentences and engaging in bizarre monologues and facilitating propaganda. He'd also tell tales, jokes, sing, dance, give "history" lessons, insult whoever he didn't like at the time (usually "El Imperio"), etc. Quite a multi-faceted man...
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Jun 1, 2016 01:32
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El Hefe posted:Maduro's gonna sue Ramos Allup for treason and usurping his functions, so now Ramos Allup is an usurper. How do you file a (civil) lawsuit for treason?  Because Maduro is corrupt/a moron, I know, but still...
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Jun 1, 2016 01:44
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Never caught his show. I heard a lot about it when I was in grad school since the research symposium I went to was pretty Venezuela-centric in the papers that got presented. At first the papers themselves were never really pro- or anti-Chavez (more focused on everyday Venezuelian religion and society anyway), but there was an undercurrent of wariness about the lack of separation of powers whenever Chavez himself came up. Then as the situation deteriorated, the focus shifted to exploring state socialism from a sociological lens, although more papers were presented on Cuba and East Germany by that point. A true believer in socialismo would've been out of place at that workshop; no hostility, just kind of an eyebrow-raising curiosity.
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Jun 1, 2016 01:48
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El Hefe posted:He'd also tell tales, jokes, sing, dance, give "history" lessons, insult whoever he didn't like at the time (usually "El Imperio"), etc. Quite a multi-faceted man... You can't make this poo poo up. Seriously. I like to think there's some alternate dimension where Chavez is a mildly successful daytime talk show host, Maduro is a bitter and depressed bus driver contemplating suicide, and Venezuela has always been in the hands of democratically elected, competent, and caring technocratic legislators who reinvested oil revenues and sparked a vibrant national economy making Venezuela the local success story and a model for its neighbors. Instead those narcissistic fuckers (not just those two, the whole cabal) who had no clue what they were doing decided they were smart and amazing enough to run a country and then once they were in they really liked the taste of all that power and attention. And here we are, children getting chemical burns from their shower, middle class families scrounging in dumpsters, market distortions that would really be something if they weren't so awful and depressing, and what appears to be an imminent breakdown in the system, economic, social, environmental, etc. b Play fucked around with this message at 01:51 on Jun 1, 2016 |
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Jun 1, 2016 01:48
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Play posted:Have you seen his TV show?? The man appeared on tv for hours every day. And yes it was like a bizarre Oprah from another dimension where Oprah is a swarthy little communist high on his own moronic thoughts. He'd go around giving things away to people, pronouncing laws and sentences and engaging in bizarre monologues and facilitating propaganda. I wish the government was still funny/terrible instead of just terrible. Maduro is as if you had the Oprah show then replaced Oprah with loving Jeff Dunham.
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Jun 1, 2016 01:49
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You could replace Maduro and his government with the cast of a soap opera, and it would look exactly the same while actually working as a proper government.
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Jun 1, 2016 01:56
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