Student Demonstrations and police crackdown in Venezuela

[Griff]

I saw this on FB and wanted to share. It's been crazy there for the past few days it seems. Looks like losing Chavez was an even bigger loss than we thought.

Griff


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[littleOne]

"Looks like losing Chavez was an even bigger loss than we thought." ? This started with Chavez, there were also huge protests when he was alive. Yes, I know, Chavez stood up to the USA and to the World Bank, so the world thought him a hero, but mostly he followed Castro and took Venezuela down a path of disguised communism and to bankruptcy. People instantly loved Chavez because he called Bush the devil, without looking to see what was really happening in the country. Yes, there were a lot of things wrong in Venezuela before Chavez, but now it seems as if that was really a paradise we had then. There is basically no production now a days in Venezuela. Farmers have gone broke, most of our industry has been shut down by the "chavistas" imposing very difficult conditions because anyone with any position, money in Venezuela is seen by them as oligarchs, people that need to be destroyed. We produce nothing and import everything with petroleum money, but the petroleum industry in Venezuela also has huge problems because the infrastructure has not been maintained. Did you read about elections in Venezuela? Did you read about the constitutional changes made by Chavez as soon as he took power, and then so many after that? Things are never as simple as they seem.

[Griff]

Well, I never thought or stated that Chavez was perfect, was merely implying that things seemed better when he was around. I did follow the elections a bit, but I saw the election of Maduro a bit of a fait accompli. I'm certainly no expert on Velezuelan Politics, though, so I appreciate your insight. I obviously did not realize the extent of problems while Chavez was in power. The expulsion of the three US diplomats yesterday by Maduro yesterday was no big surprise, given the last one in September. Who knows how many US NGO's are sicking their fingers into this one.
What's your take the student demonstrations? I mean, beyond their very justified gripes, is there more going on there than meets the outside eye?

Thanks

Griff

[Roisin]

What's always amazed me about Venezuela is the cost of living there. Believe it or not, it ranks 4th out of all of the countries in the world! Only 3 other countries have a higher cost of living and, in order, they are Norway, Switzerland and Denmark. The following link gives information on that. http://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/rankings_by_country.jsp

[christian]

Very interesting, thanks for sharing! The socialist experiment in Venezuela was doomed to fail, where there's no freedom there will be no prosperity. I hope this revolution will not be co-opted, the hyenas certainly are lurking and manipulating behind the scenes already...

[merkabagirll]

I have a sister-in-law, now in Canada, who's from Venezuela. Ive been following this for quite a while now tho there has been a media-black-out on it! This series by VICE is quite good.

http://www.godlikeproductions.com/forum1/message2501565/pg1