The Tragedy of Venezuela

Chavez strode the world inspiration to all of us fighting back against austerity and neoliberal economics in Europe showed us there is a different and a better way of doing things it's called socialism it's called social justice and it's something that Venezuela has made a big step toward in this video I will be discussing events that took place in Venezuela in 2017 Venezuela is currently run by the United Socialist Party of Venezuela which was formed in March 2007 under then President Hugo Chavez who had been in office since April 2002 Chavez was succeeded by Nicolas Maduro and he has been ruling the country ever since the events of 2017 in Venezuela have been an absolute catastrophe for the citizens of Venezuela and what we are looking at is the socialist destruction of a democracy in real time in January 2017 Human Rights Watch put out a report about the events of Venezuela in 2016 they say under the leadership of President Hugo Chavez and now president Nicolas Maduro the accumulation of power in the executive branch an erosion of Human Rights guarantees have enabled the government to intimidate persecute and even criminally prosecute its critics severe shortages of medicines medical supplies and food have intensified since 2014 and weak government responses have undermined Venezuelans rights to food and health protesters have been arbitrarily detained and subject to abuse by security forces police and military raids in low-income and immigrant communities have led to widespread allegations of abuse other persistent concerns include poor prison conditions impunity for human rights violations and continuous harassment by government officials of human rights defenders and independent media outlets the report goes on to detail the increasing centralization of governmental power in the hands of the executive and the human rights violations that have been taking place the humanitarian crisis the lack of political freedoms and the increasing march of socialism in the country under the socialist government all of these things are deep concerning and this is the status of Venezuela at the end of 2016 on January the first CBS News reported that Venezuelan food shortages had become an opportunity for the Venezuelan military to make money by trafficking food with a retired general saying that trafficking food is a better business than drugs by January the 9th hyperinflation was gripping the country and the Venezuelan government hiked the minimum wage by 50% to try and compensate by January the 16th the Venezuelan government was issuing new banknotes to help people cope with the rampant hyperinflation with the new notes ranging from 500 to 20,000 bolivars with the 20,000 Bolivar note being worth about $5 60 on the black market and naturally there was a shortage of these two which incidentally made everyone in Venezuela a millionaire overnight unfortunately for the Venezuelan millionaires their money had very little purchasing power and there was very little for them to purchase as Chris Sabatini a professor at Columbia University's School of International and public affairs said it's like the government has given up they are just adding zeros to the end of these bills and they don't mean anything naturally this all had a knock-on effect for the rest of the country for example an ABC News reporter was kicked out of the country for trying to look into Venezuela's public health care system which he described as crumbling the hospital source kept repeating there are almost zero antibiotics no surgical gowns no internal Sutras no gauze no hypertension meds no chemotherapy hospitals don't have bed sheets food or water there's no soap there's no air conditioning in short he said performing surgery is like practicing battlefield medicine in February the US government accused the Venezuelan vice president of having a role in the global drug trafficking business this caused the Trump administration to impose sanctions on Venezuela is Vice President accusing him of playing a major role in the international drug trafficking trade using regulations that were passed under the Clinton administration that allowed the u.s. to go after the assets of anyone designated a drug kingpin the Venezuelan vice president hit back at these allegations by claiming that they were imperialist aggression denying the allegations and saying that we shall not be distracted by these miserable provocations two days later the Venezuelan government shut down the spanish-language CNN station under allegations of distorting the truth according to Fortune magazine the network had worked the socialist government with various reports including one alleging passports and visas were being sold illegally at Venezuela's Embassy in Iraq Maduro had told CNN to get out of Venezuela after accusing it of manipulating comments by a girl who told him on live TV that some school students were fainting from hunger he said they defame and distort the truth inciting aggression against the sovereignty of Venezuela and its institutions by the 23rd of February it was revealed that Venezuelans had lost an average of 19 pounds in weight due to nationwide food shortages a third of the nation's citizens were eating two or fewer meals per day as soaring inflation had created food shortages the food crisis in Venezuela continued into March and on March the 17th four bakers were arrested over illegal brownies in Venezuela's bread war the president had sent inspectors and soldiers into more than 700 bakeries around the capital Caracas that week to enforce a rule that 90% of wheat must be destined to loaves rather than the more expensive pastries and cakes the government accused pro-opposition businesses of sabotaging the nation's economy by hoarding products and hiking prices the bread makers themselves blamed the government for the national shortage of wheat saying that 80% of establishments had none left in stock by the 30th of March the Venezuelan opposition alleged a coup as the supreme court seized power with the Guardian reporting that president Nicolas Maduro is the national assembly said the Assembly's leader after the court ruled it can assume congressional duties The Guardian reported this as Venezuela lurching further away from democracy and the United States condemned what it described as they moved to usurp the powers of the National Assembly the next day The Guardian reported that Venezuela's most senior prosecutor had condemned the courts move to strip Congress of its power describing it as a power grab in favor of the Maduro government the power grab was widely condemned across Latin America with the Organization of American States likening it to a self-inflicted coup by the socialist president maduro's regime against the opposition controlled Congress and this was described by one congressman as marking a point of no return on the road to dictatorship Venezuela's foreign ministry denied these allegations saying that there had been no coup d'etat in Venezuela and alleging that it was a regional right-wing conspiracy the descent into dictatorship was halted temporarily however as Venezuela's Supreme Court reversed the ruling as bloomberg reports the courts reversal came as small demonstrations flared across the capital for a second day amid calls for opposition leaders for more protests saying here there was a coup d'etat and the streets must not go silent given this action that cannot be erased by the stroke of a pen by the 5th of April it was revealed that 82% of people in Venezuela live in poverty and The Guardian reports that this is because the state-controlled economy has imploded leading to shortages in food and medicines with Venezuelans turning to scavenge for food from bins meanwhile protests and political dissent has been met with repression and arbitrary arrests the National Guard had tried to arrest an opposition legislator who they said no longer had parliamentary immunity the head of the opposition party was arrested for high treason and opposition legislators were assaulted by government supporters while the police stood by and did nothing this caused 10 days of unrest that came to a head in a massive protest according to The Huffington Post tens of thousands of people took to the streets to demand the departure of the country's unpopular President Nicolas Maduro rallies went out in cities across the country the largest of them in the capital protesters chanted Liberty Liberty and carried signs saying dictator Maduro and elections now on the 20th of april the Venezuelan government seized a General Motors Factory causing it to be shut down and losing almost 3,000 jobs General Motors said that the facility was unexpectedly taken by authorities preventing normal operations and other assets such as vehicles had been stripped from the site the company said it strongly rejects the arbitrary measures taken by the authorities and will vigorously take all legal actions within and outside of Venezuela to defend its rights GM announced the immediate secession of operations in the country had accused local officials of causing irreparable damage to the company the protests continued at the end of April with tens of thousands of people marching protesting and rioting in what has been called the mother of all marches this led to rioting in which 12 people died according to the New York Times at least a dozen people were killed as the streets of Caracas Venezuela erupted into a night of riots looting and clashes between government opponents in the National Guard late Thursday and early Friday with anger from two days of pro-democracy demonstrations spilling here two unrest in working class and poor neighborhoods the rioters had moved through local neighborhoods destroying supermarkets liquor stores and other businesses but not for the bakery because that was one of the few places that could still supply the neighborhood with bread on the 2nd of May the Venezuelan government planned to rewrite the Venezuelan Constitution a move that was branded as a coup by its former regional allies Argentina's foreign minister said that the move would pour petrol onto the fire of unrest and Brazil's top diplomat described the proposal for a Constituent Assembly as a coup d'etat it is another break with democracy violating the country's constitution and the foreign minister also condemned maduro's escalation of authoritarianism on the 7th of May Forbes magazine publish apiece describing how the rapaciousness of the Venezuelan government had ruined its oil industry Forbes attributed the decline in Venezuelan oil production to two primary causes the first is the removal of expertise required to develop the country's heavy oil which started when Chavez pact the oil industry with loyal supporters and the second was the Chavez government failing to appreciate the level of capital expenditures required to continue developing the country's oil in no small part due to the inexperience among the Chavez loyalists who are running the industry protests in Venezuela continued and became increasingly more violent as the government became increasingly more repressive protests part of daily demonstrations in Venezuela which often degenerate into clashes with police as the country teeters on the brink of collapse on May the 10th CNN reported that amid the chaos in Venezuela infant deaths and malaria cases are skyrocketing due to a severe lack of medical shortages and lack of food Venezuelans say that they must treat themselves at public hospitals if you need to have an operation nowadays you must bring your own medicines to the hospital said a 59 year old housewife who is protesting against the government there are no supplies to attend the most basic emergencies according to statistics released by the Venezuelan pharmaceutical Federation by June 2016 the country was already facing a shortage of more than 80 percent of the medicine that doctors needed on the 21st of May 2017 the independent published a piece describing how Venezuela went from the richest economy in South America to the brink of financial ruin this analysis lays the concern of the feet of the authoritarian policies of the socialist government and how they have been eroding the democratic institutions of Venezuela to the point where the government is too authoritarian to coexist with democratic institutions but too weak to abolish them without risking collapse the protests continue to increase in size with 200,000 people marching against Maduro the riots and looting spread across the country this marked the 50th day of protests against the Venezuelan government and naturally this led the Venezuelan government to becoming increasingly authoritarian increasing internet censorship and surveillance during the crisis while all of this was occurring the Venezuelan government was focusing on their number-one priority which was paying its debts the country's ability to keep making payments on his debt may be in doubt but its willingness is strong said Diego Moya on campus the senior analyst at IHS markets the government is cutting imports of food and basic goods at the expense of social unrest to pay its debt the reason that the Venezuelan government is using its citizens money in order to cover its debts is because a default would lead to Venezuela being closed out of international markets causing the problem to spiral even further out of control the Venezuelan government simply has no choice Venezuela requires access to international markets through which it can sell its oil if the Venezuelan government can't sell its oil it will not be solvent and this will cause an even worse collapse than is already happening on the 20th of June Venezuela is poised for new violence after security forces fatally shot a 17 year old protester video footage showed a National Guard member drawing a pistol and shooting into the crowd a relative of the man who was shot said the impunity is too great the government does what it pleases I just want this to end on June the 24th the Washington Post reported that Venezuelan political prisoners are being abused so badly that they were forced to eat pasta mixed with excrement among other Horrors many of the people featured in the report are students who were arrested in anti-government protests and then abused by the prison guards because of their opposition to the Maduro regime On June the 28th a Venezuelan citizen decided to take to the skies in a helicopter and attack the Supreme Court with grenades Maduro said that these were terrorists and had lobbed two grenades that fail to detonate but some reports put the number of grenades higher local media suggested a former intelligence officer had carried out the attack but nothing was confirmed and there were rumors of this being a false flag attack by the Maduro government in order to further consolidate that power in July the Maduro government planned to create a Constituent Assembly to overhaul Venezuela's Constitution due to the government's lack of political legitimacy the opposition party decided to organize an unofficial plebiscite to allow the public to vote on whether they agree with this or not and naturally the Maduro government said it would ask the supreme court to nullify the plebiscite as unconstitutional and illegal which is a remarkable appeal from a government who regularly violates their own constitution by committing illegal activities three days later the opposition party launched a 24 hour nationwide strike to protest the Maduro dictatorship the purpose of which was to protest Maduro plan to rewrite the constitution and once more attempt to strengthen his party's power and of course the Venezuelan government decided to rescind the right to protest from their citizens ahead of this vote the interior justice minister prohibited all public meetings and demonstrations gatherings and similar acts that might disturb the electoral process the elections to decide who would actually be in the Assembly was marred by violence including one Candida's death according to the New York Times naturally the legitimacy of this election to overhaul the Constitution was under threat as many voters avoided the ballot box and nations across the region rejected the predetermined results and the streets erupted in the deadliest day of unrest in three months unsurprisingly a list of leftist stalwarts had managed to gain power the result effectively liquidated the Venezuelan political opposition and leaves the left in complete control over a country that remains deeply divided Mike Pompeo revealed that the CIA was paying close attention to what was going on in Venezuela and apparently couldn't be independent hinted that the agency was working to change the Venezuelan government I can't say I'm usually a fan of CIA interventions into the democratic processes of other countries but given how the socialist government of Venezuela appeared to be setting up a dictatorship in the country it's hardly unwarranted that something might need to be done by the beginning of August the New York Post published an article called Venezuela a nation devoured by socialism the author rich Lowry began the piece by saying Venezuela is a woeful reminder that no country is so rich that it can't be driven into the ground by revolutionary socialism and as if to prove his point on the very same day Fortune magazine published an article entitled Venezuela's cash is now worth less than the currency in World of Warcraft for anyone who doesn't know what world of warcraft is it is a video game where money is created by killing an endless number of infinitely respawning enemies on the same day Venezuelan agents were arresting opposition leaders in midnight raids in their own homes as reported by NPR Venezuelan security agents arrested two key opposition leaders in midnight raids on their homes making good on maderos promise to crack down on dissent following a vote that gave him broad authoritarian powers in the middle of the night armed men took Leopold Lopez and Caracas Mayor Antonio LED Zima from their respective homes in the capsule the leaders had been highly critical of Madero and had only recently been released from jail on politically motivated charges two days after the vote a voting firm suggested that Venezuelans election turnout figures had been manipulated the CEO of london-based Smartmatic said that there was a discrepancy of at least 1 million votes between the officially declared tally on Sunday's election to the National Constituent Assembly and the one his company recorded based on the robustness of our system we know without any doubt that the turnout of the recent election for a National Constituent Assembly was manipulated on the 6th of August there was a failed military uprising at a Venezuelan military base that left one dead and one injured as a video was released with men in uniform declaring themselves to be the start of a coup the Venezuelan authorities said that they had suppressed a military rebellion near the central city of Valencia and the ruling Socialist Party's deputy said that there had been a terrorist attack at the military base given his long-term support for the Chavez regime and the Maduro regime that has followed British socialist politician Jeremy Corbyn decided to condemn all Venezuelan violence I'm very sad that the lives have been lost in Venezuela the people who have died either those on the streets or security forces that have been there tonight black people on the streets all of those lives are terrible the loss often there has to be a dialogue and a process that respects the independence of douchery and respects human rights of oil and I think quest immigrants call today that there has to be dialogue is a good one and it should be regionally based to improve the situation there there has to be respect for the Constitution and respect to the independence leadership of the judiciary do you condemn with access so do you put condemn president Maduro excellent what I condemn is the violence that's been done by any side by all sides in this violence is not going to solve the issue we condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred bigotry and violence on many sides on many sides this is a heroic level of hypocrisy from Jeremy Corbyn given how he condemned Donald Trump for making precisely the same statement in regards to the deaths and violence at Charlotte's ville saying that there was no equivalent between white supremacists in the United States and the situation in Venezuela ironically I actually agree with him there is no equivalence between a small group of white supremacists in the United States and the state violence meted out by the Socialist Party of Venezuela one is far worse than the other and in jeremy corbyn's opinion the ones without state power and without the ability to persecute their own citizens and starve them are the worse by August the 10th there were via medicine shortages in Venezuela people were literally dying in agony according to Human Rights Watch as more than 23,000 Venezuelans die of cancer every year about 80% developed moderate to severe pain in the last few months of life naturally a shortage of painkillers has making their last moments on earth unbearable by August the 12th Donald Trump was threatening a military option as the crisis in Venezuela escalated Trump said we have many options for Venezuela and by the way I'm not going to rule out in military option however Jose Miguel vivanco the Americas Director for Human Rights Watch tweeted perhaps since Chavez named him his successor no one has helped Madero as much as Trump and this nonsense he said today in response to Trump's comments about a potential military option for Venezuela the Venezuelan government responded to Trump's belligerent threats with military exercises this has only strengthened mandarins hand unfortunately by the 24th of August CNBC reported that cash is effectively useless in Venezuela thanks to hyperinflation so people were turning to Bitcoin by the 30th of August the new and socialist dominated Constituent Assembly had approved treason trials for the Venezuelan opposition the Constituent Assembly unanimously voted to put opposition leaders on trial for treason when one assembly member Gladys requena shouted Viva Maduro she was met by a standing ovation which should tell you everything you need to know about the Constituent Assembly by September the 13th Donald Trump had imposed US sanctions on Venezuela because they're anti-democratic tendencies and so Venezuela stopped accepting dollars for oil payments following these sanctions this did absolutely nothing to help his citizens of course so Maduro advised malnourished citizens to breed rabbits and eat them there's actually a very poor solution as there is a condition called rabbit starvation that pioneers and explorers have known about centuries because rabbit is a particularly lean meat with very little in the way of fat and oil and if you eat nothing but rabbits you will ironically eventually starve to death also people happen to rather like rabbits as pets the Minister for urban agriculture said that there was a cultural problem in Venezuela with rabbits a lot of the people give names to the rabbits put a bow on they take tin to the house they take the rabbit to sleep in their bed but he insisted Venezuelans must adjust their attitudes towards the rabbits and see them from the point of view of the economic war by the 19th of September even far-left publication Vox magazine were characterizing Maduro as a dictator in an article entitled how Venezuela went from a rich democracy to a dictatorship on the brink of collapse and on September the 19th Donald Trump formally called out Venezuela and the ideology of the ruling party that is the cause of all of this misery have also imposed tough calibrated sanctions on the socialist Maduro regime in venezuela which has brought a once-thriving nation to the brink of total collapse the socialist dictatorship of Nicolas Maduro has inflicted terrible pain and suffering on the good people of that country this corrupt regime destroyed a prosperous nation by imposing a failed ideology that has produced poverty and misery everywhere it has been tried to make matters worse Maduro has defied his own people stealing power from their elected representatives to preserve his disastrous rule the problem in Venezuela is not that socialism has been poorly implemented but that socialism has been faithfully implemented from the Soviet Union to Cuba to Venezuela wherever true socialism or communism has been adopted it has delivered anguish and devastation and failure those who preach the tenants of these discredited ideologies only contribute to the continued suffering of the people who live under these cruel systems and Donald Trump is absolutely correct in his assessment there by the 20th of September Venezuela was apparently late on a 185 million dollar sovereign bond payment as bloomberg reports while analysts have said for years that Venezuela will soon run out of cash to pay its debts maderos government have made honoring the obligations an issue of national pride and this wasn't the first time that Venezuela was late on making a payment at the same time Venezuelan families were scavenging for food to survive hunger according to Al Jazeera Venezuela's prolonged an acute economic crisis had seen infant mortality raised to almost 35% and maternal mortality to 65% in the last year the oil-rich country is now leading Latin America in what is called acute malnutrition defined by experts as rapid decline of nutrition that puts a child's life at risk by the beginning of October The Telegraph reported that Venezuela is becoming disconnected from the world as another airline cancels flights to the country Argentine Airlines joins a host of other major carriers to withdraw from Caracas the Venezuelan capital amid concerns about security political uncertainty and unpaid government contracts on the 15th of October Venezuelans went to the polls to vote in the gubernatorial elections which were expected to be a gauge of support for maduras grip on power in the country Maduro managed a surprise win with 54 percent of the vote naturally this came as somewhat of a surprise to Venezuela as opposition who could barely believe such a thing could happen opposition campaign chief gerardo blyde said neither Venezuelans nor the world will swallow this fiction we played by the rules for the Democratic conscience but this electoral system is not trustworthy the opposition called for protests after maduras victory The Guardian reports that the ruling Socialist Party had previously controlled 20 of the 23 state governorships but opinion polls had shown that an opposition coalition was set to upend that given voter anger at hunger and shortages stemming from an economic meltdown Sunday's surprise results raised the prospect of more unrest in Venezuela where four months of opposition led protests this year had led to 125 deaths thousands of arrests and widespread destruction of property during the campaign the government had made liberal use of state resources in its candidates campaigns vocht popular former leader Chavez at every rally and appealed to the Venezuelans exhaustion with political turmoil to vote against the candidates of violence by the 30th of October Amnesty International reported that repression was taken into people's living rooms as home raids surged they say the Venezuelan authorities have expanded their arsenal of repressive tactics by launching a vicious campaign of illegal home raids on citizens suspected of dissent in a new investigation called nights of terror attacks and illegal raids on homes in Venezuela which reveals how Venezuelan security forces and government-sponsored civilian armed groups have violently broken into people's homes in recent months as a way of intimidating them against taking part in demonstrations or any other form of protest on the 3rd of November while giving a lengthy state broadcast on live television to the nation a nation that is gradually withering away from hunger Maduro who had already been mocked for gaining weight during the hunger crisis decided to pull out some food from his desk during the live TV address and eat it in front of them apparently these broadcasts go on for hours at a time but as news which points out the optics on this could not have been worse by the 13th of November Venezuela's crude oil output had hit a 28 year low dipping below two million barrels a day its lowest level in nearly three decades according to OPEC on November the 14th Venezuela defaulted according to SNP global ratings the country had violated its 30 day grace period which had expired for a payment that was June October CNN says Venezuela has no meaningful income other than the oil it sells abroad the government meanwhile has failed for years to ship enough food and medicine inference citizens as a result Venezuelans are waiting hours in line to buy food and dying in hospitals that lack basic resources if investors seize the country's oil shipments the food and medical shortages would worsen and quickly then it's pandemonium said an analyst at The Economist Intelligence Unit the humanitarian crisis is already pretty dire it boggles the mind what could happen next on the 15th of November Russia and Venezuela agreed to a debt deal which allowed Venezuela to restructure their 3.15 billion dollar debt owed by Venezuela giving breathing space to the cash-strapped country according to the BBC Venezuela owes an estimated 140 billion dollars to foreign creditors on the 16th of November Maduro was accused of crimes against humanity by Louisa Ortega who is the chief prosecutor who was fired after breaking with the Maduro government earlier this year and had appeared at The Hague where she filed a complaint based on 8000 290 deaths she says took place between 2015 and 2017 at the hands of officials who received instructions from the government they happened under the orders of the executive branch as a part of a social cleansing plan carried out by the government Maduro and his government should pay for these crimes against humanity just as they must pay for the hunger misery and hardship they've inflicted on the Venezuelan people we have been forced to turn to an international organization because there is no justice in Venezuela on November the 18th a Venezuelan opposition leader had escaped the country and reached Spain where he vowed to continue fighting against Maduro he said I'm going to dedicate myself to traveling the world to spread the hope of all Venezuelans to escape this regime this dictatorship Venezuela is not on the verge of an abyss it has fallen in to the abyss Maduro responded to this by calling him a vampire flying around the world by November the 30th there was an exodus of teachers and professors leaving Venezuela over 430 professors assistants and faculty had left the University of Simon Bolivar in Caracas since 2015 a moment is going to arrive when there isn't anyone there's an exodus of the most talented professors to other countries students are leaving to the University start of the year with roughly 12,000 students but estimates that it is sunk to ten thousand seven hundred despite this Venezuela was still welcoming all tourists who were according to Bloomberg crazy enough to go there no food no money no security no medical care no problem and despite the Venezuelan economy being almost entirely reliant on the oil sector president Maduro had fired or arrested nearly all of the people running the oil industry according to Vox the arrests and firings began after Maduro expanded his powers in summer of 2017 by successfully pushing for the election of the new special law making body packed with loyalists the Constituent Assembly that replaced the existing opposition controlled legislative branch of the government since August Saab had arrested 65 oil officials and managers for charges ranging from corruption to sabotage then Saab announced the arrest of Nelson Martinez the official who led the Venezuelan oil industry until being fired that week and the former oil minister this was characterized by an opposition friendly news and analysts cite as a purge from the duro to consolidate power and get rid of people who might threaten him or have more market friendly politics to demonstrate that Venezuela is no longer a democracy maduro's government blocked opposition candidates from even participating in the next elections the Constituent Assembly stripped three of the most influential opposition parties of the right to participate in the next year's election they ruled that the parties who boycotted the local elections had lost legitimacy requiring them to reapply for legal status and potentially eliminating them from the 2018 presidential race while they are doing this Venezuela's farmers had fallen into a crisis Venezuela's farmers are having problems with shortages in not just fertilizer but even getting the seeds the farmers are struggling to find financing because they don't have fertilizer crop yields are lowered and the corn that farmers do grow is sold at regulated prices because it is a government staple replacing farm equipment has become increasingly difficult with farmers requiring to actually order new farm equipment from the United States and have it shipped to Venezuela which means paying for the machinery in dollars which is probably difficult enough anyway and the shipments can take months to arrive on Christmas Eve the Maduro government freed 80 political prisoners is a show of goodwill despite all of the hardships and sorrows that the socialist government of Venezuela have brought on the country and are all bad by the 26th of December Venezuela merchants had decided to trade in dollars alone although the practice was originally adopted by gourmet and design stores in Caracas the practice has expanded to food sellers and dental and medical clinics and others because there is no worth to the native Venezuelan currency on January the 12th 2018 the world was treated to a viral display of the problems in Venezuela when a starving mob were filmed beating a cow to death with rocks in a desperate search for food I'm gonna have to throw both today Mohammad [Applause] [Music] [Music] I am belfry endo and ultimately you can hardly blame them their farm lands lay fallow they have no money to import fruit from the outside and even if they did they can't trust their government not to simply appropriate it Venezuela has been destroyed by socialism by a socialist government that unsurprisingly became tyrannical who've sought to nationalize huge swathe of the economy in order to fulfill the socialist ideal of centralizing the economy in the hands of the government and it has led to the collapse of their country to the point where Venezuelans are now simply fleeing their own country where by the 20th of February 2018 half a million of them had already fled to Colombia Venezuela has been a textbook case in what happens when a democratic socialist regime takes control of a country they persecute the opposition they arrest political dissidents they suppress protests and uprisings using deadly force they subvert and co-opt democracy turning the country into a dictatorship while the socialist government is starving its people appropriating their property arresting their leaders violating their rights killing them when necessary one can only look at socialism as the death knell of a country and I think it is incumbent on the rest of us to pay attention to this and to understand that socialism does not work there is a different and a better way of doing things it's called socialism it's called social justice and it's something that this waiter has made a big step towards

Channel: Sargon of Akkad

Views: 576,364

Rating: 4.9095082 out of 5

Keywords: Venezuela, socialism, maduro, chavez, capitalism

Id: fNjtpksJD4s

Length: 40min 18sec (2418 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 23 2018