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Postmortem (Venezuela)
PJ Media ^ | 2-13-2014 | Richard Fernandez

Posted on 02/14/2014 7:25:02 AM PST by Sir Napsalot

The suddenness of Venezuela’s collapse should have come as no surprise because downfalls are inherently abrupt. Collapse is a phase change. One moment something is sailing along fat, dumb and happy and the next moment it is sinking beneath the waves. The change from two to one is a loss of 50%; but the change from one to zero is binary.

(snip)

Think of not being able to buy soap, rice or toilet paper or order a cup of coffee, where ,a href="http://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/2014/02/13/postmortem/theglobeandmail.com/news/world/venezuelas-economy-on-the-edge-of-the-apocalypse/article16845406/">even the rich are feeling poor. ......"In the grocery stores, both state-run shops and expensive delicatessens, customers barter information: I saw soap here, that store has rice today. ....”

Imagine there’s no money to keep up the sovereign bond payments, the only source of money to keep power plants going.

Welcome to Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela, a country with the fifth largest oil reserves in the world and absolutely broke. It’s a remarkable achievement for Chavismo. A just-wow moment. Socialism is useless at everything except for smashing things in record time. There it excels. It’s hard to imagine that as late as the 1980s Venezuela had the highest standard of living in Latin America. But then in 1960 Detroit was the richest city in the world in per capita income. Now it’s well … Detroit.

James Eccleton remarked on how the mighty have fallen. “Brazil is becoming Argentina, Argentina is becoming Venezuela, and Venezuela is becoming Zimbabwe.” The question that always puzzles historians about the fall of great and rich countries is: ‘why didn’t they say it coming?’ How did they let disaster sneak up on them?

(Excerpt) Read more at pjmedia.com ...


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To: Paladin2
"The genius of the Left — Chavez’s for example — is that it destroys things from the inside out.

They pervert religion, collapse the mores, abolish the family, shred the constitution and gradually expropriate the property.
The differences from one day to the next are apparently imperceptible, but it is harder and harder to go back until finally there is no reversal of ‘progressive gains’ possible at all.

Sounds like America 2008-2014

I have thought for quite a while that the establishment republicans have misread what is happening.

They are treating the Obama takeover as just another swing of the pendulum - democrats have the power now but republicans figure they can hang on and their turn will come the next election, or the next, or the next.

In their minds, once they are back in the majority they will just roll back the Obama era and get back to some semblance of what they consider normal.

But this isn't just another swing of the pendulum.

The people behind Obama are smart enough to know that if they force certain changes on the country, once those changes are in place there is no reasonable way to go back - at least no way without causing pain and disruption to the country and they know the republicans won't have the guts to do that.

It doesn't matter to the democrats/progressives if a change - like Obamacare - works well right now or not. The important thing for them is to destroy the old system and force the new program into place, making it next to impossible to return to the old system.

The time for republicans to act is now, before the democrats totally rip our culture and traditions apart. Waiting to act after they win a majority in some election sometime in the future will be too late.

But the republican elites still don't see this as the time for all-out war against the Obama juggernaut. They just want to wait for the good old days to come back.


41 posted on 02/14/2014 9:48:57 AM PST by Iron Munro ("Show me the man, and I'll show you the crime." - Lavrentiy Beria (& Eric Holder))
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To: F15Eagle

I’ve always figured that wyrmwood would impact on this hemisphere since all the action would otherwise be centered around the other side.


42 posted on 02/14/2014 10:02:09 AM PST by reed13k (For evil to triumph it is only necessary for good men to do nothings)
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To: blueunicorn6

Rome wasn’t sacked in a day...


43 posted on 02/14/2014 10:11:21 AM PST by Paladin2
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To: Iron Munro
Few took the ominous “THE MOST IMPORTANT” election warning in 2008 that seriously.

But let's face it, the “work” is in progress for at least 5 decades (if not close to a century) now.

Also substitute Chavez with Obama, and all those things described are still true. Never ever forget Obama: We Are 5 Days From Fundamentally Transforming America (youtube) Which he now says he never said it.

44 posted on 02/14/2014 10:30:37 AM PST by Sir Napsalot (Pravda + Useful Idiots = CCCP; JournOList + Useful Idiots = DopeyChangey!)
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To: Paladin2
“They pervert religion, collapse the mores, abolish the family, shred the constitution and gradually expropriate the property. The differences from one day to the next are apparently imperceptible, but it is harder and harder to go back until finally there is no reversal of ‘progressive gains’ possible at all. The public is finally faced with the stark choice between chaos or authoritarianism. And most people will chose the Boss over the Mob.”

To me, the above is what is happening here. No one thought mighty Rome would fall, but it did. This county is well on the road to collapse and when it does, other countries, islands, any other configuration of land, will also collapse as the US has been the backbone of the world.

As an example, if you go into an English grocery store, and take out all the American products, not much will be left in that store. I intentionally went through one of their largest grocery stores, to identify American products. If you wanted wax for your floor, you either buy Johnson wax or you don't buy wax as that was the only brand there. Dishwashing liquid was mostly American products.

Go in a drugstore in England and take out American products and not much is left.

Every country sells our products. Their standard of living is going down without our products. Islands would be worse off because their products have to get there by ship and that includes food products. If ships can't get there due to no fuel or repair items to keep ships moving, people on those islands will die. Do not live in the Hawaiian Islands or on any island.

Store food and a water purifier so one can safely purify any water, and store drugs and anything else that one must have to keep living.

One MUST learn how to grow food and store food seed. Do not think you can poke seeds into the ground and grow food. It has taken me a year of trial and error and study and asking questions of gardeners to know how to grow food from seed and keep it growing and finally producing.

45 posted on 02/14/2014 10:33:31 AM PST by Marcella ((Prepping can save your life today. I am a Christian, not a Muslim.))
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To: Paladin2; Marcella; dfwgator; AU72; MrB; F15Eagle

Yet the Berlin Wall did. I believe that’s how it will happen to us the ones in the know will start skipping town to keep from being hung on lamp post it it will slowly filter down and no one will want to own it.


46 posted on 02/14/2014 10:44:23 AM PST by Kartographer ("We mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.")
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To: F15Eagle

Most would go into crisis mode if Starbucks closed. I’ve never darkened their doors.


47 posted on 02/14/2014 11:27:02 AM PST by bgill
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To: dfwgator
-- Maduro is nothing but a buffoon--

He proved that he can drive a bus but he can't drive a country.... except into a ditch.

48 posted on 02/14/2014 4:46:47 PM PST by JPG (Yes We Can morphs into Make It Hurt.)
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To: Sir Napsalot

Thank you for posting. The whole article was worth the read.
Our community is not dead yet. But buzzards are circling.


49 posted on 02/14/2014 4:53:24 PM PST by SisterK (behold a pale horse)
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To: F15Eagle

The way Congress is kissing butt?

Not nearly enough time.

Hate to see the mess my Country is in.


50 posted on 02/14/2014 8:21:29 PM PST by Shadowstrike (Be polite, Be professional, but have a plan to kill everyone you meet.)
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To: Sir Napsalot

I just read this article. All young people need to read it.


51 posted on 02/23/2014 3:45:43 AM PST by sheikdetailfeather (Yuri Bezmenov (KGB Defector) - "Kick The Communists Out of Your Govt. & Don't Accept Their Goodies.")
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