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Discendo Vox posted:What is the power network actually like in Venezuela that you get a nation-scale blackout? That's downright impressive. That is not very surprising in the grand scheme of things. The 2003 Northeast blackout at its peak affected 55 million people across the US and Canada - and for that matter the 1999 major blackout in Brazil affected 95 million people at its peak, including nearly all of Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. Venezuela is a rather smaller power zone than either of those. If you have serious substation issues in the wrong place - which seems to have happened in both of those huge outages as well as the current Venezuela outage - you will have to spend a lot of time carefully restarting power production and tying the grid back together. Venezuela has a much worse likelihood of vital services having workable backup power supplies at this time though.
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Mar 8, 2019 05:50
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Pharohman777 posted:So diplomatic niceties done quickly are proof of being a puppet? Well, when Maduro leaves power and a US-acceptable government replaces Venezuela’s current government. Let’s be honest, if there were new elections and Maduro won the US would keep sanctions going. the pro-US-coup folks would twist themselves into pretzels explaining how Venezuelans in Venezuela can’t be trusted to vote in their own interest.
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Mar 8, 2019 06:24
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Discendo Vox posted:What is the power network actually like in Venezuela that you get a nation-scale blackout? That's downright impressive. Man, if the hospitals still had any stockpiles of refrigerated meds this would be a big problem.
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Mar 8, 2019 06:30
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Edit: old news
The Kingfish fucked around with this message at 07:07 on Mar 8, 2019 |
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Mar 8, 2019 07:01
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zapplez posted:Man, if the hospitals still had any stockpiles of refrigerated meds this would be a big problem. I meant food generally. Which, yeah, I know, shortages. This ain't gonna help. Discendo Vox fucked around with this message at 07:16 on Mar 8, 2019 |
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Mar 8, 2019 07:08
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Pharohman777 posted:So diplomatic niceties done quickly are proof of being a puppet? yes, coordination on that level with the trump administration is proof of such. if guaido wasn't joined at the hip with the trump administration i'd be less likely to call him a US puppet quote:And aren't the sanctions gonna be lifted when Maduro's government leaves power? Maduro and his cronies deciding to shoot protesters a few years back and then start putting up Venezuelan resources up as loan collateral are what triggered the various sanctions. And the national assembly did not like those loans Maduro was taking out one bit, and started writing letters to banks and such. And this was in the middle of maduro neutering the national assembly via the courts. yes i assume the US will stop starving the people of venezuela after they have their intended effect of regime change and having their puppet installed. not sure why you think the US starving the people of venezuela's a good thing, but you do you
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Mar 8, 2019 09:56
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Still odd certain posters are content to pass over years of food shortages caused by the current rulers. It's like glossing over all the violent deaths caused by the current regime crushing protests and pointing at a single incident to paint the opposition as the cause of violence, a standard finger-pointing tactic seen in this thread. This is something normally seen in use by defenders of Israel's regime - overwhelming use of violence is justified by blaming the Palestinian women and children peacefully protesting.
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Mar 8, 2019 10:08
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Rust Martialis posted:Still odd certain posters are content to pass over years of food shortages caused by the current rulers. It's like glossing over all the violent deaths caused by the current regime crushing protests and pointing at a single incident to paint the opposition as the cause of violence, a standard finger-pointing tactic seen in this thread. comparing the US to palestinian women and children peacefully protesting is quite a take i gotta say and the distinction here is "caused by" vs "inflicted upon". the US is very very intentionally starving venezuelans with the sanctions. they just got done discussing yesterday how much further they should push cause they'd like venezuelans to be starving, but not too starving to revolt against the venezuelan government. i'm not sure why you continually try to pretend that guaido allying with a government very intentionally starving his people is a good thing, but it's not
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Mar 8, 2019 10:12
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Condiv posted:yes, coordination on that level with the trump administration is proof of such. if guaido wasn't joined at the hip with the trump administration i'd be less likely to call him a US puppet Yes I think we should get very angry at the USA for possibly increasing the starving of these people for maybe a few weeks when their current president has been starving them well for the past few YEARS. But do we even believe people are starving? A few pages ago we had people retweeting blumenthal and friends in a supermarket filming a propaganda video of aisles full of condiments.
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Mar 8, 2019 10:33
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zapplez posted:Yes I think we should get very angry at the USA for possibly increasing the starving of these people for maybe a few weeks when their current president has been starving them well for the past few YEARS. Yes, you’ve been very clear you think people are starving, and despite the US making it clear that said starvation is their goal for the purposes of regime change you seem hell bent on minimizing their role in it to nothing Probably, as I’ve said before, cause you like guaido and want him to be president and want to ignore the slimy government who patronizes him and with which he’s tied at the hip
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Mar 8, 2019 10:50
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Condiv posted:Yes, you’ve been very clear you think people are starving You, on the other hand, do not?
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Mar 8, 2019 11:13
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When every indicator from international aid organisations is that Venezuela is experiencing a food crisis equivalent to (or very possibly worse than) Yemen's, it seems a little bizarre to suggest that everything's fine and dandy. Blaming it on sanctions also seems strange when any look at the numbers will show a steady and rapid upward trend in food insecurity since 2013 - the country had already hit Yemen numbers (40%) by 2014, and the only reason we don't have conclusive proof that the situation is vastly worse now (merely very strong indicators) is because the government refuses to let aid organisations in to assess the severity of the problem. Like, seriously, can we just step back and appreciate that a peacetime government managed to replicate the effects of an invasion by the loving Saudis on their own country? Darth Walrus fucked around with this message at 11:27 on Mar 8, 2019 |
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Mar 8, 2019 11:22
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Discendo Vox posted:What is the power network actually like in Venezuela that you get a nation-scale blackout? That's downright impressive. Cascade events are a thing. Remember back in 2003 when the entire North east lost power for days? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_blackout_of_2003 brugroffil fucked around with this message at 11:33 on Mar 8, 2019 |
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Mar 8, 2019 11:31
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Darth Walrus posted:Like, seriously, can we just step back and appreciate that a peacetime government managed to replicate the effects of an invasion by the loving Saudis on their own country? turns out, however, that chilling effects from various sanctions over the years is not helping things. and now that there's an active coup going on, usa started what is basically siege warfare. which is an international war crime. apparently it's only bad when syria does it these days tho? i really really hope venezuelans find a better trade partner for before they all die, because changing the bad food situation to far worse appears to be the US policy there now. "Failing a military outcome, sieges can often be decided by starvation, thirst, or disease, which can afflict either the attacker or defender." literally what is happening rn
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Mar 8, 2019 11:46
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Truga posted:
Sarajevo was a *siege*. Aleppo was a *siege*. Neither Caracas nor Venezuela generally is under siege. There isn't even a naval or land blockade in place. Could we maybe deal with statements vaguely related to the actual situation on the ground?
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Mar 8, 2019 12:36
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Ah, yes, economic warfare doesn't exist any more, I forgot.
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Mar 8, 2019 12:53
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Truga posted:Ah, yes, economic warfare doesn't exist any more, I forgot. You can't forget something you never understood in the first place. You started out saying the US had put Venezuela under siege, and how that was a war crime. They haven't put Venezuela under siege in any way relevant to international law, including the laws of war. You're just being dramatic.
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Mar 8, 2019 13:13
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Rust Martialis posted:You, on the other hand, do not? Did you miss me saying the US is starving the people of venezuela?
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Mar 8, 2019 13:23
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Condiv posted:Did you miss me saying the US is starving the people of venezuela? The point that should be obvious to anyone familiar with Venezuela, is that they're already starving, courtesy of Maduro, even without US sanctions. You did know that, right?
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Mar 8, 2019 13:27
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Rust Martialis posted:The point that should be obvious to anyone familiar with Venezuela, is that they're already starving, courtesy of Maduro, even without US sanctions. You did know that, right? My point is that the US sanctions are intentionally worsening that and making recovering from food shortages impossible, all in order to get their puppet in power Maduro being a fuckup doesn’t excuse the US intentionally starving people, no matter how many times you say “but maduro hosed up”, and the US intervention in venezuela should end immediately (also, the US should provide food aid via the UN and Red Cross and accept venezuelan refugees) Likewise if guaido wants to claim he’ll be better for venezuela than maduro, he needs to start by cutting all ties with a blood thirsty nation which has put known butchers and warmongers in charge of the venezuelan regime change effort Condiv fucked around with this message at 13:41 on Mar 8, 2019 |
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Mar 8, 2019 13:36
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Rust Martialis posted:The point that should be obvious to anyone familiar with Venezuela, is that they're already starving, courtesy of Maduro, even without US sanctions. You did know that, right? It's not a binary. If folks are starving it's still immoral to perpetuate and remove any possibility of relief from that suffering barring regime change through economic sanctions.
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Mar 8, 2019 13:37
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Rust Martialis posted:You're just being dramatic.
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Mar 8, 2019 13:44
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Truga posted:Yes, it's called a metaphor, I'm glad you understand. Ah yes, the US is committing *metaphorical* international war crimes, no doubt to be tried in the International Simile Court (Hyperbole Section). Look, you made a crazy statement about how this mythical US siege is a war crime, you were corrected, suck it up and move on.
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Mar 8, 2019 14:20
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The blackout is still affecting most of the country. This is unprecedented. VP Delcy Rodriguez announced recently that Maduro has ordered all school and work cancelled for the day. I remember hearing from an electrical engineer during the 2003 North American blackout that restoring power would be extremely difficult because once you have a massive power failure involving multiple stations it's not just a matter of flipping a switch to get them back online; it's a really complex process that has to be done with time and in order. I'm grossly simplifying it, of course, and this person was surprised that the blackout only lasted a few hours.
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Mar 8, 2019 14:21
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CYBEReris posted:It's not a binary. If folks are starving it's still immoral to perpetuate and remove any possibility of relief from that suffering barring regime change through economic sanctions. I'm curious if the OP agrees that the food crisis predates the recent sanctions or not; they've avoided replying clearly.
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Mar 8, 2019 14:24
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Whoops, quoted by accident. Anatoly with this: https://twitter.com/AKurmanaev/status/1103989178965127169 EDIT: Rust Martialis posted:I'm curious if the OP agrees that the food crisis predates the recent sanctions or not; they've avoided replying clearly. Yes, definitely. I remember food shortages going back to ~2006-2008, but Caracas was largely spared from this. I remember that around that time I went back to Venezuela on my birthday. This might have been 2006. My grandmother was really happy that I was there, and growing up we always baked cookies and cakes on special occassions and it was the best thing ever. We went out to buy stuff for the cake, and we couldn't find eggs or milk anywhere. I remember clearly that I took a picture of empty shelves in the supermarket, and that the manager saw me, came up to me and said "Al que sace fotos le saco el ojo" (If you take a picture I'll take your eye out). The 2014 anti-government protest wave, which lasted months and left about two dozen people dead, began partially due to food shortages (as well as inflation and insecurity). The food shortages are absolutely not new. Chuck Boone fucked around with this message at 14:32 on Mar 8, 2019 |
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Mar 8, 2019 14:27
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Rust Martialis posted:Look, you made a crazy statement about how this mythical US siege is a war crime, you were corrected, suck it up and move on. Don't need to do blockade, if there's nothing to block, and economic warfare still exists.
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Mar 8, 2019 14:29
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Truga posted:Nah, I still stand by my statement, it's absolutely a siege situation. Without foreign currency, venezuela can't buy food. Without access to trade with EU and USA, they currently don't have any way of getting that currency, even if they wanted to. Exactly what EU sanctions are blocking access to trade?
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Mar 8, 2019 14:40
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You mean besides stealing all their cash and holding it until guaido can collect? e: https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2019-03-07/eu-could-impose-more-sanctions-against-venezuelas-maduro-germanys-maas new ones on the horizon too. "The European Union will be able to monitor and respond to further developments," Heiko Maas told ZDF broadcaster. "We already discussed at the last meeting of foreign ministers that the time can come when further sanctions from the European Union will come against the Maduro regime in Venezuela." Truga fucked around with this message at 14:45 on Mar 8, 2019 |
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Mar 8, 2019 14:42
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Chuck Boone posted:The blackout is still affecting most of the country. This is unprecedented. Sorry, can you clarify this? I can intuit that this is a suspension of activities related to the blackout, and I suspect that it's due to claims of sabatoge, but I don't want to make assumptions.
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Mar 8, 2019 14:43
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Keeshhound posted:Sorry, can you clarify this? I can intuit that this is a suspension of activities related to the blackout, and I suspect that it's due to claims of sabatoge, but I don't want to make assumptions. Yes. The government is still claiming that this is sabotage (it almost always claims that it was sabotage). Because the blackout is still going on, Maduro has ordered all schools and "actividades laborales" (literally, "labour activities", i.e., work) cancelled for today.
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Mar 8, 2019 14:46
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A prolonged power outage would be debilitating. It is depressing to think about. Sporadic blackouts were bad enough. https://twitter.com/StePozzebon/status/1103990557012099075 https://twitter.com/marianaatencio/status/1104014843756118018
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Mar 8, 2019 14:48
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Truga posted:You mean besides stealing all their cash and holding it until guaido can collect? Well, you *just* said "without access to trade with EU and USA, they currently don't have any way of getting that currency, even if they wanted to". So yes, and pardon me for using your own words, exactly *what* is preventing "access to trade with the EU"? Your article you linked talks about "further sanctions", not "current sanctions", you might notice. Are there currently EU sanctions blocking access to trade? Is that your position?
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Mar 8, 2019 14:59
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Worthwhile read for the state of play with Russia -- they're owed billions by Maduro, and could lose a shitload more if Maduro's dictatorship is toppled. Looks like that support for the dunce has cracked a bit: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/08/world/americas/russia-venezuela-maduro-putin.html quote:Russian diplomats have reopened channels with Venezuela’s opposition after a brief halt following Mr. Guaidó’s proclamation, according to opposition leaders and people close to the Russian Foreign Ministry. It is worth noting that all of the bullshit, copy-and-pasted propaganda posted in here (US financing a coup, wants to steal their oil, wants to intervene with the military) is almost literally what Russia is doing. -They've given Maduro weapons, on credit. Weapons that were used to transition the country into a dictatorship. -Russia "buys" their oil for just about nothing, and the head of Rosneft is Putin's "point man" on Venezuela. -They've "lended" billions to Maduro to prop up his government. -They've effectively created a client state that has failed so badly it is reliant upon them, at the expense of the Venezuelan people and democracy. A little hegemony, with a side of death, misery, and repression. Private Witt fucked around with this message at 15:15 on Mar 8, 2019 |
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Mar 8, 2019 15:12
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Rust Martialis posted:Well, you *just* said "without access to trade with EU and USA, they currently don't have any way of getting that currency, even if they wanted to". So yes, and pardon me for using your own words, exactly *what* is preventing "access to trade with the EU"? Your article you linked talks about "further sanctions", not "current sanctions", you might notice. Are there currently EU sanctions blocking access to trade? Is that your position? Well, the US did warn foreign financial institutions about doing business with the Maduro regime a couple of days ago. From what I've read, Venezuela's looking at Asia to find a way around the PDVSA sanctions, but that last warning seems like a pretty clear cut "Stop financing these guys if you don't want to get into trouble". On the topic of the blackout. Much like with food, Venezuela has been dealing with 'shortages' for years now. Chavez declared an 'electric emergency' back in 2010 when there was another countrywide blackout. Apparently, the country's invested over 36 billion into its electrical system since 2002, but the entire process has been mired in scandal, such as that of the Derwick bolichicos who got awarded a 2.5 billion contract to deliver some generators the same year Chavez decreed that emergency. The guys who ran that company had no experience, bought some equipment they passed on to the Venezuelan electric company and it's been collecting dust ever since. That's par for the course for any money the government spent on Venezuelan infrastructure – they awarded grossly inflated contracts to friends and family, nothing ever got built, and things continued to decay. To sum it up, the problem is that despite all the money the Maduro and Chavez governments have allegedly spent on electrical infrastructure and maintenance, anyone who's lived in Venezuela can tell you the service's been decaying at a rapid pace for years. Back when I left, I already considered myself lucky because blackouts weren't that common in my area, but I had friends that dealt with them every day and there were already areas where electricity was being de facto rationed. Plus, I'd bet money there are hardly any talented engineers left working at the national electric companies.
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Mar 8, 2019 15:22
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Private Witt posted:Worthwhile read for the state of play with Russia -- they're owed billions by Maduro, and could lose a shitload more if Maduro's dictatorship is toppled. Looks like that support for the dunce has cracked a bit: Yeah, but, America.
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Mar 8, 2019 15:41
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America is worse than Russia, true.
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Mar 8, 2019 15:53
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GreyjoyBastard posted:the new ones are gonna really fuckin' suck because they're hitting the fundamental ability to sell oil through the PDVSA, which means that insofar as the government / government-controlled hilariously corrupt currency exchange were able to import food already, it's gonna get a lot tighter Yeah, but that argument pretty much boils down to "countries have a moral obligation to buy Venezuelalen oil because their economy was built wrong as a joke." Like, pretend that instead of sanctions, a loving act of God causes a massive change in global politics, we all start shifting to green energy and the market price of oil just completely bottoms out. Are countries then obligated to keep buying oil that they won't use at old prices just because the Venuzuelan economy has only one export and can't handle the shift?
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Mar 8, 2019 16:04
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Keeshhound posted:Yeah, but that argument pretty much boils down to "countries have a moral obligation to buy Venezuelalen oil because their economy was built wrong as a joke." tbf multiple folks in this thread have posted about how if we respond appropriately to climate change, Venezuela is doomed regardless of who runs it  but as long as VZ oil is competitive enough to sell, sanctions that make it unsellable are nation-crippling which is the greater part of why the new sanctions are in fact nastier
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Mar 8, 2019 16:10
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Phoneposting from Valencia. City is still in the dark. Managed to charge up my phone a bit with the only outlet connected to the Elevator's Emergency Generator in my Apartment's Building, but it's running low on diesel. I've been hearing rumors from other residents that protests are going strong in Caracas and that this blackout might take three days to be solved.
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Mar 8, 2019 16:12
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