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Robbers and looters are targeting trucks carrying food across Venezuela in another sign of worsening shortages that have turned basics like flour and chicken into coveted booty. Crime has long plagued shops and roads in Venezuela, which has one of the world's highest murder rates. But widespread shortages due to a restriction of dollars for imports have worsened since the New Year. This has made food delivery increasingly risky even as certain trucks have been fitted with GPS devices and are sometimes protected by private security agents.

Oil fell as much as 5 percent on Tuesday after the International Monetary Fund cut its 2015 global economic forecast and key producer Iran hinted prices could drop to $25 a barrel without supportive OPEC action.

I was at work and decided to run to the grocery store close by to get some stuff to make a soup. So it is around 3:30 and I am with my cart at the veggies section. All is normal. Suddenly big bags of corn flour arrive. It is the one that is price controlled, the "normal" Harina P.A.N.. The one that "el pueblo" wants because there are other presentations like the one I buy which has extra fiber, but costs almost twice as much (though still dirt cheap, a dime or 3 bucks depending on your preferred exchange rate)....

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A heated exchanged between President Barack Obama and Sen. Robert Menendez (D-New Jersey) broke out Thursday over whether the U.S. should reimpose sanctions on Iran amid ongoing negotiations over the country's nuclear program, according to two senators who were in the room. Menendez, the leading Democrat pushing for additional sanctions against Iran, forcefully pressed Obama on the need for additional sanctions during a meeting in which Obama urged Menendez and other senators to drop their efforts to pass sanctions legislation. Additional sanctions, Obama argued, could torpedo ongoing negotiations over Iran's nuclear program. The unusually sharp exchange, between...

BNSF Railway more than tripled the number of trains it moved through Nebraska with a million gallons of oil or more aboard late last year and has changed its route to bypass Lincoln, at least for some trains. Reports filed with the Nebraska Emergency Management Agency show that late last year BNSF expanded the number of oil trains it was required to report from three per week in July to a range of seven to 14 per week. Railroads must report trains that carry at least a million gallons of oil -- about 35 tank cars -- from the Bakken...

Despite an oversupply of crude oil that has halved trading prices and led the U.S. to consider lifting a 40-year-ban on crude exports, completing the northern leg of the Keystone XL pipeline remains a priority, U.S. Sen. John Cornyn said Friday in Beaumont. “We know that as global demand goes up, prices will go up,” Cornyn, R-Texas, said. “I think we ought to take advantage of the opportunity we’ve been given because great innovative drilling techniques devised in the United States and the great natural resources we have … help grow our economy and help keep America safe.” Cornyn delivered...

More than 40,000 upstream oil and gas jobs in Texas could be lost as energy sector activity here continues to slow, said Karr Ingham, the economist who compiles the monthly Texas Petro Index tracking the industry’s economic indicators. The latest data point that spells trouble for the industry: data released Friday indicating that that the number of rigs operating in the U.S. was down 74 this week, the rig count’s biggest one-week decline in more than six years. “We’re now at the point where there’s likely to be some damage inflicted on the Texas economy,” Ingham said. “I’d sure be...

If you think that Vladimir Putin would be dissuaded from his territorial ambitions by a few billionaires more or less being punished in Moscow, then you probably deserve to condemned to a Purgatory that resembles Obama’s White House. Despite assurances that Russia was on the ropes via economic sanctions imposed by the West after the Bear stirred up ethnic conflict in Ukraine, there are no signs but that Russia under Putin is restless. And hungry. New fighting has erupted near Donetsk with Russian supported separatists firing shells resulting in the death of 11 people. Since so-called “peace-talks” are underway between...

Socialism: Venezuelans are being arrested for posting Internet photos of shortages in stores. So let's get this straight: Murder and mayhem are de facto legal in that crime pit, but posting evidence of socialism's failure merits jailing. As socialism plays out to its logical conclusion in Venezuela, the specters of long lines, rationing, troop enforcers, bizarre edicts and desperate statements are now the order of the day. Not only have more than a dozen Venezuelans been arrested for posting photographs of empty store shelves on social media, three governors have responded to long lines by — prohibiting them; ordering the...

The drop in the price of oil will cost 9,000 workers at Schlumberger Ltd. (SLB) their jobs. The company disclosed: In response to lower commodity pricing and anticipated lower exploration and production spending in 2015, Schlumberger decided to reduce its overall headcount to better align with anticipated activity levels for 2015. Schlumberger recorded a $296 million charge associated with a headcount reduction of approximately 9,000. Unfortunately for the workers, the oil services company had good reason. Although fourth-quarter revenue rose 6% to $12.5 billion and operating income by 7% to $1.9 billion, the company believes the situation has deteriorated:

Shortages of basic goods in crisis-hit Venezuela has created a lucrative new profession... queuing to buy things for other people. The country is experiencing a recession triggered in part by a scarcity of hard currency - which limits imports of essential goods. As a result, there are shortages of nearly a third of all basic goods and as well as tumbling oil prices, inflation ballooned to 64% last year. Krisbell Villarroel is one of many people who make a living by waiting in line to buy everything from milk and sugar to diapers and shampoo.

There are times when a little piece of news comes in from some far flung corner of the world and it’s necessary to wonder whether one should laugh or cry about it all. So it is with this remarkable story from Venezuela. The wonders of Bolivarian Socialism are so great that governors in some parts of the country have decided to ban queuing. No, really, I promise you that I am not making this up. Here’s the news about the queuing: Governors in three Venezuelan states have banned overnight queuing amid huge and sometimes rowdy lines around shops across the...

The joke’s on them. Don’t the Saudis know that massive border fences do nothing to enhance domestic security and are, in fact, counterproductive? Well, I guess they’ll find out soon enough. According to reports, the Saudi Kingdom is fed up with defending against ISIS raiding parties that routinely cross over the Iraqi border. In order to stave off these assaults, the Saudis are going to build a massive, 600-mile long border fence across the length of the country’s border with Iraq. But that’s not all. The fence will be double layered with a concertina wire barrier in no man’s...

With the Islamic State terrorist group in control of large swathes of Iraq, Saudi Arabia has decided to build a “Great Wall” that spans 600 miles. Construction of the security apparatus began in September and will include five layers of fencing, watch towers and night-vision and radar cameras

The politics of the crude exports issue are confused by a lot of irresponsible reporting. Almost every story on the issue asserts that allowing exports would be politically dangerous because it would supposedly raise prices at the pump, but the claim is never credibly sourced. In fact, every single serious study has found precisely the opposite: allowing crude exports would lower prices at the pump. With Senator Ted Cruz leading the charge on an amendment to end the export ban, some reporters will be working even harder to pretend his amendment is dubious or even destructive. But facts matter. The...

The ruble continues to fall, sanctions are biting and the slide in the price of oil shows no sign of slowing – it's hitting Russia hard and means a credit rating downgrade to "junk" status could be on the way. Russia's Economy Minister Alexei Ulyukayev said on Wednesday that the chances of the beleaguered country's rating being downgraded to junk were "pretty high," according to the Interfax news agency.

Shortages are nothing new in Venezuela. Indeed, a shortage of toilet paper has been the subject of global amusement for quite some time. But recently, the shortages have become much worse. Last week, a government official was jeered for saying that long lines indicated that “Venezuela has plenty of food”, when rows and rows of empty shelves in stores were telling a different story. Bloomberg reports that people are queueing overnight for necessities such as soap, milk and diapers. This is very dangerous. Venezuela is already one of the most violent societies on earth. And when shortages start to affect...

Back in November, before most grasped just how serious the collapse in crude was (and would become, as well as its massive implications), we wrote "How The Petrodollar Quietly Died, And Nobody Noticed", because for the first time in almost two decades, energy-exporting countries would pull their "petrodollars" out of world markets in 2015. This empirical death of Petrodollar followed years of windfalls for oil exporters such as Russia, Angola, Saudi Arabia and Nigeria. Much of that money found its way into financial markets, helping to boost asset prices and keep the cost of borrowing down, through so-called petrodollar recycling....

The larger-than-life Russian leader has held power — with one title or another — for 15 years, and is set to reign for at least a decade more. Yet Putin remains inscrutable. With only a smattering of biographical details released to the public and his sometimes puzzling public appearances, scholars — and even many world leaders — still struggle to understand the man at the helm of the Kremlin. To glean a clearer picture, FRONTLINE took a closer look at some of the most identifiable aspects of Putin’s public persona. --------------------------------------------------------- Putin’s Way, FRONTLINE’s investigation into the accusations of criminality...

Wow! Venezuela bishops tell Pope Francis the downside of socialism and communism Pope Francis, a native of Argentina, has established himself as a critic of capitalism, but now he has received a statement from the bishops of Venezuela offering some insight on that Latin American nation’s experience with socialism and Marxism. I am not an expert on the internal workings of the Catholic Church, but this strikes me as an extraordinary move. Writing in Investor’s Business Daily, Monica Showalter lays out the message the bishops delivered:  Venezuela's bishops Monday blamed "Marxist socialism" and "communism" by name for the horrors...