Thread by @bansisharma

When I wrote the above thread about misplaced romanticism over the Nordic countries as models of socialism (BTW, those countries quite rightly don't view themselves as socialist), I thought I should let the American socialists save face by averting their gaze from Venezuela.

But now that Bret Stephens has gracefully reminded us through the pages of NY Times that in the age of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the lesson must be learned again that yes, Venezuela is a socialist catastrophe, I am compelled to complete the picture, using Bret's own words.

1. Venezuela, Venezuela
Conspicuous by its absence in much of the mainstream news coverage of Venezuela’s political crisis is the word “socialism.”

2. Yes, every sensible observer agrees that Latin America’s once-richest country, sitting atop the world’s largest proven oil reserves, is an economic basket case, a humanitarian disaster, and a dictatorship whose demise cannot come soon enough.

3. But … socialist? Perish the thought. Or so goes a line of argument that insists socialism’s good name shouldn’t be tarred by the results of experience.

4. On Venezuela, what you’re likelier to read is that the crisis is the product of corruption, cronyism, populism, authoritarianism, resource-dependency, U.S. sanctions and trickery, even the residues of capitalism itself. Just don’t mention the S-word.

5. Curiously, that’s not how the Venezuelan regime’s admirers used to speak of “21st century socialism,” as it was dubbed by Hugo Chávez.

6. Hugo Chávez, said Britain’s Jeremy Corbyn, “showed us there is a different and a better way of doing things. It’s called socialism, it’s called social justice, and it’s something that Venezuela has made a big step toward.”

7. Noam Chomsky was similarly enthusiastic when he praised Chávez in 2009. “What’s so exciting about at last visiting Venezuela,” the linguist said, is that “I can see how a better world is being created and can speak to the person who’s inspired it.”

8. Nor were many of the Chávez’s admirers overly worried about his regime’s darker sides. In a lengthy obituary, NYU professor Greg Grandin opined, “the biggest problem Venezuela faced during his rule was not that Chávez was authoritarian but that he wasn’t authoritarian enough.”

9. At least Grandin could implicitly concede that socialism ultimately requires coercion to achieve its political aims; otherwise, it’s human nature for people to find loopholes and workarounds to keep as much of their property as they can.

10. Elizabeth Warren seems to have absorbed that lesson quite well. That's why she has proposed a massive expansion if IRS troops to go with her 'wealth tax' scheme. So don't think Americans are inoculated against such a tyrannical thought strain.

11. In the light of Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, and @AOC's rhetoric, let us review how closely Venezuela followed the orthodox socialist script our leftist leaders in the U.S. are so fond of.

12. Government spending on social programs? Check: From 2000 to 2013, government spending in Venezuela rose to 40 percent of G.D.P., from 28 percent.

13. Raising the minimum wage? Check. Nicolás Maduro, the current president of Venezuela, raised it no fewer than six times last year.

14. An economy based on co-ops, not corporations? Check again. As Naomi Klein wrote in her fawning 2007 book, “The Shock Doctrine,” “Chávez has made the co-ops a top priority … By 2006, there were roughly 100,000 cooperatives in the country, employing more than 700,000 workers.”

15. And, lest we forget, all of this was done as Chávez won one election after another during the oil-boom years. Indeed, one of the chief selling points of Chavismo to its Western fans wasn’t just that it was an example of socialism, but of democratic socialism, too.

16. If the policy prescriptions were familiar, the consequences were predictable. Government overspending created catastrophic deficits. Worker co-ops wound up in the hands of incompetent and corrupt political cronies. They always do.

17. The government responded to its budgetary problems by printing money, leading to inflation. Inflation led to price controls, leading to shortages. Shortages led to protests, leading to repression and the destruction of democracy.

18. Thence to widespread starvation, critical medical shortages, an explosion in crime, and a refugee crisis to rival Syria’s.

19. All of this used to be obvious enough, but in the age of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez it has to be explained all over again. Why does socialism never work? Because, as Margaret Thatcher explained, “eventually you run out of other people’s money.”

20. Twenty years of socialism, cheered by Corbyn, Klein, Chomsky and Co., led to the ruin of a nation. They may not be much embarrassed, much less personally harmed, by what they helped do. It’s for the rest of us to take care that it never be done to us.

The End.

Wages of socialism.
cnn.com/2019/01/24/hea…

Those ignorant enough not to know any better, whether because of young age or old ideology, may think this cannot happen here because America is rich. Be aware that Venezuela went from the richest country in Latin America to a complete basket case in less than a generation.

Truer words were never spoken.

"The problem in Venezuela is not that socialism has been poorly implemented, but that socialism has been faithfully implemented," President Trump said.
freebeacon.com/national-secur…