What really happened to Venezuela?

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Here's my thought on what really happened. Chavez gave a UN speech back in 2005/2006 where he was very critical of George W Bush. What followed was a boycott of Citgo by right-wing Americans. This included a lot of bad PR and shutting down locations, in order to change from Citgos to other brands but also less gas revenue since less people shopped at certain places. This hurt the bottom line tremendously but at the time the corporation wouldn't admit it because that would be seen as losing to investors and customers. They hoped it would go away but it had long term effects. Related to that, in 2006, its 20-year contract with 7-11 was up. 7-11 refused to renew. Rumors swirled that this was because 7/11 was thinking about starting its own fuel line and that they wanted to appeal to right-wingers. Then after Chavez died, his replacement could not hold the country together. Now in February the US has pressured the Houston headquarters to split with the the parent company at the same time that there is this election dilemma, pressuring the whole country to turn rightward.

So was the Republican propaganda machine the primary factor in the demise of Venezuelan economy where now they can say, "see, socialism doesn't work because Venezuela?"

 

[repoman]

Was the boycott astroturfed?

 

[Tammuz]

[YOUTUBE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1gUR8wM5vA[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Harry Bosch]

Here's my thought on what really happened. Chavez gave a UN speech back in 2005/2006 where he was very critical of George W Bush. What followed was a boycott of Citgo by right-wing Americans. This included a lot of bad PR and shutting down locations, in order to change from Citgos to other brands but also less gas revenue since less people shopped at certain places. This hurt the bottom line tremendously but at the time the corporation wouldn't admit it because that would be seen as losing to investors and customers. They hoped it would go away but it had long term effects. Related to that, in 2006, its 20-year contract with 7-11 was up. 7-11 refused to renew. Rumors swirled that this was because 7/11 was thinking about starting its own fuel line and that they wanted to appeal to right-wingers. Then after Chavez died, his replacement could not hold the country together. Now in February the US has pressured the Houston headquarters to split with the the parent company at the same time that there is this election dilemma, pressuring the whole country to turn rightward.

So was the Republican propaganda machine the primary factor in the demise of Venezuelan economy where now they can say, "see, socialism doesn't work because Venezuela?"

Anti capitalists always want to blame a capitalist conspiracy as the culprit holding down the socialist economies. Putting everything aside, why would an entrepreneur want to start a company in a socialist state? Why would a worker or manager ever want to innovate to improve the company where they work in a socialist economy? Yea, socialism is incredibly inefficient. But the real reason why it fails is that it eliminates incentive.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Anti capitalists always want to blame a capitalist conspiracy ...

Full stop. What conspiracy?

The boycott is well-documented and not secret.

 

[J842P]

Here's my thought on what really happened. Chavez gave a UN speech back in 2005/2006 where he was very critical of George W Bush. What followed was a boycott of Citgo by right-wing Americans. This included a lot of bad PR and shutting down locations, in order to change from Citgos to other brands but also less gas revenue since less people shopped at certain places. This hurt the bottom line tremendously but at the time the corporation wouldn't admit it because that would be seen as losing to investors and customers. They hoped it would go away but it had long term effects. Related to that, in 2006, its 20-year contract with 7-11 was up. 7-11 refused to renew. Rumors swirled that this was because 7/11 was thinking about starting its own fuel line and that they wanted to appeal to right-wingers. Then after Chavez died, his replacement could not hold the country together. Now in February the US has pressured the Houston headquarters to split with the the parent company at the same time that there is this election dilemma, pressuring the whole country to turn rightward.

So was the Republican propaganda machine the primary factor in the demise of Venezuelan economy where now they can say, "see, socialism doesn't work because Venezuela?"

Look, no doubt America has been aggressively meddling in Venezuelan affaires, but the gross mismanagement of Venezuelan resources by the Chavistas is not on the US.

You can't say that America hasn't been aggressively meddling and undermining Iran, and Iran is feeling the pain of that, but you aren't seeing the same consequences in Iran as in Venezuela, because while the US has undermined Venezuela, the Venezuelans *have also* horribly mismanaged the country, in laughably predictable ways.

 

[J842P]

Here's my thought on what really happened. Chavez gave a UN speech back in 2005/2006 where he was very critical of George W Bush. What followed was a boycott of Citgo by right-wing Americans. This included a lot of bad PR and shutting down locations, in order to change from Citgos to other brands but also less gas revenue since less people shopped at certain places. This hurt the bottom line tremendously but at the time the corporation wouldn't admit it because that would be seen as losing to investors and customers. They hoped it would go away but it had long term effects. Related to that, in 2006, its 20-year contract with 7-11 was up. 7-11 refused to renew. Rumors swirled that this was because 7/11 was thinking about starting its own fuel line and that they wanted to appeal to right-wingers. Then after Chavez died, his replacement could not hold the country together. Now in February the US has pressured the Houston headquarters to split with the the parent company at the same time that there is this election dilemma, pressuring the whole country to turn rightward.

So was the Republican propaganda machine the primary factor in the demise of Venezuelan economy where now they can say, "see, socialism doesn't work because Venezuela?"

Anti capitalists always want to blame a capitalist conspiracy as the culprit holding down the socialist economies. Putting everything aside, why would an entrepreneur want to start a company in a socialist state? Why would a worker or manager ever want to innovate to improve the company where they work in a socialist economy? Yea, socialism is incredibly inefficient. But the real reason why it fails is that it eliminates incentive.

Venezuela is just as "socialist" as many other successful countries. Note, Venezuela is still capitalist in the sense that the means of production are held privately, i.e. you are more than welcome to start a business and sell things for profit in Venezuela.

The problems in Venezuela, and Latin America generally, are very multifaceted. In particular, in Venezuela's case, populist spending policies were shortsighted, and many other obvious landmines were walked in to, and yes, the US has been working to undermine them at every step. But you can't blame it all on the US. The problems fall squarely in the laps of the Chavistas, who were grossly incompetent.

 

[dismal]

The 2 sentence readers digest version is: Chavez and Maduro’s policies destroyed the nation’s currency and incentives to produce. And they stopped producing.

 

[Harry Bosch]

Anti capitalists always want to blame a capitalist conspiracy ...

Full stop. What conspiracy?

The boycott is well-documented and not secret.

Don: I apologize. You are not an "anti-capitalist". And you're not a conspiracy blamer. There are several posters who love to point out that socialism never works because of CIA meanies. But you are not one of them. Secondly, I also painted to broad of a picture saying that Venezuela is a socialist country. Actually, according to the below link, only about 511 companies are "socialist":

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/venezuela/article138402248.html

But the socialist companies are not operating well.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Anti capitalists always want to blame a capitalist conspiracy ...

Full stop. What conspiracy?

The boycott is well-documented and not secret.

But had nothing to do with Venezuela's collapse.

Also, there's a simple test: Several of us on the economic right predicted what was going to happen long ago. We didn't assume any conspiracy or the like, just normal economic forces at work. What we predicted has come to pass. Theories are measured by their predictive ability. Which side predicted the outcome correctly?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Venezuela is just as "socialist" as many other successful countries. Note, Venezuela is still capitalist in the sense that the means of production are held privately, i.e. you are more than welcome to start a business and sell things for profit in Venezuela.

The problems in Venezuela, and Latin America generally, are very multifaceted. In particular, in Venezuela's case, populist spending policies were shortsighted, and many other obvious landmines were walked in to, and yes, the US has been working to undermine them at every step. But you can't blame it all on the US. The problems fall squarely in the laps of the Chavistas, who were grossly incompetent.

No. On paper that's how it works but not in practice. In practice if you're of any size you'll end up with your company seized and handed over to cronies of those in power.

 

[Axulus]

Here's my thought on what really happened. Chavez gave a UN speech back in 2005/2006 where he was very critical of George W Bush. What followed was a boycott of Citgo by right-wing Americans. This included a lot of bad PR and shutting down locations, in order to change from Citgos to other brands but also less gas revenue since less people shopped at certain places. This hurt the bottom line tremendously but at the time the corporation wouldn't admit it because that would be seen as losing to investors and customers. They hoped it would go away but it had long term effects. Related to that, in 2006, its 20-year contract with 7-11 was up. 7-11 refused to renew. Rumors swirled that this was because 7/11 was thinking about starting its own fuel line and that they wanted to appeal to right-wingers. Then after Chavez died, his replacement could not hold the country together. Now in February the US has pressured the Houston headquarters to split with the the parent company at the same time that there is this election dilemma, pressuring the whole country to turn rightward.

So was the Republican propaganda machine the primary factor in the demise of Venezuelan economy where now they can say, "see, socialism doesn't work because Venezuela?"

Decline in US based Citgo profits has almost nothing to do with the collapse of the Venezuelan state, so your hypothesis fails from the get go.

The reasons for the collapse are well documented:
-Driving away expertise from the state oil company (firing and jailing executives that weren't sufficiently loyal to Chavez).
-Installing political hacks to run state oil company and many other leadership positions. Not based on expertise but rather political clout and loyalty.
-Corruption and massive theft by government, including army, from the oil sector. Chavez and Maduro bribed army loyalty with oil money.
-Failure to spend money to keep the state oil company maintained. Failure to invest money for future production.
-Faulire to keep basic infrastructure maintained.
-Seizure of many private companies that were not sufficiently loyal to Chavez and Maduro, as well as threat of seizures, dramatically reduced private investment.
-Jailing of business owners for charging "too high" a price. State mandated price caps forced many businesses to operate at a loss, forcing closure of many more businesses.
-Central bank controlled by Chavez and Maduro resulting in high inflation and eventually hyperinflation due to massive increases in money supply.
-State controlled currency exchange rate used for massive corruption, dollars available for cheap to loyalists and cronies, nothing available for anyone else. Decimated ability for many companies to import the products they needed for their business, resulting in yet more business failures.

 

[Axulus]

Here's my thought on what really happened. Chavez gave a UN speech back in 2005/2006 where he was very critical of George W Bush. What followed was a boycott of Citgo by right-wing Americans. This included a lot of bad PR and shutting down locations, in order to change from Citgos to other brands but also less gas revenue since less people shopped at certain places. This hurt the bottom line tremendously but at the time the corporation wouldn't admit it because that would be seen as losing to investors and customers. They hoped it would go away but it had long term effects. Related to that, in 2006, its 20-year contract with 7-11 was up. 7-11 refused to renew. Rumors swirled that this was because 7/11 was thinking about starting its own fuel line and that they wanted to appeal to right-wingers. Then after Chavez died, his replacement could not hold the country together. Now in February the US has pressured the Houston headquarters to split with the the parent company at the same time that there is this election dilemma, pressuring the whole country to turn rightward.

So was the Republican propaganda machine the primary factor in the demise of Venezuelan economy where now they can say, "see, socialism doesn't work because Venezuela?"

Anti capitalists always want to blame a capitalist conspiracy as the culprit holding down the socialist economies. Putting everything aside, why would an entrepreneur want to start a company in a socialist state? Why would a worker or manager ever want to innovate to improve the company where they work in a socialist economy? Yea, socialism is incredibly inefficient. But the real reason why it fails is that it eliminates incentive.

Venezuela is just as "socialist" as many other successful countries. Note, Venezuela is still capitalist in the sense that the means of production are held privately, i.e. you are more than welcome to start a business and sell things for profit in Venezuela.

The problems in Venezuela, and Latin America generally, are very multifaceted. In particular, in Venezuela's case, populist spending policies were shortsighted, and many other obvious landmines were walked in to, and yes, the US has been working to undermine them at every step. But you can't blame it all on the US. The problems fall squarely in the laps of the Chavistas, who were grossly incompetent.

The state seized and runs many large companies. Not sure where you are getting the idea that companies are privately owned, as this is not true for many industries. Additionally, government controls the maximum price many businesses are allowed to charge. It has massive control over the actions of even the privately held businesses.

 

[Trausti]

 

[dismal]

Venezuela is just as "socialist" as many other successful countries. Note, Venezuela is still capitalist in the sense that the means of production are held privately, i.e. you are more than welcome to start a business and sell things for profit in Venezuela.

The problems in Venezuela, and Latin America generally, are very multifaceted. In particular, in Venezuela's case, populist spending policies were shortsighted, and many other obvious landmines were walked in to, and yes, the US has been working to undermine them at every step. But you can't blame it all on the US. The problems fall squarely in the laps of the Chavistas, who were grossly incompetent.

The state seized and runs many large companies. Not sure where you are getting the idea that companies are privately owned, as this is not true for many industries. Additionally, government controls the maximum price many businesses are allowed to charge. It has massive control over the actions of even the privately held businesses.

Yes, I think "but they haven't nationalized all the companies...yet" is a pretty sad defense.

Once you've nationalized a thousand or so businesses people notice the pattern and you've pretty much destroyed the incentive to invest in a business.

 

[repoman]

This is a good video about the daughter of a Trump/Guaido advisor who gave a NYT video opinion about Venezuela. Brutal.

This is gross, the NYT pulling this shit.

 

[SimpleDon]

Here's my thought on what really happened. Chavez gave a UN speech back in 2005/2006 where he was very critical of George W Bush. What followed was a boycott of Citgo by right-wing Americans. This included a lot of bad PR and shutting down locations, in order to change from Citgos to other brands but also less gas revenue since less people shopped at certain places. This hurt the bottom line tremendously but at the time the corporation wouldn't admit it because that would be seen as losing to investors and customers. They hoped it would go away but it had long term effects. Related to that, in 2006, its 20-year contract with 7-11 was up. 7-11 refused to renew. Rumors swirled that this was because 7/11 was thinking about starting its own fuel line and that they wanted to appeal to right-wingers. Then after Chavez died, his replacement could not hold the country together. Now in February, the US has pressured the Houston headquarters to split with the parent company at the same time that there is this election dilemma, pressuring the whole country to turn rightward.

So was the Republican propaganda machine the primary factor in the demise of Venezuelan economy where now they can say, "see, socialism doesn't work because Venezuela?"

Socialism is a horrible economic system. So yes, there is that. But Social Security and the ACA aren't socialism. And neither is 90% of what Chavez did. But his successor did convert private businesses to state-owned ones. He limited the transfer of capital out of the country; this meant that all of the capital that could get out of the country got out when it could, and no one would invest in any business in the country. Capitalism stopped working in the country while socialism was having an especially hard time to getting started. As it always will.

And yes, the George W. Bush administration did interfere in the Venezuelan election to try to defeat Chavez. But it helped Chavez more than it hurt him when reveled before the election. Just another example confirming why you should never elect people to run a government who don't believe that government can work. A minor case admittedly among such others as driving us into the Great Recession and starting a war for no good reason. Or for that matter everything that the Trump administration does daily.

What also happened was fracking and the coal sands. Both drove the price of oil down, but the coal sands also hurt Venezuela in another way. The Venezuelan oil is of poor quality and can't be refined in a typical refinery, the same refineries that have to refine the oil from the coal sands. In this respect, Venezuelan oil has to compete with the oil from the oil sands.

Venezuela is not a victim of socialism as it is of dramatically not understanding real economics. Economic forces are there in socialism as they are in capitalism. And I am not talking about Econ 101, the quest for the fantasy of the free market that infects so many here. Too many socialists believe that it is the capitalistic system that turns people against their nature into greedy, uncaring bastards when it is people who are naturally greedy, uncaring bastards.

That is where capitalism shines. It channels greed and uncaring attitudes into productive, society improving businesses. What it doesn't do very well is to equitably distribute the rewards from the surplus generated by the economy. That is where capitalism failed Venezuela. And that is what the Republican propaganda machine and Econ 101 were built for, to obscure the fact that capitalism is failing for the same reason in the US.

 

[dismal]

This is a good video about the daughter of a Trump/Guaido advisor who gave a NYT video opinion about Venezuela. Brutal.

This is gross, the NYT pulling this shit.

I got 20 seconds in developed full confidence this would be a complete waste of time. I can't imagine what possesses people to defend the likes of Maduro.

Defending him in the name of "democracy" is a bit like having sex in the name of "virginity".

 

[steve_bank]

Chavez nationalized foreign busyness and oil and proceeded to buy support with unsustainable social programs. The middle and business class were destroyed.

It was predicted back then this is where Venezuela was headed.

Both Chavez and his successor are/were ignorant and utterly ill equipped. Think Trump as an actual dictator.

 

[Trausti]