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What are your thoughts on the current situation in Venezuela? I know that Bitcoin is pretty popular there; do we have any Venezuelan forum members?

Guaidó is the most obvious CIA-backed politician I've ever seen, but Maduro is totally evil. I'd recommend that the people of Venezuela find a third option, but between the two I suppose Guaidó is probably better...?

The interventionists in the US government really want to send troops there, so they're having diplomats stand in the crossfire in the hope that an incident occurs and this can be used as an excuse to invade. If Maduro is really careful, this can maybe be avoided, and perhaps he can last a while longer. Even though the US is talking as though they'll militarily support anti-Maduro rebels, I don't think that they'll actually openly do so without something that they can say constitutes major provocation.

Whatever happens, I hope that the situation in Venezuela finally improves. From what I've heard, it's been basically a hellhole there for at least several years.

It seems to me that more serious domestic issues have just been sealed up here in the USA that has now freed up resources to pay more attention to what is going on in Venezuela. While I want Venezuela to be autonomous as well, Maduro is a scumbag, and in spite of me having no trust for them the CIA is not monolithic.

Some times intervention can be helpful if there is a light hand. I think the real issues come when it becomes an issue of dominating, creating endless wars, and removing national sovereignty. We only ever witness the shit shows. There have to be plenty of other successful interventions we have never even heard of.

I'm sure the folks from Venezuela are tired of the corruption plaguing their country, and are hopeful Guaidó will restore some order.  I agree Guaidó is probably a CIA plant, but if he survives long enough to get the country through an honest election then I don't care.  The Venezuelans are wonderful people and wish them the best.

What I don't want to see is Guaidó becoming the next dictator (visions of South Vietnam and Ngô Đình Diệm's clusterfuck.)  I really don't believe US military intervention is a practical approach.  I doubt the Venezuelan people want our military in their country, and would rather resolve their problems on their own.

I saw something about Mexico, Cuba, Russia, and some others continuing to support Maduro while the US and many others are recognizing Guaidó.
That sounds like something that could turn into a sort of proxy war but if the US does anything I doubt any others would do anything about it. This is outside of Russia's sphere of influence unlike Syria..

Their are a lot of Venezuelans in crypto. With their run away inflation fiat currency I don't blame them and hope that Crypto can truly help them the way it is supposed to help those in such positions.

Sadly a lot of the Venezuelens in Crypto I have come across were on Cryptopia. The exchange that was just hacked. Many spanish speakers there.
Another crypto project I was close with for a while was Rare Pepe on Counterparty and their was a Venezuelan aspect to that as well.
https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2017/03/27/venezuelans-using-rare-pepes-bitcoin-currency/
https://dailycaller.com/2017/03/23/venezuelan-currency-slowly-getting-replaced-by-pepe-memes/

The government of Venezuela even created their own cryptocurrency. I am not up to speed on it since when I heard about it it just sounded like a fiat currency on a blockchain which is outside of my interest.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petro_(cryptocurrency)
I should probably get myself up to speed on the petro cryptocurrency and the rest of the Venezuela situation and history leading up to this situation.
I have only really been following the breaking news for the last day or so and not yet even today's news since last night.

The people of Venezuela have been in a terrible state for quite a while now so I hope that something there changes for the better.
I'm not sure about the Maduro guy keeping power through what some say was an illegitimate election, I'm not well aware of all of the aspects but he has obviously been doing a piss-poor job.

Guaidó said that one of the first things he wanted to do as president was to hold a new fair election I think. That sounds reasonable.
I joked to my GF last night that if Venezuela gets straightened out after this we should go there for oilfield work for me and marina work for her :)

Venezuela messed up when they built their country on top of our oil.  Never underestimate the evil of the United States and how far they will go to assert their will.  We've ran our course in Syria (thanks to Russia) so now its time to make another Syria.   We are still probably a few decades away from a time where China could counter US aggression by placing military presence and stabilizing Venezuela. 

I am sure he is than socialism.

Maduro and the situation in Venezuela is a reason why Americans should be terrified of the proposals of AOC, Bernie Sanders, and other left wing extremists that have taken over the mainstream of the Democratic party.

The government is very big in Venezuela. It is the largest employer directly and indirectly. The Chavez government knew how to use Petroleo's resources, they have created in the population an extreme need of government as responsible for everything in the life of a citizen.

For this reason, the protests are so significant. It is not a dispute between leaders as some belief. It is not the same as it is in Middle East and Africa.

People got tired of the government. They find no hope other than complete change.

Guaidó emerged in this situation. He gained support by fighting the government, especially in his home state. But there are other leaders who are much better known than he is, but they are in prison or have left the country. What will actually happen when Maduro falls, will be the division of the opposition and also of the situation. Many new candidates will emerge. Today it seems like they are few because either you are totally against the government or totally in favor.

And that is why no major armed conflict will occur. The rats will quickly leave the ship, each one will try to maintain some power with the fall of this government. Diosdado and Néstor will probably try to support/create another leader, and thus keep the businesses they own.

We're based in Argentina, and the amount of Venezuelans coming to our country is huge. Its a massive exodus from Venezuela to other places.

We all feel very sad about what's going on and refugees from Venezuela just leave so they can send money to the elder that are staying in their country with almost no basic needs at all (food, water, etc.)

Imagine if Alexandria Ocasio Cortez woke up tomorrow, called herself president and was recognized as the true president by other countries.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCJLL6SHst8&feature=youtu.be
Here is a detailed analysis of what has happened in Venezuela.  Its important to understand the history of Venezuela, US-backed coups, and the dishonesty in the way the mainstream media reports these situations.

https://i.imgflip.com/2rzlae.jpg

Interesting... so what your saying is corrupt people within the US government put Socialists in power as controlled opposition in order to collapse and control nations?

It has been predicted that there may be 8 million refugees may leave Venezuela if the government falls. Some of these people will go throughout Central America and some will try to reach the United States.

To put this in perspective, the Syria civil war has produced appropriately 5 million refugees throughout Europe, which has resulted in massive problems there.

The situation in Venezuela is one more reason why we need to build a wall along the US southern border in places it can easily be crossed.

It's an interesting situation as usual the US wants Regime Change
The US want to reduce the influence of China and Russia in the Latin American Sphere and the easiest and most valuable target to them is Venezuela.
It is also why they keep the sanctions and economic restrictions on them, they want another Libya with a parallel government to destroy Maduro which is equivalent to what they did to Gaddafi.

Then using the sanctioned money they have to fund Guaidó's position, which is where the 20 million they promised is coming from if their regime change is successful.

On Maduro's side given the precedent the US has of royally messing things up and their track record in Latin America and the Middle East.
Not that I am really am in favor of either government
Simply put I just want those people to have a break, that said as Vit pointed out if things go South the rats will leave the ship and they will put a new figurehead out.

https://assets.bwbx.io/images/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/ibFmPIofqTSQ/v0/1200x608.jpg

20 million for regime change aid
https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/venezuela/article225010645.html
Embassy change ignored
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/congress/the-latest-venezuelas-guaido-expresses-gratitude-to-trump/2019/01/23/c5d993d4-1f6b-11e9-a759-2b8541bbbe20_story.html?utm_term=.19c0c40cb426

I don't see the issue with regime change. The problem is trying to force democracy on poor countries. Let the economy develop and democracy be protested for by the middle class.

Regime change has worked in Panama, Chile, South Korea, Kuwait just to name a few. They are all liberal democracies now, and the richest countries in their regions.

I see nothing but benefits for the United States to change their regime. The number of refugees will decrease. The economy will grow. They will export oil cheaply.

Their socialist system is a massive failure. It has caused pain and suffering for many. Regime change is a cheap investment with massive returns.

Yes, I am. Guaidó has the backing of the national assembly, the legislative branch that people voted for with opposition winning by landslide in Dec 2015. That very December, days before the term of the former assembly ended, they hastily (and illegally) put pro-maduro tugs in the judiciary branch, and then proceeded to declare the national assembly illegal, and have ruled the country by executive powers since then.

Next they rigged "elections" for a "national constituent assembly" in 2017, That day vote turn around was minimal, with most voting centers empty the whole day, yet, they declared more than 8 million voted in favor. This is a number higher not only to what Maduro supposedly got in the 2013 presidential elections, but even more than the super charismatic Chávez got in 2012 (who died in 2013).

Once installed, this "National Constituent Assembly" declared itself "above the constitution and any rule of law", and because to them there was no National Assembly took legislative powers, which is essentially anything Maduro and his group wants. So they are in fact a de facto goverment, not de jure.

In 2018 they did presidential elections, not in December as it has always traditionally been, but much earlier in may 2018. Like the previous fiasco, almost nobody showed to vote that day and, of course, he "won" by "landslide" (with 5 million according to them).

Do note the economy starting crashing the day Maduro got into power, since 2013, and living conditions have only got worse ever since. By 2018 2~4million people had already left the country (i forgot to mention this is formerly a 30million people country).

These events were not recognized by the national assembly (that Maduro doesn't recognize) and they have all this years been declaring anything done by the executive invalid, and the executive and its puppet the judiciary appointed by them directly have declared anything done by the national assembly invalid. this brings us to 2019, the last accepted by both term would technically end in January the 10th, afterwards there is no president (the vice-president is appointed by the president and ends term at the same moment).

The constitution states that, in case of absence of the executive, the president of the National Assembly becomes president interim, this is what just happened January 23th, and the reason many countries are acknowledging him as legitimate President of Venezuela.

Of course we know the United States and others have interests here, but considering how hellish the situation has been, i think they would be welcome. The economy needs a 180° turn desperately, it is pointless to give a socialist rhetoric and have the worst conditions the country has seen in a century. A change of government, to pro free market would net us a win/win situation. Continuing this agony everyone loses.

By the way, following the appointment of Juan Guaidó as President Interim by the National Assembly, he has only requested humanitarian aid to the United States. As you probably know, the US Gov has officially acknowledged Guaidó's authority. Maduro in anger, yesterday ordered everyone in the US Embassy of Caracas to leave the country by Sunday. The Trump administration refuses to move everyone out, but has already ordered non-essential personnel to leave. This incident was solely caused by Mr. Maduro and his goons.

At the same time, since Jan 22 there have been protests and demonstrations, similar to 2017 with already 36+ people killed and hundreds detained by the national guard, national police or the urban militias known as "colectivos". There have been clashes, barricades, some looting, its been chaotic especially at night in different cities. Its not widespread chaos at this moment, but with the looming crisis with the United States, people are naturally worried.

I personally expect the Maduro regime to fall into pieces very soon, his support is more show than reality, people are angry and tired, even former Chavez supporters. I think most everyone in Venezuela would welcome a government change, regardless, if only to end this disastrous economy where people are expected to survive with the equivalent of 8 USD a month that becomes 4 USD by the end of the month...


There is not much to say about Petro, except that so far its been a giant lie (and some say State scam). It is (in its latest incarnation, the 4thish) supposedly a Dash clone, modified extensively. The (de facto) gov. has kept all nodes and mining to themselves, and don't release any wallets. All they offer is an online wallet in a single server. They are also dictating the exchange rates, just like they have done to the bolivar. The backing of "a barrel of oil" for each Petro is a promise this government is very unlikely to ever fulfill.

Unfortunately the problems are not just economic, the criminality is way out of control. A new government has this task to tackle as well. But your idea isn't far fetched, you might just want to wait some more time. Venezuela has a lot of tropical sea (beaches and islands), mountains, plains, jungle and even a sand desert, with HUGE tourism potential. Oil in the Orinoco belt is mostly super heavy that needs expensive refining, that's were most foreign companies have their drilling rigs.

This situation has gone far beyond anything that can be viewed in simple political "us vs them" or "capitalist vs socialist" rhetoric. Few socialist nations have every shown this level of incompetence.

It shows the lack of ability of the current leaders in running a country. Unfortunately, in a controlled economy that does mean mass starvation.

I hope there are ways people in the USA can help and I hope that this situation resolves itself.

Every socialist system has this level of incompetency. It's not the leaders at fault. It's the system, time and time again.

I didn't mean otherwise. A free market economy is one of the main wishes for government change (ie. a non socialist gov). The second wish is to stop criminality. When Chavez was in power, the constitution was replaced and the balance of powers skewed (even more) towards the executive. Under the strongman, things more or less worked, but after his death the "appointed successor" (Maduro) destroyed the economy. Before Chávez things weren't perfect either (which is how they came to power in the first place, out of voters anger of the previous system); but in the end they replaced a corrupt "social-democrat" system by a hyper-corrupt "socialist" system. They still think they can command the economy, like the former socialist bloc under the Soviet Union, a mistake that even the Chinese learned to fix, more or less...

What Venezuela has never seen, is a classic liberal (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_liberalism) system. I'm sure something along those lines would cure things quickly. What Venezuela has always had in its history, is an omnipotent State with powers heavily concentrated in the executive. Of course the opposition is mostly composed by social democrats (not unlike those from the past) which is why the people have lost hope many times (provoking mass exodus), and their inadequate reaction (or lack of action) against socialism.

For instance: in the last 20 years, only a single economist has been in the government cabinet, during the years 2002 and 2003. This person left because he opposed someone's else proposed idea to "control the foreign currency exchange" by pegging the bolivar to the US dollar. As any half decent economist would, he warned then president Chavez against the dangers of what ultimately led the country to this current state. Of course the socialists had their way back then (because "the rich are evil, and the poor want redemption...") and he was thrown away. A decade later, the poor are poorer, and sure there are less rich, but those few rich got richer thanks to the system corruption. For example: Who gets to import the goods the State distributes to the poor? Who gets to transport the goods from abroad? Obviously those few who bribe their way in...

You see Maduro increasing the minimal wage, yet to pay those wages he orders the central bank to "create" money (not even blockchain based money, or paper for that matter), provoking the out of control inflation that has, in effect, reduced the average salary from 250 USD a month in 2008 to 8 right now. What is the point of having such a ridiculous minimal wage? Just get rid of it entirely! Let the individuals choose their wages and working conditions with their employers, a gov should at most ensure any valid contract privately signed between parties is respected by both. But no, Venezuela has a "workers law" with such conditions no business would want to hire anyone, and if they absolutely must, it would be the minimal possible because not only they are very expensive, but almost impossible to "legally" lay off later. End result: Less employment. Who suffers most? The poor, not the rich.

Anything the politicians try to control, ends producing the opposite effect. Fixate renting prices? Make it real hard to evict people? Nobody rents homes anymore. Who suffers? The poor that could barely afford to pay rent, or those who could buy the house? But they fixated the prices in the name of the poor, and they made it almost impossible for the owners to evict non/low paying people to "protect them".

I could go on and on, why all those "socialist" ideas sound so pretty in paper, but end producing the exact opposite effect in the end. Of course we know, we are living it...

Agreed! Is anyone in Venezuela working toward that?

They don't need a classic liberal system at this moment. Political ideology is the least of their concerns. Their concern is on getting food on the table, restoring law and order, getting the economy going. There's a time and place for liberalism, it isn't when there's anarchy.

I believe the United States will eventually try to take control over Venezuela because of their vast oil reserves.  I also know the media in America is trying to use Venezuela as an excuse to declare capitalism is better than socialism. 

I don't think it is anything to do with democracy. The Chinese have lent large sums of money to the Venezuelan government, and they are secured on assets. This is a known ploy of the Chines, and when the government can't repay, the Chinese claim the assets. There is no way that the US wants China to own land to set up a military base in Venezuela.

Another problem is the quality of oil in Venezuela, It is very heavy, and most of it is processed in the US.

Trump may have slipped up by supporting the interim president.

Today looking once again heard the news that all the consuls of the United States hastily began to collect their belongings and leave Venezuela.
The situation is quite tense and I hope the fighting will not come. People have always been in conflict and it is mainly their financial situation that is to blame. I hope that everything is solved peacefully and clashes will suffer as less as possible people.

Well, as usual, if you start an armed conflict I think everyone would blame Russia))) It's a classic USA..

Actually the closest group (political party?) promoting classical liberalism/libertarianism is the one led by Maria Corina Machado (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mar%C3%ADa_Corina_Machado): Vente Venezuela (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Come_Venezuela). Of course that is a debate for later, right now comes a transitional government. Then, when things calm down, and proper elections are made, this discussion will come to the table again. She does have lots of followers, not sure which group from the opposition would lead later, since right now everyone is united towards the common goal.

So the answer is yes! https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4d/Vente_Venezuela.png


No, only non essential personnel are leaving the US embassy.  Funny you mention Russia, as that is one of the few countries backing Maduro (dark purple):
https://i.ibb.co/qgrR6Yc/image.png
Those in green are officially acknowledging Guaidó as President Interim... Yellow are calling for dialogue, gray have not pronounced yet.

(Thanks freedomno1 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5101907.msg49411480#msg49411480) for this map!)

No country in Latin America ever saw that
 There are many different interests here that doesn't allow the economy to simple become classic liberal overnight.

For decades allow the economies of the Continent have been very repressed, being the government the main actor in the economy (Keynesian policies or even socialist policies, like in Venezuela). This kind of capitalism  run by governments allows only few oligopolies run by big companies that linked to the government itself (like Odebrecht in Brazil, one of our biggest companies which it's only client is Brazil government or other corrupted governments. Odebrecht os involved in corruption in all Latin America and Africa and it's former CEO is in jail).

Free market and a liberal economy are obvious threats to those elites oligopolies.


It has to do with democracy imo. Maduro sent to jail all his opposition before the election. Only 40% of population voted, and he won. Later on the Congress was able to remove him from presidency because of corruption, but he refused to leave.
Then guaipo became interim president, according to constitution .

If a corrupted president cannot be removed by the Congress, it's not a democracy, but a dictatorship.

https://www.businessinsider.com/russia-linked-military-contractors-in-venezuela-to-protect-maduro-2019-1


If Russia is sending troops doesn't that basically give the US a green light to send troops also?
You can hardly send troops yourself and then hypocritically oppose troops sent by anyone else..

If this is a battle between Russian influence and American influence, sorry, the USA needs to win...

This is not good. These tensions may rush our next global economic crisis (which many people say it is imminent). It will be Bitcoin's first economic crisis. Let's see will bitcoin deal with it

It is really about the US and China. IMO Russia is acting as a proxy for them in this case so they can keep their plans for South America on the down low for as long as possible. This is not only part of China's economic plans of loan sharking every nation with natural resources it can, but an answer to the US exerting influence in what it considers its exclusive sphere of influence regarding Taiwan, the South China Sea, North Korea, etc. They want a foothold in South America putting them in a much stronger position economically and militarily to challenge the USA.

Sovereign immunity will largely prevent creditors from collecting on any defaulted debt by the Venezuelan government, even debt secured by most assets.

Sovereign immunity is the fact that governments cannot be sued without their consent in their own courts, and some governments will extend this to foreign governments as well, depending on the specific circumstances.

It is effectively impossible to force Venezuela to give up any land located within the country without military intervention. The same is true for any assets (such as oil) located within Venezuela. The only assets that can potentially be seized are those outside of the country, so long as they are still owed by the government at the time of seizure.

This is a problem creditors of Argentina has had in the past. The Argentina government defaulted after granting US courts jurisdiction over disputes over specific debt, and creditors have had difficulty collecting via asset seizures after obtaining judgment because assets owned by the Argentina government are rarely located in jurisdictions that recognize the judgment.

It might be worth looking into more closely how the Chinese operate before making any conclusions about sovereignty.

Is anyone anywhere going in that direction? I'd be happy to be wrong, but it seems like economic liberalism is being slowly and carefully crushed everywhere



Be watchful for the careful crushing I'm warning about. Liberal/libertarian political parties are always infested with politicians using the most cleverly crafted lies of everyone else in the political spectrum. It should be obvious why: political power is anathema to liberal ideals, true liberal/libertarian politicians would be essentially turkeys voting for christmas. They will tell you lies, or make themselves look stupid. In Venezuela, you'll probably get the lies, whereas in the established "liberal" countries the "look stupid" variety are more the norm.

It appears the European Union (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_union) is considering giving Maduro 8 days to call for presidential elections under fair conditions, or else they will support Guaidó. Then it wouldn't just be the United States, but the NATO (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO) could get involved as well...

EU drafting appeal for Venezuela's Maduro to call elections (https://www.rappler.com/world/regions/latin-america/221939-eu-appeal-maduro-call-elections-january-2019)

In the meantime, at least the UK, France and Spain are already backing Guaidó, with Germany also sounding so: Guaido versus Maduro - Who backs Venezuela's two presidents? (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-maduro-guaido/guaido-versus-maduro-who-backs-venezuelas-two-presidents-idUSKCN1PI1M5)


According to Quartz (https://qz.com/1532754/which-countries-support-venezuelan-president-maduro-over-guaido/); "Here’s a list of the countries that have taken a public position on the divided government."



My opinion on the Chinese is: they need a business partner, not an inept that can't run a country and keep it in eternal poverty. I believe they learned the hard way under Mao about the dead end that killing the economy is by sticking to "real socialism" dogmas. They have become pragmatic with the economy and adopted capitalism, without political freedom. Like the United States, Venezuela has the largest debt with China. Under Chávez, the economy in Venezuela looked more or less good, and they started investing and made heavy loans backed with oil, as some correctly pointed, to have a beach head for south America/Caribbean. But under Maduro, everything went to a grinding halt. I have watched the official Chinese news channel (its on the free terrestrial digital broadcast TV) and they don't hide the economy mistakes of Maduro's regime, in fact they criticize it.

My point is, China already invested in Venezuela, and they need the economy of Venezuela to actually work, not fail like it is doing right now. Maduro in 6+ years have shown zero signs of understanding this. In my opinion, under a new government, China will remain and in fact finally start their business (banks, rail construction, etc), because the debt is too large for the transitional government to get rid of them, so its simpler to comply with the agreements and let them do business along the Americans and Europeans who will undoubtedly come (Actually only the Americans left, the Europeans are still involved in the drilling oil business in the Orinoco belt region).

The 'light hand' is key though, I don't want American boots in the ground where it doesn't make any sense to have Americans on the ground.

If we can't handle the problem through sending foreign aid, monetary payments to support the new interim President, etc --I don't think its a problem we should get involved in then.

My rule is always to try to steer clear of boots on the ground.


Eh, I don't know about the last part about China. I think China is going to stay neutral in this (though I've seen stories saying they're supporting Maduro) only due to the fact that if Maduro falls, US businesses (and other western nations) are going to come in as they know they'll be able too. Who knows what's going to happen, this is a crazy situation like no other.

Yes China is staying neutral wants to LOOK neutral, instead of supporting Maduro. That says A LOT. If it had been Chavez, they would have reacted like Russia. Unlike China, Russia has almost no investments in Venezuela. Venezuela has bought weapons and allowed a few housing building projects from Russia, but that's about it. They have also loaned very little money compared to China. They have some oil drilling like everybody else in the Orinoco belt region.

As for boots, nowadays you can military intervene without risking a single human (from your side). Aside from the classic manned air strikes, there are now unmanned air strikes. If the EU gets involved, as its starting too look like, then NATO could also be potentially involved; should Maduro remain stubborn. Then you get a repeat of Libya, where they mostly provided support from air while rebels on the ground seized power. The big difference is the Venezuelan opposition is unarmed, unlike the Libyans, so i don't know much about that scenario. But the chance that this could occur, can be enough to crack the de-facto gov. After all, there is unhappiness within "Maduro" ranks, and he has witch hunted and imprisoned 100+ military people. There are even rumors that the ministry of defense could turn at any moment. And unlike Chávez, Maduro is a civilian, and quite inept at commanding or inspiring troops.

The chance is big that this will be resolved peacefully with a strong hand, as in, expect a surrender at the last moment when they see it coming for real. Yes, there could be a few guerrilla groups here and there causing trouble later, but this the transitional government will have to deal with afterwards.

BREAKING 🔴 President Trump's Secretary of State Mike Pompeo makes Unprecedented Move on the World Stage regarding Venezuela at the UN Security Council (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KT1WXCO6mwI)

Lol at China staying neutral. China wants to LOOK neutral. Big difference.

You haven't heard?

America is now a net energy exporter.

And as for the media in the US, they are genuinely ignoring Venezuela because it doesn't fit with their concept of socialism working so wonderfully.

I'll give you this one, that's a fair remark.

They are doing the same in Africa, Pakistan and wherever they can get away with it. Its called the Chinese debt trap. https://qz.com/1223768/china-debt-trap-these-eight-countries-are-in-danger-of-debt-overloads-from-chinas-belt-and-road-plans/ - its clever if you ask me.

Could be a trap, or could be their plan to remain in power. While North Korea placed their bets only in the military, the Chinese went for wealthiness (capitalism). After all, is not like you are forced to ask loans from them... Venezuela got them in exchange for oil AND supporting their international political position (ie. Taiwan, Tibet, Hong Kong...) during Chavez. But after Maduro did what he did to the economy, even China stopped loaning.

They became an attractive alternative to the World Bank and the World Monetary Fund, with their Chicago school of economy thinking (growth by debt).

"Forced" can be subjective. I would like to recommend a good book related to this subject.

https://www.amazon.com/Confessions-Economic-Hit-John-Perkins/dp/0452287081

It describes in detail how powers can in fact force countries to enter into debt, then start harvesting the nation of all of its resources.

Venezuela coming to Mexico. Well, it's only a start. I wonder how long it will take.


Mexico is starting to look like Venezuela (http://www.freedomsphoenix.com/News/255273-2019-01-29-mexico-is-starting-to-look-like-venezuela.htm)




If this gets bad enough, we should be able to pick up various kinds of property, including real estate, in Mexico very inexpensively. Do you remember the Road Warrior movies? Think of the fuel wars that are coming to Mexico.


8)

whats the point of cheap stuff if you have not a working economy and a happy society around it?

Things always change. Buy low, sell high.     8)

thats not necessarily the case, you might end up in a nation with a foreign currency that is taxing your "property"

This is a forum, not an investment service. Some people win in the stock market, and some people lose. The people who win wish they had known a long time ago. The people who lose often wish they had never heard of it.

8)

It bemuses me how quick the US plays the interventionist police, thinking itself as the world's big brother. This position has often caused more harm than good to the general American people and their finances. The US is always in a haste to flex muscles and start a war it hasn't been able to end. Check the history books - From Iraq to Libya to Syria (to almost Zimbabwe), just check it. The same US would hastily pull out its forces after a while. It's just a pity that a bitcoin and cryptocurrency loving country like Venezuela is at the precipice of war. Were it China, I wouldn't give a rat ear.

Oil, protests, sanctions, rabbits, Russian involvement and Kim Jong-un.
Here is the real story how Venezuela came to Blockchain.

https://shitcoinoffering.com/pablo-the-miner-and-superman-everything-you-need-to-know-about-el-petro/ (https://shitcoinoffering.com/pablo-the-miner-and-superman-everything-you-need-to-know-about-el-petro/)

I hope this YouTube video by Joanna Hausmann helps to debunk some misinformation about the current situation, some of which have even been expressed on this very thread...

What's Happening in Venezuela?: Just the Facts (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bEvHwiJWgAY)

Keypoints:

• This is not a U.S. backed coup.
• This is not about a political ideology.
• The people want democracy.
• Juan Guaidó did not just "declare" himself president.
• Juan Guaidó is acting as Interim President.
• Maduro is illegitimate (made his own parallel congress).
• Monthly wage went from $350 a month to $7 a month.
• Inflation in 2018 +1,700,000%.
• Projected inflation in 2019 +10,000,000%.
• 5,000,000 Venezuelans have fled.

Please listen.

let me be clear about one point

Bitcoin cannot save venezuela,

there is no way it can.

Bitcoin will only create a society that constanly invests into bitcoin mining and thats mad

regards

I am now in South America, and I see that the situation in Venisuele will not be stable for a long time, while it is the scene of a fight between the USA and Russia.
poor people of Venesuela

I feel sad for Venezuelan, they don't deserve this kind of situation. This will never be happened if their government doing their job well, unfortunately, they have an incompetent leaders. Here in Brazil we accepted thousands of Venezuelan refugees. This time , i am 100% supporting trump regarding this issue. that fucking Maduro should be ousted in Office. he doesnt deserve to handle any position in government because he is corrupt, greedy and incompetent !! he doesn't even know how to manage their economy. Poor venezuela.

maduros opponent will then create his coin, and live as king of venezuela will be no difference, power will corrupt everyone.

And that will cause many problems in economy... I mean, many cryptocurrencies will be represented on the market, so which is the official one? Now they use Bitcoin and Dash... WTF? Just imagine if they will use some more new coins - it will bring chaos...

Russia is already gone. They just sent a plane and that left. Rumors say they took gold from the central bank, and the families from the "leadership".

Unlikely. A sane government would put an end to the subsidies, or at least lower them. Electricity won't be as cheap as it is today. Tho this probably wouldn't occur overnight, just like Argentina where they started a transition to move from subsided electricity to international prices in a 3 year period.

Venezuela would likely not go straight to international prices, but maybe half way there. Cheaper, but not free. Same as with gasoline, which is the only mad thing going on in this country. If you think a bitcoin mining society is bad, what do you make of a society with free gasoline? I'd rather have the former.

Oh and just for the record, there are some big miners here with solar power, they planned for the future as every miner should...

Actually the petro was 100% the idea of the Maduro and his administration. The Venezuelan congress wanted nothing to do with it, and I'm betting that once Maduro is removed from power the project will be abandoned. As far as we know he only ended up raising about $250,000 during the NEM petro ICO.

They sacked the original author (it wasn't Maduro's idea, but he bought it) and started another round since October. They have been taking money since then again but the amount is undisclosed. You can still register in their page (http://petro.gob.ve/) and they will happily take your bitcoins. Like most ICOs, you will probably lose it all. Perhaps its just a fund to aid their escape...

Petro started as an Ethereum token, an idea that was scratched, then moved into a Nem token (that pre-ico) that was scratched as well (funds were NOT returned), then into a Dash clone, but was hacked and they covered the incident, and redid yet again using the Dash code, this time without wallets, completely centralized in a single server and that server provides the only online wallet, and doesn't give you keys or anything. Nodes and mining was kept indoors (only they do it); and of course they are not sharing the modifications they did to the code (even Venezuelan law forces them to, but they are above any laws anyway).

Since the time of the Nem pre ico; it was rumored the Russians invested. It might be that Russian plane that left recently was returning that investment in gold. This is of course dirty assets getting laundered, as that gold belongs to the Venezuelan people and not any "officials".

Right,  I've been following the saga for a while now. I added up all the NEM petros that were initially distributed (but due to the way the tokens were created they are immovable and just sit there in wallets) by the "mosaic" creator address -- at $60 a pop it added up to less than $230k if memory serves me. Maduro's claims that they raised "billions" are backed by absolutely nothing.

Never heard the part about the hack of the dash clone version. The petro that exists now might not even actually exist at all, because as you mentioned, its completely centralized and impossible to interact with its blockchain (there's only 1 web wallet and 1 mobile wallet). One dude in the petro ANN thread actually found some negative account balances in their "block explorer," which again, might not actually be exploring anything.

Because it was never made public, that's internal info that leaked... It "delayed" the launch of Petro v3 (Dash centralized edition) a few months... Doesn't matter anyway, it was made wrong since the beginning and they insist in absolute centralization as "solution" to their security problems.

Its just like what they did to the economy, they made the problem much worse....

Just found this on Youtube, take your time to watch it and understand the situation better:

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/ySko8ux2cl4/hqdefault.jpg

🇻🇪 Living inside the world's worst economy, Venezuela | Counting the Cost (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySko8ux2cl4)

The best outcome would be that we (the U.S.) gets sucked into an extremely costly and protracted new Vietnam in Venezuela and our 'allies' in the West (and our bitches in South America) abandon us to our own devices.

I say this because being tied up there in Venezuela in probably the only way we are not forced by the Zionist masters of our so-called leaders in Washington into 'doing' more and more countries in the Middle East and Former Soviet Union.  And things over there could easily go nuclear.

Quite similar pattern thing happens in Syria, and is now provoked to be started in my beloved country Indonesia. All of destabilized countries now are just  proxies of the true cold war between three superpowers of 21st century: USA, Russia, and China.

That is highly unlikely, they could form a few guerrilla groups and produce some violence, but nothing even remotely looking like a "war". Maduro's Venezuela doesn't compare to the previous charismatic Chavez. The amount of people willing to give their lives to defend Maduro's regime is practically zero, despite state media propaganda. You might be fooled into thinking he is the same because he was appointed by the former, but he is not...

Any sort of military resistance would disappear within hours, and most likely you will see en-mass surrender. This is because the Venezuelan military know more than anyone else how bad their situation is with what little equipment and weapons they have in working condition. From a military perspective, the only sensible answer is surrender. The Venezuelan military can deal with drug traffickers or smugglers in border land, sea and air patrol, but they are in no condition to engage with any other military force of any country, including Colombia or Brazil.

Suffice to say that the US dealings with Colombia have been far more longer and complicated, than anything that could possibly come out from Venezuela.

But if you mean it could be used politically as an excuse for "we are too busy here to go there", well i don't know, USA has enough military capacity to deal in many fronts at the same time. Not to mention this is the UAVs/drone warfare era, where you don't even need to risk human pilots anymore and can field plenty of remote controlled units 24/7 over vast areas. Proximity is also so ridiculously close they could launch from home, and we do technically share a border with the USA in Puerto Rico... A civilian jetliner can do the trip from continental America in under 4 hours, and a civilian cargo ship under 4 days.

This is the typical scenario where a politician would say "surrender is not an option" but the military understands that "surrender is the only option".

The best outcome for Venezuelans, right now, is to show such a display of muscle from the international community to make the regime surrender without any resistance, and this is what i think will happen.

Looking the other way and letting the regime continue is only going to continue the grief and deaths, and mass exodus...

I listened to the video, I then noticed there is a response video in the comments that took the time to deconstruct the soundbyte being spread in this video part by part.

How Joanna Hausmann is lying about Venezuela

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTTzA9yrZW4


Neutral opinion goes to commie
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCJLL6SHst8

Wow!  Thanks for sharing your wisdom about what a 'cakewalk' doing Venezuela is going to be.

Here I was thinking that the Venezuelan people would take a look at Iraq, Libya, Ukraine, etc, and say 'no thanks.'  Anyway, there are only 30,000,000 of them so our seal-team-6 should be able to take care of business in a day or two.

None of these South American Noahides are smart enough to put two-and-two together and figure out that the sanctions had anything to do with their misery so of course they will blame everything on Maduro and welcome the U.S. back with open arms.  After all, the multi-national corporations were super generous in making sure that the profits derived from Venezuelan oil were shared fairly with all of the Venezuelan people.  Everyone know that.

Let's do this thing!  I mean, what could go wrong?

Take a look at the "first line of defense" by yourself:

http://caraotalibre.cf/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/303eafa2-367d-4a37-a383-18b77179bb89.jpg http://caraotalibre.cf/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/536149ca-2370-41cd-bc61-fdc35d9f2825.jpg http://caraotalibre.cf/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/7c1ded0b-e090-4ff0-b453-f2c8482e1284.jpg
Source: http://caraotalibre.cf/nacionales/en-fotos-asi-bloqueo-el-regimen-de-maduro-los-tres-carriles-del-puente-tienditas-en-frontera-con-colombia/

You think I'm joking? It gets worse...

This is Maduro's response to prevent the "imperialist" humanitarian aid that may help save lives in hospitals deprived of medicines by years of socialism. Of course, none of that matters to you it seems...

And again, the sanctions are a lie. There are no sanctions against Venezuela, only against specific individuals from Maduro's regime. They have personal assets frozen abroad, those assets are of course ill gotten from Venezuela by theft, corruption and who knows what else...

Can only be concerned with citizens of Venezuela, usually a country that is indeed developing will certainly have foreign interference that has a hidden interest in it, so many arrange for what is done will be accepted later. just how the citizens of Venezuela can respond that there really is another party.

As you correctly said, the armed forces of Venezuela are no match for the U.S. military and would see it as pointless to try to take them on directly.

The logical strategy would be let the U.S. and our lackeys invade then fight an asymmetric war.  A lone water-buffalo and a guy with a rifle looks exactly what I would expect, and I expect that Venezuela has been preparing for asymmetric warfare for 20 years now.  We all knew that this day was coming.

---

The U.S., in conjunction with the international bankers who own the USD federal reserve notes which constitute the world reserve currency, have killed people by the hundreds of thousand through sanctions in the past and have in effect bragged about it.  See M. Albright and Iraq.  Just recently they were bragging about Iran needing to play our game or their people do not eat.

As much as a lot of us detest socialism we're not going to ignore the dedicate efforts that the U.S. has made in trying to destabilize Venezuela through economic means and the impacts that that has had on the country.

In other words, the propaganda that Venezuela's problems are wholly a result of their own socialist economic system is a dog which won't hunt for anyone with at least a little bit of a clue.

You are assuming everyone will go out to "defend" against a "foreign invader", but that is not the case. Maduro does not have the ability to rally enough supporters as you may think... 30million? Already 4million fled the country, take out the children and the elderly, you are left with like 15million able. But from those... 80% oppose Maduro, you are down to 3million. Of those at least 2million are militia, as in, civilians with barely any training, beyond parading and some occasional physical exercises (i will spare you the meme jokes from videos of their activities). The military in Venezuela are no more than 100k, assuming no one would surrender or turn traitor. But don't forget the 80% discontent does include the military, and even among the Maduro supporters, not everyone able is going to pick up a rifle (and might not have access to, anyway) and do violence to risk getting killed...

If you look at Libya, NATO didn't bother with troops on the ground, they mostly just did air support to rebels and mercenaries, and that was conventional human piloted air support. The doctrine of asymmetric warfare was developed for a previous pre-unmanned era, they expect boots on the ground to shoot at... What happens if a sniper shoots where the air space is controlled 24/7 by unmanned aerial vehicles? He is instantly spotted and dealt with. The doctrine is useless against the unmanned aircraft, so what if you can take down a few, more will come. But each of your casualties is unrecoverable. They can't go guerrilla hiding like in the past, even the half century old guerrillas of Colombia have been defeated and or pacified (because they saw no choice) one by one.

In fact sooner than later even ground operations will be performed by remote controlled automated units, tho i don't think that is available quite yet.

I can talk to you about the "dedicated efforts" the US tried to destabilize Venezuela, under Chavez they got close but failed, but you already know that...

No, under Maduro it wasn't the US, it was Maduro himself. Maduro inherited tremendous international support and money, all done by Chavez, he burned it all, not just the money, but the trust. Even Russia is now showing signs of distancing away, but that was expected given the little involvement with Venezuela, beyond the occasional parade of the same two old bomber planes or the rare visit of their military ships. Now that i remember China once sent a hospital ship as well, not sure if its still here, it was technically a military vessel performing a humanitarian mission (red cross etc).

Now other countries are sending humanitarian aid as well, but Maduro's response is this:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DyzFU4GWwAEKOET.jpg (https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DyzFU4GWwAEKOET.jpg)

What do you think should/will happen next?

Do not be mistaken, the vast majority of the people from Venezuela want Maduro and his lackeys gone. You can argue he didn't do "true" socialism if you want (Guidó's party is technically socialist, it belongs to the international socialist) but that doesn't change the sentiment against Maduro, he built that upon himself thru his own actions and some of his close people. Mind you, there is a significant former Chavez supporters, including ex-ministers and party members, who are against Maduro and are even supporting Guaidó. Rafael Ramirez has publicly stated he wants to run for elections to "restore" the project Chavez left.

I do not support them nor socialism, especially any system that involves "controlling" the economy, that doesn't work, and never will. Despite the problems, the poor live much better in a free market economy than in a socialist (controlled) economy. "Free things" involve a cost too high to pay in the end: The misery of everyone but those select elite few that manage to stay close to the ruler or his close circle...

I'm sure you are right.  Let's "get 'er done!"^(tm)  What are we waiting for?

---

As for 'fully automated fighting units', we'll know they are ready when we see them on mainstreet USA.  It will be a little less clear who is at the controls, but we can make a pretty good educated guess about who it will be even now.

I'll project that we won't actually 'see' these 'fully automated fighting units' in the manner which most people anticipate, but we will 'feel' them.  5G FTW!

In other news: Venezuela's inflation has reached 2,688,670% per year (http://caraotalibre.cf/economia/inflacion-interanual-del-primer-mes-de-2019-se-ubico-en-2-688-670/).

This year alone (1 month), inflation went up to 191%. But since January 2018, its up the aforementioned 2million+
So what last year (Jan 2018) 1 VEF could buy, today you'd need 2,688,670 VEF (27 VES) to buy the same.

The USD is back up to 3,000 VES, so you can imagine what could be bought with 27 VES (1¢?): nothing. The min monthly wage in Venezuela is 18,000 VES, so, 6$. The average monthly wage for a full time job is not far from that 10$ at best...

Reminder: The regime removed 5 zeroes from the currency last September.

Also: The first cargo of UN's humanitarian aid successfully landed by plane from Puerto Rico. (https://twitter.com/josefco27/status/1093371831837437953)
We are waiting to see what the military will do to the cargo coming from Colombia, what the "defending containers" intend to stop...

Did you know in Venezuelan banks you are not allowed to withdraw more than 2,000 VES in cash per day? And most banks only allow 1,000, not even 33¢ in USD...

Also wire transfers exceeding the equivalent of 100 USD can be frozen pending investigation on possible "criminal activity"...

LOL!  U.S. fakenews media busted staging more propaganda.  Again.

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qs_9eHeHPJM (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qs_9eHeHPJM)

With all of the tax dollars I pay to generate this fake news they cannot get script writers who can figure out the difference between 'FAN' and 'FANB'!?!  I think I'm being cheated!

Edit:  I might add that it's pretty sad, and telling, that these frauds cannot even get two Venezuelan military troops to defect and hand over a couple of modern uniforms.  Oh well.

That's just the older camo uniform before Chavez changed it to simple olive green and added the B at the end. Same reason the opposition likes to use the older flag with 7 stars instead of 8. It means nothing, you can still hire actors wearing the proper uniforms. It doesn't mean there is not discontent within the military, but getting on any media attention is suicidal and they would rather keep appearances until the very last moment...

Maduro has imprisoned hundreds of military personnel remotely "suspected" of not being loyal, on a basis not unlike that of the Spanish inquisition...

You didn't hear about this?

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/08/world/americas/venezuela-sanctions-maduro.html

The sanctions are against Venezuela's state run oil company, which produces 90% of the country's revenue.

I find it meaningful.  I mean, sure, you can hire actors and give them proper uniforms, but how to you do an interview with legitimate 'defectors' who are wearing fake uniforms?

Busted.  How anyone can believe anything these mainstream ass-clowns pump out is beyond me.

Oh, BTW, I took the liberty of restoring the link that you snipped out.  Didn't like that one, eh?  We see you, buddy.  You are not the first one on this board to pull just such a stunt.

2019, not 2004... As i explained the cash flow went to PDVSA, which in turn goes to Maduro. This has stopped, and CITGO's earnings are now being given to Guaidó directly, instead of PDVSA. Once PDVSA is taken away from Maduro as well, the money will flow back in.

The people are not suffering a thing from it, only Maduro and his people do. He had made PDVSA and the gov. bankrupt anyway, and has been fulfilling debt with pure non existent money, which is the main cause of inflation, like i said, they literally just add zeroes to their accounts and pay wages with that. They don't even bother printing more banknotes... We were forced (like everything socialism does) into a cashless society.

The gov was already bankrupt by 2015 which is when Maduro started his heavy "induced" inflation by making money out of thin air, simply because the State is bloated and corrupt, and doing the sensible thing (reduce expenditure) would make them lose face with their socialist friends abroad...

Maduro was waiting for the US to cut the cash flow for some years now, so its not like they weren't ready. Its not just Russia, but China is happily buying what little production still goes on (down to 1/3rd of what used to be two decades ago).

The entire world is closing in freezing accounts and assets of anything related to Maduro and his close people, NOT Venezuela. Already 60+ countries have given support to Guaidó, not even 20 sided with Maduro. Those who don't recognize Maduro have to act accordingly and that is what is going on.

The push will come to an end soon. Guaidó has popular support even with former chavistas and still growing, while Maduro is finished.

What Venezuela is experiencing is what i fear my county Nigeria might experience in few years coming. the similarities between the two county is too much both has oil as their major export, ruled by ditactors who calls them self democratic presidents, also the economy and currencies of both country is dying. I feel the pains of Venezuelans and can only hope they recover. Hoping my country kearns one or two lesson from Venezuela situation.

If your ruler starts thinking he (and his people) can control the economy instead of letting the free market do it... then you will come to this disaster. Not unlike Zimbabwe with Mugabe...

Venezuela's current crisis is 80% Maduro's fault.

Easy solution:

Make sure you tolerate a leader who is a western puppet and who will protect the rights of foreign multinationals to pocket the wealth generated by the resources of your country.

Remember that these multinationals are favorable to a society where most native-born live in abject poverty with no hope of elevating themselves and thus having a say in how the country is run.  If the peeps have any power at all and any left over energy after dealing with the internal problems injected into the country, then their profits are at risk.  Not good.

From time to time your nation may be required to help create problems in other nearby countries, or support other groups who've been so tasked.  Like Columbia and Brazil are at this moment.  Do it.

Our 'enlightened' people here in the West have figured out what your population count should be what types of diseases your people need to have.  When the WHO, UNICEF, Bill Gates, etc come around with the needle, offer up your children without a fuss.  Your puppet-leader and his cronies will be helping with these projects.  The peeps just need to comply without question.

In a way you guys in impoverished 'developing' countries are lucky.  Since you don't have any money to buy overpriced drugs there is no point in making it so that most of your population is on expensive prescription drugs like here in the U.S..

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/IBYs1NWOp1Q/hqdefault.jpg
FULL SPEECH: President Trump Addresses Crisis In Venezuela (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBYs1NWOp1Q)

Hopefully the situation will come to an end soon, there are good chances this will finally be resolved pacifically. All the military need to do is disobey Maduro and let the humanitarian aid in, recognize Guaidó as president Interim and let the presidential elections occur. Bonus points if they detain the usurper and his close associates.

Only then will the Venezuelan people finally be able to breath, after years of asphyxiating socialist economy a return to a free market economy will end the shortages, next is ending the rampant crime.

Today there is an International Music Benefit concert for Venezuela:

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/VCMznkolBWo/hqdefault.jpg (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCMznkolBWo)

All this humanitarian Aid is already piling at the borders waiting to get in. Maduro doesn't want it, but the people of Venezuela do, and they have been going to the border to persuade the military blockade and let the aid go in.

More information on this page: https://www.venezuelaaidlive.com/

The concert is being streamed live here:

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/J55O252e72k/hqdefault_live.jpg (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J55O252e72k)

February 23 is the date set for the humanitarian aid to be delivered, but today 22 this concert will be held in neighbor Cucuta, Colombia, right next to the border with Venezuela.

President Guaidó is traveling by car to the border to officially receive the aid, he has already been blocked multiple times but so far has been able to go thru, thanks to the support of several people on the way confronting the military with orders from Maduro to stop him.

Max Blumenthal doing real reporting on-the-ground in Venezuela:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqAEnV2pr_M (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqAEnV2pr_M)

Those poor poor zoo animals!  Even I bought that one back a few years ago.

This person did not notice two important things in his "supermarket tour": Few people next to him.
Because: prices. People earn the equivalent 8 USD dolars a month and the goods on his camera almost all are above that price.
Also: Venezuela is not Caracas, Caracas has spots that look like an oasis, but only if you have foreign currency with you...

As for the zoo, it is true, some animals where slaughtered and eaten, others died due to sickness from almost zero maintenance in the zoopark.
The sign he is making a crap joke about is not against Maduro, but a donation campaign for children in need...
Take this socialist all his money and make him live here and see if he likes it for real...

The capitalists did this? Oh really? Maduro did not print money?, did not fixate prices of things? Of course the economy is a capitalist lie, according to socialists. Socialism works perfectly inside their minds, so its impossible for it to fail in real life... And yet it always does.

His comments about "Colombians taking away the money" reveal his obscene ignorance. Go back to America and claim how capitalism is the cause of Venezuela's misery, not socialism. Because it was capitalists, not socialists who have been in power the last 20 years...

"Real reporting"? Take his ass to a poor neighborhood atop one of Caracas slums, but not for a few hours, make him live there without any money, have him taste what socialism is all about...

In Venezuela, the revolution has been rattling for almost a month now, despite the multimillion-dollar riots of citizens and the appointment of a new provisional government. Maduro stubbornly clings to power. All this is accompanied by a humanitarian catastrophe, the population is completely impoverished and on the verge of starvation, and the dictator is blocking supplies of humanitarian aid to the country. The vast majority of military Venezuela still maintain neutrality, not supporting any of the parties, but it will not last that long. The pressure on the Venezuelan military is increasing as it approaches February 23, when a massive supply of humanitarian aid to the country is scheduled. Even presidents from a number of Latin American states are ready to come to the border of Colombia and Venezuela to monitor and control the process. Yesterday Trump turned to the Venezuelan army and demanded that she not interfere with the movement of the convoys with help. At the same time, there are constantly reports of negotiations with the highest command of the Venezuelan army. Also on February 23, aid from Russia should arrive in the amount of 300 tons, but this is a drop in the ocean. British billionaire Richard Branson organized the concert of the famous Bob Geldof. The collected money is planned to spend on humanitarian assistance to the people of Venezuela. The main question is what will happen on February 23. If, nevertheless, humanitarian aid starts to come in, then how exactly the Venezuelan army will behave - this is the main uncertainty. Formally, she will have to execute Maduro's orders, but will she? And if so, how will the neighbors of Venezuela behave?

Your team is currently losing, and a transparent propaganda ploy by a few spirit-cooking weirdo billionaires are not probably going to turn it around.  Try harder.

Edit:

Scanned around in the livestream of the 'concert' a bit.  The verifiable live human contingent of the crowd looks like it could have been brought in in 8 or 10 tour buses.

Occasionally there would be a 1 second shot of a bigger crowd, and it looked phony AF to me.  Especially one with the live crowd in front and a mass of people in the distant background.  If it's not been snipped, you'd recognize it by there being a couple of tent structures.  I really only saw that one once in my scans.

There were lots and lots of shots of looking over a small-ish number of real live people at the stage.  The camera-man (if not a drone) is able to walk smoothly and easily laterally over and over again.  Either that is the extent of the participants, or there is some sort of a roped off path for the camera to work.  Given that the concert is (supposedly) way out in bum-fuck Columbia, I'd expect the former.  Whatever the case, not one time did the camera-man turn his camera around to capture the sea of people who are supposed to be behind him.

This thing stinks to high heaven.  If Geldof and Brandson are there, they must be out getting their young-blood transfusions or something since I didn't see them.  Of course I didn't watch a whole lot, and wouldn't really recognize them anyway.

It will be interesting to see what more skilled 'truthers' make of this (proposed) charade.

I'm Venezuelan, and this concert you're talking about is a window to hope.

You can not cover the sun with a finger, and the genocidal socialist influence is the worst of all political currents, I do not wish any country to fall into disgrace Socialist or Communist, which for me is the same, it is always good to live Free, the adoption of bitcoin in Venezuela is great, although the majority of Venezuelans do not handle very well the concepts of Blockchain and technology associated with it, many survive thanks to the fact that they risk trading, participate in some projects and what they earn is much higher than what they can earn on a salary with a normal job, the inflation that everyone talks is 1,000,000%, is exorbitant, has no explanation as a country continues to hold on to its nails while a handful steals everything , but the Real Inflation figure is more than 2,000,000% ... That is the reality of all this, for that reason Bitcoin and this technology represent an economy that escapes from the usual, that is the Venezuela of now, that in fact there is a great hope to get out of the nightmare already.

Today two indigenous people were killed for protesting against Maduro's refusal to let humanitarian aid in.

Team? This is a game for you "socialists" living in wealthy capitalist nations, playing with people's lives and laughing at the misery of others. But why you didn't come to live your utopian dream? Without any money of course, let the socialist state employ you and see if you like it...

How about you go to a hospital here? Surely the socialist system is superior? heh, hypocrites.

Don't worry, you'll get free gasoline, while it lasts. Food and medicine is overrated, and weapons of imperialist domination...

Dude, I'm not a Socialist and don't want to be.  Especially under the current definition.  I don't know much about Maduro but most of the people I trust claim he's a scumbag.  No reason to doubt it.  I did like Chavez because he was a nationalist with balls.

In fact a country which is rich in natural resources (Norway, Venezuela, etc) probably _could_ make socialism work fairly well for the peeps even with the corruption and inefficiency with the system inevitably degrades into.  I've a feeling that that, as much as anything, is why the full scale economic war on those poor people.

Anyone can see that Guido (or whatever his name is) is a puppet who only cares about giving all of Venezuela's resources to his globalist masters.  No way life is going to be ultimately better for the people of Venezuela under such a system.  They've 'been there, done that.'  That's why you guys don't get any support in the country and why Maduro won the election handily.

As for 'humanitarian aid', it's inevitably weapons and things which go boom when the CIA runs it.  It's happened again and again.  If you want to get food to the 'starving people' of Venezuela, give it to the Russians to deliver to Maduro, or someone who he (and the people of the nation) trust a little bit.  But of course you know that Abrams and his ilk don't give two fucks about starving South Americans or anyone else.   They just want the oil.  It's a joke and a charade, and everyone knows it.

As for the two 'indigenous' people [love your appropriation of the eco-scammer globalists shtick BTW], it might be justifiable to go 'full Duterte' on their asses.  Anyone 'helping' the boarder aid fraud game is obviously an operative trying to destabilize the country even more...or is to stupid to live.

Venezuela crisis: Border clashes as aid row intensifies (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-47329806)

All I need to see is the '.bbc.' or '.time.' part of a URL to be able to reliably predict the kind of propaganda I'd fine in back of a link.  Globalist tripe is a waste of time...unless one is studying the elements of modern state department propaganda after the smith-mundt 'modernization' act timeframe.

There aren't many countries this side of Yemen, Syria, or NK where it's actually worse than now in Venezuela... so yes, there is a good chance that without Maduro it would be better. Of course when you think that humanitarian aid for starving population is fraud then you can justify just about anything.

I'll reserve judgement on that until AFTER the attack by the BIS-based central banking cartel is over.  Especially after seeing the fully stocked store in Caracas which Max Blumenthal visited (link above.)

Seems fairly obvious to me that there is plenty of food, at least in some places.  Toothpaste also.  The problem is mostly that money doesn't work, and it's equally obvious that that is the attack vector being used against these people.  Hopefully they can make something work with crypto.

When things are scarce, its because the prices are fixed AND the officials are doing their "job". I live here, you don't. We had periods where it was indeed impossible to find things like toothpaste or toilet paper and many other things like car batteries or lamp bulbs.

Prices of many things are "still fixed", but business simply disregard the socialist rules. From time to time Maduro orders officials to imprison managers who disobey the "fair price law", and during those times things would disappear for months again, only to re-appear in the "black market" at outrageous prices.

When things reappear (such as right now) the officials are not doing their job, are being bribed, or are tired. There are still shortages, more or less rotational. Sometimes its cooking oil, sometimes its mayo, sometimes its soap. More and more things are reappearing, all imported, things that used to be manufactured in Venezuela for much cheaper prices, but that was before socialism destroyed the economy and made them go bankrupt, or in some cases gave the ownership to workers who in turn made them go bankrupt (they had no choice, the socialist imposed them ridiculously low prices for their products to remain profitable no matter who owned "the means of production" anyway).

In health the situation is much much worse. I have acquaintances that left the country, remaining here would mean dead to them. Several diabetes patients are unable to take their medicine, people go blind and have all the nasty effects and short life someone untreated goes. Same with all diseases, basically there is no treatment (or healthcare for that matter).

Its "illegal" to send food or medicine, but this has been occurring on a massive scale. Either by bribing customs or smuggling. There is also a small group of importers tied to Maduro, they get permits and subsidized dollars. Only when the socialist "controls" fail or dwindle, things reappear (in the market), but because the "rules" are still there, and the market remains intervened, there are heavy disruptions both in price and availability and they happen at random. Don't count that you will find toilet paper (at any price) in that place every day, you won't.

It is not a matter of "the coin failing", The coin was destroyed by Maduro, some think intentionally. Because Lenin once said: "Destroy the money to destroy capitalists". The inflation of the coin is 80% Maduro's policies. He spends too much, and then the money was gone, he ordered to print more, taxing the entire population and destroying the REAL wage.

In 2009 an average wage was 250 USD, and now is 8 USD. The socialists ironically reduced the wages, and at the same time destroyed the economy by forbidding everything attempting to "control" the marker and provoking much worse side effects.

At the same time... The destruction of the economy damaged all public services, such as health and education, but actually everything, water, electricity, police, everything including the military have serious maintenance problems and even lack of personnel, due to people quitting and many leaving the country.

The "Fully stocked store" means nothing when only a few can actually buy the things there. The hypocrite in the video paid with USD, paying with physical currency is a privilege few Venezuelans can do, even the banknotes become scarce from time to time, debit card is what the majority of Venezuelans use.

Also nobody explained the ignorant American many things in that shop have weird names BECAUSE it what some suppliers managed to evade the "price law". Why camomile scented? Because the price fixed the normal variant. Why is the shampoo not called shampoo but "hair pre treatment"? Why is the milk labelled "reconstituted lactic liquid" or some other weird euphemism? Because it was the only way they could keep producing and selling it at market price. Anything that survived socialism and still exists and works, does it because it managed to evade the socialist rules one way or the other.

All that food can be seized by the people thus solving the problem? Is that what your socialist mind thinks? Do you think that hasn't been tried here? And what where the results? They have sacked those supermarkets before, you get 6 hour lines for a few days, then the place remains closed and empty for months, some never reopen. Even the socialists currently usurping power eventually stopped doing that as it provoked much more unrest later. Tho they still do it from time to time, at random, or when Maduro feels like so.

In socialism there is no rule of law, only the rule of the executive branch which is usually a small elite group on the top.

These descriptions don't match anything in your theories but its what your theories always produce. Because you haven't had a chance to try and live with them, you keep defending it. If you had won over there and made America bankrupt, you would understand my position. But you still "believe" in socialism, because it has to be an act of faith since all evidence shows it results in far much worse living conditions, corruption and its worse for everyone, ESPECIALLY the poor.

But you don't know what really means, or pass months without eating an ounce of meat or cheese, due to socialist results on the economy. All you do is preach from your ivory tower, your paradise of wealth and overabundance, and overall, your freedom.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/pK_CgcHrgNA/hqdefault.jpg
The Economic Policies that Ruined Venezuela (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK_CgcHrgNA)

I've heard that the false flag (Western-backed mercenaries shooting people and blaming it on Maduro...probably 'indigenous people' in the propaganda) is scheduled for tomorrow.  This to justify an invasion of course.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKnJHqOpQG8

I used to think that we (the US) would not be allowed by our masters to waste our blood and treasure in S. America before Iran was done thus more-or-less completing the 'Greater Israel project.'

More and more I'm warming to the hypothesis that Israel, Russia, and Iran are already on the same team and are gas-lighting us with all the we-are-enemies crap.  In that case we Americans could be free to burn out in S. America which will help the collapse of the U.S..  The U.S. has no place in the 'new* world order' other than as a natural resource pool.  Just got to get rid of those pesky Americans.

'new' as in 1581

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Paolo_Ciuccarelli/publication/250917123/figure/fig2/AS:298166499987458@1448099842019/Buenting-clover-leaf-map-A-woodcut-made-in-1581-in-Magdeburg.png

https://i.ibb.co/vjYzYXh/image.png
Venezuela soldiers abandon posts at Colombia border (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-47343918)


Several people wounded, by shotgun grapeshot or tear gas cans shot horizontally (they have killed demonstrators that way before).
At least 4 dead near the border with Brazil, all demonstrators demanding opening of the borders for to let the humanitarian aid.

Most but not all humanitarian aid was blocked, burned or stolen. Also there have been several desertions, thankfully.

There are several demonstrations nationwide... As usual, unarmed civilians had to face armed police, armed military, or armed irregulars...
So far at least 14 dead and several hundred wounded, in the various border cross-points and within nearby cities.


Maduro’s opponents brave tear gas in push to deliver aid (https://www.apnews.com/69e2d13d63b9467caf3906cc3c77699d)

https://i.ibb.co/Vjn6d96/image.png

With so much media manipulation, it's really hard to understand the situation.
Too many bin interests on the table.

I live half an hour from the border with Colombia, the situation was very unfortunate and full of impotence as they have burned humanitarian aid full of food and medicines.

Now we are in the hands of what the International Organizations can decide, both the Lima Group, the UN, where it is not understood, how a group that does not exceed 20 people manage to manipulate these prestigious organizations, even so, with the support of more of 50 Countries.

We have reached such a critical moment that dialogue will never allow us to reach a consensus where there is a solution to economic and humanitarian disaster.

Today in this State Wrestle, State Táchira the government cut off the supply of gasoline, only the military is granted, the State is taken on its border next to Prisoners and National Guards with Arms, where the last confrontation violated the sovereignty of Colombia , throwing tear gas bombs at La Parada (Cúcuta, Colombia).

This is interpreted as guera, in my opinion ... However in the South of the country they have massacred Pemones (Indigenous Group) that still remain.

The economic disaster of the country I do not see a clear solution, because in the traditional economy, has never taken into account an inflation that reaches figures close to 3,000,000% inflation.

Those of us who know about BITCOIN, and Cryptocurrencies see an outlet trading with this type of Free Economy, but the rest, they have left: leaving the country, many die of hunger, children die of hunger, old people die of hunger and if not it's like that, they die due to lack of medicines ...

I think that this climate, or that which is lived in Venezuela, is worse than a nightmare, because a country with reserves of oil, gold, precious stones, are being taken by a group of tyrants.

Honestly the picture is not very encouraging, because I think that at this moment they are deciding that the way of dialogue is the best, which is totally wrong.

According to the footage mentioned by the other thread, the trucks burnt on Columbia soil and the fires were started by Molotov cocktails thrown from the direction of interior Columbia.

I would not say it was Colombians doing the throwing because there are a lot of different parties operating in Columbia at the moment.  And in Venezuela for that matter.

In short, the event matches well with what a lot of us were expecting.  Namely a false-flag event, or at least a generalized kerfuffle at the border staged to justify an invasion.  It's standard operating procedure in 'regime change' operations.

Richard Branson is a treasonous Blairite, and a friend of Obama. He is opposed to Brexit, and a supporter of the regime changes demanded by the globalists. You know that if he is supporting the George Washington University trained Guaido, then his suggestions will be far worse for Venezuela than the current situation under Maduro. The sanctions by the US are the major cause of the current problems, but things haven't been helped by the mismanagement of Maduro.

The US needs to remove sanctions, and stop trying to steal Venezuelan oil and gold. That would give the Venezuelan people a chance to rebuild their country, especially if they were able to elect a new leader who wasn't a globalist puppet. It would also help if the mainstream media stopped lying about political events.

What a bull of crap. Hundreds of thousands were watching the streamings live from several different media broadcasts and was clearly as I wrote:

4 Trucks started moving, all 4 entered Venezuela (it starts from the middle of the bridge, in case you also are ignorant about borders), after the first one started exiting the bridge, it was ambushed. "Police" and irregulars shot not caring there were 50 unarmed civilian (including women and children) on the truck, they fled back to Colombia, many wounded. At first they tried stealing the first truck that was left there but couldn't, then they set it on fire. Since that blocked the trucks behind they tried to set the others on fire as well, people defended using rocks making them flee back, but at least two caught fire, and the engine of the third. Part of the cargo from a 3rd one was hurriedly salvaged by the people there while under fire from "police" and the irregulars. the fourth truck was able to return.

In short: They ambushed, shot at innocent civilians, then burned the trucks carrying food and medicine, which is a severe crime under international law. Oh and when the civilians fled back into Colombia, they kept shooting towards Colombia. There are SEVERAL videos showing the aggression against Colombian soil, even Colombian Police is seen running away and taking cover. They don't just shoot cans (which can kill you when aimed horizontally at you, something which is forbidden by international law), they also replace the "rubber" shotgun pellets with glass marbles or nails, this has been Maduro's repression policy for the past 5 years. That is exactly how hundreds were killed just in the last few years, they simply took to the border the exact same thing they did to unarmed civilians in Caracas and other cities protesting the miserable conditions of life brought by socialism.

Those "irregular" (sometimes called "colectivos") is basically a militia of sorts. It is rumored they even use convicted prisoners in exchange of reducing their sentence. Those irregulars from Maduro were caught in the act of making the molotov bombs, and in fact one was captured and brought back to Colombian soil.

Here another "Lie". Maduro was getting interviewed, and it was shown "a lie", because if this insulted, he stopped the interview and left. Nothing wrong with that, except... He ordered the journalists detained, taken their belongings (and footage) and given a house arrest at an hotel then expelled.

In YOUR country you can say the things you want (except death threats) to your President, and you won't even get detained for that. But when socialists get in power they act worse than a monarch...

Univision's Jorge Ramos detained in Venezuela after Maduro interview, network says (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/25/jorge-ramos-univision-detained-venezuela-maduro-interview)

And here you can clearly see the difference between freedom and tyranny. Trump dismisses him while Maduro puts him under arrest and expels him.

Do you know what would have happened if they were Venezuelans journalists? (yes it has happened before). Of course you don't, for you everything is a "lie" because you don't live here and you haven't been into socialist hell. If they were Venezuelans they would be imprisoned by now, without anyone knowing, no lawyers or family, nothing, zero due process. Maybe in a year or two they get a mock up "trial" as an excuse to keep them imprisoned 5 or 10 more years. And wait until you learn the truth of Venezuelan prisons... They are hell on earth. Venezuela has thousands of political prisoners because socialism makes a crime to think something different. You instead, in your freedom capitalist country are allowed to poison people with socialist ideas...

Of course you'll never learn the truth and never care about the suffering of the Venezuelan people. To you defending your sacrosanct ideology comes first, and Maduro is "socialist" therefore your friend, while everyone else is a capitalist pig therefore your enemy. Because this is the materialistic garbage Marxists teach everyone, that a conflict is inevitable and only thru it would the "workers class liberate themselves"...

Media lie? I'm tired of watching people searching for food from the garbage. I could even set up a live stream if that wouldn't endanger myself. Socialism brought the worst living conditions in the history of this country, and has done the same anywhere else it was tried.

Capitalism creates wealth, socialism destroys it.

Lol.  This is exactly both anticipated and believed I saw about Branson's fake-ass concert:

  https://www.moonofalabama.org/2019/02/venezuela-no-more-than-20000-people-came-to-bransons-concert-stunt.html (https://www.moonofalabama.org/2019/02/venezuela-no-more-than-20000-people-came-to-bransons-concert-stunt.html)

For a few more chuckles, WaPo tries to cover up their own fake new:

  https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-02-24/wapo-secretly-deletes-bransons-venezuela-concert-article-after-fake-attendance (https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-02-24/wapo-secretly-deletes-bransons-venezuela-concert-article-after-fake-attendance)

More and more, people are not wising to this kind of propaganda.

---

This stuff, and what Max Blumenthal saw when he went to street markets in Caracas instead of a gocery store, I saw here:

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_q8acIRXLU8 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_q8acIRXLU8)

Spoiler:  Max found plenty of toothpaste.  Enough to make me a little suspicious to be honest.  The TLAV piece also has info on the Colombian Molotov cocktails which caught the trucks on fire.

BTW, is the 777 guy saying that the truck loaded with women and children when they were sent across the boarder?  I actually would not put that past the propagandists, but I didn't see video documentary evidence of it.

I'm more worried that this would turn into a proxy war with China. China is eyeing the country as an additional source of oil and has already done deals with Maduro.

I gather Venezuela has a large supply of food, but the people can't afford to buy it because of US sanctions. The US needs to remove the sanctions so that people can start working again, and they should return the money they seized when Maduro tried to buy dialysis machines and other health aid, which the US blocked.

and why doesn't the US send aid to the Yemen if they are so keen on humanitarian aid?

The mistaken made by US government does not make the decisions of Maduro right. The two leaders may be wrong in many decisions. But it is difficult to debate or defend a regime that is doing everything they can to expel from the country who thinks differently.

It is not just American sanctions that are isolating Venezuela.

---

It is important to emphasize once again that since January, Brazil has a government that is radically against Maduro's government.

This war for information passed by the press is the last resource of the government. There is no other possibility for this government to stand. It is a dispute over narratives. But how to believe in a version that prohibits videos that are not positive?

People can't buy it because the socialists in power destroyed the economy, when they ran out of money over corruption and overspending they just "printed" more and that is that. Whatever you say is nothing more than lies.


RIGHT NOW there is no toothpaste shortage in Caracas, its simply all imported, and very expensive. Socialists destroyed the economy, and with it the national production of toothpaste, which used to be made in Venezuela, but not anymore.

And guess what, they don't take our fiat in other countries, because socialism forbids free exchange of it. So international price, at black market, plus the profit of the merchant. Direct result of a socialist policy: There is less of everything and more expensive.

As i explained before, toothpaste and other things reappear when people circumvent the socialist law, specifically the one that fixates the prices.

Food is the same, un-buyable for the masses, plenty for the few rich, usually tied to the usurper government, and the occasional foreigner who instantly becomes rich due to the magic of hyperinflation.

Of course you didn't watch the live streams, because the truth would shatter your anti Venezuelans propaganda. Here is a picture of one of the trucks before it entered the bridge:
https://i.ibb.co/sjLjP4Z/image.png (https://i.ibb.co/sjLjP4Z/image.png)

And after:
https://i.ibb.co/6r9LH9z/image.png (https://i.ibb.co/6r9LH9z/image.png) https://i.ibb.co/LN0sYJg/image.png (https://i.ibb.co/LN0sYJg/image.png)

That's only the tip of the iceberg. Maduro and his cronies are involved in criminal acts against humanity even before he ordered the burning of the food and medicine trucks. If they survive the transition, they will spend the rest of their lives in prison, and they know it.

Also internet is heavily censored in Venezuela, and cable companies (including Direct TV) had to take down several channels that day or else...

Every bit of footage I've seen shows exactly what I expected.  Laughable fake-ass stuff just like the 'white helmets' stage-craft in Syria or the 7' tall mooslims beheading white people.

I have to think that this fake-ee state department stuff has to be so obviously fake that it makes it clear to every person in the corporate media that it is a government authorized propaganda effort and they have to play along if they want to keep their jobs.  You cannot send a memo around since it would be leaked, but you can arrange things such that anyone in the media has no excuse not to recognize the propaganda since it is so fake and laughable.

CIA-Backed Goons Set Humanitarian Aid on Fire in Venezuela:

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6EGefs9_mo (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6EGefs9_mo)

These CIA-backed goons have been asked politely by the International Red Cross to please stop wearing their uniforms when they fire-bomb fake aid trucks as false-flag operations.  That didn't work so the IRC are taking things a to the next level.  I wish them luck.

All of this stuff is documented.  If Fatty Pimpeo does gets U.S. boots on the ground thus giving the brain-dead U.S. peeps a reason learn that that there is a country called Venezuela down there, then they may be interested enough to look into what is going on and they will be stumbling across the frauds being perpetrated as we speak.  That would be my guess anyway.  The more Google and Facebook try to memory-hole the info, the more irrelevant they will become.

They won't, because they have plenty of UAVs to swarm the skies without putting feet on the ground. Libya was air support and the occasional civilian contract, and here there is even a chance Colombia and Brazil would walk in instead. And Colombia is a NATO friend too...

This conflict could end peacefully by a resign of Maduro and Tarek (usurping president and vice-president positions), but they would rather let the people die of sickness and malnutrition than losing power. So it has come to this. After they fall, you will see the network of corruption and scandal surrounding them. Almost all of south American presidents lost their position over Odebrecht scandals, and Venezuela being the country with the most dealings with this Brazilian construction company, nothing occurred. Well you will see all the dirt they were hiding soon...

More and more Americans seem to feel that this 'creative destruction' is so clever and cool.  Especially the growing Christian Zionist movement it seems.  'Creative Destruction' in theory and practice was 'not invented here' and for most of our history our people (if not our leaders) found such things repulsive.  That's one of the reasons the U.S. enjoyed the support it did in times past.  There is no reason that 'creative destruction' could not be implemented in and on the U.S. by the proponents of this philosophy.  I expect that one day it will be.

The foundation of our strength is currently having our name on the world reserve currency.  When that collapses we will have relatively little going for us what with a large majority of our population being on prescription meds and so on.  If the U.S. is filled with the kind of shit-heads that think what we did in Libya was just great then there will be few tears shed for us when we run into trouble.  Actually there will be quite a few high-fives I'll bet, and I honest will not be able to blame those around the world who will be cheering.  Especially the Libyans, Yemenis, and Syrians that didn't get killed by our munitions and our ISIS creations and so on.

If I happen to be overseas when the shit hits the fan it will be the memory of people like Artemis3 (assuming he's even an American) who will help me come to terms with my losses.  That is to say, most of my friends and family.

Venezuelans have taken over an online game called runescape.  They are farming virtual gold and selling it

Interesting.  That's the only reason I've seen since the 8086 CPU was cutting edge to play a video game.

Please comment so out of place ... If that were the case they were not dealing with humanitarian crises or with so many patients in a hospital without medicines. What I do not understand, is how people can be defending the indefensible, usurp the executive positions and think they are going to stay another 6 years? only in his micro brain can such information enter him.

Venezuelans try and get jobs paid in foreign currency, be it online games or anything that provides any amount of money in any currency that is not the Venezuelan bolivar, including bitcoin of course.

This is to survive the current situation. A full time job would pay you the equivalent of 10 USD, so naturally if you get an online job that pays you *anything* above that a month, you take it. Yes, even the menial tasks or ad clicks, or helping google train the AI for the pentagon (https://gizmodo.com/gig-workers-unknowingly-helped-google-and-the-pentagon-1832340422) to classify objects and recognize faces. Yes i have an account in figure eight, (formerly crowdflower) and clearly remember doing a few of those. I didn't mind, it brings food to the table, something socialists don't.

There is also solve captchas for money (pretty much defeating their purpose) and much worse. Some people resort to scams or MLM and ponzis. Most online games don't allow selling of items for real money, but the black market exists, and black market is something socialism makes you a habit of using, their promoters never stop to think of the consequences their destruction of the economy produces in human beings.

The Runescape thing is old, almost as old as that game. Game farming was usually seen as a joke about Chinese inmates, even Venezuelans would joke about it a decade ago. But socialism turned the joke on us, and many started doing it as a means to survive, at least when there are no blackouts or internet service outages, which are sadly very frequent especially outside of Caracas.

Some professionals are able to do freelancing from home, while others just leave the country. Several families have gone separate, mothers working alone in neighbor countries, hiding because they are overstaying, sending money back home for their children to it. It is not a joke i have seen it myself. The socialists have forbidden the sending of money without paying taxes, meaning you are supposed to use their intermediation always. Yes, even bitcoin. Good luck enforcing that, same as their attempt to replace the market with bureaucracy...

Well, it seems that every day political situation in Venezuela becoming worse and more difficult.
It seems that Maduro will not accept free presidential election and will not give up from his political power.
So, either army supports Guaido or America intervenes there, I don't see that any other solution is realistic right now.
It's obvious to me that Venezuela became political playground for the ''big powers'' like America and EU on one side and Russia and China on other side.
Each side wants to protect their political interest and main award is their oil.

Of course not, nobody was expecting Maduro to give up. As i mentioned, if Maduro and Tarek resign, the problem is over. Calling Guaidó "CIA" backed is childish, your government and country officially recognizes Guaidó, and that obviously includes intelligence, but is not like the act as a separate entity doing "evil". All countries have intelligence services, wherever effective or not that's another matter.

Guaidó is actually USA backed, heck, Guaidó is currently backed by:


Maduro is also backed by the intelligence service of Cuba (g2), so what? Are you going to play spy fiction games now? Who cares?

Albeit the "big powers" do have interests in the region, you seem to be ignoring what the actual Venezuelans want. Can you understand becoming hostage (or prisoner) of your own State? That is more or less the situation, 80% want Maduro and his close group gone, but they say no and they have the weapons while civilians don't. Oh and they do with justice, laws and voting whatever they want and nobody can do or say anything about it because... He has the weapons, and civilians don't. And they use the military force like an occupation army against their own people. "In the name of the 'Legacy' (Chávez) and Socialism" anything goes to them. To them, the constitution is no more, the "National Constituent Assembly" is above all...

Even if America doesn't intervene, nothing is going to change the sentiment against Maduro, the only difference is the number of deaths and misery the prolonged usurping or power produces, while at the same time stubbornly denying humanitarian aid that the people DO WANT.

As of today, more than 400 military and police have defected Maduro and fled to Colombia to request asylum. I don't know how many more had fled to Brazil or the other neighbors. In the Santa Elena town near the border with Brazil, more indigenous people have been killed. At least 700 "irregulars" assaulted the airport which was controlled by the indigenous people protesting the killings, these "irregulars" are not police, nor miltary, some witnesses have recognized convicted criminals and several colombians, probably from ELN guerrilla.

Colombia and other Latin American countries should organize a military intervention, not the USA.

Latin America should start making its own interests and this means taking responsabilities

I don't see why _anyone_ 'should organize military intervention' against a country which:

 - has a leadership which was elected fair and square by the population, and

 - is not bothering their neighboring states.

The rest of the 'Latin American' countries have plenty of internal problems that they should be focusing on within their own borders.

Even countries like Saudi Arabia and China who's citizens have no say about who or what their leadership is should not be attacked unless the un-elected leadership is reaching outside of their borders to spread their own brand of anti-human taint on others.  (In both of these cases they happen to be doing so.)  If they keep their stink within their borders then their own people can deal with the problems if they take a mind to.

"Fair and square" according to whom, you? You are not even Venezuelan and have no idea what actually happened to be making that statement. They were blatantly rigged, period. You have every right to demand your politicians to not intervene (and they have every right to ignore you), but you have zero rights to defend the cause of the misery of the Venezuelan people. The moment you move a finger to defend Maduro, you are trampling over millions of lives and you have no morals to make those anti Venezuelans comments. In fact, i demand that you stay out of our matters. YOU are the one intervening. We requested the aid, not you. You don't want to give it? Fine, others will. Maduro is a criminal usurper and has no authority over any matters, he should be taken into custody and trialed for his crimes in the international court along with his close accomplices. But that is not YOUR problem, its OURS, so mind your own problems in your own country before spitting lies about a place you don't belong to.

Me, and the 300 or so international election monitors who said it was amazingly well organized and fair.

  https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/05/29/election-observer-the-majority-have-chosen-the-path-they-want-for-venezuela/ (https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/05/29/election-observer-the-majority-have-chosen-the-path-they-want-for-venezuela/)

Those would be the monitors which the anti-Maduro forces asked the U.N. NOT to send for the election:

  https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-un/venezuela-opposition-asks-u-n-not-to-send-observers-to-may-vote-idUSKCN1GO2J0 (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-un/venezuela-opposition-asks-u-n-not-to-send-observers-to-may-vote-idUSKCN1GO2J0)

It's pretty clear to any thinking and somewhat knowledgeable person, no matter what their feelings about Maduro and his type, what is going on here, and the 'facts' are not on your side of the equation.

If you don't like democracy and think that 'autonomous drones' are the way to impose the oligarchy's will on the people of non-aligned nations, fine.  Lot's of us simply don't feel that way, and further we think people like you are douche-bags.

I am American and want intervention because I hate Trump and he was elected in a questionable manner.  Please liberate me.

https://twitter.com/WHAAsstSecty/status/1103365672040570881

And yet again Maduro imprisons more journalists. Where is the hypocrite Max Blumenthal that doesn't go try inquire about this? See if he likes socialism for what truly is: State oppression.

capitalism is effectively the same, instead of state thugs there are hired and payed thugs, instead of laws that ban the creation of money, there are corrupt media systems that prevent others from establishing themselves as capitalits.

in both systems society is divided by money printing elites and money earning cattle.

in socialism the elites at least pretends to care for others, in capitalism the elite just surpresses and stupidises the others

if you think its different to live under bitcoin billionaires and their central bank and centraly controlled cryptoindex, or in a state with a state official controlled index and financial system you are stupid

there is no difference

both are about the doomed "idiots" that are still selling their time for money

He did not even win the popular vote, but if you are the president of the most powerful country in the world you can do whatever you want like call anyone you want a liar, shutdown the government because you want a stupid wall that not will bring anything useful at all, broke nuclear weapons pacts like we broke a deal for a candy with a boy, and nothings happens.
Now if you are the president of any other country and you don't kiss the boots of US you will be trick to look like you kill your people with hunger and corruption even if almost all presidents of the world have some corruption cases that have been prove at some point and they people are without many problems.

the usa will have soon no more presidents for a long time and will become a headless & communist urban sphere if they have luck

if not they will fall back into the polytheistic tribalism that the usa was during rule of native americans.

Yesterday (and today) we had a nationwide blackout. Years of neglect to do preventive maintenance to the national electric grid has taken its toll. The situation with all State owned companies is pretty much the same. With 5 USD monthly wages at least 50% of the workers have quit in the past two years. At the same time, the socialist government neglects to provide the required parts or foreign currency for them to buy the parts to do the maintenance. Everything is holding with whatever was in place 10 years ago.

This is a key distinction of a socialist economy: There is never money because everything is lost in corruption under the facade of social programs.

The liar usurper immediately blamed the US gov, of course; he would never admit the truth, and ALWAYS blame USA. Funny "imperialist sabotage", a whole night in darkness (24 hrs) but no operations were carried out...

The situation in this country is such, that a mere wind or rain can render the whole country inoperative. Commerce? In a country without physical money thanks to the socialists that intentionally destroyed the fiat to finance their madness? 90% closed.

You always wanted to know what happens to a country that loses physical money but is somehow out of electricity?, Well this is what happens: everything halts.

Socialism made electricity nearly free, like it did with gasoline. Next you know, there is no electricity, and soon there won't be no gasoline, for the same reason: they also neglected the state oil industry and its breaking apart, like everything they touch.

My information is that this event occurred by negligence in the operation of Venezuela's main power source: The electric dam at Guri river, which provides electricity to 80% of the country. While Chávez invested in an extensive backup system using natural gas, all of this was dismantled during Maduro and the money lost.

Power is restored in parts of the country, but apparently the problem is not solved so rationing is expected to occur far more frequently than usual.

https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/images/ic/720x405/p072ykr8.jpg
Venezuela power cuts: Blackouts hit Caracas and spread (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-47492624)
Huge power outage leaves most of Venezuela in darkness (https://edition.cnn.com/2019/03/08/americas/venezuela-blackout-power-intl/)
Venezuela Blackout Plunges Millions Into Darkness (https://www.wsj.com/articles/venezuela-blackout-stretches-across-country-closing-schools-and-businesses-11552053011)
Venezuela: 'country has stopped' as blackout drags into second day (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/08/venezuela-power-outage-maduro-schools-closed)
In Venezuela, massive blackout continues as Maduro blames U.S. for outages (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/venezuelas-devastating-blackout-stretches-into-friday/2019/03/08/10ea8812-4198-11e9-9361-301ffb5bd5e6_story.html)
As Blackout Plunges Venezuela in Darkness, Maduro Blames the U.S. (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/world/americas/venezuela-power-outage-blackout-apagon.html)
Venezuela blackout plunges most of country into darkness (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/venezuela-blackout-plunges-most-country-darkness-n980841)
Blackout In Venezuela Leaves Its Leaders Casting Blame In The Dark (https://www.npr.org/2019/03/08/701448955/blackout-in-venezuela-leaves-its-leaders-casting-blame-in-the-dark)
Venezuela power flickers after worst blackout in decades (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-blackout/venezuela-shuts-schools-suspends-working-day-as-blackout-continues-idUSKCN1QP1AL)
Venezuela blackout: Maduro blames US for power outage (https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/03/venezuela-blackout-maduro-blames-power-outage-190308072119366.html)

The blackout was the operation.  Marco Rubio was accidentally the first person to report on this by tweeting a comprehensive summary just 3 minutes after it began.  
https://twitter.com/marcorubio/status/1103782022537977857

There is no way someone could find out about all of that, fact check it, and then type up the tweet in 3 minutes. He could be a really sloppy co-conspirator or at worst, just a really irresponsible tweeter.   Either way, you shouldn't believe anything he says.

Also this
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_blackout_of_2003
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRp343N5ByR0J95a7B6lv5WxitdovpWrdgetthZL8Xmqpr64DHc-w
I guess Canada's healthcare system caused this blackout.  

It never ceases to amaze me how many times people from former Communist nations and current Socialist collapsing states will tell you Marxism and its child ideologies are a tumor on society, and yet you continue to defend it.

Minutes after writing my previous post internet went out, and later electricity, for nearly 24 hours more. We had another whole night in darkness...

The ineptitude of those usurping power "in the name of socialism" is the only reason this is occurring. Not any "evil" imperialist action. If the US actually engaged their cyber division, it would be combined with something else...

As i have wrote before in other posts, they have have let all State owned companies rot, mostly because of their same failed economic policies.

Someone (http://www.el-nacional.com/noticias/servicios/sistema-electrico-podria-recuperarse-entre-domingo-lunes_274058) related to the State company wrote some numbers:

• Venezuela depends 80% from the single Guri hydroelectric dam (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guri_dam)
• Over 70% of the transformers nationwide are past their due lifetime
• 48% of the workers have quit, and left the country (due to the miserable wages)

There is a LONG transmission line from the south of the country where this dam is to the north where most of the population lives. Chávez himself noted this weakness in 2010 (when a similar blackout incident occurred for a few hours) and spent countless millions purchasing and building a backup system using natural gas, but all of this is gone under Maduro...

Within this transmission line, a critical substation (Malena) near the dam has been neglected any maintenance, the foliage grew up so much it shutdown two 765 kW lines and a third by overload. This is to give you an example of the truth behind "imperialist US attacks", and the kind of trustworthiness Maduro has.

Minutes after writing that post above, lights went out again. It just came back, who knows for how long.

The usurper de-facto gov is hiding facts as usual. Information from a professional from the college of engineers of Venezuela told Union Radio news that Caracas is in fact rationing power, due to lack of energy coming from the dam in the south of the country.

Actual capacity near the city is around 700mw from 3 smaller fuel power plants, but the city is currently demanding 2000mw. Other parts of the country are faring much worse, many places having 72+ hours without electric service.

Yes, this darkness is the direct result of economic socialist policy and socialist thinking and managing of the country. There is no point hiding it.

• 'A city of shadows': fear as Venezuela's crippling blackout enters day four (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/10/venezuela-blackout-day-four-maduro-fear-anger)
• Rotting food and endangered patients: How Venezuelans are faring during continuing nationwide power outages (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/rotting-food-and-endangered-patients-how-venezuelans-are-faring-during-continuing-nationwide-power-outages/2019/03/10/137e14a2-4343-11e9-94ab-d2dda3c0df52_story.html?utm_term=.bead2cb6db49)
• Guaido says will ask Venezuela legislature to respond to blackout (https://www.yahoo.com/news/guaido-maduro-rallies-set-venezuela-struggles-blackout-062726034.html)
• Nerves fray, tempers flare as Venezuela blackout hits fourth day (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics/venezuela-enters-fourth-day-of-blackout-as-maduro-blames-u-s-for-power-outage-idUSKBN1QR0M8)

PS: Because there was a thread split and i was asked to move back the messages, the post time in my previous posts doesn't reflect the actual time when they were made.

If anybody wants to know the most recent status of the petro (though it seems to hardly be relevant any more except for its association with cryptocurrency), chances are high it doesn't actually exist.

Somebody recently uncovered an account with a huge negative balance (https://explorador.petro.gob.ve/address/pSnXVfW3VSehqKcAXUDMRHE7vz87L2Y24w) (equivalent to about $21 million), suggesting it doesn't use a blockchain at all.

https://i.imgur.com/UFNSKfI.png

Too bad for all the Venezuelans that got caught up investing in it, though it couldn't have been very many, and I suspect most investors were run-of-the-mill crypto people, some of them from this forum.

I think Maduro has bigger problems to worry about the moment.

I don't think anybody considers Maduro to be the perfect president, but he is the democratically elected leader, and the elections were supervised by an international committee. The aggressive military actions by Washington are not helping Venezuela or the Venezuelan people. China has been investing heavily, and we know they like to create debt, and then convert this into potential military bases. Obviously Washington doesn't want this, but they aren't using the correct tactics to prevent it. Then there is the issue of publicly stating that they want Venezuelan oil to preserve the oi interests of the Koch brothers, this will help to turn world opinion against America. Very few people seem to realise that Washington and America are effectively different countries now.

Washington should remove sanctions, and try to heal the rift between the US and Venezuela by offering commercial investment and aid. Neither country can afford a war, especially as it will create more suffering in both the US and South America. Once this has been started, then the possibility of installing a new democratically elected government will be created. Washington should have learnt its lesson in Syria - Assad is a much stronger and capable leader, and he has managed to resist the same failed tactics of Washington.

it doesnt matter who runs the venezuela ico, weather maduro nor gordanio or whatever his name is. its still same prinzinple there is someone who prints money and many others who are supposed to be the money earning cattle for it.

Holy shit, you finally admitted China has self interest in this situation, and the real reason why the USA has interest. This is about protecting the US from China, not taking over Venezuela. The US did offer investment, then Chavez nationalized all of it an without the corporations there to manage it, it degraded into what it is today, especially after Maduro. The USA will not tolerate Chinese military presence in South America, and I am not sure it should. It is just too bad you seem to think the USA is more of a threat than Communist China which has literal concentration camps and is run by a dictator for life. One question for you. How free of influence from China do you think the EU and UK will remain if they take down the USA?

got this one today

venezuela becoming uninhabitable

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2019/03/12/venezuela-is-quickly-becoming-uninhabitable/?utm_source=quora&utm_medium=referral#1091e9797a03

since no one wants their oil anyway, we can expect there will be no real solution anytime soon

dont expect any help from bitcoin, or dash if you are in venezuela

Now that my electricity and internet came back (after 40+ hours of MORE blackout) I'll take the chance to say that in the middle of this chaos some people started taking USD bills directly. There is few or no Venezuelan currency in cash available anymore (and you need 7 of the (rare) highest bills to reach 1 USD), commerce basically halted for most people since they don't have USD.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D1OR11FXQAAsuZB.jpg (https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D1OR11FXQAAsuZB.jpg)
https://de6b5cc7c8deb8bhd.woldrwidessl.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/89-12.jpg (https://de6b5cc7c8deb8bhd.woldrwidessl.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/89-12.jpg)
(1 USD for 10 mins charge your smarphone/tablet; 9 USD 1 kg of meat. Note avg monthly wage is 10 USD, NOT paid in USD or cash, but wire transfer to your bank, so most people use debit cards due to physical fiat scarcity, which doesn't work without electricity).

There were some lootings and repression from authorities to people having days without food and water. Water in Caracas stops without electricity, because its source of water is at a lower elevation and the system uses electric pumps...

https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2019/03/11/01/10818938-6793585-image-a-13_1552268300660.jpg (https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2019/03/11/01/10818938-6793585-image-a-13_1552268300660.jpg)
Similar situation occurred across other major cities such as Maracaibo, and Merida, here they looted a State owned bank...
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D1aktkZWoAAYJh-.jpg (https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D1aktkZWoAAYJh-.jpg)
...But they didn't care for the money, just the computers and other valuables.

Since last week we have been several hours without electricity, 70+. After restoring power, many transformers blew up either by lack of maintenance or incompetence and several locations ended in blackout again. This should show you how fragile this country really is, there was no intervention, just apparently a forest fire out of control and people without the expertise to protect and control their own SCADA air-gapped network.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D1WtjFQWsAAdmdA.jpg:large (https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D1WtjFQWsAAdmdA.jpg)
Insinuating that this was an US aggression is stupid at best, but that's your typical socialist rhetoric: Always blame capitalists of everything we are unable to do properly.

Looters take to Venezuela's streets as blackout enters its FIFTH day killing 15 kidney patients as under-pressure president Maduro claims the power cut was caused by an 'imperialist' electromagnetic attack from the US (https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6793585/Venezuelans-turn-looting-Caracas-fourth-day-power-outages.html)

And yes we are expecting even more blackouts, they are rationing while hiding the facts to the people, no one believes them but no one can do anything, that's how it works when they own the guns.

https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2019/03/11/01/10818934-6793585-image-a-17_1552268311471.jpg (https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2019/03/11/01/10818934-6793585-image-a-17_1552268311471.jpg)

Where is that hypocrite Max Blumenthal now?


https://i.ytimg.com/vi/sMN1BlZBKM0/hqdefault.jpg
Venezuela blackout: 'Like living in the apocalypse' - BBC News (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMN1BlZBKM0)

If I were a dictator, I would not cut the power, because that creates chaos and angry people near me.
If I were a country trying to invade other, I would cut the power off to make it weaker.

You know nothing about war.

Maduro didn't personally cut the power with a big-ass circuit breaker. The whole country is falling apart after years of incompetent and corrupt rule.

So, it still can get worse huh? I've been seeing these blackout incidents in my feed recently. How are public hospitals faring?

I mean, I read somewhere that the infrastructure in Venezuela has deteriorated to the point that they don't refine oil anymore. Would suck to not have oil to run generators. Reminds me of my own country's blackout plagues in the early 90s.

@Artemis3 Hope you stay safe. Don't make your house a target for looters.

Does anyone know what happened to the cypto launched by Venezuela?

It is really difficult for "outsiders" to understand the situation in Venezuela. What is certain is that Washington ( not the US ) has a policy of illegal sequestration against Venezuela., and that sanctions have weakened the country. Objective consideration of reports, and manipulated images, lead me to believe that sabotage by Washington, or its agents, was the reason for the electrical outage. The country seems to be split at the moment between the wealthy and the rest of the population, and this makes it difficult to gain an accurate picture of the situation. There are so many vested interests involved that is difficult to see a way forward. I believe that the sanctions should be removed, and the country should be allowed to regain some form of peaceful stability. At that point, it should be possible to allow the people to decide on a government for their future.

The reason for the blackout has been a decade of negligence, the worst started when Maduro took power after Chávez death in 2013. Under Chávez there was corruption, but the influx of money was so big the quality of life was adequate, and not enough people cared. In 2009 Chávez ordered renewing the electric grid and increase generation, so that hydro dam that currently provides 80% of electricity could go completely offline and leave the country powered on. 80,000 million USD and 10 years later, all of this is gone.

Do not bring your infantile accusations against the USA, the CIA did not install Maduro, he and his own people stole everything on their own, no sanctions. President Interim Guaidó is supported by the majority of the people, never forget that. There is no "split" anymore (there was under Chávez), everyone want Maduro gone; poor and what few "rich" might remain that did not make their fortune the last 5 to 15 years thanks to corruption.

Overgrown foliage inside one of the key substations near the dam caught fire, as vegetation in the area periodically do every couple of years or so.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/uPMJMQQt8HE/hqdefault.jpg (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPMJMQQt8HE)

Normally the fault would have been fixed within hours, but "something", probably lack of skill, made the situation worse. Maduro blamed "hackers", until people who previously worked in the dam revealed all operations in the hydro plant are still done using air gapped analog systems designed in the 60ies, leaving their lies exposed. I personally believe there is/was a Scada system for monitoring the transmission line, but not the Guri hydro dam. In any case they made a mess trying to restore things "manually", with most professionals who formerly worked there gone after a complete nationalization done in 2009 joined generation, transmission and delivery nationwide. This used to be separate in three levels, under various companies, some state owned, some private).

There is electricity here right now, but we haven't got any tap water for 8 days since the blackout started. It is much much worse in the countryside, at least in the major cities there is electricity and Internet when it doesn't go out, which is rather frequently. The reason is the same, all State owned companies (all services were nationalized under Chávez) have been neglected and are in terrible shape, and with the miserable wages few want to work in them anyway, and those who still do, are not exactly the best, but simply the most loyal to Maduro specially in managerial positions.

Today another substation had transformers blow up and catch fire in the city of Maracaibo, leaving it without power. No, there are no cia agents or civil contractors doing secret ops, its 50 year old transformers that couldn't take the load or so frequent on/off cycles and power fluctuations.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/MjMByRHY6qs/hqdefault.jpg (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjMByRHY6qs) https://i.ytimg.com/vi/qe2mTh3GkdY/hqdefault.jpg (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qe2mTh3GkdY)

Before that, this substation in Caracas also went in flames for the same reason, they replaced the transformer(s) and restored service a few days later, but portions of the city still go out of power at random, because they are doing "manual load management" an euphemism for rationing without telling anyone in advance, because who cares if people lose their electrical appliances in a country where the average wage is no more than 10 USD a month...

Here is another video of someone explaining Venezuela's situation. Main reason you don't get more in depth quality and prompt explanations, is because this is a Spanish speaking country and good information in English language is scarce and often inaccurate. Also the de-facto government extinguished all opposition media, its mostly on internet alone where dissidents express themselves, and are often detained and incarcerated just like journalists, foreigners and nationals for asking "improper" questions or daring to criticize someone in power. For now Guaidó remains free because there are clear signs Maduro is genuinely scared of the US reaction should he be detained, but until recently anyone like him was put behind bars, like it happened in 2014 to opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez; of Guaidó's political party, which was declared "illegal" by the regime last year among many others before the facade "elections" done against whats written in the constitution, because they installed a supra-legal entity called "National Constituent Assembly" that was declared by themselves above the constitution and is ruling by decree whatever Maduro and his cronies want.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/OUltZmKqfmM/hqdefault.jpg
Venezuela Collapse Explained (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUltZmKqfmM)

I don't think referring to my comments as "infantile" is helpful. We know that Washington is determined to force regime change in many countries, and that Guaido was schooled in the George Washington school for regime change activists. We also have the comments from the Washington politicians who confirm their actions in the name of the US. It is also generally accepted that Maduro has not been the best president for Venezuela. The major factor in all this is that the sanctions by Washington, and their covert actions have made it very difficult for the population of Venezuela.

I've just received a brief message from my fiend in Venezuela, and it seems that she managed to leave the country before the power outage. I'll try to see if I can get some more information from here, although she has had some difficulties in contacting her family.

I don't care where Guaidó was schooled, i don't even like his political party, because they are also socialists, just of a different kind (yes they are in the international, go find it). But given the current situation, ANYONE that frees the economy and puts a stop to crime would do for now; later after some breathing i can think in choosing a proper candidate, probably from the only party close to classic liberalism...

When power goes out everything goes out. Thanks to a socialist (central planned) economy, at some point they also fixated battery prices. Guess what happened next? No batteries, and the few that remained were stolen. Few cell tower have working batteries anymore. I clearly remember years ago still having signal during blackouts, but that is a thing of the past...

If the new gov happens to be friendly with the US, i don't mind. You might think your government is the worst in the world, but it isn't, even with Trump. One reason: you still have food, water, electricity and a place to live, and that says a lot.

I wonder why your friend left this country...

I haven't ever said that Maduro is good. I have said that Venezuela should be given the chance to elect its own government for recovery. Gauido will pillage Venezuela, and will be far worse than Maduro. Just look at the results of previous regime changes orchestrated by Washington. Theresa May is obviously taking orders from the Committee 300 which is based in the City of London. It was founded by Cecil Rhodes, and it is no coincidence that Clinton was a Rhodes scholar at Oxford University.

It is a difficult problem for Venezuela. Maduro has obviously not been good for the people of Venezuela. Washington's control will be far worse, and China will claim land in payment for defaulted debts, and that will probably be used to set up military bases. I don't know what the answer is, but the removal of sanctions and military threats might enable some sort of basic stability to be restored.

He is in the UK as far as I can tell, not in the US, so really he doesn't know as much as he thinks he does about either party here. Artemis called your comments infantile because as you sit enjoying your own comforts telling a man there on the ground living thru this horror, "No your version of reality is incorrect I know what caused the horrible problems in your own country from thousands of miles away as I enjoy this cuppa." Meanwhile he is risking his freedom and possibly his life to tell you what he thinks is going on, but you insist on lecturing to him about his own nation from afar while you enjoy the comforts of a market economy (for now). He called you infantile because you care more about pushing your political ideology than what is actually happening there.

The sanctions were put into place AFTER Chavez nationalized a bunch of private assets. The sanctions resulted DIRECTLY from Socialist policies of snatching up private infrastructure and nationalizing it. Then they mismanaged it and it rotted into disrepair. Do you think countries should be able to just take international assets as they please without consequence? It is not like the president just woke up one day and said "fuck Venezuela", this was done for good reason. Removing sanctions just makes it that much easier for China to slide in and do what they want. You talk about pillaging, wait until China gets control.

Yes, I'm in England, and I'm trying to understand the situation in Venezuela. I'm sure the situation is pretty bad, possibly almost as bad as some cities in the US. I'm not sure how easy it is to understand where Venezuela fits in one the global chessboard that is being played by the committee 300, but I doubt if it is even known within Venezuela. I'm concerned because the Committee is making a major play at the moment, and it affects the US, the UK and Venezuela as well as a large number of other countries. Venezuela is only important because of its mineral wealth, and I am sure you are aware that there are several other countries in a far worse condition, but they are ignored by Washington. You seem to be saying that my opinion that the people of Venezuela should be allowed to determine their own future is not a good idea.

I have a lot of sympathy for the people of Venezuela, but you are correct when you say their plight will have little effect on me. However, if Washington does engineer a war, then that will have a severe impact on the UK, and I think they need to create this war to enable them to bring down the dollar, and the other currencies with unsustainable debts. As usual, the seized assets will go to the City of London, and will not be used for the benefit of the people in any of the countries involved.

There won't be "a war", just a regime change and possibly some isolated violent groups that will need to be taken care of. The Venezuelan military are not going to give their lives for Maduro or any of his corrupt generals...

The duty of the president interim, according to the constitution, is precisely to organize presidential elections so you don't need to worry about that. He might not even run in them for all we know.

PS: Just had another couple of hours of blackout. They are rationing, even after saying on State radio/tv that "everything is 100% fixed"...

Why do you call him the president interim? I thought his 30 days had expired.

Is there anybody who could run for president? Guaido has said he will sell off everything to Washington, and that can't be good for Venezuela. I would have thought that the assets should be used to rebuild your country, and not to feed the globalist war machine.

You are correct to assume Venezuela has great geopolitical importance. However your logic is flawed. The USA is now the #1 energy exporter, elements within the US need not take it over for oil. What does concern them, (and me frankly) is what China will do with their influence there. You seem to disregard the fact that this would give China a military staging ground in the Americas complete with fuel supplies to launch an invasion further North.

Again, I ask you, how free do you think the UK and EU will be if China is able to take out the USA as a counter balancing force? I find it amazing you are willing to attribute all of these motives to "Washington" while totally ignoring the potential devastation of China getting a foothold there as if their intentions are nothing but pure. They pay lots of lip service to national sovereignty, but really they just know this is a useful card to play against people like you with no common sense and a conditioned hatred for the US, hoping you will run into their arms as a knee jerk reaction in a rejection of "Washington's" policies only to find they are worse than "Washington" ever hoped to be.

I hope they find independence, but China's whole game is a system of creating dependence in order to strip natural resources. At least in the USA we are still (mostly) free to criticize such actions when perpetrated by our government. Good luck doing that in China where people's lives are treated as meaningless.

Perhaps "someone" hasn't allowed that part of the constitution to go on? Perhaps someone usurping the power? What do you think? This "someone" and the other guy prosecuted abroad for his relation with a drug cartel must go away and this mechanism activates the exact same way. Guaidó is the President of the National Assembly, elected by popular vote, unlike the usurper in the executive who refuses to leave office and keeps an entire country hostage at gunpoint.

But that time will come, sooner than later.

The roadmap is:

• Cease usurpation
• Transitional government
• Free elections

Those points are nonnegotiable, and must be accomplished in that exact order.

PS: Just had another 20 min blackout...

you cant

understand the situation in venezuela, you will get a similar one in uk soon, once you will be forced to deal with uk foreign trade defizit.

the problem in venezuela is systematic, the solution one large portions of the poplation wont like.

regards

It's quite clear you actually know what's going on, and understand the root and systemic causes for it.

I agree with the non-negotiable policies so that the usurper and the usurpers of power leave. There is a clear connotation, these blackouts could never have originated due to attacks by hackers, it is clear that Venezuela does not have high-tech digitized systems, everything is analog, I say it, because I am an electronic engineer, and I know that in Guri they have very few computers with industrial instrumentation systems, with automation under SCADA, which, in my opinion, is deficient, the best systems for automation and control are PLC and Siemens brand (I have programmed it), the reason is clear, there was no preventive maintenance , or corrective, much less predictive, the money allocated to these procedures was stolen.

Nothing more than the fact of having turned off a whole country for so many hours is a total bad practice generated by the usurping government itself, which occurs when people trained in courses in foreign countries are fired and hire people graduated from universities created by the government, where quality is harmful. That is the reason, in addition, I have many friends who work in Corpoelec and corroborated my hypothesis, they have no excuse or defense whatsoever.

Another national blackout two days this time. Internal information revealed they overloaded the hydro by improper manipulation of this delicate very high voltage system, which they "switched to manual" after claiming a "cyber attack" last week... This time it resulted in transformers catching fire. In case you somehow manage to read their propaganda, they claim "imperialist sabotage", lets ignore the fact the place has been placed under heavy military control even further after the March 7th event...

Of course, they blamed the opposition and the US, because... yeah, who cares, its never their fault... But no one believes them.

Wonder if its also America's fault that the Petro websites are now offline:

https://i.imgur.com/ZaAeZ1L.png

RIP El Petro

I feel bad for these people, they got suckered in to buying paper certificates representing Petro holdings a couple weeks before its death:

https://i.imgur.com/9Kw5Im7.jpg

Completely their fault for centralizing it, since "socialists" don't believe in the freedom of a free market. They say that's how capitalists keep "exploiting the masses", therefore in their infinite wisdom the only solution they can think of from letting people decide for themselves where to work or buy, and for how much; is to "command" the whole thing entirely (planned economy, fixed prices, fixed exchange, etc), since... people can't ever play nice to each other by themselves and have to be, "guided/educated" (coerced) into...

But don't worry, I think that Petro site might come back up, its probably down due to the frequent blackouts. Doesn't mean people will ever see their money back, you can write in the history book of crypto-currencies that even a Goverment made an ICO scam.

To guess their rhetoric, yes, the Petro is site is currently down because USA "attacked" the national electric grid...

Also their lack of skills is not limited to electricity, IT is seriously lacking, most of their systems are outdated, unlicensed and even cracked crapware that any script kiddie can take down at any point (and have done for years), but since corruption is the number one driving force, there was always someone benefiting from dubious sales of both equipment and licenses, at outrageous prices paid by Venezuelan's oil/tax money, and no one can do or say anything about it because... A) They don't care, or B) You are an imperialist for daring pointing an obvious flaw or C) Since you know so much you must be involved therefore go to prison. In this country people can land in prison for posting the wrong tweet, go figure...

Petro came from Dash, but the few nodes that exist belong to the gov, no software code was ever released (infringing their own laws), there are also no wallets beyond the only online wallet in that specific site. So if that site goes down, so does the Petro.

The Venezuelan government has banned Juan Guaido from holding public office for 15 years and now is the biggest crisis there that befell his community


Liputan6.com, Caracas - Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro called on local people to pray for a recovery from the national outages that crippled the country.

In late-night television broadcasts, Maduro claimed the latest power outage was caused by sniper attacks on an important part of Venezuela's energy infrastructure, carried out by mercenaries "foreign military shipments supporting coups", as quoted by The Guardian on Friday (29/3 / 2019).

Of course, they don't care about parliamentary immunity, heck they don't care about the legislative branch at all, they are like: "we do what we want because no one can stop us". Yes, they have done this to almost the entire opposition for the past 5 years, there is no rule of law here, only the rule of "presidential decree".

In other news, yesterday we had the third nationwide blackout in a month... Remember this is a cashless country, thanks to gov induced hyperinflation. No electricity, no purchasing. Oh and most of the water needs electric pumps. Every time electricity goes, it takes about a week for the water to return after power is restored...

The excuses for the blackouts are laughable at best. First one was "cyberattack" (on an analogical system from the 60ies) then they claimed electromagnetic attack (because Maduro can't get it right), the second one was attributed to a fire by saboteurs, and after being laughed and the stupidity of the comments, because all those places are guarded by the military, they came with "sniper attack". Yeah right, a sniper would waste bullets to remote electric installations instead of going after them like real snipers actually do... The third one was yesterday, lets see what excuse they come up with... And yes, the electrical engineers and even workers anonymously leak the real reasons, thats how we get to know the truth, mostly thru internet social media.

Truth is, lack of maintenance to a system that has been neglected for almost two decades. The only reason it lasted this long is thanks to the diligent and excellent work done by those prior to them, but even the best systems have a lifetime and when not replaced promptly, things start falling apart. This is what is happening to the electricity, and its what has been happening to all state controlled companies, which in a "socialist" state, means pretty much all. They have gone to a severe state of disrepair, and things just break and don't get repaired, except the bare minimum and for the areas they consider the most important. The city of Caracas is blessed in that regard, while Maracaibo had weeks without electricity, which prompted looting (remember cashless society, days pass but no one can buy things anymore?)

Here i found a better source of Venezuelan news in english (https://news.sky.com/topic/venezuela-6520):

• Venezuela's opposition leader Juan Guaido vows to fight on despite 15-year ban from public office (https://news.sky.com/story/venezuelas-opposition-leader-juan-guaido-vows-to-fight-on-despite-15-year-ban-from-public-office-11677709)
• Venezuela: Starving children forced to feed off rubbish dumps (https://news.sky.com/story/venezuela-starving-children-forced-to-feed-off-rubbish-dumps-11674179)
• Venezuela: After days of darkness, mob's orgy of violence has left city in shock (https://news.sky.com/story/venezuela-after-days-of-darkness-mobs-orgy-of-violence-has-left-city-in-shock-11670999)
• Venezuela: Plunged into anarchy - A city on edge after frenzied looting (https://news.sky.com/story/venezuela-plunged-into-anarchy-a-city-on-edge-after-frenzied-looting-11670935)
• Venezuelans risk illness as they resort to dirty water (https://news.sky.com/story/venezuelans-risk-illness-as-they-resort-to-dirty-water-11663813)
• Venezuela crisis: Rich and poor both suffer as Venezuela struggles without power (https://news.sky.com/story/venezuela-crisis-rich-and-poor-both-suffer-as-venezuela-struggles-without-power-11661459)
• Venezuela: Power cuts - not power struggle - could see off Nicolas Maduro (https://news.sky.com/story/venezuela-power-cuts-not-power-struggle-could-see-off-nicolas-maduro-11660584)
• Venezuela blames major power cut on US senator Marco Rubio (https://news.sky.com/story/venezuela-blames-major-power-cut-on-us-senator-marco-rubio-11658409)

PS: Posting asap then editing for beautification in case the next power outage hits, they come without warning, Maduro already announced rationing but no one knows when and where or for how long...

To our Venezuelan friends, I think this information may be very helpful in the times to come:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DlnAq5UAqY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10k-DPcLrHU

Hope it helps.

Deutsche Welle documentary:

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/-knTMU1_3C8/hqdefault.jpg

Venezuela: Humanitarian crisis and the fight for power | DW Documentary (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-knTMU1_3C8)

Covers the events during the attempted delivery of humanitarian aid, and the status of Venezuela in general.

only german style nazism or soviet style communism, or saudi arab style wahabis can safe venezuela and pull it out of the misery, the population has to use their lingual skills to cooperate and develop their infrastructure.

foreigners like the americans or the evil rouge state of uk will only try to abuse and scam the venezuelans as money earning cattle to extract ressources, minerals, vegetable, or farm other stuff like meat and fruits thats it.

capitalism will not make venezuelans richer it will only scam and abuse them as money earning cattle by foreigners, but capitalist media will never admit that because its not in there interest to be honest and admit that. they only want the money earning cattle and teach the children in venezuelan schools to earn and prostitute themselves for bitcoin.

I'm glad that the squatters from codepink were kicked out from our embassy in Washington D.C. Anyone willing to break international law to support a tyrant deserves imprisonment.

https://pbs.twimg.com/ext_tw_video_thumb/1123892364735651843/pu/img/3gAdDqzC_2e63Omc.jpg (https://twitter.com/AnonymousVene10/status/1123893427920343040) https://pbs.twimg.com/ext_tw_video_thumb/1124007109111222273/pu/img/h5oOi4C_j9hHUsTJ.jpg (https://twitter.com/ReporteYa/status/1124025683708137472)

And i hope they get exemplary punishment.

I started hearing about Code Pink supporting Maduro a few days ago, and I started wondering, why the fuck are they supporting a dictatorship? Then, I did some digging and found this:

https://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/nb/warner-todd-huston/2008/04/15/obama-big-money-bundler-hugo-chavez-supporter-will-media

An article from 11 years ago showing a photo of Jodie Evans and Medea Benjamin, co-founders of Codepink, next to Hugo Chavez...It all makes sense now. Can't imagine the amount of money they've received from Hugo Chavez and Maduro for the past +10 years.

And here they are:
https://www.conservapedia.com/images/1/1c/Jodieevans-medeabenjamin-cindysheeh.jpg
Well that explains their mysterious connection defending Maduro. I wonder what is the punishment for squatting an embassy?

Now that you mention, the name Cindy Sheehan sounds familiar, probably appeared on national TV back when Chávez had his Sunday tv show. Lots of foreigners and "leftish" organizations received "support" during the happy days of high oil price...

Here she is in 2012 on national TV with Eva Golinger, the one i mentioned to Lauda (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=101872)...
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/MmwUm_JkY3w/hqdefault.jpg (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmwUm_JkY3w)

Venezuela's Highest Court is Led by a Career Criminal and Defrocked Judge
https://imageproxy.themaven.net/https%3A%2F%2Fs3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com%2Fmaven-user-photos%2Fevagolinger%2Fworld-news%2F5CmBjgog502PpXmBEKUc4w%2FzCPYyJJ5hEyJb1vf_5ZfvQ (https://mavenroundtable.io/evagolinger/world-news/venezuela-s-highest-court-is-led-by-a-career-criminal-and-defrocked-judge-x1nEnpSCU0yj9sduEBf20Q)
by Eva Golinger... 2019.

Golinger, an American who actually lived here for years (unlike certain someone who loves writing lies on this forum), learned things her socialist friends abroad know nothing about, or rather prefer to turn a blind eye to the atrocities suffered by the Venezuelan people in the name of political "solidarity"...

The instability that is happening in Venezuela was eminent.
If a democratic presidential will be chosen from the Venezuelan people then the same situation will continue. The dictator should be stopped, but sadly the only way to do so is war...

War is not the solution. A free and fair election should do the trick.

I am not sure about the current approval level of Maduro, but there is a large segment of the population which remains loyal to him. In case the Americans go ahead with a military invasion, then his support base will grow and many millions will revolt against the invaders.

Till now, Juan Guaidó is unable to create a sizeable militia to fight against Maduro. He wants the Americans to do the dirty work for him. That's not going to work. If he has the popular support, then he can easily overthrow Maduro from power (just like what happened in countries such as Libya). If he is not capable of that, then I suspect that his support levels are quite low.

You think Libya overthrew the government by themselves? That is cute. That was an intervention I did not support and the results were horrible, especially for the Libyan people. It is kind of hard to have a free and fair election when a dictator is in charge, especially when he has China and Russia's state power backing them. I can't say i want American troops in Venezuela, but I also am not naive enough to think we can allow China to use it as its South American military hub complete with fuel supply either.

There are different scenarios proposed from past history in the Americas. Intervention doesn't necessarily mean old fashioned troops on the ground (which is what those supporting Maduro would want). One of these was actually used in Libya, which was air control. Only this time there are far better unmanned flying vehicles that could establish 24/7 surveillance while... A surgical operation picks out the problem to be trialed in Hague or elsewhere (like Noriega).

But why would America spend resources to this end, what is IN for them? I don't think much, yet.

On April 30 they tried for the last time to convince the Venezuelan military to join Guaido. The 3rd in command (Maduro and Padrino being the first two) was surprisingly involved in this last attempt. That day it was evident that they didn't want to, so they aborted the operation and fled the country or went underground. The 2nd in command (Padrino) acted as if he was also going to defect, but didn't, and in fact lied to the Americans.

I'm not going to go into details of why the military won't participate in overthrowing Maduro anymore, but i can assure you it is not an act of loyalty, but more of survival. It is not evident that the situation will change any time soon, and they don't want to risk what little they have left. And, Chávez left an intelligence network inside (glorified snitches emulating a Cuban method) that makes everyone distrust each other. Besides many in the military participate in corruption or other criminal acts, they know if they fall they all fall. There is no hope for the Venezuelan military anymore.

What IS left? Not much, really. The opposition is not going to accept any elections where Maduro or anyone representing that group participates. Maduro on the other hand can eternally re-elect himself unopposed.

In the meantime, while this status quo remains, people keep dying. Sometimes demonstrators, sometimes the rampant crime, sometimes hunger or lack of medicine, but everything closely related to the State, or lack of. Unfortunately it is a State that cannot be criticized, where people can be detained without reason because you can't go against the authority and that is that. It is not exaggerate to think of Venezuela as a country being held hostage, with the victims living in it unable to do anything about it. Others see it as a giant prison, which is more or less the same thing.

If Maduro falls and is taken prisoner or such, millions will NOT go out to defend or rescue him. Maduro IS NOT Chávez, this is a critical difference some people don't quite understand. Sure some "leftist" groups would, probably go guerrilla warfare or so, but nothing resembling half the population like some would think 10 years ago back when Chávez was alive. This is a completely different Venezuela (or whats left of it).

Another possible scenario is neighboring countries forming a coalition to intervene. I think both Colombia and Brazil are willing to. This could probably be in coordination with the American complete air supremacy doctrine.

One idea is that after watching for real an intervention unfold, Maduro just might break and resign or surrender. Or he could play Martyr, it is unknown.

Do note that the opposition to Maduro is not equal to the support for the political opposition. There is also, a lot of disillusionment with them, even Guaidó. Due to their mistakes, lack of action at times, or late moves, hidden deals with the gov, etc. There are two decades of that already. Many people just gave up and left the country. Others just fled escaping poverty, and in some cases political persecution. About 10% of the population.

The approval rating of Maduro? Its like 15~20%.

It's unfortunate the economic and the political issues cannot be separated.

Comparable hyperinflations come to mind.

China 1948-1950, Germany 1921-1922, Zimbabwe ? 1990s.

No government can survive with an approval rating below 20%. Realistically, I think it is somewhere around 40%. A lot of the poor people benefited from free healthcare and education during the Chavez era, and these people are still loyal to the socialists. On top of that, we should remember that some of the people who are leading the opposition are members of the Venezuelan UHNW community, and they don't enjoy widespread support among the mainstream Venezuelans.

The US wants EVERYONE to keep out of Venezuela's shit, EXCEPT the US of motherfuckin A.  World police waving their dick in everyone's face!

I'm surprised at the naivete in this thread, generally speaking Trump is very receptive to dictators yet this one him and little Marco want GONE, could it have something to do with the large Venezuelan population in Florida (a state Trump MUST win if he wants to be re-elected in 2020...).

oil


there are many countries with dictators right now, there always are. US concentrates on "bringing democracy" to specific countries for specific reasons. In the case of Venezuela, it's oil (2nd highest confirmed oil reserves in the world)


Venezuelans are struck by the commodities curse: everyone who wants to "help" probably just wants to help themselves. Chinese gov, Russian gov and the Venezuelan gov are all as greedy as the US gov.

This simply isn't true.  

While it is true that the US picks and chooses what dictators to support and which ones to dispose based on very selfish reasons, this time the US gives ZERO fucks about Venzuela's oil reserve's.  The US could have and did get as much oil as they wanted from the Maduro regime and have been getting oil from them for a long time.  The largest importer of oil to the US is Canada a 2 century old ally of the US, 4 of every 10 barrels of oil imported to the US comes from Canada.  The US could have chosen to dispose Maduro for the oil anytime in the last xx years but they chose NOW to do it.  This is 100% a political ploy to get the Venezuelan vote for Trump (Rubio gets the tangential benefit of it as well) in 2020 in Florida.


Florida in 2020. without Florida Trump has ZERO percent chance of being re-elected!

You are a fucking muppet. Haven't you learned you are out of your depth yet with American let alone world politics? You have such strong convictions but so little actual knowledge about any of these subjects. You act like this is something different than any other nation who had the capability would do. Also the fact that you think this is all to drum up votes in what is already setting up to be a LANDSLIDE for him is so retarded it is beyond words. Do you really think it is worth losing his base by starting more wars to get some localized fringe minority in the US? Like I said you are a muppet and should stick to things you know like ice, hockey, maple syrup and alcoholism.

You are right on one thing though, that is the USA doesn't need to do this for oil, especially since it is a net oil exporter now. This is a stale trope that barely made sense in the past as a superficial marketing tool for wars, but was never really the objective.

Is Florida a key state when it comes to votes?

It is a bit odd that Marco Rubio, the senator of Florida, is one of the most (if not the most) anti-Maduro politicians in the US, he's always keeping an eye on everything that happens in Venezuela, the guy doesn't waste a second to display his view about Maduro & Co. He even goes as far as to post memes on this twitter: https://twitter.com/marcorubio/status/1103556681483591680 (The guy is Diosdado Cabello, to many, the 2nd in command of the dictatorship). That to me looks like an attempt to gain the sympathy of venezuelans (both in Venezuela and Florida)...Just saying.

Wow! So many different opinions.

I believe that Washington's only interest in Venezuela is to preserve the heavy oil exports for the Koch brothers, and to prevent the profits being given to the people of Venezuela, and don't forget the gold mining potential . Gold will become more important as the current fiat system collapses.

Washington seems to be intent on attacking most of the countries in the world at the moment, and that includes the United States.

Trump CAN NOT win re-election without winning Florida. Trump barely won Florida in 2016 (won by ~1%) he is doing all he can to shore up Florida.  This entire Venezuela thing is designed to help Trump in Florida 2020.

This issue of Venezuela will always be a problem as long as there is a government that is in power that only interests you is to stay there at any time, where there is not even the slightest chance of progress, where power cuts are made to order of the day

Which country will take away electrical service at any time? for 6.12 hours? and to say that they attack from the US, to an electrical system that is not digital but analogue, and that works only with 1 turbine in Guri (Dam) that if it is damaged, all of Venezuela is extinguished, because they are over-demanding their capacity, apart from they have no system or they are working on alternative solutions, but they are simply lengthening everything with such and remaining in power.

I know many workers of the company Corpoelec who say that the government has not even worried about getting new technology from the Russians and the Chinese to at least solve the problem of lighting, since the existing technology is German and of the USA, Obviously, those countries will they never help a tyrant, then? where is the delivery of its rulers? If every time they have a terrible failure, they blame Donald Trump? that's like hacking a blender, because blenders do not have access to digital.

How can Maduro's followers defend something like that? Are they people who like to suffer?

Not turbine, 1 (auto)transformer. There were 3 but two of them are damaged, if this last transformer breaks the whole country goes dark (again).

Those 3 transformers were used for the very high voltage line from the south of the country to the north most populated areas. The same line that catched fire due to their irresponsible neglect in maintenance or even foliage cutting along the line. Who is going to believe their garbage anti US rhetoric? Not even their people, and yes they are masochists.

Maduro has neglected maintenance, in his avarice to keep the bloated budget running, instead of cutting "social" expenses (which they use to profit) he denies everything the State companies need to keep running, and the wages are the worst of the planet. Then ADD hyperinflation, due to his continued debt being paid by non existent money. That might work within the country but not abroad, the Chinese are not giving us loans anymore, and the Russians keep appearances but there you see him giving our gold away which is basically stolen Venezuelan minerals he has no rights to.

If he hadn't destroyed the economy with his lunatic real socialism economy, at least China could have brought us a solution. The Russians don't have suitable equipment and the actual sources are from countries not recognizing his regime.

The icing on the cake was Carabobo's governor Lacava, from Maduro's socialist party, recommending (https://www.sumarium.es/2019/05/08/lacava-sugiere-la-privatizacion-de-la-distribucion-electrica-seria-mas-eficiente-el-manejo-de-ese-sector/) Maduro the privatization of electricity as a solution. We might see him ousted from the party in a few days and labeled traitor, or maybe not.

Well obviously privatization is one way to improve the situation without incurring in even more debt. But, how about stopping the absurd gasoline subsidy? No country in the world needs free gasoline, only Venezuela... Ridiculous. They rather impoverish the entire population because they can't pay debts than cut the obvious source of the problem. But then again that's also the main source of corruption within the military...

Carlos Andres Perez, a former president of Venezuela, attempted a liberalization of the economy in the late '80s to early '90s. The result? Widespread demonstrations, vandalism and looting, and the rise of Hugo Chavez, who attempted a coup. The liberalization failed mainly because, firstly, the first price control to be removed was that of oil, understandably a sacred cow for Venezuelans, and, secondly, he campaigned against economic liberalism while running for office (and was a big economic interventionist during his first term), then went ahead and instituted it, at the behest of the IMF, World Bank and the US.

Check this out:
https://books.google.com/books?id=CUIiQCIygFcC&pg=PA10&lpg=PA10&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false

I think the major sin of this troubled Maduro is his allegiance with Russia and US government don't want to see Russians calling the short in this South America country, and Maduro decision to stop accepting dollars for oil trade, can't tell if this was fully implemented. US government will hunt any top oil producing countries that are not super power, that plan to drop the USD for crude oil trade. Maduro has not helped his country economically.

Well that actually started with Chávez, Putin has been around all along these last couple of decades, either as president or vice-president. Since the very beginning the USA banned arms sales from American companies to Venezuela so Chavez went to the Russians back then and kept buying weapons, so you can say there is a business client relationship.

The "vice-president" Tareck is also supposedly close to certain groups from the middle east. such as Hezbollah (https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/tareck-el-aissami-hezbollah-nicolas-maduro-hugo-chavez/2019/05/02/id/914338/), some opposition leaders even claim he harbors them.

The aftermath of the failed uprising on Apr 30th is that they are now imprisoning national assembly representatives. Parliamentary immunity? Overrated, they ignore the rule of law because no one dares to stop them, besides anyone objecting is thrown to prison as well, even judges...


The de-facto government de-facto dissolved the legislative branch when they lost the votes back on Dec 2015. After losing the votes, within that Christmas holiday season when the national assembly was supposed to be on vacation, the Maduro supporters who were meant to leave by January, appointed close political friends (and party members) as "judges" to the supreme court, in a process blatantly illegal. But they did it anyway and soon after, this de-facto "supreme court" proceeded to nullify any acts done by the national assembly. This is more or less how Maduro seized power completely for himself and his gang. One of these "judges" (the top one) even has past criminal records (https://mavenroundtable.io/evagolinger/world-news/venezuela-s-highest-court-is-led-by-a-career-criminal-and-defrocked-judge-x1nEnpSCU0yj9sduEBf20Q/), go figure...

But, you have to see people still defending Maduro, implying he was somehow "democratically" elected, ignoring the previously stated facts of how obscenely rigged that "election" was, and then proceed to ignore the rest of the events that unfolded, such as the democratically elected National Assembly (which is considered the last "fair" election) where the majority voted for the opposition that was immediately cast aside by the regime.

---

Hmmpf. I lived thru that and it was well over within a week. From that myth came free gasoline, from free gasoline came the corrupt military generation who now happens to be high ranked, and unsurprisingly defend he who lets them a share of the pie...

The problem with Perez is that he actually came from a social democrat (reformist) party, and as you correctly point, he went against his party policies. Lets just say a "troyan" horse politician. But he had a good reason: Winning an election in this country without pledging yourself to socialism one way or another, is/was impossible. The socialist mentality of Venezuela starts in the 60ies, all politicians won votes by offering "free stuff", not a "better economy" which sounds dumb to the uneducated majority. This is typical populism, and is a culture that degenerated into what we have today. The sin started much earlier than Chávez.

I don't justify Perez methods, but a true honest pro capitalism free market politician never won any elections, and several tried. And yes, if he had remained a bit longer, perhaps Venezuela would be much better now. But back then the executive wasn't all mighty invincible, and he was trialed and made resign, something impossible today...

Why do you think so many had given up, packed and left?

Let me guess, they're gonna send those lawmakers to the "venezuelan EL-DE Haus (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EL-DE_Haus)" called El Helicoide (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Helicoide), right?

Feels like with everything that happened on April 30th (failed uprising), Maduro and his gang have gained anough confidence and strength to start going after the opposition, HARD, they're try to isolate Guaido to try to force to him to leave the country (since Maduro doesn't dare to do anything to him apparently).

that's ridiculous

Florida has 29 electoral votes and it will be very difficult (or impossible) for either of the two mainstream candidates to win the POTUS elections without winning the sunshine state. But what I don't understand is how the intervention in Venezuela can influence the voters in FL. There is a large Cuban American community in Florida, but the Venezuelan immigrants are not significant. Trump is not going to get any additional votes from the Hispanics, in case he topples Maduro in Venezuela.