Posted on 02/04/2024 8:39:40 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Twenty-five years ago, far-left socialist Hugo Chavez assumed Venezuela's presidency, lawfully elected and sworn in on Feb. 2, 1999, after an up-and-down career as a restive army office involved in a coup d'etat.
He ran and won as an outsider at a time when the establishment had discredited itself, got into trouble when oil prices fell, and signed on to an International Monetary Fund austerity program, such as were being employed at the time in measures that left capitals burning.
Once in. it didn't take long for Chavez to turn his once-prosperous country into a socialist hellhole.
Today, the country is in rubble, a dictatorship, a shadow of its now-dimly remembered glory. It had been South America's most prosperous and developed country, with a huge middle class. Now, as with all socialist regimes, millions have fled its poverty, oppression, and despair.
For many years, here in the states we watched the leering, clown-like dictator wreck and ruin his country. The global left embraced Chavez as if he were the new Fidel Castro. But the rest of us just watched it with detachment, having seen this disaster play out many times earlier throughout the 20th century -- in Russia, in China, in Cuba, in Vietnam, in North Korea, in parts of Africa.
Did it have any relevance to us? For many years, many didn't think so, and the country was often ignored, often by U.S. presidents. And yet, yet, we've met Venezuelans. We know they are like us.
Now that the full scope is laid out after 25 years, maybe Venezuela does offer cautionary lessons for us in the states.
What might a few of those lessons be?
One -- that elections matter. Elect a politician promising handouts, as Hugo Chavez did, and watch the country go bust,
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Worse still, as government power concentrated itself in a few hands, it didn't take long for corruption to gain a foothold, corruption unlike any the hemisphere has seen, with billions stolen by its cronies. Hugo himself died a billionaire by 2013.
A BRIEF HISTORY OF VENEZUELA’s RECENT ELECTIONS...
Two, fraudulent elections, and even the perceptions of fraudulent elections matter even more.
For Venezuela, the wages of Chavez’s economic mismanagement, and attempt to coopt the Venezuelan state oil company’s union led to huge protests and a recall referendum petition that drew millions of signatures asking to get rid of that guy.
The very concept of the recall was placed into the rewritten constitution by Chavez’s own cronies, and it opposition took that opportunity to turn it onto Chavez himself. In 2004, after numerous attempts to halt the recall through legal technicalities failed, but absolutely gargantuan demonstrations showed the extent of the popular support for it, the recall happened. Very strangely, it failed.
Scientists conducted studies posthumously and said the numbers didn’t add up. Locals said their votes were improperly counted or were programmed to vote for Chavez, not his ouster. One theory held that the voting totals were flipped.
The recall was monitored by Jimmy Carter’s Carter Center, which came out and said all was free and fair, having seen everything for themselves with the small exception of what went on ... in the totalization room. Fraudulent or not, the opposition was shocked, having had its own monitors that found otherwise, but its concerns were dismissed by those who viewed them as rich whites out of touch with vast dark-skinned Venezuelan masses, who still supposedly loved Hugo Chavez. Maybe it was true, some good reporters, such as Juan Forero of the New York Times, who was there, thought so. But the perception of fraud left the opposition so shocked and silent it boycotted the next local election in late 2005.
By default, Chavez and his Chavistas then took full power in the legislative elections and ran with it, socializing the country even more, coopting the courts, the food supply, the industries, the internet, the once-free press, driving the latter out of business, or forcing television stations to sell to Chavista outlets at rock-bottom prices.
“Two, fraudulent elections, and even the perceptions of fraudulent elections matter even more....
Lesson: Fraudulent, or at least rigged, elections lead to even more horrible consequences than legal elections and once they happen, there is no return. Once fraud became the order of the day, government grew even more unaccountable and tyrannical.
Three, immigration matters...
Four: Crime matters...
Five: Chavez may have been a failure, but it didn’t matter, because his regime was forever...
Does that hold lessons for us? In the era of Joe Biden, eerily so. The international left, and the left in the U.S. has long admired the Chavez model under the rubric of helping the people, but that Chavez model is Cuba in a more developed form. The handouts are long gone and the people are now fleeing. Will that same model be replicated here?
Suddenly, Venezuela’s history looks pretty relevant.”
Those who will steal elections will steal everything else.
It is just that basic.
A nation, a people, a culture must continuously strive to reduce the power of government.
Government is like a virus, the DNA of which is to spread and grow until it kills the host.
You can vote your way into socialism, but you will have to fight your way out.
“You voted for me because I promised you a revolution”
Venezuela was a 1st-world country. A year before that “election” I had a project manager assigned full-time to the planning for our piece of a new automotive transmission plant to be built there. (Chrysler, I think it was.) That of course collapsed within six months after Chavez took power. The country was already in free-fall.
“Suddenly, Venezuela’s history looks pretty relevant.”
Obviously DemocRATS are running the Hugo Chavez playbook.
Terrifying article.
Those same Venezuelan Hugo Chaves voters are now in the USA, voting for the Quisling Puppet. The goal is to destroy America, and they are right on schedule.
Biden is in office only because the 2020 election was corrupt thanks to the Marxist Dems. The vote count math does not add up. It appears Biden’s governmental abilities are being controlled by Obozo and other Marxists who want to Socialize America and look where it’s taken us.
We call for the full restoration of democracy and political freedoms in Venezuela. [Applause.]...the same wonderful speech during which he called Kim Jong Il “Rocket Man”, whereupon his traitor chief-of-staff John Kelly facepalmed in front of world media.
The problem in Venezuela is not that socialism has been poorly implemented, but that socialism has been faithfully implemented. [Applause.]
From the Soviet Union to Cuba to Venezuela, wherever true socialism or communism has been adopted, it has delivered anguish and devastation and failure. Those who preach the tenets of these discredited ideologies only contribute to the continued suffering of the people who live under these cruel systems.
America stands with every person living under a brutal regime. Our respect for sovereignty is also a call for action. All people deserve a government that cares for their safety, their interests, and their well-being, including their prosperity.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.